The commander of Iran’s Navy, Shahram Irani, proclaimed on television that his government owns Antarctica and plans to carry out military activities there.

“The beautiful beaches of Makran connect us to the South Pole; we have property rights there, and they belong to the public. We have property rights in the South Pole. We have plans to raise our flag there and carry out military and scientific work,” he said, according to a translation from the Washington, DC-based Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI).

Iran’s announcement to expand its military presence in Antarctica has raised concerns. Yonah Jeremy Bob, military and intelligence analyst for the Jerusalem Post, noted that this action would violate multilateral conventions and reflect the aggressive tendency of the Iranian regime.

“Through terrorism on basically every continent or its rampant piracy in the maritime arena, the Islamic Republic continues to show why it is a danger to world stability,” he opined.

According to the military analyst, these statements and other signs by Tehran of expanding its influence should be sufficient reason for both the United States and its allies to seriously address the possibility of a nuclear threat.

“Antarctica might seem a distant threat, but if the West acts as meekly as it did when Iran recently kicked out nuclear weapons inspectors, the Islamic Republic will only become further emboldened on other track,” he warned.

Is it possible for Iran to claim Antarctica as its own?

According to statements from Jennifer Dyer, retired commander of Naval Intelligence from the United States, to Fox News Digital, Iran “could claim an interest in Antarctica similar to India’s, Australia’s, New Zealand’s or Chile’s (or those of the U.K. and France, for that matter), with their island outposts in the southern hemisphere.”

Dyer explained that raising the flag at the South Pole does not grant territorial rights under international law and that the Antarctic Treaty, in force since 1961, states that no action after that year can be used as a basis for claiming territory on the Antarctic continent.