Leader of Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei said the intelligence service needs to have the upper hand if they are to neutralize plots against the country.
In a meeting Wednesday with officials of the Intelligence Ministry, the Leader said, “The Islamic Republic is now facing a complex and a major war created by the intelligence services of its adversaries.”
“We need to stand up against this war not only with defense preparedness but also plans for offense so that our intelligence apparatus can determine the rules of the game,” his official website reported.
Foreign intelligence services’ plots against Iran so far have not been successful, he said, and urged officials to stay vigilant or they would suffer setbacks.
The Leader referred to the recent devaluation of the local currency, the rial, adding that “A closer look into this matter clearly shows traces of foreign intelligence services.”
After a two-day jump in foreign currency rates that saw the rial trading at 62,000 to the dollar, the government last week announced that it would abandon a controversial dual exchange rate regime to prop up the national currency.
It later said that dollar would be sold at the fixed rate of 42,000 rial. The move seemingly stopped the steep decline in the value of the rial but has yet to calm nerves in the forex market that for months has been starved of hard currency.
Central Bank of Iran Governor Valiollah Seif said last week that Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates had been involved in the unprecedented fall in the rial.
Elaborating on ways that foreign intelligence services act against Iran, Ayatollah Khamenei said “creating financial and economic instability”, among other things, is a ploy used by such services.
In December last year protests erupted in many cities over rising prices and deteriorating living conditions. The protests turned violent and although police showed restraint there were numerous reports of clashes with security forces that led to death of at least 21 people.
Iranian police later announced they had not used any “live bullets” during the protests and security officials said they had intelligence pointing to the role of foreign elements hijacking what started as ordinary demonstrations that occur in many parts of the world.
