The world knows Iran is not pursuing nuclear weapon -Guards chief

The world knows that Iran is not pursuing a nuclear weapon, the head of the elite Revolutionary Guards, Major General Hossein Salami, said on Monday, according to the Tasnim news agency.

Iran threatened on Monday to restart deactivated centrifuges and ramp up the enrichment of uranium to 20 percent purity as its next potential big moves away from a 2015 nuclear agreement that Washington abandoned last year.

"Why do they globally sanction us about the nuclear issue when the world knows that we are not pursuing a weapon? In reality, they are sanctioning us because of knowledge," he said. "Nuclear weapons have no place in Islam. Islam never approves of weapons of mass destruction."