U.S. and Iran vow to step up strikes in expanding war as Gulf states run low on interceptors
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi called his counterpart in neighboring Azerbaijan on Thursday and expressed regret for drone strikes that injured two people earlier in the day, but he denied the drones were part of Iran’s widespread retaliatory attacks and blamed them on Israel.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev accused Iran of a “baseless act of terror and aggression” with the strikes, which hit an airport and near a school earlier in the day, injuring two people, according to Azerbaijan’s Foreign Ministry.
Aliyev said he had ordered the Azerbaijani army to prepare and take retaliatory measures.
Araghchi told Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov that Tehran wanted to expand relations with its neighbor “in all areas” during their telephone conversation, according to an Iranian Foreign Ministry statement.
Referring to the explosions in Azerbaijan, Araghchi “denied any launch of projectiles towards this republic from Iran and said that the Iranian armed forces are carrying out the necessary investigations in this regard. He particularly highlighted the role of the Israeli regime in such attacks to mislead public opinion and harm Iran’s good relations with its neighbors, noting that other similar incidents have occurred in recent days,” according to Tehran’s reading of the call.
Araghchi has repeatedly said Iran only targets U.S. and Israeli interests in the Middle East, but it this week infuriated many of its neighbors, including Gulf states that had maintained close ties and helped facilitate negotiations with the United States, with a seemingly indiscriminate and deadly barrage of missiles and drones.
Azerbaijan closed part of its southern airspace along its shared border with Iran on Thursday and said it would remain closed to planes for at least 12 hours.
