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Iran Holds Unannounced Air Defense Drill over Natanz

A view of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility 250 km (155 miles) south of the Iranian capital Tehran, in this Maxar Technologies satellite image taken last week and obtained by Reuters on April 12, 2021. Satellite image ©2021 Maxar Technologies/Handout via REUTERS
A view of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility 250 km (155 miles) south of the Iranian capital Tehran, in this Maxar Technologies satellite image taken last week and obtained by Reuters on April 12, 2021. Satellite image ©2021 Maxar Technologies/Handout via REUTERS
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Iran Holds Unannounced Air Defense Drill over Natanz

A view of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility 250 km (155 miles) south of the Iranian capital Tehran, in this Maxar Technologies satellite image taken last week and obtained by Reuters on April 12, 2021. Satellite image ©2021 Maxar Technologies/Handout via REUTERS
A view of the Natanz uranium enrichment facility 250 km (155 miles) south of the Iranian capital Tehran, in this Maxar Technologies satellite image taken last week and obtained by Reuters on April 12, 2021. Satellite image ©2021 Maxar Technologies/Handout via REUTERS

Iranian air defenses fired a missile as part of an exercise on Saturday over the central town of Natanz, which houses nuclear installations, state TV reported, after local residents reported hearing a large blast.

The TV said air defense units fired the missile to test a rapid reaction force over Natanz.

"Such exercises are carried out in a completely secure environment ... and there is no cause for concern," Army spokesman Shahin Taqikhani told the TV.

Iranian news agencies earlier reported a large explosion in the sky above Natanz, but said there was no official explanation of the incident.

The semi-official Fars news agency quoted its reporter in nearby Badroud as saying a short blast was heard which was accompanied by an intense light in the sky.

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Pope Hopes to Visit Türkiye in 2025 to Mark 1,700 Years since the Council of Nicaea

Pope Francis asperges the coffing with the body of late Cardinal Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot during his funeral in St. Peter’s Basilica at The Vatican Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
Pope Francis asperges the coffing with the body of late Cardinal Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot during his funeral in St. Peter’s Basilica at The Vatican Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
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Pope Hopes to Visit Türkiye in 2025 to Mark 1,700 Years since the Council of Nicaea

Pope Francis asperges the coffing with the body of late Cardinal Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot during his funeral in St. Peter’s Basilica at The Vatican Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
Pope Francis asperges the coffing with the body of late Cardinal Miguel Ángel Ayuso Guixot during his funeral in St. Peter’s Basilica at The Vatican Wednesday, Nov. 27, 2024. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)

Pope Francis said on Thursday that he hopes to travel to Türkiye next year to commemorate the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, Christianity’s first ecumenical council.

The visit to Nicaea, today located in İznik on a lake southeast of Istanbul, would come during Francis’ big Holy Year, the once-every-quarter-century celebration of Christianity, according to The AP.

Francis is likely to use the occasion — the anniversary of a council before the Great Schism of 1054, which divided the church between East and West — to once again reach out to Orthodox Christians. Nicaea is one of seven ecumenical councils that are recognized by the Eastern Orthodox.

The spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, Patriarch Bartholomew I, said in September that he expects Francis would visit to commemorate the anniversary in May 2025.

Under Emperor Constantine I, the 325 Council of Nicaea gathered some 300 bishops, according to the Catholic Almanac. Among the outcomes was the Nicaean Creed, a statement of faith that is still recited by Christians today.

Francis announced his hope to visit Nicaea during an audience Thursday with the Vatican’s International Theological Commission. He told the theologians that the Council of Nicaea was a “milestone in the history of the church but also of humanity as a whole.”

Francis made his first visit to Türkiye in 2014 and met with Bartholomew there, as well as earlier that year in Jerusalem and on several occasions at the Vatican since.