Video interview and direct meeting of Mohammadreza Naqdi with a U.S. public media outlet

🔸For the first time, Mohammadreza Naqdi, as one of the senior figures of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), spoke directly with an American media outlet.

🔸Mohammadreza Naqdi, the senior adviser to the commander-in-chief of the IRGC, in an interview with Reza Sayeh, an Iranian-born journalist for the U.S. public and nationwide network, PBS, said, “The IRGC welcomes the opportunity to be able to bring its voice to the ears of people in the Western world.”

🔸This security figure, in explaining the reason for this political-military institution’s “change in media approach,” also claimed that “previously, Western media had not made any requests for an interview.”

🔸During his remarks, Naqdi spoke about what he called an increase in Iran’s “experience” over the five months of military clashes with the United States, and claimed that Tehran would prefer to continue a war of attrition until the U.S. elections and the next presidential term so that, as he said, “the next U.S. leaders will know what the cost of military confrontation with Iran is.”

🔸This senior IRGC official, while implicitly confirming attacks on civilian vessels in the Strait of Hormuz, claimed that such an action during wartime is “also lawful under international law,” because, as he said, it is not clear that ships that do not travel through the route approved by Iran are not engaged in transporting shipments for the “enemy.”