Special to WorldTribune.com

NICOSIA — Iran has reported the export of indigenous unmanned aerial
vehicles.

Officials said the Teheran regime has exported several models of UAVs to
allies in the Middle East and Africa. They said Iran’s defense industry has
enhanced its technological capability by reserve-engineering U.S. unmanned
platforms.

“Iran has become a world leader in UAV technology,” Iranian Deputy
Science and Technology Minister Mohammed Mahdinejad said.

Mahdinejad said Teheran was exporting Iranian-designed and manufactured UAVs to a range of countries. The deputy minister cited Syria and Venezuela.

Officials said Iran was also exporting UAVs and military equipment to
African and Central Asian states. They did not elaborate.

Iran’s UAV industry is said to have been bolstered by the acquisition
of U.S. technology. Parliamentarian Avaz Heidarpour, a member of the
National Security Committee, said Teheran reverse-engineered the U.S. Air Force’s RQ-170 Sentinel, captured by the Iranian military in December 2011.

“Iranian experts examined and analyzed the RQ-170 UAV,” Heidarpour said
on Dec. 12. “Its components were brought down so that all files and boards
of the UAV were copied and used to improve Iran’s unmanned aircraft.”

Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said it also reverse-engineered
the U.S. military’s ScanEagle, a tactical UAV. IRGC said three ScanEagles,
manufactured by Boeing, were downed after they entered Iranian air space in
the Gulf. Washington has refused to confirm that the ScanEagles went
missing.

  After reverse-engineering U.S. drone, Avaz Heidarpour, Iran bills itself world leader in UAV tech, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Mohammed Mahdinejad, RQ-170 Sentinel, ScanEagle