Iran has shot down a US military drone using a surface-to-air missile, Iran and American military officials said, amid an escalating row over alleged attacks on oil tankers in the Strait of Hormuz.
IRNA said the drone was hit when it entered Iranian airspace near the Kouhmobarak district in southern Iran’s Hormozgan province.
Last week the US military accused Iran of firing a missile at another drone that responded to the oil tanker attacks near the Gulf of Oman.
The secretary of Iran’s supreme national security council Ali Shamkhani had warned on Wednesday of Tehran’s harsh response to any intrusion into its airspace or maritime borders.
Shamkhani emphasised that Iran robustly protects its aerial and maritime borders, describing its airspace as the country’s “red line”. “No matter whose plane trespasses into it (the airspace), we have always given and will give a harsh response to intruders.”
