A long-range Qadr ballistic missile is launched in the Alborz mountain range in northern Iran on March 9, 2016.
Iran said its armed forces had fired two more ballistic missiles as it continued tests in defiance of US warnings.
/ AFP / TASNIM NEWS / Mahmood Hosseini
By Paul Elliott Mar 13, 2016
Iran tests more ballistic missiles that can reach Israel. Representative Ed Royce, the Republican chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee, said: “Iran is making a mockery of President Obama’s vow to confront Iran’s risky and illicit acts”.
There was no immediate reaction from Jerusalem, where Biden was
meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who strongly
opposed the nuclear deal.
Iranian state media said the second round of ballistic missile
tests was conducted during a military drill, in spite of a U.N. Security
Council resolution calling on Tehran to refrain from such tests and in
the face of us sanctions imposed earlier this year.
“Iran should face sanctions for these activities and the worldwide
community must demonstrate that Iran’s threats toward Israel will not be
tolerated”, she said. “I want to reiterate, as I know people still
doubt, if in fact they break the deal, we will act”.
The tests, which come after Iran won sanctions relief in January by curbing its nuclear program, seem to be “aimed at demonstrating that Iran will push forward with its ballistic program”, The Associated Press reports.
Such missile tests are not considered a violation of the nuclear
deal because the accord is focused on Iran’s nuclear enrichment program,
not its weapons. The hawks within Iran’s military establishment have
fired missiles and rockets repeatedly despite American opposition to the
tests after the nuclear deal was reached between Iran and P5+1 country.
This week’s series of tests have included short-, medium- and long-range precision guided missiles with ranges of between 300 and 2,000 kilometres, state media reported.
Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh said Iran had designed these
missiles with a range of 2,000km to be able to attack its enemy from a
safer distance.
President Hassan Rouhani, a cleric close to moderates, pursued the
nuclear deal in a bid to end Iran’s global isolation. Apparently, the
episode is a show of power and strength by Iran in the wake of Joe
Biden’s visit to Israel. He stressed that Iran would not fire the
missiles in anger or start a war with Israel.
“It will continue it’s completely defensive and legitimate missile
program while observing its global commitments and without entering into
the fields of either nuclear warheads or designing missiles capable of
carrying such warheads”, he added.
The Fars news agency reported the Hebrew inscription on the missiles.
When U.N. sanctions on Iran were lifted in January, the Security
Council’s Iran sanctions committee was shut down. But on Wednesday, she
called for the U.S.to “address Iran’s destabilizing activities across
the region, while vigorously enforcing the nuclear deal”.
