LATEST: Iran Military: Islamic State is US “Proxy Force”

UPDATE 0955 GMT: President Rouhani has reiterated that the Government will pursue a comprehensive nuclear agreement with the 5+1 Powers.

“Regarding our foreign policy, we will keep to the path and will seriously continue the negotiations based on logic and the international laws and commitments,” Rouhani told reporters on Saturday after he visited the mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini in southern Tehran.

Rouhani said the Government “has done and will do its utmost” in the talks, which may resume in September.

Iran’s regime has backed continuing nuclear talks with the 5+1 Powers (US, Britain, France, Germany, China, and Russia), while issuing a warning to Washington and its partners to agree to Tehran’s basic demands.

The Tehran Friday Prayer leader, Ayatollah Mohammad Ali Movahedi Kermani, put out the message, “Accept Iran’s advice because Iran’s proposal is a win-win one, i.e. it will be in the interest of the region, the West, and of course Iran.”

The cleric continued, “If you refuse Iran’s proposal, it would no longer be a win-win (situation) but a win-lose one.”

Iran and the 5+1 adjourned negotiations for a comprehensive nuclear agreement on July 18, agreeing to extend interim arrangements to November 24.

The two sides envisaged a resumption of talks in the autumn, but this was unsettled last week by the Supreme Leader’s declaration that discussions with the US are “useless”, even as he backed the Rouhani Government’s pursuit of an agreement.

After some hesitation, President Rouhani reiterated this week, “We are determined to achieve results,” while Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said most technical details had been resolved.

The major dispute between Iran and the 5+1 is over the number and level of centrifuges that Tehran can operate for enrichment of uranium for a civil nuclear program. Tehran wants a capacity of 190,000 Separative Work Units; the US and its allies envisage less than 1/10th of that output.

Iran Military: Islamic State is US “Proxy Force”

The Iranian military has renewed its allegation that the jihadist Islamic State is an American “proxy force”, even as the US carries out airstrikes on the group in northern Iraq.

The commander of Iran’s ground forces, Brigadier General Ahmad Reza Pourdastan, told a gathering in northern Iran on Friday night:

Today, the enemy is seeking to overthrow the Islamic Revolution through different threats, soft wars, economic sanctions and proxy wars….

By killing people, the ISIL (Islamic State) forces in the Arab states and al-Nusra Front in Syria are fighting for the US in a proxy war.

Soon after the insurgent offensive in Iraq in June, led by the Islamic State, Iranian officials alleged that the US had fostered the jihadist movement. However, in the past week, the Foreign Ministry had backed away from the rhetoric, acknowledging that the Americans were attacking the Islamic State in Iraq — even though Iran would not cooperate with the Americans to check the offensive.

Head of Basij: Vast Protests in 200 Cities Show “Depth of US Racist Crimes”

The head of the Basij militia, Mohammad Reza Naqdi, is often the regime’s point man for attacks on US politics and society, and he does not disappoint today.

“The vast protests and their continuation in two hundred cities show the depth of the racist crimes of the American regime,” Naqdi told Basij commanders in northern Iran.

“The racist behavior of the US towards the Blacks and the Hispanics who constitute 35$ of the US society is severely violent and inhumane and such massive reactions (by the public) indicate the depth of the regime’s violence,” he added.

Regime officials, from the Foreign Ministry to the judiciary to the Supreme Leader, have been highlighting this month’s protests in Ferguson, Missouri — following the killing of unarmed African American teenager Michael Brown by a police officer — as an example of the depth of America’s abuse of race and human rights.