He said the Russians were using Iran’s Shahid Nojeh air base some 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of Hamedan, a secluded base where Russian warplanes were detected landing late past year.
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Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier any US dismay over Moscow’s military co-operation with Iran should not distract from efforts to realise the US-Russia deal on coordinating action in Syria and securing a ceasefire.
Lavrov was referring to comments by US State Department spokesman Mark Toner, who said on Tuesday that Russian Federation might be violating UN Security Council Resolution 2231 by using Iranian territory to launch air strikes in Syria.
State Department spokesman Mark Toner said US government attorneys had not yet decided whether they think Russia’s use of the Iranian base is a violation of U.N. Security Council Resolution 2231, which was passed as part of the Iran nuclear deal.
The Russian bombers took off from Hamedan airbase in Iran with full fragmentation bomb charge to launch an airstrike against ISIS facilities in Syria’s Deir ez-Zor province.
The airbase, in Iran’s western Hamadan region, is much closer to ISIL targets than the Khmeimim airbase, which Russian Federation had previously been using, in coastal northern Syria. The development represents a historical rapprochement with Russian Federation that could rile USA -allied Gulf neighbors, strengthen Syria’s Bashar Assad and impact the war against DAESH.
Russian media said the Tupolev-22M3 bombers, which had already conducted many strikes on fighters in Syria from southern Russia, were too large to be accommodated at Russia’s airbase inside Syria.
Moscow backs Syria’s government.
But he said Russia is also concerned about appearing strong on other points of tension with the West, including Ukraine, where Russian-backed rebels are fighting the government in Kiev, and in the Baltics, where governments fear Russian destabilization. “It’s not just Russian planes touching down in Iran”.
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“I really think this is meant to be strategic messaging to the West that Iran and Russian Federation are now completely committed to the survival of the Assad regime”, he said. In addition, this is the first time that Tehran has allowed foreign forces to enter the country in order to carry out military operations since the 1979 Iranian Revolution.
