Iran's Foreign Ministry Says Any New Attack Will Be Met With an Equal or Stronger Response, as Tehran Petitions the U.N. Over Threats to Its Energy Infrastructure
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said at his weekly news conference in Tehran on Tuesday that Iran will not leave any new attack unanswered. "The hit-and-run era is over," Baghaei said, according to Iran's Tasnim news agency and Press TV. "We have demonstrated in practice that we will not leave any attack unanswered. We will respond in equal measure, if not more forcefully." He added that Iran's armed forces stand ready to repel any act of aggression.
The remarks were a response to reports that the United States may strike a facility in Iran's central Isfahan province. Washington says Iran stores highly enriched uranium at the Mount Kolang site, known to the U.S. as "Pickaxe Mountain"; President Donald Trump told Newsmax last week that the U.S. was looking at striking the site, a development GSM reported on October 18.
Baghaei also said Tehran had conveyed its demands to Washington through Qatari mediators but called the U.S. reply "insufficient." Iran is holding to its conditions, including an end to the war on all fronts, the lifting of the U.S. naval blockade, relief from oil-export restrictions and the release of frozen Iranian assets. Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said on Sunday that Iran's offer to reopen the Strait of Hormuz within seven days, provided Washington accepts those conditions, remains on the table.
Also on Tuesday, Iran's permanent mission to the United Nations published a letter to the U.N. secretary-general and the Security Council warning against U.S. and Israeli threats to attack Iran's energy infrastructure and asking the U.N. to condemn them. The letter said that if the Security Council fails to act, Iran will exercise its right of self-defense under Article 51 of the U.N. Charter, and that the United States and Israel would bear full responsibility for the consequences of any further aggression.
On the U.S. side, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Ovda Air Base in southern Israel on Monday during an unannounced visit to discuss Iran; Hegseth confirmed the trip to reporters on Tuesday but declined to discuss the talks, as GSM reported on October 19. Trump has said the U.S. will not bomb Iran again before the November 3 midterm elections. Reuters reported on October 20 that Iranian officials expect the bombing to resume sooner or later and that Tehran is deliberately prolonging the negotiating stalemate to influence the U.S. midterms.
A claim circulating widely on Chinese social media - that the United States is newly sending a third aircraft carrier to the Middle East - is not a development of this week: Bloomberg and the Associated Press reported in early October that the USS Theodore Roosevelt carrier strike group departed San Diego in late September, followed by the Makin Island amphibious readiness group, with roughly 10,000 sailors and Marines due to arrive by late November, which would put three U.S. carriers in the region. U.S. Central Command said at the time that it does not discuss unit schedules for operational-security reasons. Along the strait itself, tensions continued on Tuesday as Iran said two more tankers had struck mines and caught fire in the Strait of Hormuz, as GSM reported separately today.
Related:
Trump Tells Newsmax U.S. Is Looking at Striking Iran's Pickaxe Mountain Site, Says War Will End Soon
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 「罗斯福」号航空母舰（CVN 71）在海上航行（资料图，2026 年 7 月 RIMPAC 演习期间）。图：美国海军，摄影 Aaron Haro Gonzalez，经 Wikimedia Commons，Public domain。 / USS Theodore Roosevelt (CVN 71) underway at sea (file photo, July 2026, during RIMPAC). U.S. Navy photo by Aaron Haro Gonzalez, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.
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