U.S. risks triggering wider war, Iran warns

Iran’s supreme leader warned Sunday that any attack by the United States would spark a “regional war” in the Mideast, further escalating tensions as President Trump has threatened to militarily strike the Islamic Republic over its crackdown on recent nationwide protests.

- JON GAMBRELL

IRANIAN lawmakers wearing Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps uniforms chant slogans in Tehran.

HAMED MALEKPOUR Associated Press

The comments from the 86-year-old Ayatollah Ali Khamenei are the most direct threat he's made so far as the aircraft carrier USS Abraham Lincoln and associated American warships are in the Arabian Sea, sent there by Trump after Tehran's bloody crackdown on nationwide protests that left thousands dead.

It remains unclear whether Trump will use force. He's repeatedly said Iran wants to negotiate and has brought up Tehran’s nuclear program as another issue he wants to see resolved.

Khamenei also referred to the nationwide protests as “a coup,” hardening the government’s position as tens of thousands of people reportedly have been detained since the start of the demonstrations. Sedition charges in Iran can carry the death penalty, which renews concerns about Tehran carrying out mass executions of those arrested — which Trump has said is a red line for the U.S.

Iran also planned a live fire military drill for Sunday and Monday in the strategic Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf through which a fifth of all oil traded passes. The U.S. military's Central Command had warned against threatening American warships or aircraft during the drill or disrupting commercial traffic.

Defiant message from Khamenei

Khamenei spoke to a crowd at his compound in Tehran as Iran marked the start of a days-long commemoration of the country's 1979 Islamic Revolution. At one point, he described the U.S. as being interested in its oil, natural gas and other mineral resources, saying that they wanted to “seize this country, just as they controlled it before.”