WASHINGTON: Senior US officials are pushing President Donald Trump’s administration to take steps to topple Iran’s regime, according to a latest report.
It quoted them as saying that the new White House policy towards Iran should be aimed at removing the “militant clerical government”.
This would be the first step towards halting Tehran’s pursuit for nuclear weapons and its sponsorship of terrorism, they maintained.
“The policy of the United States should be regime change in Iran,” Senator Tom Cotton was quoted as saying by the Politico publication on its website.
“I don’t see how anyone can say America can be safe as long as you have in power a theocratic despotism.”
He recommended a combination of economic, diplomatic and covert actions to pressure Tehran’s government, and “support internal domestic dissent” in the country.
The Republican senator from Arkansas also pointed out that Iran was home to several minority ethnic groups, including Arabs, Turkmen and Balochs, which “aren’t enthusiastic about living in a Persian Shi’ite despotism”.
The comments came closely on the heels of US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson telling a key congressional hearing earlier this month that the new US policy towards Iran included regime change.
Though Trump’s Iran police is still under review, Tillerson said the US would rely on “elements inside Iran” to bring about “a peaceful transition of that government”.
The Politico report said key Trump officials have said that Iran will remain a US enemy until the clerical leaders and military officials who control the country’s political system are deposed.