TEHRAN, Feb 10: Iranian President Mohammad Khatami warned on Thursday that any invader would be met by a "burning hell" as tens of thousands of people braved snow blizzards to join rallies for the anniversary of the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
"All the people of Iran are united against any attack and any threats," Khatami told a rally in the snow-bound capital. "Any invader will find Iran to be a burning hell for them."
Tens of thousands gathered around Azadi square in central Tehran despite the fierce cold and snow to hear Khatami in the escalating war of words between Iran and the United States.
Washington has hinted at military action against Tehran, accusing the regime of seeking to develop nuclear weapons.
"These threats you hear nowadays are just part of the psychological war and the consequence of their failures," President Khatami said, after warning in a speech on Wednesday that Tehran could reverse commitments made over its nuclear activities.
"We are not humiliated and we are not dependent on anyone."
After close to a week of record snowfall, Tehran and much of the north has been virtually paralysed - making it virtually impossible for many people to find transport to take them to the town centre for the annual anti-American demonstrations. But regime loyalists were out in force, parading effigies of US President George W. Bush and his new Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. And the head of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps, General Yahya Rahim Safavi, said the revolution 26 years ago and the ouster of US-backed Shah Reza Pahlavi "is a model for all nations that want to get rid of the United States and take back their independence."
The United States accuses Iran of trying to obtain nuclear weapons under cover of developing civilian atomic energy and has not excluded a military option. But Britain, France and Germany are using diplomacy to try to convince Iran to abandon its nuclear fuel cycle technology in exchange for a package of incentives. Iran has so far refused.
According to an official statement released for the rally, Iran's regime Said: "The Iranian people will not step back even a little bit from their legitimate right to produce and use peaceful nuclear energy, and they reject any sly blackmailing to deprive Iranian people of this right."--AFP