Alwaght- Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Hossein Dehghan said Islamic Republic of Iran and Russia will cooperate to "design and manufacture" combat aircraft. After learning about Iran’s capabilities, Russia has came to this decision, he emphasized.
“In the field of (manufacturing) fighter jets, we will not develop such cooperation with any country other than Russia,” Tasnim news agency cited General Dehghan as saying in a press conference in Tehran.
The minister said Tehran has military ties with 35 countries including China, Iraq, Russia, Oman, India, Pakistan and Belarus, in different fields, such as technical expertise and engineering, maintenance, and the sale of military systems and weapons.
He further touched on Iran’s progress in the aviation industry, saying Tehran has plans to sell a range of homegrown Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) to foreign customers.
In recent years, despite tough sanctions imposed by the West, Iran has made great achievements in its defense sector and has attained self-sufficiency in producing essential military equipment and systems.
Defense Minister, also, in a televised interview on Saturday night said “Proportional to the threats, we deem it necessary to design, manufacture and test all kinds of missiles including ballistic, cruise and air defense, and stage maneuvers at the proper time".
He also noted that Tehran extends the range of its missiles according to the “threat factors”, adding that the ranges of Iranian missiles are now sufficient for countering the threats and there is no need for longer ranges.
Another Iran-based news agency, ISNA, cited Mr. Dehghan as saying "Iran could receive S-300 missile defense systems from Russia by the end of 2015".
No new agreement between Iran and Russia was reached on the issue, but only a complement was added to the previous deal, because some changes were introduced in some parts of the S-300 systems, which increases its costs, the minister added.
Tehran has always assured other nations that its military power poses no threat to the regional countries, saying that the Islamic Republic’s defense doctrine is entirely based on deterrence.
