The world's greatest superpower is not the United States ... or Russia ... or China, says Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. It's Iran.
"Iran is the number one power in the world," Ahmadinejad said Thursday in a speech to the families of those killed in his country's war with Iraq more than 20 years ago.
"Today the name of Iran means a firm punch in the teeth of the powerful and it puts them in their place," the president said in an address broadcast live on state television, AFP reported.
He also launched a new assault on critics within his country who he says are siding with the enemy.
On Wednesday, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, Hassan Rowhani, attacked Ahmadinejad's foreign policy, accusing him of using "course slogans and grandstanding."
"You can see how some people here... try to materialize the plans of the enemies and by showing that Iran is small and the enemy is big," Ahmadinejad said.
The president's comments came amid renewed U.N. Security Council efforts to agree on sanctions against Tehran over its refusal to suspend nuclear activities, AFP reported.
Ahmadinejad insisted that Iran is winning the standoff over its atomic program.
Ahmadinejad is expected to travel to Iraq this weekend in the first visit by an Iranian president to the neighboring country. The two nations waged a costly war between 1980-1988.