Article Posted on : - Nov 15, 2010

TEHRAN (AFP): Iran has conducted defence drills at its sensitive nuclear facilities, a senior commander told media Sunday, adding that fresh aerial war games will be launched across the country next week.

"This year, we carried out tactical drills which resembled real combat in Fordo, Tehran, Natanz, Bushehr and Isfahan," where the country's nuclear plants are located, the Mehr news agency quoted Ahmad Mighani as saying.

Mighani did not specify when exactly the exercises were conducted.
Iran's arch-foes Israel and the United States have not ruled out a resort to military action to prevent it developing a nuclear weapons capability, an ambition it strongly denies.

Mighani said the armed forces will stage a new five-day air defence drill from Tuesday "all over the country in order to improve defence capability," the Fars news agency reported.

Iran's armed forces regularly conduct such exercises to show off the country's military prowess and test-fire what they boast are home-made missiles.

Following the latest package of UN sanctions on Iran, Russia refused to deliver long sought-after S-300 ground-to-air missiles.

A top commander said on Wednesday that Iran would soon test its own version of the S-300. It was unclear whether that would be during the upcoming war games.