“For the past 60 years, not a day has passed in which the US has not been torturing Iranians,” Chomsky said in a Wednesday interview with Democracy Now on the occasion of 9/11 attacks.

“That’s 60 years, right now, began with a military coup, which overthrew the parliamentary regime in 1953, installed the Shah, a brutal dictator,” he added.

In late August, the CIA spy agency for the first time published a document that confirms the US role in the 1953 coup d’état against the democratically-elected Iranian Prime Minister Mohammad Mosaddeq.

The explicit acknowledgment by the US intelligence community comes some six decades after the British- and American-backed military overthrow.

On August 15, 1953, the British and US intelligence agencies initiated a coup by the Iranian military, setting off a chain of events, including riots on the streets of Iran’s capital, Tehran, which led to the overthrow and arrest of Mosaddeq four days later.

Chomsky also alluded to the US support for the eight-year imposed war by former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein against Iran, in which hundreds of thousands of Iranians were killed, and Washington’s harsh economic sanctions against Tehran as other instances of Washington’s continued hostility toward Iran.

"Saddam Hussein was a favorite of the Reagan and first Bush administrations, to such an extent that George H.W. Bush, the first Bush, right after the war, in 1989, invited Iraqi nuclear engineers to the United States for advanced training in nuclear weapons production. That’s the country that had devastated Iran, horrifying attack and war. Right after that, Iran was subjected to harsh sanctions. And it continues right until the moment. So we now have a 60-year record of torturing Iranians. We don’t pay attention to it, but you can be sure that they do, with good reason. That’s point number one," Chomsky noted.

The renowned analyst reaffirmed support for Iran’s right to nuclear energy and argued that as a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Tehran is entitled to enrich uranium.

"Most of the countries of the world belong to the Non-Aligned Movement, which had in fact just had its regular meeting in Tehran, in Iran. And once again, it vigorously supported—vigorously supported—Iran’s right to enrich uranium as a signer of the Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), unlike Israel and India. That’s the Non-Aligned Movement," the academic said.

The United States, the Israel regime and some of their allies falsely claim that Iran is pursuing non-civilian objectives in its nuclear energy program. Tehran strongly rejects the claim and says as a committed signatory to the NPT and a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) it has the right to use nuclear technology for peaceful purposes.

Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, logician, and political commentator and activist.

NTJ/HH