IRANIAN Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei on Monday said that the American submarine taken by Iran was “captured as spoils of war”, asserting that such spoils are legitimate, Iran’s ‘IRNA News Agency’ reported. Speaking about the American submarine taken by Iran, Baghaei said, “It was not confiscated; it was captured as spoils of war, and such spoils are legitimate.” On Saudi Arabia’s request to postpone the regional summit, Baghaei said that attributing the request to developments in Yemen was a deviation from the main roots of the crisis, as reported by the Iranian media. “Saudi Arabia’s request to postpone the regional summit and attribute it to developments in Yemen is a deviation from the main roots of the crisis,” he said. The Iranian Revolutionary Guards earlier in September claimed responsibility for seizing an uncrewed American submarine near the gateway of the Strait of Hormuz. Iranian state media outlets identified the captured hardware as a Dive-LD, representing a large autonomous underwater vehicle manufactured by the California-based defence contractor Anduril.

 

The 19-foot submersible is engineered to perform diverse operations, including mine countermeasures, seabed mapping, intelligence gathering, and the examination of submerged critical infrastructure such as cables and pipelines, according to manufacturer specifications. Announcing the seizure through state media, the Revolutionary Guards Navy declared, “We trapped one of the most modern, intelligent and unmanned submarines of the terrorist American army at the entrance to the Strait of Hormuz. This submersible is equipped with the latest technologies.” Countering the Iranian claims, a Pentagon spokesperson clarified that an underwater drone had experienced technical failure more than a day prior. Esmail Baghaei added that Iran has always supported the roadmap agreed upon by the Yemeni parties and said the continuation of conflict between Islamic countries was in line with the “Zionist regime’s goals for perpetuating insecurity”, according to Iranian media.