Turkey’s defense ministry said on Friday that NATO forces shot down an Iranian ballistic missile in Turkish airspace, the third such occurrence in the Middle East war.
“A ballistic munition launched from Iran and entering Turkish airspace was neutralized by NATO air and missile defense assets deployed in the eastern Mediterranean,” claimed a statement from the ministry.
Hours earlier, sirens blasted at Turkey’s southern Incirlik airbase, a crucial NATO facility where US forces are stationed, according to the state news agency Anadolu.
Local media reported sirens in Batman, 600 kilometers (370 miles) to the east.
NATO air defenses intercepted Iran’s first ballistic missile on March 4, followed by another on Monday.
Residents in the southern city of Adana, near Incirlik, were woken up by sirens at 3:25 a.m. (0025 GMT), and some shared footage of a fast-moving object that appeared to be on fire, according to the Ekonomim business news website.
In a phone chat with Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian denied that the missile was shot from Iran.
Since the US-Israeli war against Iran began on February 28, Tehran has responded with strikes across the Middle East.
According to its website, Incirlik is a key NATO station that has been utilized by US troops for decades. It also houses military personnel from Spain and Poland.
US forces are also stationed in Kurecik, a facility in central Malatya province, where they operate an early-warning radar system that NATO refers to as a “key element” of its missile shield, capable of detecting Iranian missile launches.
Despite Ankara’s unequivocal denial that radar data was ever utilized to aid Israel, its existence has alarmed Tehran.
On Tuesday, Turkey announced that a Patriot missile defense system was being placed in Malatya, only days after NATO moved to enhance its “alliance-wide ballistic missile defense posture.”
