Iranian nation will turn enemy plots into opportunities: Ahmadinejad

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has dismissed the West’s US-engineered sanctions against the Islamic Republic, saying the Iranian nation will turn enemies’ plots into opportunities.

“The Iranian nation will not only bypass the embargos, but will overcome the sanctions,” Ahmadinejad said at the opening ceremony of several industrial projects in the central province of Isfahan on Tuesday.

He dismissed allegations by the United States and Israel, accusing Iran of pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear energy program.

“When there was no nuclear pretext, they armed [executed Iraqi dictator] Saddam [Hussein] against the Iranian nation, and today they are toying with the nuclear pretext,” he said in a reference to the war which was imposed on Iran by Iraq during the 1980s.

“The enemies are unable to understand and recognize the current conditions in international stage and the Iranian nation’s viewpoints and capabilities,” Ahmadinejad stated.

At the start of 2012, the US and its European allies imposed sanctions on Iran’s oil and financial sectors with the goal of preventing other countries from purchasing Iranian oil and conducting transactions with the Central Bank of Iran.

On October 15, the EU foreign ministers reached an agreement on imposing another round of sanctions on Iran.

The embargos followed unfounded accusation that Iran is pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear energy program, which Tehran has strongly rejected.

Iran argues that as a signatory to Non-Proliferation Treaty and a member of International Atomic Energy Agency, it is entitled to develop and acquire nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.