Date:
Iran's supreme leader has said that his country's struggle will only end when it defeats U.S.-led oppression.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told members of parliament in Tehran that Iran must be armed and 'have the capability to defend itself' in a 'world full of thieves'.
His comments came as negotiations with the international community over Iran's nuclear programme ran into a stalemate, with Tehran saying world powers were 'demanding too much'.
'Battle and jihad are endless': Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, pictured in 2009. He yesterday told MPs in Tehran that 'battle will only end when society can get rid of the oppressors' front with America at the head'
'Battle and jihad are endless because evil and its front continue to exist,' Khamenei told MPs, according to a translation by U.S. news site The Daily Caller.
'This battle will only end when the society can get rid of the oppressors’ front with America at the head of it, which has expanded its claws on human mind, body and thought.
'This requires a difficult and lengthy struggle and need for great strides.'
The Daily Caller's translation of a Fars News Agency report is by a reporter pseudonymously bylined Reza Khalili, who claims to be a former CIA agent in Iran's Revolutionary Guard.
Khamenei's address to Parliament on Sunday continued with veiled references to the actions of the West and Arab states as he justified Iran's continued defiance of international sanctions against its nuclear programme.
'Logic and reason command that for Iran, in order to pass through a region full of pirates, needs to arm itself and must have the capability to defend itself,' he said.
'Today’s world is full of thieves and plunderers of human honour, dignity and morality who are equipped with knowledge, wealth and power, and under the pretense of humanity easily commit crimes and betray human ideals and start wars in different parts of the world.'
There has been little progress in the latest round of nuclear talks between Tehran and the U.S., Russia, France, Britain, China - the five permanent members of the UN Security Council - and Germany.
Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, speaking in Tehran today before a visit to Turkey for talks with European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, laid the blame for the impasse at the feet of the six powers.
'They should stop demanding too much. We have our red line, and they too want assurances that our nuclear programme will always remain peaceful. We believe these two add up,' he was quoted as saying by state news agency IRNA.
'I feel the realism awakened from the last round of talks will bring us closer to conclusion. We may be able to remove one of two of the previous hurdles, or rather face new ones. In any case, we should make an effort to pass through this phase.'
Iran considers the right to enrich uranium for nuclear energy a red line but that levels of enrichment are negotiable.
Enriched uranium provides fuel for nuclear generating stations but it is also, if refined to a high level, the key ingredient for atomic bombs.
Western powers claim Iran's declared civilian nuclear energy programme is a facade for seeking a weapons capability. Iran denies this but it has a history of hiding activity from U.N. nuclear inspectors.
The powers want Iran to agree to scale back enrichment and other nuclear activity and accept tougher U.N. inspections to prove it can't quickly build atomic bombs, in exchange for an end to economic sanctions.
But Mr Zarif said world powers should refrain from additional pressure on the Islamic Republic to force it into concessions.
'Sanctions haven't served them any purpose, only led to our making 19,000 centrifuges,' he said, according to IRNA, referring to the machines that enrich uranium.