IRAN ADDS MILLIONS TO MISSILE BUDGET
Tehran answers new US sanctions with greater spend on military
Iran’s parliament yesterday approved a budget increase for the country’s ballistic missile programme and the regional operations of its Revolutionary Guard, in defiance of recent US sanctions over Tehran’s testing of new missile technology.
The budget for the defence ministry and the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ powerful Quds Force, which operates in support of the regime in Syria and militias in Iraq and elsewhere, was backed by 240 of the 247 members present in parliament.
“The Americans should know that this was our first action to confront terrorist and adventurist actions by the United States in the region,” parliamentary speaker Ali Larijani said after the vote.
The US$520 million (Dh1.91bn) budget allocates $260m for continuing development of the missile programme and $260m for the Quds Force.
The US sanctions put in place last month target the missile programme and the IRGC.
Washington and European countries that negotiated the nuclear deal have said Iran’s missile tests breach the spirit of the 2015 accord, which calls upon Tehran “not to undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons”, but not its letter.
Iranian officials say its missiles are defensive and that US sanctions breached the deal.
US president Donald Trump campaigned on a pledge to withdraw from the nuclear deal, but so far has reluctantly certified Tehran’s compliance every 90 days, as required by US law. His national security adviser and secretaries of state and defence have urged him not to scrap the accord as long as Iran abides by it.
The White House has reportedly continued to look – so far unsuccessfully – for ways to declare Iran non-compliant.
In July Iran tested a satellite launch vehicle the Pentagon said could be used to create a long-range ballistic missile. The test drew a rare joint condemnation from Washington, the UK, France and Germany, although the European signatories to the deal are unlikely to support any US attempt to scrap it.
Iranian president Hassan Rouhani said yesterday that “if the US intends to stand against the deal, the entire world will stand before the US”.
Iran’s deputy foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said the budget law passed yesterday had the support of Mr Rouhani’s government. The bill is “very smart particularly because it doesn’t violate the nuclear deal and doesn’t allow the other side to make excuses”, he said.