Eyeing nuclear sites, Iran tests new anti-aircraft missile

Missile has higher "destruction power" and is meant to defend Tehran's nuclear plants, report says; official blames US, Israel for Stuxnet worm.

Iran on Saturday tested a new anti-aircraft missile system dubbed the Sayyad-2 and the country's defense officials said the system will be deployed throughout the country in the near future, Fars News Agency reported.

Tehran had previously introduced the Sayyad-1 surface-to-air missile which is capable of destroying targets with a low Radar Cross Section (RCS) at low and medium altitudes, and can also defuse electronic warfare attacks, according to Fars report.

The newest Sayyad-2 is an upgraded version of the system and has "higher precision, range and destruction power," said the report.

Iranian Lietenant Commander Colonel Abolfazi Farmahini said recent tests of the mid-range hawk anti-aircraft missiles, conducted near the Khondab nuclear facility, successfully hit their targets. He said the test was aimed at assessing the level of preparedness of the system in defending Iran's nuclear plants.

Farmahini said the Khatam ol-Anbia Air Defense Base tests the missiles regularly to strengthen the country's defense capabilities.

Also Saturday, Iranian military officials said the US and Israel are behind the Stuxnet computer worm that has harmed the country's nuclear program, AFP reported quoting IRNA.

"Investigations and studies show that the source of Stuxnet originates from America and the Zionist regime," Gholam Reza Jalali, the commander of the Iranian civil defense organization, said.

Jalali stated that once the worm is mounted on a system, it starts collecting information and then sends reports from the infected machines to specific Internet addresses.

"After following up the reports that were sent, it became clear that the final destinations (of these reports) were the Zionist regime and the American state of Texas," IRNA quoted Jalili as saying.

Jalili was the first Iranian military official to blame the US and Israel for the Stuxnet virus last year.

http://www.jpost.com/IranianThreat/News/Article.aspx?id=216853