Our cooperation can isolate US: Khamenei

Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday that Tehran and Moscow must step up cooperation to isolate the United States and help stabilise the Middle East, state TV reported.

Iran and Russia are the main allies of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, while the United States, Turkey and most Arab states support rebel groups fighting to overthrow him.

Putin met Iranian leaders in an effort to nurture a warming relationship strengthened since US President Donald Trump threatened recently to abandon the international nuclear deal with Iran reached in 2015.

“Our cooperation can isolate America... The failure of US-backed terrorists in Syria cannot be denied but Americans continue their plots,” Khamenei told Putin.

Since Russia’s military intervention in Syria’s war in 2015, and with stepped-up Iranian assistance, Assad has taken back large amounts of territory from rebels as well as swathes of central and eastern Syria from Islamic State militants.

Moscow is now trying to build on that success with a new diplomatic initiative.

Pragmatist Iranian President Hassan Rouhani echoed Khamenei, saying Iran and Russia together could tackle “regional terrorism” - an allusion to Sunni Muslim armed groups hostile to Iran, Assad and many other Arab states. REUTERS

TEHRAN: