Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Hossein Dehghan made the comment in response to Mehr News’ question on his positon toward the announced US-UK-France-Australia war games drill in the Persian Gulf called exercise Unified Trident, adding “the holding of the exercise is natural; that is, under the situation created in the wake of the presidency of Donald Trump, Persian Gulf littoral states are somehow concerned about the future and the European countries are interested in cementing their presence in the region and giving some form of reassurance to their allies.”
He went on to add, “but these drills will have no outcome for them since the governments which do not rely on the will of their own nations and seek other country’s interests instead of their own, will not achieve any success.”
The defense minister then responded to a question about Iran’s recent missile test, “whatever has been said about Iran’s missile tests, I must say that the tests are not in violation of either the nuclear deal or the 2231 resolution.”
He went on to stress, “the missile test is part of our current program and we have always announced that we will continue with our defense measures and production according to our own schedule and in line with our own national interests. Nothing can affect our defense programs and objectives.”
Deghan then talked about the Astana talks on Syrian settlement that was held on January 23‑24 in the Kazakh capital, saying “the successful holding of the Syrian-Syrian talks was an accomplishment of victories on the ground achieved in a political atmosphere.”
To a question on whether Iran has purchased any military equipment from Russia other than S-300 air defense system, he said that it has not.
He further announced that the domestically-built Karrar Tank will be unveiled in the near future.
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