Resisting Western pressure costs less than compromise, MP says

An Iranian lawmaker said Tehran’s cooperation with the UN nuclear watchdog had fallen to zero and accused Western powers of seeking to curb the country’s defenses.

Mahmoud Nabavian, deputy head of parliament’s national security and foreign policy committee, added that International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors were no longer in Iran.

He said Tehran had already made extensive concessions during talks in the early 2000s, including halting enrichment and allowing visits to military sites.

Nabavian also said the United States and European powers wanted Iran’s missile range cut to 300 km, a demand he rejected as undermining national defense.

Iran’s armed forces chief of staff said the country’s naval units were at an “extraordinary level of readiness” for any potential future conflict, state media reported on Tuesday.

Major General Abdolrahim Mousavi, inspecting army and Revolutionary Guard naval forces in Hormozgan province, said “very significant steps” had been taken in the short period since the recent 12-day war.

An Iranian lawmaker said on Tuesday that the reimposition of UN sanctions under the snapback mechanism has pushed consumer prices up by as much as 30% but argued that the impact could be contained through effective management.

Alireza Nesari, a member of parliament’s construction committee, said that while the sanctions’ economic effects were “clear and visible,” Iran was familiar with such measures and had “good practice” in coping with them.

“The art of officials is to preserve internal unity and make conditions bearable for people,” he said, urging the government to secure basic goods, control currency and gold prices, and support households with food, housing, jobs and family incentives.

Nesari warned that failure to control inflation could trigger social unrest, and called on supervisory and security bodies to curb profiteering.

“If the government does not manage economic and livelihood conditions, people will certainly protest,” he said.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said on Tuesday that Tehran would not yield to foreign pressure despite sanctions and economic difficulties, pledging to “stand for Iran until the last breath.”

“Now the world is pressuring us to surrender, but surrender is not in our nature,” Pezeshkian told a ceremony honoring Iran’s freestyle and Greco-Roman wrestling champions. “Although we are in difficult conditions, we are taking steps such as improving relations with our neighbors.”

He said Iranian athletes’ victories at the world championships in Croatia had lifted national morale and should inspire broader determination. “With the determination and passion you showed, we must move forward toward success in all areas,” he added.

Mohsen Rezai, a former commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, said on Tuesday that speculation about whether war will break out is misplaced because “the war is already ongoing,” describing Iran as engaged in an “unjust economic, propaganda and media war.”

Rezai, now a senior member of the Expediency Council, told state media that for two decades regional neighbors had been led to believe an Iranian attack was imminent, fueling “Iranophobia.”

He said the true goal of Iran’s adversaries was to obstruct the country’s political, scientific, economic and military progress.

“Our country today is under attack by the most ruthless enemies in history … who respect no international rules and even shed the blood of children,” Rezai said.

He added that US and Israeli actions in past conflicts had failed against Iranian resistance, and that Iranians would continue to defend themselves “until the last breath.”