TEHRAN - Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told Reuters on Tuesday that Russia could use Iranian military bases to launch air strikes against terrorist groups in Syria on a “case by case basis”.

“Russia doesn’t have a military base (in Iran), we have good cooperation, and on a case by case basis, when it is necessary for Russians fighting terrorism to use Iranian facilities, we will make a decision,” Reuters quoted Zarif as saying.

Zarif is accompanying Iranian President Hassan Rouhani on his two-day visit to Moscow.

Russia and Iran are both providing crucial military support to President Bashar al-Assad against terrorists and jihadi fighters in Syria's six-year-old conflict.

Russia announced in August 2016 that its planes had used a base in western Iran to carry out counter-terrorism air raids in Syria.

“On 16 August [2016], Tu-22M3 long-range bombers and Su-34 frontline bombers, flying with a full bomb load from the Hamedan air base, conducted a group airstrike against targets of” Daesh and Jabhat Fath al-Sham terrorist groups in the Syrian provinces of Aleppo, Dayr al-Zawr and Idlib, a Russian Defense Ministry statement said back then.

Just days later, Moscow confirmed that all warplanes based in Iran had returned to Russia.

It was the first time a foreign power had used an Iranian base since World War Two. 

The Iranian base, far closer to Syria than bases in Russia, allowed the aircraft to carry less fuel and more munitions as they struck rebel forces and positions in Syria, Russian and Iranian officials said.

"Su-24 bombers is less effective than the Tu-22M3. One Tu-22M3 can carry up to 12 tons of missiles and bombs to 2,000 km. The distance between Hamadan and Aleppo is less than 1,000 km," Russian military analyst Anton Lavrov said.

Also, flights of Russian strategic bombers from the Hamadan base would increase the intensity and efficiency of Russian airstrikes, Alexander Khamchikhin, head of the Institute for Political and Military Analysis, pointed out.

NA/AK