"UFO" Reports Abound Near Reputed Iranian Nuke Plants

Long before Monday's Washington Post article reporting the US has sent one UAV after another over Iran to eyeball that country's controversial nuclear plant, Iranians who live and work in the neighborhood had been reporting mysterious UFOs.

For more than a year now, Iranians have been reporting strange, shiny objects overhead. Some even took pictures. Most of the sightings were in northern and northwest Iran, home to the very same nuclear plants the US and UN have been worried are used to create nuclear weapons.

"Most of the shining objects that our people see in Iran's airspace are American spying equipment used to spy on Iran's nuclear and military facilities," said Iranian Information Minister Ali Yunessi, as quoted in the New York Times. "If any of the bright objects come close, they will definitely meet our fire and will be shot down. We possess the necessary equipment to confront them."

Something Big Goes Bang

Not long after that statement, local news organizations reported a large explosion in southern Iran. Those reports indicated Iranian anti-aircraft batteries had fired on one of the mysterious air vehicles, causing the explosion.

There was an immediate flurry of contradictory reports from the region surrounding the explosion. One government official was reported to have attributed the explosion to a fuel tank falling from an airplane. A spokesman for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards said the blast was part of a dam construction project. Another government official, paraphrased in the Times, said there was a big bang, but no blast.

"The unidentified flying objects could be satellites, comets or spying or reconnaissance crafts trying to monitor Iran's nuclear installations," the daily news publication Ressalat quoted a spokesman for the Regular Army Air Force, Col. Salman Mahini, as saying.

"Flights of unknown objects in the country's airspace have increased in the recent weeks," he continued. "They have been seen over Bushehr and Isfahan province.... All anti-aircraft units and jet fighters have been ordered to shoot down any flying objects over Iran's air space."

So far, Washington has denied sending UAVs over Iran. Iranian air defense officials, at least in public, agree. They say there has been no penetration of Iranian airspace by any unauthorized foreign aircraft.

FMI: www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/ir.html