Media reports say drones attacked a military plant in Iran’s central city of Isfahan.
Iran’s Fars News Agency (FNA) reported on January 29 that Iran’s Defense Ministry has announced that the country's air defense units foiled a drone attack on a defense industrial complex in the central province of Isfahan.
“An explosion has occurred in one of the military centers affiliated to the Ministry of Defense,” the deputy head of security for Isfahan governorate Mohammad Reza Jan-Nesari was quoted as saying by FNA.
Jan-Nesari said the explosion left some damage, “but fortunately there were no casualties.”
Iran’s national news agency IRNA said later the same day that the explosion had been caused by “small drones.”
“There was an unsuccessful attack by small drones against a defense ministry industrial complex and fortunately with predictions and air defense arrangements already in place, one of them (struck),” IRNA said in a post on Twitter, citing the country’s defense ministry, according to CNN.
“The air defense system of the complex was able to destroy two other drones. Fortunately, this unsuccessful attack killed no one and minor damage was sustained to the roof of the complex.”
The ministry said the attack took place at 10:30 p.m. local time.
CNN says the plant is about 440 kilometers south of Tehran.
In the past few years, several explosions and suspicious fires have occurred around Iranian military and nuclear facilities.
In July 2020, a fire tore through the Iranian Natanz nuclear complex, a site that has been key to the country’s uranium enrichment program, in Isfahan province. According to Iran’s Supreme Nation Security Council, Iranian authorities decided not to publicly announce the findings on what caused the fire due to security concerns.
The BBC says that in 2020 Iran alleged that Israel was behind the assassination of one of its top nuclear scientists, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh.
The following year, a blackout occurred in Natanz on the anniversary of National Nuclear Day, with Iran’s Atomic Energy Organization (AEOI) calling it a “terrorist action.” Israel’s army chief appeared to hint at possible Israeli involvement in the incident.
In October 2019, an oil tanker belonging to the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) was hit and damaged by two missiles. A spokesperson for the National Iranian Tanker Company initially suggested it could have been fired from Saudi soil, but that was later dismissed and the Iran government did not provide an alternative conclusion.
Earlier that year, a truck loaded with explosives detonated and struck a bus carrying members of the Iranian military’s elite Revolutionary Guard in the southeastern province of Sistan-Baluchestan, killing at least 23 and wounding 17. A separatist group called Jaish al-Adl, or Army of Justice (Salafi Islamist militant organization), claimed responsibility for the suicide attack.
