News / Politics

Zarif tweets detailed map showing US spy drone hit in Iran’s airspace

Saturday, 22 June 2019 3:44 PM [ Last Update: Saturday, 22 June 2019 4:03 PM ]

Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif

Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has tweeted a map with detailed coordinates that shows a US spy drone shot down two days ago was within the Islamic Republic’s territorial waters.

"For more visual detail on the path, location, and point of impact of the US military drone Iran shot down on Thursday, and of the waters over which it was flying, see these maps and coordinates," Mohammad Javad Zarif wrote on his Twitter account on Saturday.

For more visual detail on the path, location, and point of impact of the U.S. military drone Iran shot down on Thursday, and of the waters over which it was flying, see these maps and coordinates.

There can be no doubt about where the vessel was when it was brought down. pic.twitter.com/eInqIYolaS
— Javad Zarif (@JZarif) June 22, 2019

"There can be no doubt about where the vessel was when it was brought down," Zarif wrote.

The map also showed two yellow squares on the flight path of the doomed drone which indicated Iranian radio warnings sent to the aircraft.

LEGEND: blue=drone; yellow line=Iranian FIR; red line=Iranian territorial waters; ; green line=baseline internal waters; yellow dots=Iran radio warnings sent; red dot=point of impact. pic.twitter.com/Fs2jadCuoq
— Javad Zarif (@JZarif) June 22, 2019

"One last visual: Red dot is the impact point of the trespassing drone against the border of Iran; and the border of the United States," Zarif stressed.

One last visual: Red dot is the impact point of the trespassing drone against the border of Iran; and the border of the United States. pic.twitter.com/nqVYI6EmkL
— Javad Zarif (@JZarif) June 22, 2019

The Islamic Revolution Guards Corpse (IRGC) shot down a US surveillance drone Thursday in the Strait of Hormuz after it did not heed four warning signals, even as the force spared a second spy plane carrying 35 passengers which accompanied the downed aircraft.

Hours after the incident, the US military confirmed that one of its drones had been shot, claiming that the incident took place in international airspace.

Navy Captain Bill Urban, a spokesman for the US military's Central Command, also alleged that it was "an unprovoked attack.”

On Thursday, Zarif said the country would take the case of US drone encroaching on its territory to the United Nations to prove Washington was lying about the aircraft having been shot down over international waters.

PressTV-Iran refrains from hitting intruding manned US plane: IRGC

A senior IRGC commander says Iran refrained from shooting down a US plane with 35 people on board in the Persian Gulf.

Read more:

‘Iran will take US to UN over drone encroachment’

US President Donald Trump initially issued a series of cataclysmic threats, insisting that the RQ-4 Global Hawk was flying over international waters when it was taken down by an Iranian missile.

However, the GPS coordinates released by Iran put the drone eight miles off the country’s coast, inside the 12 nautical miles from the shore, which is Iran's territorial waters.

Read more:

Iran condemns US drone incursion in letter to UN

On Friday, Trump claimed he aborted a military strike on Iran because it could have killed 150 people, but many analysts believe the announcement was a face-saving move vis-a-vis a determined Tehran.

Iran said the IRGC shot down the US drone with a Khordad 3 missile defense system, which can detect and track targets 95 miles away and down them at a distance of 30 miles. The system can target enemy aircraft flying as high as 81,000 feet, or roughly 15 miles.

On Friday, the IRGC showed retrieved sections of the US military drone.