Iran President Accuses Reagan of Lying About Arms Shipment

Iranian President Ali Khamenei on Friday accused President Reagan of lying during his replies to questions about the secret shipment of U.S. arms to Iran.

Khamenei, speaking the day after Reagan held his first news conference since November when the shipments were disclosed, said Iran would publish its own account of the deal.

“In last night’s news conference, Reagan, who had promised reporters not to say anything other than the truth, once again did not tell the truth and accused his colleagues,” Khamenei said in a sermon during prayers at Tehran University.

“Concerned officials in the Islamic republic’s government are preparing a report about the facts (of Iranian-American dealings). Then the world will know how much of what the (Tower) report and the American leaders have said is correct and how much is vicious and false,” he said.

Khamenei’s speech, carried on the state-run Iranian television, was monitored in Nicosia.

Reagan made no new disclosures about the Iran arms affair, but acknowledged that it led to trading weapons for American hostages held by pro-Iranian Shia Muslim extremists in Lebanon.

“The American Administration is still struggling with this affair and it doesn’t seem that it will finish soon,” Khamenei said.

“In the 500-page Tower report they have written anything they liked,” he said, referring to the report issued after an investigation by a commission headed by former Sen. John Tower (R-Tex).

Khamenei said that while the report contained “some truth,” other parts of it were “largely fictional.”