Iranian FM Zarif's Truth-Telling v. Pompeo's Big Lies

by Stephen Lendman (stephenlendman.org - Home - Stephen Lendman)

The difference between both senior officials is stark and revealing.

Pompeo is a war-mongering/hate-mongering neocon extremist v. internationally respected/peace and stability proponent Zarif.

Both officials appeared on CBS News' Face the Nation Sunday, their remarks world's apart.

Zarif explained that host nation USA is obligated to issue visas to foreign delegations visiting the UN in New York.

The Trump regime illegally denied them to Iran's delegation. Zarif said he was granted one "on a waiver basis," adding: 

"(T)hey want me to know…I'm not (wanted) here" — the same true about President Rouhani, reluctantly granted visa permission to come at the 11th hour.

Iranian reporters were also denied visas to accompany Tehran officials and cover UN General Assembly proceedings, an international affront.

Throughout years of US aggression in Yemen, the Saudis a junior partner in what's going on, Zarif said his government "called for a ceasefire, immediate negotiations, humanitarian assistance, and formation of a broad-based government," adding:

The US and Saudis rejected the idea, "believ(ing) they could win this war (in) weeks." It's ongoing endlessly with no prospect for resolution because US hardliners reject peace in all their conflict theaters — my comment, not Zarif's.

He stressed that years of war left long-suffering Yemenis' "cut off from the rest of the world" by illegal US/Saudi blockade.

Zarif: The Trump regime is hard-pressed "to explain why its state of the art (air defense) equipment was not able to intercept" munitions striking Saudi oil facilities.

He stressed that Iran had nothing to do with what happened. No credible evidence suggests it.

Asked who carried out the attack, Zarif said Yemeni Houthis "announced…responsibility for it. They have even shown evidence that they launched this attack. So I should take it as that." 

"But if the United States believes that the Yemenis were not behind it, first of all…why did the Saudis retaliate…against the Yemenis?" 

"Why did they break the UN-brokered ceasefire in Hodeidah and retaliated against the Yemenis?" 

"They did that because they all know where (the attack) came from, and how it should end is through an end to the killing of innocent children, women, elderly that has been going on."

Mass slaughter and destruction continue. Dire humanitarian conditions are the worst worldwide — millions of defenseless civilians suffering from US-led aggression, killing a nation and its people.

Zarif: "Over two million cases of cholera in Yemen. Now everybody is concerned about an attack on an oil refinery which, based on the latest information that I have, didn't even have a single casualty."

Mass slaughtered "human beings are not enough but a refinery is an imminent threat…(T)he moral compass is totally lost."

Zarif debunked the Big Lie about Iranian weapons used to strike the Saudis, saying:

"(T)hey made all those claims in the past. The fact of the matter is Yemenis inherited all the weaponry that (US installed puppet president) Ali Abdullah Saleh bought with Saudi money…"

"(I)t would take a miracle for (the US) to claim (Iranian weapons were used) because (they) didn't come from Iran. Period!"

"The weapons the Yemenis have…are Yemeni made. I've heard news stories that they are different from the weapons that we produce. I believe the Yemenis." 

"Based on what I know, the Yemenis have the technology and the knowhow to increase the range of the missiles that they already had from Ali Abdullah Saleh."

Zarif debunked the Big Lie claim about strikes on Saudi oil facilities coming from the north, what's technologically impossible to judge.

Drones and missiles can be maneuvered to strike from any or multiple directions. No credible evidence whatever suggests they were fired from Iranian territory or by elements connected to Iran from Iraq or anywhere else.

Zarif: "The Saudis made a show" that proved nothing," their news conference presentation "a lot of lies."

Days earlier, former Trump secretary of state Tillerson said they can lie Trump into a war, Zarif stressed.

All wars are based on Big Lies and deception! Truth-telling destroys pretexts for waging them, why it's buried.

Zarif: "I'm confident that Iran" had nothing to do with striking the Saudis. "I'm confident that anybody who conducts an impartial investigation will reach that conclusion." 

"But I cannot say a priori that the people who are being sent will conduct an impartial investigation because we've had cases in the past where they didn't."

Asked if he's confident war with the US can be avoided, Zarif said: 

"No. No, I'm not confident that we can avoid a war. I'm confident that we will not start one, but I'm confident that whoever starts one will not be the one who finishes it."

"That means that there won't be a limited war" if the Trump regime launches aggression on Iran.

Whenever interviewed, Pompeo's remarks include a litany of long ago debunked disinformation, Big Lies and fake news when discussing nonbelligerent states targeted for regime change by the US.

On Face the Nation Sunday, he lied repeatedly throughout the interview, saying: 

"No reasonable person (sic) doubts precisely who conducted these strikes, and it is the intelligence community's determination that it is likely the case that these were launched from Iran (sic)."

Not a shred of credible evidence backs Pompeo's Big Lie!

Claiming the strike came from the north is another Big Lie, as well as falsely saying weapons used "had ranges that could not have come from the Houthis."

In January, a UN commissioned report said advanced Houthi drones have a range of up to 930 miles — putting key Saudi and UAE targets within range.

Pompeo: The attack "was Iran true and true (sic), and the United States will respond in a way that reflects that act of war by" Tehran (sic).

Asked if it "was launched from Iran," Pompeo ducked the question, saying: "This was an attack by Iran on the world (sic). This was an act of war (sic). I'm here at the UN."

War in Yemen indeed is raging endlessly, launched by the US, bearing most responsibility for the mass slaughter and destruction of the country, along with creating and perpetuating the world's gravest humanitarian crisis.

Pompeo ignores the above reality whenever making public remarks, focusing instead on blaming others for US aggression. 

He disgracefully demeaned Zarif, a diplomatic giant compared to his pigmy stature on the world stage, saying:

"I don't know why anybody listens to the Iranian foreign minister. He has nothing to do with Iranian foreign policy (sic), and he has lied for decades (sic)."

"It's beneath the dignity of anyone in the world to listen to someone who repeatedly makes the claim that the Houthis launched this attack."

The rest of Pompeo's interview was littered with more of the same bald-faced Big Lies by a figure long ago exposed as a congenital liar, proving nothing he says is credible.

Make your own judgment. Throughout its 40-year history, the Islamic Republic never attacked another country.

It threatens none except in self-defense if preemptively attacked by an aggressor.

Throughout the post-WW II era, the US has been perpetually at war directly and/or through proxies against one nation after another it doesn't control.

That's what the scourge of imperialism is all about, naked aggression the main US tactic, the highest of high crimes under international law.

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