Iran has manufactured a 10-tonne bomb comparable in scale to the United States’ ‘mother of all bombs’ which was dropped in Afghanistan in April earlier this year.
Airspace Commander of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards General Amir Ali Hajizadeh said, “These bombs are at our disposal, can be launched from aircraft and they are highly destructive,” reported The Independent.
Speaking to Iran’s state news agency, FARS, Hajizadeh described the bomb as the ‘father of all bombs’ drawing comparison with the Massive Ordnance Air Blast Bomb (MOAB) which the US Air Force dropped on tunnels in Afghanistan’s Nangarhar province from an MC-130 aircraft in April.
The MOAB is the largest non-nuclear weapon ever used in combat by the US military. Its explosion is equivalent to 11 tonnes of TNT and the blast radius is a mile wide.
The announcement comes as tensions are escalating between the US and Iran over the development of its military programme.
Earlier this month, Iranian state media claimed the country’s military had tested its first ever long-range missile defence system which irked the US.
In 2015, massive economic sanctions on Iran were lifted after the government agreed to restrict development of its nuclear weapons. The United Nations (UN) resolution, signed by five members of the security council, called upon Iran not to “undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including launches using such ballistic missile technology”.
Iran maintains it has complied with the UN accord. However, the Trump administration has repeatedly said it believes Iran is violating the terms of the agreement.
“In our view, Iran is clearly in default of these expectations of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action”, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said this week at a press conference in London.
The country’s actions were “threatening the security of those in the region as well as the United States itself”, he said.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said, “The Iranian nation is standing firm and any wrong move by the domineering regime regarding the [nuclear accord] will face the reaction of the Islamic Republic.”