Tehran, Aug 20, IRNA – Defense Minister Hossein Dehqan said Iran has received the full package of S-300 defensive missile systems from Russia.


The minister made the remarks here on Saturday while talking to reporters on the eve of Defense Industry Day.

He said parts of the package have already been delivered to Iran with the rest being in the stage of loading and transporting to the country.

He went on to elaborate on the history of the deal with Russia over the S-300 missiles and said the one Iran had signed with Russia was unilaterally frozen by Moscow in 2010 under the excuse of the United Nations resolutions.

Iran compiled a lawsuit on the issue with international legal bodies, he added.

After President Hassan Rouhani took office, the minister added, the issue was discussed in the highest political level between the two countries.

It was also considered during talks between the presidents of the two countries, the minister stated.

Dehqan also said that during his first trip to Moscow as the Iranian defense minister he raised the issue with his Russian counterpart and finally got the approval of the Russia’s President Vladimir Putin on implementation of the agreement.

In April last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin lifted a previous ban on the delivery of S-300 to Iran.

In November 2015, Russia signed a new contract to supply Iran with the systems by the end of that year for the first time since the 2010 freeze on supplies under the UN Security Council resolutions.

The development came after Iran and the P5+1 states — Russia, China, France, Britain, the US and Germany — reached a landmark agreement, dubbed the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), on Tehran’s nuclear program in July last year.

On February 15 this year, the Russian Foreign Ministry official Zamir Kabulov told RIA Novosti that Russia will deliver the S-300 surface-to-air defensive missile systems to Iran in “the nearest time” as part of a long-running contract between Tehran and Moscow.

By IRNA