Putin garners strong support from Iran in visit with leaders
TEHRAN, Iran — Russian President Vladimir Putin won staunch support from Iran on Tuesday for his country’s military campaign in Ukraine, with Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei saying the West opposes an “independent and strong” Russia.
Khamenei said if Russia hadn’t sent troops into Ukraine, it would have faced an attack from NATO later, a statement that echoed Putin’s own rhetoric and reflected increasingly close ties between Moscow and Tehran as they both face crippling Western sanctions. NATO allies have bolstered their military presence in Eastern Europe and provided Ukraine with weapons to help counter Russia’s attack.
“If the road would have been open to NATO, it will not recognize any limit and boundary,” Khamenei told Putin. Had Moscow not acted first, he added, the Western alliance “would have waged a war” to return the Crimean Peninsula that Russia seized from Ukraine in 2014 back to Kyiv’s control.
In only his second trip abroad since Russia launched the military action in February, Putin conferred with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the conflict in Syria, and he used the trip to discuss a U.N.-backed proposal to resume exports of Ukrainian grain to ease the global food crisis.
In Washington, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee gave easy bipartisan approval Tuesday to admitting Finland and Sweden into NATO, as lawmakers aimed for quick Senate passage and a show of congressional support for expansion of the U.S. and European defense alliance in the face of Russia’s war in Ukraine.
The vote sets the expansion up for a decision by the full Senate as soon as next week.
Turkey, a NATO member, has found itself opposite Russia in bloody conflicts in Syria and Libya. It has even sold lethal drones that Ukrainian forces have used to attack Russian troops. But Ankara hasn’t imposed sanctions on the
Kremlin, making it a sorely needed partner for Moscow. Grappling with runaway inflation and a rapidly depreciating currency, Turkey also relies on the Russian market.
Erdogan made Putin wait for nearly a minute before entering the room for talks and then praised what he described as Russia’s “very positive approach” during last week’s grain talks in Istanbul.
Speaking to Erdogan, Putin thanked him for his mediation to help “move forward” a deal on Ukrainian grain exports. “Not all the issues have been resolved yet, but it’s good that there has been some progress,” Putin added.
U.N., Russian, Ukrainian and Turkish officials had reached a tentative agreement on some aspects of a deal to ensure the export of 22 million tons of desperately needed grain and other agricultural products trapped in Ukraine’s Black Sea ports by the fighting. Reaching the agreement would mark a major step toward alleviating a food crisis that has sent prices of vital commodities such as wheat and barley soaring.