TEHRAN - Iran has denied President Donald Trump’s claim that a US Navy ship had “destroyed” an Iranian drone.
Mr Trump said on Thursday that the drone had flown to within 1,000 yards of the USS Boxer and had ignored “multiple calls to stand down” in the latest episode to stir tensions in the Gulf.
It was the first US military engagement with Iran following a series of increasingly serious incidents.
“We have not lost any drone in the Strait of Hormuz nor anywhere else. I am worried that USS Boxer has shot down their own UAS [Unmanned Aerial System] by mistake!,” Abbas Araqchi, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister, responded in a tweet this morning.
Brigadier General Abolfazl Shekarchi, an Iranian armed forces spokesman, added: “Despite Trump’s baseless and delusional claims, all of (Iran’s) drones... have safely returned to their bases.
“There have been no reports of a confrontation with the American USS Boxer” naval vessel, he added, quoted by Tasnim news agency.
Mr Trump announced that the USS Boxer, an amphibious assault ship, “took defensive action” against the Iranian drone as it was “threatening the safety of the ship and the ship’s crew.”
“The United States reserves the right to defend our personnel, our facilities and interests and calls upon all nations to condemn Iran’s attempts to disrupt freedom of navigation and global commerce,” he said.
A first-hand account from a journalist aboard the Boxer suggested that Iran had been harassing the navy ship before the drone was shot down.
A Wall Street Journal reporter said that an unarmed Iranian navy Bell 212 helicopter flew alongside them, yards away from the deck, before it was chased away by a US helicopter.
The convoy of six US warships passed numerous Iranian speedboats without incident, but was then tailed by a larger Iranian warship which closed to within 500 yards of the Boxer.
An Iranian Y-12 surveillance drone then came even closer and was then brought down by electronic warfare jamming.
The apparent confrontation came as Iran defended its detention Sunday of a “foreign tanker” believed to be the Panamanian-flagged vessel Riah and its 12 crew for allegedly smuggling fuel. (The Telegraph)