“It is fairly obvious that it is another act of provocation that sends the wrong signal from Washington and I think that their own message is that the US continues to violate the airspace of Iran contrary to the international norms and rule of international law,” Kaveh Afrasiabi said in an interview with Press TV on Saturday.
Iran’s Defense Minister Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi said on Friday that the Iranian military has repelled an unidentified aircraft that had entered the country’s airspace “above the territorial waters of the Islamic Republic in the Persian Gulf.”
The comments come a day after the Pentagon claimed that two Iranian warplanes fired at a US drone last week as it conducted a routine, but classified surveillance mission over the Persian Gulf about 16 nautical miles off the Iranian coast.
Afrasiabi expressed hope that the swift reaction of the Iranian armed forces would send the message to Washington that “Iran is vigilant and is not like some other countries that allow the violation of their sovereignty all the time.”
On Friday, Deputy Chairman of Iranian Armed Forces Chief of Staff Brigadier General Massoud Jazayeri said the Iranian Armed Forces would “firmly” respond to any air, ground and sea aggression.