Asked about the Wall Street Journal quoting unnamed US officials as claiming that Iran fired two missiles at the UK-US military base on Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, Aragchi said: “We have intentionally kept the range of our missiles below 2,000 kilometres, so we don’t have that capability. We have built that capability in order to defend ourselves against our enemies.”

He added that Iran does not seek confrontation with the West. “We don’t have any hostility against the United States people or Europeans,” he said, citing the limitation as a strategic choice rather than a technical constraint.