Shafaq News- Tehran

Iran is prepared for a “decisive war” and remains committed to its existing nuclear doctrine but cannot say what will happen in the future, Supreme National Security Council Secretary Mohsen Rezaei said on Saturday.

“We are still committed to the [late Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei’s] fatwa and have not changed our nuclear doctrine, but we do not know what will happen in the future,” Rezaei told Al Jazeera, adding that Iran had not yet decided to withdraw from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), but any decision would depend on Washington’s “conduct.”

Rezaei explained that Tehran remains in contact with Qatari and Pakistani mediators and that Qatar had conveyed Iran’s conditions to Washington, including an end to the war on all fronts, the release of frozen Iranian funds, and an end to the naval blockade. Tehran is now “awaiting [US President Donald Trump’s] response.”

Iran had changed its strategy toward Washington after the United States withdrew from the memorandum of understanding, he argued, warning that Iran was now better prepared than before for US air attacks and would strike American bases and interests in the region “with greater force” if attacked again.

On September 17, Trump told Axios that he faced a “big decision” over whether to resume large-scale military attacks on Iran.

The nuclear remarks come as the International Atomic Energy Agency says its ability to verify Iran’s nuclear program has sharply deteriorated. IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi reported on September 14 that, apart from an inspection of the Bushehr nuclear power plant in June, the agency had conducted no in-field verification in Iran for more than six months. The IAEA also reported losing continuity of knowledge over previously declared inventories of low- and highly enriched uranium at facilities affected by attacks and described the lack of information and access needed to verify the material as a matter of “serious proliferation concern.”

On September 9, the IAEA Board of Governors reported Iran to the UN Security Council for the first time in 20 years over what diplomats described as Tehran’s failure to meet its nuclear non-proliferation obligations. Iran rejected the move, arguing that attacks on safeguarded nuclear facilities had disrupted routine verification and were then being used to justify action against Tehran.