Turkey’s missile deployment undermines Muslim unity: Iranian lawmaker

An Iranian lawmaker says Turkey’s move to deploy NATO’s Patriot missiles on its border with Syria will fuel tensions in the region and sow division among Muslim nations.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran expects Turkey, as a powerful Muslim country, to avoid acts that could harm the foundation of Islam and lead the Muslim world into an internal confrontation instead of aligning against Israel,” Mehr news agency quoted Nozar Shafi’i as saying on Wednesday.

Shafi’i, a member of the Majlis (parliament) committee for National Security and Foreign Policy, acknowledged Ankara’s right to secure its borders.

The parliamentarian, however, warned that the NATO member state might find it inevitable to use the missiles against its Arab neighbor if the Western military alliance agreed on an armed intervention in Syria.

Shafi’i made it clear that Iran is not opposed to Turkey’s moves to tighten security at its borders, but that Turkey and Syria are both Muslim countries and Turkey is morally not expected to interfere in Syria’s internal affairs.

Turkey has officially requested NATO for the deployment of Patriot systems along its border with Syria, claiming that the move would only be defensive and that it would not “support a no-fly zone or any offensive operation” in Syria.

Patriot is a long-range, all-altitude and all-weather system employed to counter tactical ballistic and cruise missiles as well as advanced aircraft.

Russia has warned that the deployment of the missiles by Turkey could tempt Ankara to use the weapons and spark a “very serious armed conflict” involving NATO.

Damascus blames Turkey along with Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and a number of Western countries for fueling a deadly unrest that has plagued the country since March 2011.