Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, who underscored his government’s commitment to upgrading Iran’s military power. Photo: Wikipedia.

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said that his government was more determined than its predecessors to upgrade the country’s military power and capabilities, semi-official Fars News Agency reported on Monday.

Rouhani stressed that military advances under his administration have well exceeded those of previous governments, despite the impression that his was a rule of “smile, logic, negotiation and talks” more than one interested “in building weapons and defensive power.”

“The government has done more to develop strategic weapons in the past two years than what had been done in the 10 years before that,” he said, pointing to the October 11 test of the Emad missile. “Our engaging in negotiations does not mean that we are not enhancing our defensive power and not thinking of war at all.”