Speaking at a press conference with New Zealand’s visiting Foreign Minister Murray McCulley, Lavrov said there had been no supplying, sale or transfer of combat jets to Iran.
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Russian Federation sprung into a second day of an air campaign against Syrian militants from an Iranian air base, rejecting all USA suggestions on its co-operation with Tehran violating a United Nations resolution.
Mr Lavrov was responding to comments by Mark Toner, a United States State Department spokesman, who said the move “could very well be a violation” of Security Council resolution 2231, which bans the sale or supply of military technology including fast jets to Iran. Toner said that beyond the question of Russia’s use of a base in Iran, its air strikes often “indiscriminately” hit civilian targets and moderate Syrian opposition groups.
The ministry said five large warehouses with weapons, ammunition, fuel and lubricants, three command posts and several training camps were destroyed and a significant number of terrorists were killed.
“The defense cooperation between Iran and Russia in battling terrorism is not an unexpected matter”, Velayati told reporters in Tehran on Wednesday, in response to reports of Russian bomber jets using one of Iran’s western airbases for flying to Syria.
Both Russia and the Iran-backed regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad may have violated global law by dropping incendiary bombs over civilian areas in Syria in recent weeks, according to a report by Human Rights Watch (HRW). Russian warplanes took off on Tuesday Aug. 16, from Iran to target Islam.
President Vladimir Putin visited in November and the two countries regularly discuss military planning for Syria. The United States said that it was still assessing the extent of Russian-Iranian cooperation but described the new development as ‘unfortunate’.
He said they were using the base near the eastern city of Hamedan with the authorization of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council. Because Iran supports the regime of Assad in Syria with proxy fighters and because Russian airstrikes there are in support of Assad’s government, it is possible that the aircraft could be seen as being used for the “benefit of Iran”.
Alaeddin Boroujerdi, the head of the Iranian parliament’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee, said on August 17 that Russian warplanes are using the remote Shahid Nojeh air base, which is about 50 kilometers away from the city of Hamadan in northwestern Iran. Moscow says it is more convenient to fly from a base in Iran.
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The Russian Defense Ministry says its warplanes have launched a new wave of airstrikes on Islamic State fighters in Syria.
