Iran's defense minister on Monday denied at least parts of a report in the Iranian media that the military recently test-fired a ballistic missile with pinpoint accuracy at a range of 1,250 miles — a range that would include Israel and several other Middle East nations.
Brigadier General Ali Abdollahi, the Iranian military's deputy chief of staff, told Iran's Tasnim news agency that Iran fired the test missile two weeks ago and that it was accurate to within 25 feet, which he described as zero error.
"We can guide this ballistic missile," he told Tasnim. Iran has previously asserted it has such missile capability.
Abdollahi declined to provide further details on the missile or the test. Defense Minister Brigadier General Hossein Dehqan later denied that a missile test of that distance took place. He also told Iran's Islamic Republic News Agency that the U.S. and Saudi Arabia are conducting a propaganda campaign to make the world believe Iran's missiles are not for defensive purposes.
Firas Abi-Ali, an analyst for the consulting firm IHS Country Risk, said Iran's government must pursue its missile program to appease hardliners after striking a deal on its nuclear program with the West.
"Given there technical restrictions, the missile program makes a lot of sense for them," Abi-Ali told USA TODAY. "At the end of the day, they are beholden to the hardliners and the IRGC (revolutionary guard). The elected government is not the most powerful actor in Iran."
Last month, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei stressed the need for boosting Iran’s defense capabilities, saying negotiations without a robust defense could weaken Iran's position and force it to yield to countries posing threats.
Two months ago, Iran test-fired two ballistic missiles, one of them with the phrase "Israel should be wiped off the Earth" written on it in Hebrew. Iranian officials say the phrase was added by workers on the ground and was not a decision made by higher-level officials. Iran also conducted a missile test in November.
Iran has rejected claims that missile tests violate the nuclear agreement it reached with the U.S. and other nations or a United Nations resolution on missile testing, describing its missiles as conventional armaments for "legitimate defense" and not designed for carrying nuclear warheads.
U.S. State Department spokeswoman Elizabeth Trudeau said the department was aware of the reports. She said that, if a launch was confirmed, the U.S. would take up the issue with the U.N.
The nuclear deal, which took effect in January, does not directly address missile restrictions. The U.N. Security Council lifted its ban on such testing when the deal was struck, but passed a resolution that "calls upon Iran not to undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles ... including launches using such ballistic missile technology."
The U.S., Britain, France and Germany were among nations decrying the March tests. The Security Council's Panel of Experts on Iran later said in a confidential report, first reported by Reuters, that the March launches did violate the U.N. resolution.
The tests in March involved two types of ballistic missiles during “Might of Velayat” military drills, Tasnim said. (Velayat is Persian for "governance of the jurist.") The missiles, Qadr-H and Qadr-F, were launched from the East Alborz Mountains, north of Iran, and hit targets on the Makran coast to the southeast along the Pakistan border.
