Rouhani: Fate awaiting Trump no better than ex-Iraqi dictator Saddam’s

“There were two maniacs who waged wars against the Iranian people; one was Saddam who imposed a military war and the other was Trump who started an economic war on us,” Rouhani told a cabinet meeting in Tehran on Wednesday.

“During the [1980s] imposed war, we defeated the enemy owing to our unity and alliance, and the day Saddam was hanged was a day of victory for the Iranian people. Thanks to the resistance the Iranian nation has put up against the US sanctions, Trump's fate will not be better than Saddam’s,” he said, according to Press TV.

Iran has been under a series of illegal sanctions imposed by the US since 2018, when Trump withdrew Washington from the 2015 nuclear deal and enforced a “maximum pressure” campaign to target the Iranian nation.

Rouhani said the US economic war was meant to bring the Iranian people to their knees and destroy the Islamic establishment, lauding the nation for refusing to buckle under pressure.

"As pointed out by Leader of the Islamic Revolution [Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei], what is important is that we prevented the economic war from achieving its objectives. A thriving manufacturing sector and the positive economic growth mean the sanctions have failed,” he underlined.

He counted lessening the impact of the economic war on people's livelihoods and the removal of the oppressive sanctions as the important goals pursued by his administration.

"By breaking the sanctions, we will in fact defeat Zionism, reactionary [states] in the region and the extremists in the US,” he said, in reference to Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Vaccine for COVID-19

Rouhani said the government has made arrangements to obtain reliable vaccines from abroad and develop a homegrown vaccine for COVID-19.

He further dismissed concerns about developing the coronavirus vaccine inside Iran and purchasing a foreign vaccine, Tasnim reported.

“We have gone ahead on par with the world and even better than some countries in the fight against the virus,” he added.

The president also assured people of Iran that the Central Bank and the Health Ministry have been doing their utmost and made arrangements to provide the society with a reliable foreign vaccine and develop a homegrown one.

He noted that Iran’s health care capabilities, including the number of hospital and ICU beds, have doubled during his tenure and reached an all-time high.

The coronavirus pandemic has killed more than 54,000 people and sickened nearly 1.2 million in Iran since it emerged earlier this year.