Responding to US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s earlier statement, Iran dismisses Washington’s declaration of a massive economic pressure campaign, saying it disproves US claims to have dismantled Tehran’s military and nuclear capabilities.

“Your narrative doesn’t add up: you say that Iran’s military power has been ‘dismantled’, 100% of its military factories ‘destroyed’ and its nuclear program ‘buried’,” Kazem Gharibabadi, deputy foreign minister, has said in a post on X.

Yet, he adds, “there is a need for ‘the largest financial invasion in history’ and the mobilisation of ‘all institutions and powers’ of the United States! Is this a victory or an admission of America’s defeat?”