TEHRAN – Iran is confident that its air defense will deploy a domestically made ballistic missile by March 2018, which it says matches the prestigious Russian-made S-300.

“In parallel with the deployment of the S-300, work on Bavar-373 system is underway,” Farzad Esmaili, commander of the Khatam ul-Anbiya Air Defense Base, told the IRIB on Saturday evening a day before he and his staff were to meet Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Iran has already tested its home-grown air defense system, designed to match the Russian S-300, Esmaili said, adding, “The system is made completely in Iran and some of its parts are different from the S-300. All of its sub-systems have been completed and its missile tests have been conducted.”

The general said Bavar (which means faith) is Iran’s first long-range missile defense system, and is set to be operational by this year’s end, the Iranian calendar year which ends on March 20.

In 2010, Iran began manufacturing Bavar-373 after the purchase of the S-300 from Russia was suspended due to international sanctions.

Russia resumed the sale following the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers which lifted sanctions, and Iran's S-300 defense system became operational in March.

On Saturday, the new defense minister Amir Hatami said Iran has “a special plan to boost missile power”.

Hatami said he hoped “the combat capabilities of Iran's ballistic and cruise missiles” would increase in the next four years.

The comments as well as the commanders’ meeting with the Supreme Leader come amid increasing tensions with Washington, which has passed new sanctions against Iran's ballistic missile program.

SP/PA