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A photo of the Iranian army shows the drones: allegedly hundreds of meters below ground
Photo: IMAGO/Iranian Army Office/ IMAGO/ZUMA Wire
It is said to be hundreds of meters underground and is said to house around 100 drones: Iran says it has an underground air force base for drones.
Iranian state television showed footage of the base for the first time on Saturday.
"Combat, reconnaissance and attack drones" are stationed at the base under the Sagros Mountains in the west of the country, it said.
State television reported on a visit by Iranian chief of staff Mohammed Bagheri and army chief Abdolrahim Musawi to the underground facility.
The exact location of the drone base was not mentioned.
A state television reporter said he flew by helicopter from the city of Kermanshah for about 45 minutes.
Only after arrival was he allowed to remove a blindfold.
Equipped with air-to-surface missiles
Television images showed drones inside a tunnel.
According to state television, the flagship of the drone fleet is the Kaman-22, a missile-equipped drone that can fly at least 2,000 kilometers.
Another type of drone said to be stationed there is the Ababil-5, which the report says is armed with air-to-surface missiles similar to the US Hellfire missiles.
"Without a doubt, the Iranian army's drones are the most powerful in the region," said army chief Musawi.
"Our ability to upgrade drones is unstoppable."
The US and Israel have accused Iran of supplying drones to its Middle East allies, including the Lebanese Hezbollah militia, the government of Syrian ruler Bashar al-Assad and Yemen's Houthi rebels.
The US Treasury Department imposed sanctions on Iran's Revolutionary Guards drone program in October.
Washington accused the elite force of being behind drone strikes on an oil refinery in Saudi Arabia in September 2019 and on a merchant ship off the coast of Oman, killing two crew members.
Iran denied the allegations.
The report on state television came after the Revolutionary Guards detained two Greek tankers in the Persian Gulf on Friday.
It is apparently about retaliation for an Iranian ship that was held up in Greece last month.
Greek authorities had prevented the oil tanker from continuing its journey with reference to EU sanctions, later US authorities confiscated the oil and wanted to bring it to the USA on another tanker.
The incident happened at a sensitive time.
Iran and the United States, among others, are currently negotiating a new version of the nuclear deal that was canceled by then-US President Donald Trump.
Sep/AFP/Reuters
