Esmail Khatib made the remarks during a speech in the holy city of Mashhad.

The plot, which had been devised for implementation on September 30, had been hatched towards fueling ethnic and religious differences in the country," Khatib said.

He pointed out that the enemies are after afflicting Iran's Eastern borders with insecurity, and urged vigilance on the part of Shia and Sunni clerics, as well as relevant authorities.

The remarks came after the Intelligence Ministry released a statement, announcing that its agents had managed to frustrate a plot aimed at triggering as many as "30 simultaneous explosions" throughout the capital Tehran.

Twenty-eight terrorists were arrested in connection with the plot, which had sought to target the city's "populous centers," the statement noted.

The explosions in question had sought to send across a false image of the prevalence of insecurity in the country, sow despair and fear across the society, and trigger chaos and protest, the ministry said.

The plot had been designed for implementation on the anniversary of last year's foreign-backed riots throughout the country, it stated.

The riots spread out throughout the country last September following the unfortunate death that month of a young girl named Mahsa Amini.

Amini fainted at a police station and was pronounced dead days later at a Tehran hospital. An investigation attributed her death to a medical condition, dismissing allegations that she had been beaten by police forces.

Iran says the 2022 riots were the result of foreign-backed elements exploiting the incident.