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The US military says it has shot down an Iranian drone that “aggressively” approached the Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier in the Arabian Sea.
The Iranian Shahed-139 drone was flying toward the carrier “with unclear intent” when it was shot down by a F-35 US fighter jet, US Central Command said on Tuesday.
“An F-35C fighter jet from Abraham Lincoln shot down the Iranian drone in self-defence and to protect the aircraft carrier and personnel on board,” Capt Tim Hawkins, a navy spokesperson at Central Command, said. He added that no US service members were harmed or US equipment damaged.
The shooting down came as diplomats attempted to arrange nuclear talks between Iran and the US, and President Donald Trump said that with US warships heading toward Iran “bad things” would probably happen unless a deal could be reached.
Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, said on Tuesday he had instructed the country’s foreign minister to “pursue fair and equitable negotiations” with the US, the first clear sign Tehran wants to negotiate with Washington.
The announcement marked a significant turn for the reformist Iranian president, who had told Iranians for weeks that the turmoil in Iran had gone beyond his control. It also indicated that the president had support from Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, for talks, which the 86-year-old cleric had previously had dismissed.
The Lincoln carrier strike group is the most visible part of a US military buildup in the Middle East following a violent crackdown against anti-government demonstrations in Iran last month, the deadliest domestic unrest since the 1979 revolution.
Trump, who stopped short of carrying out his threats to intervene during the crackdown, has since demanded Tehran make nuclear concessions, and sent a flotilla to its coast. He said last week Iran was “seriously talking”, while Tehran’s top security official, Ali Larijani, said arrangements for negotiations were under way.
Central Command said that in another incident on Tuesday, in the Strait of Hormuz, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards harassed a US-flagged, US-crewed merchant vessel.
“Two IRGC boats and an Iranian Mohajer drone approached M/V Stena Imperative at high speeds and threatened to board and seize the tanker,” Hawkins said.
