Australia “decided to take side with the aggressors”, a senior Iranian official has said while warning his country “cannot distinguish between offensive and defensive operation” in the spiralling Middle East conflict.
The federal government last week announced it would deploy a military reconnaissance plane, dozens of personnel to operate it and defensive missiles to the United Arab Emirates after the Gulf country requested help to defend against Iranian strikes.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said overnight any Australian military assets in the Persian Gulf could be targets.
Iranian foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei says Australia ‘has decided to take side with the aggressors’. Picture: Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs / Handout / NewsWire
“We have the inherent right to self-defence against offensive or defensive operation against us,” Mr Baghaei told the ABC’s 7.30.
“We cannot recognise that those military assets being deployed to intercept our missiles, our drones against the aggressors would be regarded simply as defensive.
“That’s going to be part of this aggression.”
He also took issue with Australia’s offer of asylum to players of the Iran women’s football team.
Two players, Fatemeh Pasandideh and Atefeh Ramezanisadeh, chose to stay in Australia after the team was knocked out of the Women’s Asian Cup.
Others initially requested asylum but changed their minds.
Remaining players arrived back in Iran this week after a days-long journey due to airspace closures in the Middle East.
Mr Baghaei accused Australia of taking the players “hostage”.
“When they first they were invited to go to a room under the pretext of clarifying the doping or something like that, then they put a paper beside them, ‘Please sign these papers, you can be given asylum, you can be given all what you need’,” he said, contradicting Australian officials and sources familiar with players’ cases.
He also accused Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke of “a shameful sham posture” by posing for a photo with players.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke posed for a photo with players of the Iranian women’s football team after some of them sought asylum. Picture: Department of Home Affairs / Handout / NewsWire
The team gained international praise for remaining silent as the Iranian national anthem played before their first game.
But their protest sparked condemnation in their homeland, with state media declaring them “traitors”.
Earlier this month, government mouthpiece Mohammad Reza Shahbazi lambasted the players, saying that in “wartime conditions, going (to Australia) and refusing to sing the national anthem is the height of shamelessness and betrayal”.
“Both the people and the authorities should treat them as traitors in a time of war, not as individuals staging some kind of symbolic protest,” he said.
“The disgrace of this shameless betrayal should remain on their shoulders, and they must be properly dealt with so that others take a warning from it.”
Public support for the team exploded in Australia, with the Albanese government pushed to offer asylum.
Among those urging the government to help were Iranian groups in Australian and US President Donald Trump, who said Washington would offer asylum if Canberra did not.
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