(Reuters) – The United States would not be safe from retaliation if Iran is attacked by Washington, the Iran newspaper quoted a senior Revolutionary Guards commander on Tuesday as saying.

“In the face of any attack, we will have a crushing response. In that case, we will not only act in the boundaries of the Middle East and the Persian Gulf, no place in America will be safe from our attacks,” Massoud Jazayeri was quoted as saying by the daily.

Iran would not strike any country first, he said.

Tehran is locked in a dispute with the West over its nuclear program.

New York Times

The Hyundai Motor Company, the automaking subsidiary of Hyundai, the South Korean conglomerate, has quietly ended its business dealings with Iran, where it had extensive operations, including a joint venture to make cars. United Against Nuclear Iran, an American group that has advocated economic sanctions to pressure Iran over its disputed nuclear program, has reclassified Hyundai Motor, putting it in the “withdrawn” category on a list the group has compiled of foreign businesses that deal with Iran. Hyundai Motor officials did not respond to requests for comment. A strict new American law is putting pressure on foreign companies to reduce or eliminate their operations in Iran or risk penalties in the United States market. Hyundai is the second big foreign automaker in a week to pull back from Iran. Last week, General Motors said its French partner, PSA Peugeot Citroën, had suspended shipments of components to the Iran Khodro Industrial Group, an Iranian vehicle maker, to comply with American restraints on Iran trade.

Radio Zamaneh: The head of Iran’s Welfare Organization has warned preschool and daycare centres against teaching “immoral programs such as dancing” to children.

The Fars News Agency reports that Valiollah Nasr, Director General of Tehran Province Welfare, said on Tuesday: “Educational programs must be in line with Islamic principles.”

He added that the preschools and daycares have been given set curricula and cannot teach “immoral programs.”

Radio Zamaneh:

Iran’s Minister of Cooperatives, Labour and Social Security has been summoned to Parliament to explain the recent appointment of Saeed Mortazavi to head the Social Security Fund.

ILNA reports that Abdolreza Sheikoleslami must attend a parliamentary Q & A with a number of MPs who are critical of leaving the Social Security Fund in the hands of Mortazavi. He’s the former Tehran prosecutor who was removed from his position in the judiciary after the media exposed a scandal regarding prisoner deaths at the Kahrizak Detention Centre.

Mortazavi remains one of the prime suspects in the Kahrizak deaths, having been accused of ordering the transfer of post-election detainees to this facility, knowing full well they would be severely mistreated.

China and Iran have agreed to increase trade between the two countries beyond $50 billion in the coming year.

MohammadJavad Mohammadizadeh, Iranian vice president, met with China’s Deputy Prime Minister Li Keqiang today to discuss mutual relations and regional and international issues, according to IRNA.

Mohammadizadeh told IRNA that the talks were “pleasant and beneficial”, adding that the two countries are determined to expand relations.

TEHRAN (AFP)— Iran declared on Monday it will not be swayed from its nuclear “path” by sanctions, a week before talks with world powers that are increasingly seen as a last chance for diplomacy in its showdown with the West.

“The sanctions may have caused us small problems but we will continue our path,” Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi vowed in an interview with the official Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA).

“We do not underestimate any enemy, no matter how tiny and lowly they are. The regime’s officials — the supreme leader, the president, the army, the (Revolutionary) Guards and Basij (militia) — are completely vigilant. And the nation is prepared to defend the achievements of Islamic Iran,” he said.