Israel slams Iran missile test as 'provocation'

Israel denounced Iran's testing of a medium-range missile as a "provocation" to the US and its allies, Israeli Army Radio reported on Sunday.

In defiance of US warnings, Iran on Saturday tested a missile with a range of 2,000 km and that can carry multiple warheads.

"The ballistic missile which Iran fired is a provocation of the United States and its allies, including Israel," Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman said in a statement, adding it was proof of Tehran's ambition to become a world power, Xinhua reported.

"It is also a means to test our reactions as well as new proof of Iran's ambition to become a world power in order to threaten the countries of the Middle East and democratic states around the world."

The test comes at the end of a heated week of diplomacy at the UN General Assembly, where both the United States and Israel denounced Iran and its nuclear deal with six world powers.

US President Donald Trump accused Iran of destabilising the Middle East, calling it a "rogue state whose chief exports are violence, bloodshed and chaos".

The US President also threatened to scrap the 2015 nuclear accord, saying Iran is developing missiles that could be used to deliver a nuclear warhead.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to fight what he described as "an Iranian curtain" descending on the Middle East, and pledged to prevent Iran from producing any weapons that could hit Israel.

--IANS

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