Iranian state media reported missile drills in several cities on Monday, as Tehran said its missile program was strictly defensive against the backdrop of rising regional tensions and warnings from Israel.
The semi-official Fars news agency, citing field observations and public reports, said missile tests were observed in multiple locations, including Tehran, Isfahan, Mashhad, Khorramabad and Mahabad.
Iran’s state broadcaster and the semi-official Nournews published videos that appeared to show missile launches, without specifying the exact locations. Other reports said launches took place in Tehran, Isfahan and Mashhad.
Earlier in the day, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmaeil Baghaei rejected any discussion of Iran’s military capabilities, saying the country’s missile program had been developed solely to defend Iran’s sovereignty and was not subject to negotiation.
“Iran’s defensive capabilities are by no means an issue that can be discussed,” he said.
The reports came a day after Axios said Israel had warned the United States that recent Iranian missile drills could be used as cover for preparations for a surprise attack, citing Israeli officials.
US officials told Axios, however, that Washington currently saw no indication of an imminent Iranian strike.
Iranian media said the satellites would be launched at 1648 local time (1318 GMT) aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket from the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s far east. The payload includes Paya, also known as Tolou-3, Zafar-2 and a prototype satellite known as Kowsar-1.5.
Paya (Tolou-3) is Iran’s heaviest Earth-observation satellite to date, weighing about 150 kg, with imaging resolution of around five meters for black-and-white images and about 10 meters for color imagery, Iranian officials have said.
The satellite, made by the Iranian Space Agency, is designed for applications including agriculture monitoring, water resource management, environmental monitoring and disaster assessment.
Zafar-2, developed by Iran University of Science and Technology, is also an Earth-observation satellite intended for mapping, environmental monitoring and tracking natural hazards.
The Kowsar-1.5 satellite is a combined platform integrating imaging and internet-of-things capabilities, aimed primarily at smart agriculture and farm monitoring.
The Iranian satellites will be launched alongside a large cluster of mainly Russian spacecraft into a sun-synchronous low Earth orbit.
According to launch data, the mission also includes Russian Earth-observation satellites such as Aist-2T and Zorkiy-2M units, multiple Marafon and SITRO satellites designed for internet-of-things and ship-tracking services, as well as university-built and technology demonstration satellites from Russia and partner countries including Belarus, Kuwait and Montenegro.
Iran says its space activities are civilian and focused on scientific and economic uses, though Western governments argue that satellite launch technologies overlap with those used for long-range ballistic missiles.
Iran has increasingly relied on Russian launch services in recent years, even as it develops domestic launch sites and heavier rockets.
