TEHRAN - Vice President Mohmmad Reza Aref said on Saturday that foreign policy must serve the economy and strengthen social capital, pointing to the complicated situation that Masoud Pezeshkian’s government has been wrestling with since he took over as president in the summer of 2024.

Hours after Pezeshkian was inaugurated as president on July 30, 2024, Hamas leader Ismaeil Haniyeh was assassinated in a terrorist attack in northern Tehran. He had visited Tehran to attend the presidential inauguration. This attack led to back-to-back events.

In January 2025, Israel, backed fully by the United States, attacked Iran, assassinating several top Iranian military commanders, nuclear scientists, striking Iranian nuclear sites, and killing civilians, including an attack on Tehran’s Evin prison, moves which amounted to crimes against humanity.  The U.S. also directly joined Israel by dropping bombs on Iran’s key nuclear sites in Isfahan, Natanz, and Fordo, using B-2 bombers.

Later, on August 28, 2025, the European signatories to the 2015 nuclear deal(the JCPOA) – Britain, France, and Germany – triggered the snapback mechanism and officially returned the sanctions that had been superficially lifted under the agreement. After the activation of the snapback mechanism, the sanctions against Iran were intensified, leading to a sharp depreciation of the national currency against the dollar.

In recent weeks, the United States has also amassed military assets, including aircraft carriers, warships, and advanced fighter jets, in the waters near Iran, threatening to attack Iran if the Islamic Republic does not give in to its maximalist demands, thereby pushing the country into a state of confusion.

Concurrent with the extreme economic pressure and military threats, a peaceful protest rally in Tehran’s Grand Bazaar over the economic instability was turned into riotous acts in certain cities across the country in early January, leading to the death of 3,000.

“This government has simultaneously been engaged on three fronts, confronting the imposed war and external pressures; managing the January crisis and countering the destabilization project,” Aref stated at a meeting with some professors of political science and international relations.

“Overcoming these conditions is not possible without precise analysis by universities and making use of expert and elite consultation sessions, and foreign policy must be placed at the service of the economy and the strengthening of social capital,” the vice president remarked.