“Instead of making futile attempts against the Islamic Republic of Iran, the British government needs to answer the call of so many people in the world to stop selling deadly weapons to Saudi Arabia, and to free itself from the accusation of committing war crimes against the Yemeni people,” Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Abbas Mousavi said in a statement on Monday.
His remark was in reaction to UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who said Monday that Britain believes Iran was responsible for the attacks and will work with the United States and European allies on a so-called joint response.
“The UK is attributing responsibility with a very high degree of probability to Iran for the Aramco attacks. We think it very likely indeed that Iran was indeed responsible,” Johnson told reporters on the plane to the United Nations General Assembly in New York.
“We will be working with our American friends and our European friends to construct a response that tries to deescalate tensions in the Persian Gulf region.”
Yemen’s Ansarullah movement and their allies in the Yemeni army deployed as many as 10 drones to bomb Abqaiq and Khurais oil facilities run by the Saudi state-owned oil company Aramco last Saturday (September 14).
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, without evidence, was quick to blame Iran for the attack. The claim drew ridicule from many social media users who compared Pompeo’s rushed conclusion to Washington’s indecision about the murder of prominent journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October 2018.
Tehran has vehemently rejected accusations of involvement in the raids as "lies" and warned of "an all-out war" in the event of military strikes against the country.
MNA/4726696
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