TEHRAN – Rounds of bullets were fired on Monday by an anti-aircraft machine gun, in central Tehran, at a drone which had entered the no-fly zone.

Eyewitnesses said the bullets were targeted at what seemed to be an unmanned aerial vehicle. 

A military commander later said the shots were fired by Iran’s anti-aircraft forces.

“Shots have been fired at a drone as it entered the no-fly zone in Tehran,” Tehran governor Isa Farhadi said, according to Tansim news agency.

“There’s nothing to be worried about,” he said.

Central Tehran is a no-fly zone in which government institutions and the residence of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei are located.

“We do not know yet who it belonged to,” Farhadi added.

“Investigation is underway,” said Ali Asghar Naserbakht, a security official at the office of Tehran governor.  

Alireza Elhami, a commander in Iran's air defense forces, said the drone was a quadcopter that left the area after the warning shots, Tasnim reported.

Quadcopters, also called quadrotor helicopters or quadrotors, are multirotor helicopters that could be used for surveillance and reconnaissance by military and law enforcement agencies.

MH/PA