Teheran 13 Sep (ANA) - Iran reportedly threatened to shoot down two US Navy spy planes as they flew over international waters in the Persian Gulf this weekend. US defense officials said a Navy P-8 Poseidon aircraft and a EP-3 Eries were warned if they didn't change course they would be shot down. The military planes were on a reconnaissance mission 13 miles off the coast of Iran on September 10 when the incident occurred, meaning they were just one mile outside Iran's territorial waters. International maritime law says nations can lay claim to a belt of waters extending 12 nautical miles from the coast. 'It's one thing to tell someone to get off your lawn, but we weren't on their lawn,' an official told Fox News. The incident comes after at least five other confrontations in the area - denounced by the Pentagon as 'unprofessional' encounters - were revealed in the past month. In one incident, an Iranian boat came within 100 yards of a US coastal patrol ship in the Persian Gulf, forcing the USS Firebolt to maneuver out of the way. Another confrontation prompted an American ship to fire warning shots. A senior Iranian military commander on Sunday dismissed claims from Washington that US patrol ships have been harassed by Iranian boats in the Persian Gulf, saying Tehran acted according to international law. 'Iranian boats continue to act based on defined standards and are well aware of the international laws and regulations, so the claims are not only untrue, but stem from their fear of the power of Iran's soldiers,' said Brigadier General Masoud Jazayeri, deputy chief of staff of Iran's armed forces.

The Pentagon last week said seven Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps fast-attack boats approached the USS Firebolt on September 4 with their machine guns uncovered, though not trained on the Americans. But Jazayeri said the claims were exaggerated. 'When Iranian boats pass by them at a distance of a few kilometers, Americans claim that Iranian boats have approached them within a range of one kilometer,' he said. 'Iran's marine corps will never be stopped by the propaganda of extra-regional enemies and their vassals in the region in guarding the Islamic Republic of Iran's sea borders and economic interests,' he added. US navy officials say ships from the two countries interacted more than 300 times in 2015 and more than 250 times in the first half of this year, and claims 10 percent of those encounters were unsafe and unprofessional.(ANA)

FA/ANA/13 September 2016-----