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The 2,000-kilometre range had placed parts of Greece and the Balkans, the entire Arabian Peninsula, the Levant and most of Egypt within the reach of Iran’s ballistic missiles, according to The Times of Israel. In March, Iran reportedly attempted, but failed, to strike the joint US-UK military base at Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean, approximately 4,000 kilometres (2,500 miles) away, The Times of Israel reported. Separately, NBC News reported that some of US President Donald Trump’s advisers had told him, five days before Tuesday’s midterm elections, that any decision to resume major combat operations against Iran should be taken before the new Congress is sworn in in January.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has announced that a self-imposed restriction limiting the range of its ballistic missiles to 2,000 kilometres (1,200 miles) “has been lifted”. Asked whether the restriction on missile range remained in place, Mohebbi said, “That restriction has been lifted for us. “We will demonstrate these capabilities in practice,” he said, according to reports. The announcement came days after a statement attributed to Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Mojtaba Khomeini, warned that “any kind and level of threat” from the US or Israel would be met with a response without geographical limits.
The move could open the door for Tehran to pursue longer-range missile capabilities amid growing fears of a renewed full-scale conflict with the United States and Israel. He added that Iran would demonstrate its capabilities rather than make further statements. The missile announcement comes as military tensions continue across the region.
US officials have previously warned that technology developed through Iran’s space programme could potentially be repurposed to build intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs). IRGC spokesman general Hossein Mohebbi made the remarks at a press conference in Tehran on Saturday, according to news agency AP. The US Central Command said on Saturday that American forces had disabled a St Kitts-flagged commercial vessel in the Gulf of Oman after it allegedly ignored repeated warnings and attempted to leave the region after visiting an Iranian port.