Iran
said Saturday that it downed and captured another "enemy drone," the
semi-official Fars News Agency reported.
The incident reportedly took place
during Iranian military maneuvers in southern Iran.
"IRGC's electronic warfare
systems detected electronic signals, which indicated that foreign drones
intended to enter our country," said Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps
Lt. Gen. Hamid Sarkheili, Fars reported. "Our
specialist forces then succeeded in bringing down the drone in the field of
maneuvers."
Sarkheili said that Iran
may release film of the drone.
Earlier this month, Iran
said that it had decoded and released footage from a U.S.
drone that it downed more than a year ago.
The black and white aerial footage,
which Iran
claims was from a RQ-170 spy plane, was aired by Iranian news agencies and
placed on YouTube.
Iran
said it downed the drone on December
4, 2011, near Kashmar in the country's northeast, some 225
kilometers (140 miles) from the border with Afghanistan.
At the time, U.S.
officials acknowledged that the drone was missing and President Barack Obama
asked Iran to
return it.
Iranian military officials vowed not
to return the plane.
In December 2012, Iran's
navy claimed that it had captured another U.S.
drone, after it entered Iranian airspace over the Persian Gulf.
However, a U.S.
defense official, who could not be named because the official was not
authorized to speak to the media, told CNN that whatever the Iranians claim to
have, it is not an actively operating U.S. Navy drone.
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