“By doing this, the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps once again showed its might and capability to enemies and proved that it responds to any aggression in the shortest possible time,” Mohammad Hassan Asafari, a member of the Iranian Majlis Foreign Policy and National Security Committee, said on Saturday.
An IRGC commander said on Wednesday that the Islamic Republic has fully extracted data from the US spy drone, which was captured by Iranian forces over the Persian Gulf upon its intrusion into Iranian airspace on Tuesday.
Iran has released footage of the captured drone, which is a long-endurance aircraft manufactured by Insitu, a subsidiary of Boeing.
Pentagon spokesman George Little acknowledged on Friday that the unmanned aerial vehicle that Iran captured is a US-made ScanEagle.
Asafari further pointed out that, violating the Islamic Republic’s airspace by the US drone proves the hostility and aggressive attitude of the United States.
“Americans on the one hand talk about negotiation and on the other hand commit such acts of intrusion against our country,” the lawmaker added.
In December 2011, the Iranian military grounded a US RQ-170 spy aircraft while it was flying over the Iranian city of Kashmar, some 140 miles (225km) from the Afghan border.
The US RQ-170 was downed with minimal damage by the Iranian Army's electronic warfare unit. The drone was one of America's most advanced spy aircraft.
Last month, Iran repelled a US drone that had entered the country’s airspace above the territorial waters in the Persian Gulf.
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