War with US not over yet, Iran holding defensive positions — FM

 Iran believes the conflict with the United States and Israel is not over, so the Islamic Republic is taking a defensive position in all directions, said Deputy Foreign Minister Saeed Khatibzadeh.

"I think it's hard to say that the war is over. Until the war ends on all fronts, peace cannot be guaranteed. And this is why I think Iran cannot risk its national security. Iran will continue to remain on high alert and [take] a defensive position on various fronts," the diplomat said at the Institute for Political and International Studies (IPIS), a research center at the Iranian Foreign Ministry. He said that the Islamic Republic’s goal is to "defeat the aggressor," to prevent the United States from "achieving any of its goals inside Iran."

According to him, it is now necessary to "focus on ending this war and eliminating its root causes. And we will deal with this, as we proposed [at the talks] in Islamabad and after."