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Azerbaijan Dismisses Claims on Its Airspace Used to Attack Iran

Azerbaijan Dismisses Claims on Its Airspace Used to Attack Iran
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Azerbaijan Dismisses Claims on Its Airspace Used to Attack Iran

Azerbaijan Dismisses Claims on Its Airspace Used to Attack Iran

Azerbaijan’s Defense Ministry on Monday denied allowing another country to use its airspace to carry out attacks on Iran.

"Information about Russia's 'Container' radar system detecting unknown planes using Azerbaijan's airspace to carry out attacks on Iran is an absolute lie," Azerbaijan's Defense Ministry said according to Azerbaijan's International News.

“The dissemination of such information is aimed at undermining the Azerbaijani-Iranian relations," the Ministry told International News and declared that the allegations of Azerbaijan's involvement were propagated by "pro-Armenian forces" with the aim of damaging the relations between Iran and Azerbaijan.

The Azerbaijani Defense Ministry also stressed that Azerbaijan has never taken any steps against Iran and will not do so in the future.

The source of the news about the detection of foreign planes in Azerbaijan's airspace is the lesser-known Avia-Pro news website of Russia. The news website on Monday claimed that the drones that attacked Iran's military and nuclear sites had been detected by the Russian Radar system.

In recent days there have been explosions at two of Iran's top security nuclear and military facilities – Khojir in the east of Tehran and Natanz in Isfahan province.

Iranian authorities said the incident at the first site was caused by the explosion of a gas storage tank but have delayed the announcement of the cause of the incident at Natanz "for security reasons".

When video footage of the blast surfaced online, the Iranian Defense Ministry quickly rolled out a spokesman to downplay the incident. Davoud Abdi, speaking on state television, dismissed it as a minor blast at a gas-storage facility in a “public area” of the Parchin military complex, outside the Iranian capital.

A well-known former site of nuclear activity, an explosion at the Parchin military complex would undoubtedly have been a serious incident.

Satellite imagery later suggested that the explosion took place at the Hemmat Industrial Complex, east of Tehran and away some 24 km from Parchin.

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Ukraine’s Parliament Will Vote on Ratifying US Minerals Deal on May 8, Lawmaker Says

In this handout photograph posted on the official Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko late on April 30, 2025, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent (L) and Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko (R) attend a ceremony to sign a minerals deal, in Washington DC, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP PHOTO / Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko)
In this handout photograph posted on the official Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko late on April 30, 2025, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent (L) and Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko (R) attend a ceremony to sign a minerals deal, in Washington DC, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP PHOTO / Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko)
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Ukraine’s Parliament Will Vote on Ratifying US Minerals Deal on May 8, Lawmaker Says

In this handout photograph posted on the official Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko late on April 30, 2025, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent (L) and Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko (R) attend a ceremony to sign a minerals deal, in Washington DC, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP PHOTO / Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko)
In this handout photograph posted on the official Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko late on April 30, 2025, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent (L) and Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko (R) attend a ceremony to sign a minerals deal, in Washington DC, amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. (AFP PHOTO / Facebook account of Ukraine's Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko)

Ukraine's parliament will hold a vote on May 8 to ratify a minerals deal signed with the United States earlier this week, a lawmaker said on Friday, while the prime minister suggested the agreement will help Kyiv with supplies of air defense systems.

Ukraine and the US signed a deal on Wednesday that will give the United States preferential access to new investments in extraction of Ukraine's natural resources, and fund investment in Ukraine's reconstruction.

According to the deal, new military aid, if provided by Washington to Kyiv, could be scored as the US contribution to the joint fund being set up under the accord.

"This agreement will allow us to better defend our country here and now - to better protect our skies thanks to American air defense systems," Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said at the governmental meeting.

Lawmaker Yaroslav Zheleznyak published the date of the upcoming ratification vote on the Telegram messaging app.

The accord, heavily promoted by US President Donald Trump, is central to Kyiv's efforts to mend ties with the White House, its main military backer in its war against the Russian invasion. The ties had frayed after Trump took office in January.

Zheleznyak also cited Shmyhal as telling parliament on Friday that two of the documents related to the deal covered its implementation and would not need to be ratified by lawmakers.

Ukraine's cabinet registered a bill with parliament to ratify the minerals deal with the US late on Thursday, according to the parliamentary database.

"We want to ratify it as soon as possible. So we plan to do it within the coming weeks," First Deputy Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said on Thursday.