Featured Image Credit: FADEL ITANI/Getty Images
Topics: Iran, World News, Politics, Terrorism, Travel
Niamh Shackleton
Topics: Iran, World News, Politics, Terrorism, Travel
Iran has made a chilling threat to the countries across the globe that aren't allied with Tehran.
Iran has been embroiled in conflict with the US and Israel for almost three weeks — and it doesn't look like the war is ending anytime soon.
Tensions are higher than ever after Israel targeted the South Pars gas field on Wednesday (March 18), which is part of the world’s largest natural gas reserves. It is shared between Iran and Qatar and contains an estimated 1,800 trillion cubic feet of usable gas, says CNN.
President Trump has since addressed the matter and insisted that the US had no knowledge of Israel's plans to attack the gas reserve.
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In the ongoing conflict, Iran has largely focused its counter attacks in Israel and Gulf countries allied with America rather than on US soil, but this might all change in the near future.
Iran has now threatened to target recreational and tourist sites worldwide. The country's military spokesman, Gen. Abolfazl Shekarchi, made the chilling threat on state TV.
"From now on, based on the information we have about you, even parks, recreational areas, and tourist destinations anywhere in the world will no longer be safe for you," he said.
Elsewhere, Gen. Ali Mohammad Naeini warned (per PBS): "We are producing missiles even during war conditions, which is amazing, and there is no particular problem in stockpiling."
Discussing when the war might end, he added: "These people expect the war to continue until the enemy is completely exhausted."
Naeini is said to have since been killed in an airstrike, Iranian state television reported. As well as Naeini, top security official Ali Larijani has been killed.
Iran's new leader Mojtaba Khamenei has addressed his death in a rare statement.
"Without a doubt, the assassination of such a figure attests to his importance and to the hatred that the enemies of Islam harbour toward him," he said, France24 reported.
"Every drop of spilled blood comes at a price, and the criminal murderers of these martyrs will soon have to pay it."
The message was published on Khamenei's official Telegram channel. He is yet to be seen out in public, sparking speculation that he may have been seriously injured in the blast that killed his father and he's now 'in hiding'.
Discussing the matter with USA Today, Hadi Ghaemi, founder and executive director of the Center for Human Rights in Iran (CHRI), said that the new Iranian leader is 'maybe being kept in hiding, which only adds more uncertainty and speculation to his whereabouts'.
Elsewhere, Yousef Pezeshkian, son and adviser to President Masoud Pezeshkian, said on his Telegram channel that Khamenei is in a 'safe and in a secure location', per Euro News.