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Iran Reports Missile Test, Drawing Rebuke


This image from Iranian television shows a Shahab-3 missile being test-fired on Wednesday.

By ALAN COWELL
Published: July 10, 2008

PARIS — One day after threatening to strike Tel Aviv and United States interests if attacked, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards were reported on Wednesday to have test-fired nine missiles, including one which the government in Tehran says has the range to reach Israel.

State-run media said the missiles were long- and medium-range weapons, among them a new version of the Shahab-3, which Tehran maintains is able to hit targets 1,250 miles away from its firing position. Parts of western Iran are within 650 miles of Tel Aviv.

The reported tests coincide with increasingly tense negotiations over Tehran’s nuclear program, which Iran says is for civilian purposes but which many Western governments suspect is aimed at building nuclear weapons.

At the same time, United States and British warships have been conducting naval maneuvers in the Persian Gulf — apparently within range of the launching site of the missiles tested on Wednesday. Israel insisted it did not want war with Iran.

“Israel has no desire for conflict or hostilities with Iran,” Mark Regev, a spokesman for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said. “But the Iranian nuclear program and the Iranian ballistic missile program must be of grave concern to the entire international community.”

The missile tests drew a sharp response from the United States. Gordon D. Johndroe, the deputy White House press secretary, said in a statement at the Group of 8 meeting in Japan that Iran’s development of ballistic missiles was a violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.

“The Iranian regime only furthers the isolation of the Iranian people from the international community when it engages in this sort of activity,” Mr. Johndroe said.

He urged Iran to “refrain from further missile tests if they truly seek to gain the trust of the world. The Iranians should stop the development of ballistic missiles which could be used as a delivery vehicle for a potential nuclear weapon immediately.”

Energy traders reacted to the news by bidding up oil prices, which had been falling in recent days. Light, low-sulfur crude for delivery next month, the most-watched oil price benchmark, rose more than $2 a barrel in early-morning electronic trading, though by late morning in New York the gain had been pared somewhat.

Iran displayed its military capability just a day after the United States and the Czech Republic signed an accord to allow the Pentagon to deploy part of its contentious antiballistic missile shield, which Washington maintains is designed to protect in part against Iranian missiles.

In the United States, both presidential contenders took the missile tests as an opportunity to demand measures to restrain Iran.

The Republican candidate, John McCain, said the tests “demonstrate the need for effective missile defense now and in future, and this includes missile defense in Europe as is planned with the Czech Republic and Poland,” according to Reuters. His Democrat challenger, Barack Obama, said on NBC’s “Today” show that the tests showed a need for stronger restraints and incentives to head off “rising tensions that could lead into real problems,” The Associated Press said.



Iran’s Arabic-language Al-Alam television and English-language Press-TV channel both reported the missile firings, which were shown on Iranian television.

Al-Alam said the missiles, fired from an undisclosed location in the Iranian desert, included a “Shahab-3 with a conventional warhead weighing one ton and a 2,000 kilometer range,” or about 1,250 miles. Cairo, Athens, Istanbul, New Delhi and the whole of the Arabian peninsula are within 1,250 miles of Iranian territory. Iran was first known to have fired a Shahab-3 in November, 2006.

The other missiles in the tests were identified as the Zelzal, with a range of 250 miles and the Fateh, with a range of 110 miles, Agence France-Presse reported. Iranian television showed what was said to be the Shahab-3 missile rising amid clouds of dust from the desert launch site.

Hossein Salami, a commander of the Revolutionary Guards, was quoted as saying: “The aim of these war games is to show we are ready to defend the integrity of the Iranian nation.”

“Our missiles are ready for shooting at any place and any time, quickly and with accuracy. The enemy must not repeat its mistakes. The enemy targets are under surveillance,” he said.

The missile tests followed remarks by a senior Iranian official who was quoted Tuesday as warning the United States against attacking Iran.

“In case that they commit such foolishness, Tel Aviv and the U.S. fleet in the Persian Gulf would be the first targets to burst into flames receiving Iran’s crushing response,” said Ali Shirazi, a representative of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, according to the Iranian state news agency.

Like the missile tests, the bellicose rhetoric seemed part of an effort by Iran to couple offers of negotiation with warnings of military preparedness.

Negotiations between Iran and the West are scheduled to resume this month and Iranian officials have sounded mounting alarms about speculation that the United States or Israel could attack Tehran’s nuclear facilities. On a European tour last month, President Bush repeated Washington’s warning that no options had been ruled out.

Last weekend, Iran signaled that it would not comply with United Nations Security Council resolutions requiring it to stop enriching uranium. During his European visit, Mr. Bush won pledges from some European leaders to tighten sanctions against Iran.

But Iran’s foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, said his country was prepared to open comprehensive negotiations with the European Union’s foreign policy chief, Javier Solana, and the six world powers — the United States, Britain, France, Germany, Russia and China — that have proposed a set of incentives to resolve the impasse over its nuclear program.

Myra Noveck contributed reporting from Jerusalem and Sheryl Gay Stolberg from Rusutsu, Japan.

Copyright 2008 New York Times Company