Ayatollah wants to strengthen ties to Russia
Sanctions-hit nations find common cause in forming an alliance to counter the hegemony of the West
IRAN’S supreme leader has called for strengthened long-term co-operation with Vladimir Putin, as the Russian president made his second overseas trip since his forces invaded Ukraine.
Mr Putin yesterday received a red carpet welcome in Tehran, which, like Moscow, is suffering under Western sanctions.
Speaking after their meeting, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei praised the Russian leader for ensuring his country had “maintained its independence” from the US and said their two nations needed to remain vigilant against “Western deception,” Iranian state television reported.
The visit carried symbolic importance as Mr Putin’s first outside the former Soviet Union since invading Ukraine in February. He visited Kazakhstan in June.
The purpose of the trip, which came shortly after Joe Biden travelled to Israel and Saudi Arabia last week, was for Moscow to deepen ties with regional powers carving out a bloc to rival the West at a time of international isolation.
As well as meeting Iran’s supreme leader and president, Ebrahim Raisi, Mr Putin also met the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan – the first Nato leader to meet the Russian leader since February. Before Mr Putin arrived in Tehran, Iranian officials indicated they may be ready to strike weapons deals with Russia.
“We are ready to export military equipment and weapons,” Iran’s army ground forces commander Kiumars Heydari, said yesterday, according to the Young Journalists Club news agency. His comments came a week after the US claimed Iran was preparing to send hundreds of weapons-capable drones to Moscow for use in Ukraine.
The meeting came amid warnings that Europe could face acute shortages of gas this winter if Mr Putin closes the Nord Stream 1 pipeline. The pipeline reopened for pressure tests yesterday after being closed for 10 days of maintenance. The scheduled closure is expected to end this Thursday.
Meanwhile, a Ukrainian missile struck a key bridge linking the Russianoccupied city of Kherson with the heavily militarised Crimean peninsula yesterday in an attack that could disrupt Russian reinforcements if Ukraine goes ahead with plans to assemble a one-million-strong army to liberate the occupied south. Footage showed a shell crater in the middle of the Antonovsky bridge that spans over the Dnipro river.
Russian news agency Tass quoted the Russian occupation administration as saying that the bridge was struck by Ussupplied HIMARS artillery launchers.
Kirill Stremousov, a local occupation official, sought to play down the attack in an interview on Russian state television.
“We’re boosting the missile defence system as far as the bridge is concerned,” he said. “There’s no panic in the city. No one is running away.” Separately, Russian forces targeted southern Ukraine and struck deep behind Ukrainian lines in the Donbas.
At least one person was killed and 10 injured in an air raid on a residential building in the centre of Kramatorsk in eastern Ukraine yesterday afternoon, Pavlo Kyrylenko, head of local administration said.
Earlier in the day, several Russian cruise missiles hit the outskirts of the Black Sea port of Odesa, injuring at least six residents – including a child – and destroying three private houses and damaging a school.
Ukraine and Russia remain locked in a bloody war of attrition but they may be close to reaching a deal to end Moscow’s blockade of Ukrainian grain exports, the Financial Times reported yesterday. Under a deal that could help ease the global food crisis, the EU could relax some sanctions on Russian banks that would allow transactions related to food and agriculture to go ahead. Kyiv was seeking guarantees that ports and vessels will not be targeted.