TEHRAN (FNA)- Tehran has devised the necessary plans and measures to defuse the potential threat of the US missile shield project in the Persian Gulf, a senior commander of the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) said.
“We have thought of the necessary measures to counter this plan,” Commander of the IRGC Aerospace Force Brigadier General Amir Ali Hajizadeh told reporters here in Tehran on Monday.
He said after the recent announcement and deployment of the so-called NATO missile shield in Turkey, Tehran knew that the US would announce a second such plan to complete the chain of its early warning system in the region.
Hajizadeh added that the Washington and Tel Aviv are seeking to establish security for Israel at the expense of the Arab countries.
“All assessments have been made (by Iran) and we know that (establishing security for) Israel is the goal of all these issues,” he said, but meantime stressed, “Yet, we are not worried about the deployment of such systems.”
Last week, Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Ahmad Vahidi called on the neighboring states to avoid joining a US-Israeli project for deploying a missile shield in the Persian Gulf.
“This missile defense shield (in the Persian Gulf) is a US-Israeli project and everyone should pay attention to the fact that anyone who gets involved with this project is, in fact, implementing the US and Israel’s plot,” he said on Wednesday.
“Since the very beginning we have rejected this project as we saw it against the regional security, and we have recommended our friends not to enter such fields (of activity),” he noted.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton last Saturday promoted the missile shield idea at a Persian Gulf-US security forum in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Washington has been seeking hard to portray Iran as a threat to the regional states, specially the Arab countries on the rims of the Persian Gulf, but many Arab leaders in the region stress that they do not see Iran as a threat.
US officials have said it is their “priority” to help the six Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (PGCC) states build “regional missile defense architecture” against Iran.
Clinton stressed Washington’s “unwavering” commitment to Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman, all longstanding US allies.
In reply, Iranian officials said that the US plan to establish a missile shield in the Persian Gulf is a source of “tension”.
