TEHRAN, Nov 6 (Reuters) - Iran is ready to share its missile systems with friends and neighbours, the commander of the Revolutionary Guards said, after he showed off missiles including some he said had cluster warheads.When a country can be proven to have lied, repeatedly, Reuters ignores it in favor of "reporting" its claims and ignoring the context. Because to Reuters, terrorists and their supporters are just politicians.
Guards commander-in-chief Yahya Rahim Safavi also told Iran's Arabic-language Al-Alam TV late on Sunday the Guards had thousands of troops trained for suicide missions in case Iran was threatened although he said any U.S. attack was unlikely.
The United States has said it wants to resolve a dispute over Iran's nuclear programme by diplomatic means but has not ruled out the use of force. Washington believes Tehran is seeking to make atomic bombs, despite Iranian denials.
Iran's ambassador to Lebanon, Mohammad Reza Sheibani, was quoted by Iran's semi-official Mehr News Agency on Sunday as saying the Islamic Republic was ready to supply air defence systems -- without giving specifics -- to the Lebanese military.
"Tehran also considers this as its duty to help friendly countries which are exposed to invasion of the Zionist regime (Israel)," Sheibani was quoted saying, in response to what he said was a request by Lebanon's army commander, General Michel Suleiman, for help from friendly states.
Iran funded and supplied Lebanon's Hizbollah militia in the 1980s, but now says its support is political and moral. The group used Iranian-made missiles fighting Israel this summer.
"The Revolutionary Guards does not only depend on its technological might because it has thousands of martyrdom seekers and they are ready for martyrdom-seeking operations on a large scale," Safavi said, calling them trained professionals.
An organisation has previously said Iranians have signed up for suicide raids in case Iran was attacked, but officials have in the past said the group was independent of the government and not part of the Guards, the ideological wing of Iran's military.
No Iranians are thought to have directly executed suicide bombings in recent years. But the United States accuses Iran of being a state sponsor of terrorism, a charge Tehran denies.
Reuters doesn't even bother to mention the many threats that Iran has made against Israel in a story that talks about how Iran wants to arm Israel's Arab neighbors. Somehow, that is not considered relevant. But Iranian denials of terror and its nuclear bomb program are front and center.
Reuters is apparently so enamored of its "even-handed" status that it cannot be bothered to even juxtapose Iran's denial of terror with its claim of training thousands of suicide bombers. To put those facts together would be prejudicial, I suppose.
UPDATE:Reuters also misses the small fact that Iranian missiles in Syria or Lebanon increase the percentage of Europe within range significantly. But as long as Tehran "claims" to only being concerned with defending its Arab friends from Israel, this is nothing to worry about.