In leaked audio, Iran’s foreign min says he was told to deny plane’s downing

Iran’s top diplomat complained in a leaked audiotape that the Revolutionary Guards had more influence in foreign affairs than him, and that he was told by the IRGC to deny the accidental downing of a Ukrainian passenger jet.

In a leaked portion of an interview aired by London-based Iran International news channel on Sunday, foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said he had “zero” influence over Iran’s foreign policy. “I have never been able to tell a military commander to do something in order to aid diplomacy,” he rued.

Zarif also complained about the influence that the late IRGC commander Qasem Soleimani had over foreign policy.

“He (Soleimani) asked me to make this or that concession almost every time I went to negotiate (with world powers),” Zarif said in the leaked interview. “The (military) field’s success was more important than diplomacy’s success.”

Soleimani was killed in a US drone attack in Iraq last year. Iran retaliated with a rocket attack on an Iraqi air base where US forces were stationed. Hours later, Iranian forces shot down a Ukrainian passenger airliner taking off from Tehran.