May 13: Iran consolidates power on various fronts, positioning it at the heart of regional security

By Press TV Website Staff

Iran is consolidating its power and authority across political, diplomatic, and military fronts, advancing a coordinated strategy that places it at the very center of Persian Gulf security.

The Iranian parliament on Wednesday unveiled a plan to strengthen governance and development across the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz.

Senior officials condemned Kuwait’s unlawful detention of Iranian citizens and rejected fabricated accusations designed to distract from the failures of US-Israeli aggression against the Islamic Republic, in which the Arab country was complicit. 

Iran deepened its strategic partnership with Oman through legal-technical talks on navigation rights in Hormuz, a move that coincided with the Army’s announcement that foreign weapon shipments bound for US regional bases will no longer be permitted to pass through the strait.

Meanwhile, a leaked intelligence confirmed Iran’s missile capabilities remain intact, American aircraft have suffered heavy losses during the war, as well as covert Israeli-UAE coordination, all underscoring the unravelling of Washington’s maximalist project.

Key developments on day 75 of the war, the thirty-sixth day of the ceasefire:

• Iranian parliament's national security and foreign policy commission finalized a comprehensive plan for the security and development of the Persian Gulf and the Strait of Hormuz, Ebrahim Azizi, the chairman of the commission, said while also revealing a proposal calling for legal and financial incentives for action against US and Israeli regime leaders.
• Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi, who arrived in New Delhi for a meeting of BRICS foreign ministers, condemned Kuwait’s detention of four Iranian nationals who were sailing on a boat in the Persian Gulf, saying the Arab country must immediately release them.
• Iran's foreign ministry also dismissed as "utterly baseless and rejected" accusations by Kuwait that the Islamic Republic had been planning hostile acts against the neighbouring country.
• Iranian and Omani delegations convened a legal-technical meeting to discuss the Strait of Hormuz, arrangements for the secure passage of ships, and the sovereign rights of both nations over the waterway.
• Iran’s foreign ministry spokesman said the US-Israeli aggression against the country is not a conventional war over land or resources, but a historic confrontation that will define the very concepts of good and evil for the present era and generations to come.
• Classified US intelligence assessments indicate that Iran continues to maintain substantial missile capabilities, despite repeated claims by Donald Trump that the Islamic Republic’s military has been "shattered," The New York Times said.
• Araghchi identified the US's maximalist approach as well as its other instances of counterproductive attitude as the main obstacles to ending the situation that has arisen out of unprovoked aggression against the Islamic Republic.
• The al-Mustafa International University said the participation, facilitation and cooperation of the UAE in the recent war of aggression by the United States and the Israeli regime against Iran amount to “assisting the front of unbelief against Muslim brothers” and, thus, are “categorically haram.”
• US lawmaker Ed Case said the American military lost at least 39 aircraft during 40 days of the US-Israeli war of aggression against Iran.
• Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu revealed that he "secretly” visited the United Arab Emirates during the latest unprovoked US-Israeli aggression against Iran, where he also met the Emirati president.
• Israel’s Mossad chief secretly travelled to the United Arab Emirates at least twice in recent months to coordinate military attacks against Iran, the Wall Street Journal reported. His visits were part of a broader Israeli war planning that also saw war ministry director General Amir Baram lead a security delegation to the UAE as part of preparations for the aggression against Iran.
• Iran will no longer allow US weaponry to transit the Strait of Hormuz into regional bases, Army spokesman Brigadier General Mohammad Akraminia said, declaring that the strategic waterway is now under the coordinated strategic control of the Iranian Armed Forces.
• At least twelve people, including two children, were killed in a string of Israeli airstrikes on southern Lebanon, as the Tel Aviv regime continued its breaches of an ongoing fragile ceasefire.
• Sheikh Naim Qassem, the Secretary-General of the Lebanese resistance group Hezbollah, thanked Iran for the continuous and sincere support the country has provided to the resistance movement over the past five decades.
• Israeli regime officials acknowledged that Hezbollah’s rapidly advancing drone capabilities have caught its military off guard, as fighters increasingly deploy hard-to-detect fibre-optic drones against Israeli forces in southern Lebanon.
• Yemen’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abdulwahid Abu Ras warned that the continuation of the US-Israeli aggression against Iran will set the region and the entire world on fire, while reaffirming Yemen’s full solidarity with the Islamic Republic.
• Dozens of protesters staged a demonstration in Bahrain to condemn the Al Khalifah regime's repressive measures against those sympathising with Iran and displaying expressions of support for Iranian retaliatory operations amid the US-Israeli war of aggression.

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