Tasnim � The US government has formally waged an economic war against Iran, with its Treasury Department serving as the war headquarters and dollar being used as the pivotal weapon, Head of Iran�s Civil Defense Organization Brigadier General Gholam Reza Jalali said.

Addressing a conference on civil defense tactics in the banking industry, held in Tehran on Tuesday, General Jalali said Iran is faced with a full-fledged American economic war.

�Today, the US Department of Treasury has formally turned into the ministry of economic war (against Iran), and has defined structures and strategies to that end,� he warned.

The general added that the US has devised various sanction-based strategies to harm Iran�s economy.

�The US central bank (Federal Reserve System) has officially announced that it has turned dollar into a weapon for the economic war, and is controlling it via SWIFT,� he warned.

The general said the major security challenge that Iran is now facing relates to the financial and banking fields, calling for plans to handle the threats and opportunities brought by new digital currencies.

Iran should push to create an Internet-based national currency, he went on to say.

In recent years, Iran�s Civil Defense Organization has held several cyber drills to determine the weak points of the country�s major institutions, such as the Central Bank.

In 2016, the organization unveiled plans for developing a nationwide alarm system that would alert the country�s organizations to possible cyberattacks.

It came after a spate of cyberattacks against Iranian websites in June 2016.