News / Politics

Iran says missile tests not violate UN resolution

Friday, 25 March 2016 9:01 AM [ Last Update: Friday, 25 March 2016 8:59 AM ]

Iran’s Ambassador to the UN Gholamali Khoshroo ©AFP

Iran’s ambassador to the UN says the country’s recent ballistic missile tests do not violate a UN Security Council resolution that endorses Tehran’s nuclear agreement with world powers.

Gholamali Khoshroo said in a letter to UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and the UN Security Council that the missile tests were not against the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) adopted in July.

“Security Council resolution 2231 does not prohibit legitimate and conventional military activities, nor does international law disallow them,” the Iranian ambassador said in the letter.

He added that the missile tests “were part of ongoing efforts of its (Iran’s) armed forces to strengthen its legitimate defense capabilities.”

Resolution 2231 (2015), which endorses the nuclear agreement, provides for the termination of the provisions of previous Security Council resolutions on the Iranian nuclear program and establishes specific restrictions that apply to all states without exception.

A long-range Iranian Qadr ballistic missile is launched in the Alborz mountain range in northern Iran on March 9, 2016. ©AFP

The resolution calls upon Iran not to undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including launches using such ballistic missile technology.

Khoshroo said Tehran “fully honors its commitment” under the JCPOA and that there is “no basis for the raising of this issue in the Security Council.”

“It is contrary to the prevailing positive environment and detrimental to the good faith implementation” of the nuclear agreement, he said.

On March 9, Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) successfully test-fired two ballistic missiles as part of military drills to assess the IRGC's capabilities. The missiles dubbed Qadr-H and Qadr-F were fired during large-scale drills, code-named Eqtedar-e-Velayat.

Iran fired another ballistic missile dubbed Qiam from silo-based launchers in different locations across the country on March 8.

Earlier this month, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said the missiles are a means of defense. “We spent a fraction of any other country in the region on defense, and missiles are a means of defense that we require.”

After Iran and the P5+1 group of countries – the US, Britain, Russia, France, China and Germany - started to implement the JCPOA on January 16, all nuclear-related sanctions imposed on Iran by the European Union, the Security Council and the US were lifted. Iran, in return, has put some limitations on its nuclear activities.

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