Iran’s defense resolve will never waver: Dehqan

Iranian Defense Minister Brigadier General Hossein Dehqan says the country’s military resolve will never waver and will always remain strong against any potential threat.

“Nothing can erode our determination [to improve] our defense capabilities,” Dehqan said in a televised interview on Saturday, adding that Iran will continue to design and manufacture any type of missiles proportionate to all potential threats.

Dehqan said Iran’s missiles currently meet the country’s defensive requirements, saying, “We will increase the range of our missiles in proportion to possible threats.”

He stated that Iran is also determined to conduct missile tests and military exercises in due time.

Dehqan’s remarks came on the same day that Iran unveiled a new solid-fuel precision-guided missile, named Fateh 313, which has been designed and manufactured by the country’s experts.

Fateh 313, with a range of 500 kilometers (310 miles), is an advanced generation of missiles which runs on combined solid fuel using a domestically-designed sensor.

Russia’s S-300 delivery to Iran

Elsewhere in his remarks, Dehqan said Russia has agreed to deliver the S-300 surface-to-air missile defense system to Iran by the end of 2015. He added that the control systems of the S-300 have been upgraded.

Moscow had banned the delivery of the missile defense system to Tehran in 2010 under the pretext that the agreement it signed with Iran in 2007 was covered by the fourth round of the UN Security Council sanctions against the country over its nuclear program.

On April 13, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a presidential decree paving the way for the long-overdue delivery of the defense system to Iran after Tehran and the P5+1 group of countries reached a mutual understanding on Tehran’s nuclear program in the Swiss city of Lausanne on April 2.

Dehqan also dismissed any link between the delivery of the S-300 missile defense system and the country’s domestically-built Bavar-373 air defense system.

Bavar-373 air defense system was successfully test-fired last August. The long-range air defense system, which is similar to the Russian S-300, has been manufactured by Iranian defense experts and is capable of hitting air targets at a high altitude.