From FARS News Agency:  The Iranian Navy dispatched its first fleet of warships to the Atlantic Ocean in a ceremony participated by Navy Commander Rear Admiral Habibollah Sayyari and his deputy Rear Admiral Seyed Mahmoud Moussavi in Southern Iran on Tuesday.

The flotilla, which is the first dispatched to the Atlantic, but the 29th one dispatched to the international waters, consists of Khark logistic and helicopter-carrier warship and Sabalan destroyer. The warships should sail 25,000 nautical kilometers in the next three months.

Addressing Iranian commanders, Navy personnel, sailors and crews in a ceremony to bid farewell to the flotilla, Admiral Moussavi said Iran has a message of peace and friendship for the world states and seeks to show its defensive power to the world by sending its fleets of warships to the international waters.

From ABC News:  “The warships will have task of securing shipping routes as well as training new personnel,” the semi-official Fars news agency quoted Iran’s navy chief Admiral Habibollah Sayyari as saying.

It said the ships, carrying some 30 navy academy cadets for training along with their regular crews, left the southern Iranian port of Bandar Abbas. It did not mention any ports of call. . . .

In 2012, Iran said it aims to put warships in international waters off the U.S. coast within the next few years, and extend its reach as far as Antarctica.

Image: Iranian frigate Jamaran (photo: Aspahbod)