Iran fired two more long-range ballistic missiles on Wednesday as it continued military tests in defiance of US sanctions and fresh warnings from Washington.
The missile tests, described by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards as a show of force in the face of US pressure, come just weeks after the implementation of Iran’s historic nuclear deal with world powers.
After similar tests on Tuesday, Washington had warned it could raise the issue with the UN Security Council and take further action after US sanctions were imposed in connection with Iran’s missile program in January.
Photo: EPA
US Vice President Joe Biden on Wednesday said that the US would take action against Iran if the missile tests were confirmed.
“All their conventional activity outside the [nuclear] deal, which is still beyond the deal, we will and are attempting to act wherever we can find it,” Biden said during a visit to Israel and the Palestinian territories.
He said Washington was also ready to act if Iran breaks the nuclear agreement.
The hard-fought deal, which saw international sanctions lifted in exchange for curbs on Iran’s nuclear ambitions, did not extend to its missile program.
Wednesday’s tests saw two Qadr-H and Qadr-F precision missiles fired from launcher trucks tucked in the Alborz mountain range in northern Iran, hitting targets about 1,400km away in the southeastern Makran area, the Revolutionary Guards said.
“Our enemies have come to understand that increasing security pressures and sanctions will not affect the enhancement of our capabilities so they seek to limit us in the missile arena through imposing economic sanctions,” Revolutionary Guards head Major General Mohammad Ali Jafari said.
“Enemies of the Islamic revolution and regional security must fear the roar of the Guards’ missiles,” he said, quoted by the Revolutionary Guards’ official Web site.
The Revolutionary Guards’ deputy head General Hossein Salami said the missile tests were to demonstrate Iran’s “defense and deterrent power.”
“We have massive stockpiles of ballistic missiles waiting for orders and ready to hit targets at any moment from various points across the country,” Salami said.
Ballistic missile tests have been seen as a way for Iran’s military to demonstrate that the nuclear deal will have no impact on its plans, which it says are for domestic defense only.
Previous UN resolutions have aimed at stopping Tehran from developing missiles capable of carrying a nuclear warhead, although Tehran has always denied seeking the capability.
The US sanctions imposed in January saw five Iranians and a network of companies based in the United Arab Emirates and China added to a US blacklist.
US Secretary of State John Kerry called his Iranian counterpart Mohammad Javad Zarif on Wednesday to protest the latest tests. The pair had built up a close working relationship during negotiations for last year’s nuclear accord.
US State Department spokesman John Kirby on Tuesday said that if the latest missile tests were confirmed, “then we’ll have every intention of raising the matter to the UN Security Council.”
Kirby warned that the US could take unilateral action “to counter threats from Iran’s missile program.”
This week’s series of tests have included short, medium and long-range precision guided missiles with ranges of between 300 and 2,000km, state media reported.
“The reason we have designed these missiles with such a range is to be able to hit our remote enemies, the Zionist regime,” said General Amir Ali Hajizadeh, who heads the Revolutionary Guards’ aerospace wing, referring to Israel.
“But there is no need to fire missiles to destroy the Zionist regime as it will gradually collapse. Our main enemy is the US,” he said.
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not