Government of Iran

Turkey's foreign minister will visit Iraq on Thursday to try to ease tensions after Iran launched missiles at US-led forces in response to the killing of a top Iranian commander, the foreign ministry said on Wednesday.

'We are warning all American allies, who gave their bases to its terrorist army, that any territory that is the starting point of aggressive acts against Iran will be targeted,' Iranian National Guard said.
The Iranian Guard has also threatened to bomb Haifa in Israel and Dubai in the Emirates, the Daily Mail reported.

The United States has declined to issue a visa to the Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, who was scheduled to attend a UN Security Council meeting in New York on Thursday. This was reported by Reuters, citing a US official who requested anonymity.

Turkey's foreign minister on Jan. 5 spoke with U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres and his Qatari counterpart over the phone, diplomatic sources said late on Jan. 5

Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu, in separate phone conversations with Guterres and Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, discussed the killing of top Iranian commander Qasem Soleimani in a U.S. drone airstrike in Iraq.

China voiced opposition to the abuse of military force by the U.S. in Iraq, days after a U.S. drone strike killed a top Iranian general in Baghdad and a senior Iraqi figure.

The statement by Foreign Minister Wang Yi came after he spoke to his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov to discuss the tension in the Middle East, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

Turkey has joined an international diplomatic campaign to defuse tension between the United States and Iran after the assassination of the latter's top military figure with calls on all related parties to act with restraint and common sense to avoid a larger conflict in an already unstable Middle East.

Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu spoke with his U.S. counterpart over the phone on Jan. 4, according to diplomatic sources.

Çavuşoğlu and Mike Pompeo discussed the situation in Iraq and Iran, as well as bilateral issues.

Police have stepped up security at the American and Israeli embassies in the Greek capital amid fears of retaliation following a US air strike against a leading Iranian military commander.

Greece called for "cool-headedness" and "moderation" following the US killing of Qassem Soleimani, the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard's elite Quds Force.

"Greece is following with great concern the developments in Iraq," the Foreign Ministry said in a statement Friday.

The US confirmed that it carried out a strike that killed Iranian Revolutionary Guards' Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani in the Iraqi capital Baghdad.