Baku, Azerbaijan, April 29
By Umid Niayesh - Trend:
The Iranian army deputy chief-of-staff has claimed that Iran has made a new missile system which is more advanced compared to the Russian S-300 anti-aircraft missile system.
"Iranian Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei ordered Iranian experts to produce home-made version of S-300 after Russian side cancelled the contract to supply Iran with the system," Gen. Mohammad Hejazi said, Iranian Mehr news agency reported on April 29.
"Our experts have made big achievements on the issue," Hejazi said, adding that the details of the project will be made public when its time comes.
Russia signed a contract with Iran in 2007 to deliver five S-300 advanced ground-to-air missiles at a cost of $800 million.
In 2010, Russia's then president Dmitry Medvedev cancelled the contract because of UN Security Council sanctions over concerns about Tehran's disputed nuclear program.
One of the most advanced multi-target anti-aircraft missile systems in the world, the S-300 has a reported ability to track up to 100 targets simultaneously while engaging up to 12 at the same time.
In mid-February the commander of Iran's Khatam al-Anbiya Air Defense Base Brigadier General Farzad Esmaili announced that the country will launch Bavar 373, the Iranian version of S-300 in the next two years.
The technical problems hampering construction of Bavar 373 have been resolved, and development and construction of the sophisticated anti-missile defense system would be completed by the end of Iran's Fifth Five-Year Development Plan (2010-2015), Esmaili said.
The commander claimed that "the domestic system will be more powerful than the S-300 missile system."