None other than Qasem Soleimani, commander of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' Quds Force, snuffed the hopes of hard-liners that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif would follow through on his Feb. 25 resignation letter.
As Sinan Toossi reports, “Soleimani backed Zarif as ‘the main official responsible for foreign policy’ and stressed that he has always had the support of senior officials, ‘especially’ Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. His comments echoed President Hassan Rouhani's letter rejecting Zarif's resignation in which he stated that he agreed with his chief diplomat that the foreign minister is the ‘highest official implementing the country's foreign policy.’"
