LONDON/WASHINGTON: The US said on Sunday that Iran will face “severe consequences” if it attacks any Americans, including the 52 people Tehran imposed sanctions on a day earlier.
“We will work with our allies and partners to deter and respond to any attacks carried out by Iran,” the White House said in a statement, quoting National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan.
Iran on Saturday imposed sanctions on dozens more Americans, many of them from the US military, over the 2020 killing of Gen. Qassem Soleimani in a drone strike.
Sullivan said the US will protect and defend its citizens, including those currently serving the country and those who formerly served.
He added that the Iranian regime imposed the sanctions while its “proxy militias continue to attack American troops in the Middle East, and as Iranian officials threaten to carry out terror operations inside the United States and elsewhere around the world.”
Soleimani, the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, the overseas arm of the elite Revolutionary Guards, was killed in Iraq in a drone strike on Jan. 3, 2020, ordered by then President Donald Trump.
Those added to Iran’s sanctions list included US General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and former White House national security adviser Robert O’Brien.
Iran and the US are currently holding indirect talks in Vienna on salvaging a 2015 nuclear deal.
(With Reuters)
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