In a post on his X account, Baqaei mocked the US decision to highlight Bahrain’s participation despite its limited economic ties with Iran and to halt Iranian sports and academic exchanges that had already been effectively inactive for years.
“Washington’s Iran policy has reached pure parody,” the spokesman wrote.
“It turns to Bahrain - a country with virtually no meaningful economic exchange with Iran - to prove that its ‘coalition’ is working,” he said.
“It then ‘stops’ Iranian sports and academic exchanges that had already been effectively dead for years,” Baqaei added.
“It is sanctioning the already sanctioned and calling the empty space a coalition,” he noted.
His comments came after US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced an economic pressure campaign dubbed “Operation Economic Outcast,” threatening to target Iran’s oil revenues and financial interests worldwide and impose secondary penalties on countries and companies doing business with Tehran.
Bessent claimed that Washington sought to “sever every economic lifeline” sustaining Iran and warned that no entity would be beyond the reach of US sanctions. The campaign, which he described as “economic D-day,” has drawn criticism in Iran as another attempt by Washington to use coercive economic measures to isolate the country and pressure its international partners.