Iranian commander Qassim Soleimani threatens Saudi Arabia with revenge after suicide bomb attack

Iranian commander Qassim Soleimani threatens Saudi Arabia with revenge after suicide bomb attack
"I am warning you: Don't test Iran's tolerance," the overseas commander of Iran’s revolutionary guard said in the latest of a series of warnings following a deadly suicide bomb attack.
2 min read
22 February, 2019
Iranian commander Qassem Soleimani attends Ayatollah Khamenei's September meeting with the Revolution Guards[Anadolu Agency/Getty Images]
The commander of Iran's revolutionary guard Qods Force, Qassim Soleimani, threatened Saudi Arabia with revenge on Thursday over a suicide bomb attack in southeastern Iran, reported Reuters.

The February 13 attack killed 27 soldiers from Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard in the volatile southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchistan bordering Pakistan.

"Saudi Arabia is building its regional influence with money only. This is a false influence and a failure...We will take revenge for our martyrs...(and) it might be anywhere around the world," Soleimani said, according to the semi-official Tasnim news agency.

"I am warning you: Don't test Iran's tolerance".

Saudi Arabia's foreign minister has earlier hit back at Iran for blaming the kingdom for the attack, saying Iran, a "chief sponsor of terrorism" was seeking to divert the attention of the Iranian people.

Iranian officials first said Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were behind the attack but then said the attack was planned from "inside Pakistan" and demanded Islamabad take action against the perpetrators.

The militant Sunni group Jaish al-Adl (Army of Justice) which claimed responsibility, is believed to operate from havens in Pakistan.

Jaish al-Adl, which seeks greater rights for ethnic minority Baluchis in Iran, was formed in 2012 out of the Jundallah (Soldiers of God) militia, which waged a deadly insurgency for a decade before it was severely weakened by the capture and execution of its leader Abdolmalek Rigi by Iran in 2010.

Pakistan's foreign minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, assured his Iranian counterpart, Mohammad Javad Zarif, over the phone that Islamabad would fully cooperate in the investigation on the attack on Revolutionary Guard members.