Iran classes EU armies as terrorist groups

US President Donald Trump said he hopes to reach an agreement with Iran, even though the country’s supreme leader warned that an attack on the Islamic Republic by the US would trigger a regional war.

When asked about Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s warning, Trump told reporters: “Of course he is going to say that.”

“Hopefully we’ll make a deal. If we don’t make a deal, then we’ll find out whether or not he was right,” the US president said.

In June last year, the US already carried out limited strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities as part of a 12-day Israel-Iran war.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards have no plan to exercise in the Strait of Hormuz, Reuters reported, citing an unnamed Iranian official.

This comes after Iran’s state-run Press TV reported that such a life-fire exercise would take place on February 1 and 2, reports which the official called “wrong.”

Germany Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul criticized Iranfor its decision to designate EU armies as terrorist groups.

According to Germany’s top diplomat, Iran’s decision — which came in response to the EU’s addition of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards to its list of terrorist organizations — is “baseless” and “propagandistic.”

“Those who violently suppress peaceful protests, execute members of the opposition and spread terror to Europe cannot deflect criticism with political diversionary tactics,” Wadephul said ahead of a trip to Southeast Asia and the Pacific, adding Germany’s support for those seeking freedom in Iran.

“We will not be intimidated by our stance,” he said.

US President Donald Trump on Saturday said that an agreement had been reached for India to buy Venezuelan oil rather than purchase oil from Iran.

“We’ve already ⁠made that ‍deal, the concept of the deal,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One while returning Washington from his vacation home in Florida.

India has ⁠not been importing significant amounts of Iranian oil because of US sanctions, turning instead to Russia for oil imports after the commodity’s price was driven down by Western sanctions imposed on Moscow over its invasion of Ukraine.   

In August,  Trump doubled tariffs on imports from India to 50% in a bid to stop the country buying Russian oil, threatening to go higher with the duties if Delhi did not cease.

However, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said in January the tariffs might be halved again, as India had sharply reduced its imports of Russian oil.

 Trump has said Washington is now “in charge” of Venezuela following thecapture of its president, Nicolas Maduro, by US forces on January 3.

He said the US was going to share oil profits with the country.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned on Sunday that a “regional war” in the Middle East would break out if Iran were attacked by the US.  

“The Americans should know that if they start a war, this time it will be a regional war,” the 86-year-old Khamenei was quoted as saying by the Tasnim news agency. 

“We are not the instigators and we do not seek to attack any country. But the Iranian nation will deliver a firm blow to anyone who attacks or harasses it,” he added.

His remarks come as Washington has sent the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and other warships to the Arabian Sea in a move ostensibly prompted by Tehran’s bloody crackdown on nationwide protests.

In June last year, the US already carried out limited strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities as part of a 12-day Israel-Iran war.

Khamenei also compared recent protests to an attempted “coup” in his reported remarks.

“They (rioters) attacked the police, government centres, IRGC centres, banks, and mosques, and burned the Quran … It was like a coup,” Khamenei said, adding that “the coup was suppressed.”

An explosion that hit an apartment building in Iran’s port city of Bandar Abbas has reportedly killed a 4-year-old girl and wounded several other people.

The blast, which, media say, officials have blamed on a gas leak came a day before a planned naval drill by Iran in the Strait of Hormuz, the waterway on which Bandar Abbas sits.

You can read more about the incident here: Iran: 1 killed after explosion hit Bandar Abbas Port

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian has stressed the “necessity of establishing diplomatic processes” following renewed military threats from US President Donald Trump.

State news agency IRNA cited Pezeshkian as telling Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sissi in a phone call that Iran had never sought war and was not seeking one now.

According to the report, Iran “deeply believes that war will not benefit Iran, the United States, or the region.”  

Pezeshkian’s reported remarks come as a senior Iranian official says that preparations for negotiations with the US are underway.

 Ali Larijani, secretary general of Iran’s National Security Council, wrote on X that “contrary to the artificially manufactured media war narrative, the formation of a framework for negotiations is progressing.”

Trump on Saturday seemed to suggest that military action by the US was still on the cards as several US warships, including a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, are reportedly deploying near Iran.

“[Iran is] talking to us, and we’ll see if we can do something, otherwise we’ll see what happens … We have a big fleet heading out there,” Trump told conservative US broadcaster Fox News.

The speaker of Iran’s parliament said on Sunday that Tehran now sees all European Union militaries as terrorist groups.

The announcement by Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf comes after the EU declared Iran’s paramilitary Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization over its violent suppression of nationwide anti-government protests.

“By seeking to strike at the (Guard), which itself has been the greatest barrier to the spread of terrorism to Europe, Europeans have in fact shot themselves in the foot and, once again through blind obedience to the Americans, decided against the interests of their own people,” Qalibaf said.

“According to Article 7 of the law on countermeasures against ‍the designation of the Revolutionary Guards as a terrorist organization, the armies of European countries are considered ​terrorist groups,” he said.

He added that the parliamentary commission on national security would debate expelling EU countries’ military ⁠attaches.

As he made the announcement, he and all others in the Iranian parliament were wearing Guard uniforms in symbolic support of the force.

DW continues its coverage on events connected with the growing tensions between Iran and the United States and other Western countries, as Iran itself contends with fallout from recent, brutally suppressed anti-government protests.

A buildup of US military vessels near Iran has fueled fears that US military action might be imminent.

However, negotiations between the two sides are reportedly taking place or in preparation, with both Washington and Tehran saying they are willing to talk.

US and Western demands that Iran curb its nuclear program are likely, however, to be a stumbling block on the way to any resolution of the current strains.

DW invites you to read on here for more information about the situation in and related to Iran.