Tehran: Iranian lawmakers have overwhelmingly approved a bill that labels all US military forces as terrorist, state TV reported, a day after Washington ratcheted up pressure on Tehran by announcing that no country would any longer be exempt from US sanctions if it continues to buy Iranian oil.
The bill is a step further from the one last week, when lawmakers approved labelling just US troops in the Middle East as terrorist, in response to the US terrorism designation for Iran’s Revolutionary Guard earlier this month.
The Trump administration re-imposed sanctions on Iran, including on its energy sector, last November, after pulling America out of the landmark 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers. The US designation against Iran’s Revolutionary Guard — the first-ever for an entire division of another government — added another layer of sanctions to the powerful paramilitary force, making it a crime under US jurisdiction to provide the guard with material support.
On Monday, President Donald Trump decided to do away with waivers as part of the administration’s “maximum pressure” campaign on Iran that aims to eliminate all of its revenue from oil exports that the US says funds destabilising activity throughout the Mideast and beyond.
Hours before Trump’s announcement, Iran reiterated its long-running threat to close the Strait of Hormuz if it’s prevented from using the crucial waterway in the Persian Gulf through which about a third of all oil traded at sea passes.
The US Navy has in the past accused Iranian patrol boats of harassing American warships in the waterway. Iran’s Foreign Ministry promptly brushed off Trump’s move to stop the oil waivers, saying the Islamic Republic “basically has not seen and does not see any worth and validity for the waivers”.
But on Tuesday, 173 out of 215 lawmakers at the parliament session in Tehran voted for the new bill. Only four voted against while the rest abstained; the chamber has 290 seats.
The bill confirms Iran’s earlier label of the US Central Command, also known as CENTCOM, and all its forces as terrorist. Any military and non-military help, including logistics support, to CENTCOM that can be detrimental to the Revolutionary Guard will be considered a terrorist action, the semi-official ISNA news agency said.
The bill also demands the Iranian government take unspecified action against other governments that formally back the US designation. Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and Israel have all supported the Trump administration’s designation. The lawmakers also requested Iran’s intelligence agency provide a list of all CENTCOM commanders within three months so that Iran’s judiciary can prosecute them in absentia as terrorists. The bill requires final approval by Iran’s constitutional watchdog to become law. Other than underscoring Iran’s defiance, it’s unclear what impact the bill could actually have, either in the Persian Gulf or beyond.
Meanwhile, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif on Wednesday condemned the silence of US President Donald Trump’s administration on Saudi Arabia’s mass execution of 37 people convicted of terrorism.
“After a wink at the dismembering of a journalist, not a whisper from the Trump administration when Saudi Arabia beheads 37 men in one day — even crucifying one two days after Easter,” Zarif said on Twitter. He was referring to the murder of prominent Saudi journalist and regime critic Jamal Khashoggi last year in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul. (Agencies)
