Iran unveils new helicopter-carrying catamaran ship

Tehran: Iran's state TV says the country's Revolutionary Guard has unveiled a new high-speed vessel capable of carrying a helicopter and up to 100 people.

The report today follows a series of close encounters between American warships and Guard vessels in the Persian Gulf.

It showed a catamaran-type ship described as 55 meters (yards) long and 14 meters (yards) wide, carrying a light civilian helicopter. It did not elaborate on the speed of the boat.

It was painted with Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei's call for US forces to "Go back to the Bay of Pigs."

In May, Khamenei criticized the US presence in the Persian Gulf region in an apparent reference to the 1961 failed invasion of Cuba's Bay of Pigs by 1,500 CIA-trained exiles.