Amid the ongoing crisis in the Middle East, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi rejected calls for a ceasefire, telling NBC News Meet the Press that Iran must “continue to fight for the good of our people.”
According to the report, Iran’s FM claimed that Israel and the US had already violated the ceasefire that ended last year’s 12-day conflict, saying: “And now you want to ask for a ceasefire again? This is not how it works.”
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But before Tehran could even consider a ceasefire, Abbas Araghch said it “must explain why they launched this aggression”. Araghch did not specify who he was talking about.
Araghchi also told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that “the war should be permanently ended, and if we don’t get there, I think we have to keep fighting for the sake of our people and our security.”
He says the war was “forced upon us” by the United States and Israel and that “what we are doing are legal acts of self-defense and we have every right to do so.”
Iranian attacks on the neighboring countries of the Persian Gulf
He defended Iran’s attacks on neighboring Gulf countries, explaining that the attacks were aimed at US military bases in the region because Iran’s missiles do not have the range to hit the United States.
“The Americans started this war against us, they attacked us and we are defending ourselves. So it is clear that our missiles cannot reach American soil,” Araghchi said.
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“What we can do is attack American bases and American facilities around us that are unfortunately on the soil of our, you know, neighboring countries.”
“Iranian missiles cannot hit US soil”
Iran’s foreign minister said on Sunday that Tehran’s missiles were not capable of hitting the United States and defended strikes that hit neighboring Gulf countries in the ongoing Middle East conflict, AFP reported.
“The Americans started this war against us, they attacked us, and we are fighting back. So it is clear that our missiles cannot reach American soil,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“What we can do is attack American bases and American facilities around us, which unfortunately are on the soil of our, you know, neighboring countries,” AFP said.
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US President Donald Trump has previously claimed that Iranian missiles could hit the United States “soon”. However, a 2025 U.S. intelligence assessment found that Tehran does not currently possess ICBMs and estimates that if Iran decides to pursue such weapons, it will likely take until 2035 to develop a force of about 60 ICBMs capable of reaching the U.S. homeland, contradicting the idea of an imminent threat.
It doesn’t work that way.
Since Israel and the United States launched airstrikes on February 28, the war has killed at least 1,230 people in Iran, more than 300 in Lebanon and about a dozen in Israel, with six American soldiers also killed, according to officials. The conflict has unsettled global markets, disrupted flights and severely weakened Iran’s leadership through hundreds of Israeli and US airstrikes.
(With input from agencies)
Key things
- Iran sees the conflict as a defensive response to American and Israeli aggression.
- Calls for a cease-fire have been rejected by Iran, citing violations by the US and Israel.
- The continued airstrikes took a significant toll on Iranian leadership and civilian casualties.
