Increasingly close ties between Iran and Russia worry the West | Middle East, the eternal conflict

The ever closer alliance between Iran and Russia, which is already fueling Moscow’s war effort against Ukraine, is increasingly worrying Western capitals at a time when no one can predict how far the war will go. military escalation in the Middle East.

New symbol of this partnership: the new Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin will meet for the first time on Friday during a regional forum in Turkmenistan.

For months now, the Islamic Republic and the Kremlin have put aside their centuries-old history of regional rivalry to focus on their common enemy: the West.

While Iran has been supplying Shahed attack drones to Russia for two years, many experts say that Tehran recently transferred to Moscow Fateh-360 ballistic missiles with an estimated range of 120 kilometers and also intended for the front Ukrainian.

Ballistic missile delivery illustrates deepening military partnership that goes beyond drone delivery and now includes more advanced technologiesnotes Nicole Grajewski, researcher at the Carnegie Center, interviewed by theAFP.

This alliance could well become even closer during the spiral of reciprocal attacks between Israel and Iran, which threatens to ignite the Middle East.

Accord global

Russia, which built the first Iranian nuclear power plant, contributed to the international effort which made it possible in 2015 to reach a global agreement to prevent Iran from acquiring atomic weapons.

This text became obsolete after Donald Trump withdrew from it following his election, a year later. Russia, which in the meantime supported the regime of Bashar Al-Assad in Syria with Iran, now no longer seems to have any interest in curbing Iranian nuclear ambitions.

To the extent that Russia depends on Tehran for the supply of drones and other weapons in its war against Ukraine, Washington cannot expect Moscow to join new international initiatives to prevent the Iran obtains nuclear weaponsnoted this week the American think tank Atlantic Council.

Indeed, the Putin regime might even welcome the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran, which would distract the United States and other Western countries from its war in Ukraine.adds theAtlantic Council.

From now on, the Moscow-Tehran relationship is also part of a multilateral framework since Massoud Pezeshkian will participate this month, in the Russian city of Kazan, in the next summit of BRICS, this group of countries initially founded in 2009 by Brazil, the Russia, India and China, which Iran joined this year.

On the bilateral level, Vladimir Putin was received in Tehran in July 2022 by the Iranian Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, a rare honor for a non-Muslim foreign leader.

Monitor disputes

The Russian and Iranian authorities also have in common the close surveillance of their populations: for Moscow, it is a question of preventing any contestation of its war in Ukraine, while Tehran absolutely wants to avoid a new wave of protests linked to the “Woman, Life” movement. , Liberty”, which has been shaking his authority since September 2022.

The relationship is much deeper than a simple transactional one: Russia and Iran are now increasingly dependent on each otherestimates researcher Nicole Grajewski. Both Russia and Iran view each other as dependent on each other for the survival of their respective regimesadds the researcher.

This rapprochement may be surprising given the historical rivalry which opposed these two empires around the Caspian Sea, in the Caucasus and in Central Asia, a major element of the Great Game which brought several powers into conflict in this vast region in the 19th century.

One of the most dramatic moments of this competition was undoubtedly the death of Russian playwright and diplomat Alexander Griboyedov during a mob attack on the Russian embassy in Tehran in 1829. A St. Petersburg canal still pays tribute today in his memory.

More recently, tensions have arisen between Moscow and Tehran over the corridor de Zanguezoura project led by Azerbaijan and Turkey which would see a road built on the border between Armenia and Iran, against the wishes of Tehran.

The two partners, however, took care to ease these tensions through intense exchanges between the head of the Russian Security Council Sergei Shoigu and his Iranian counterpart Ali Ahmadian.

Pour Nicole Grajewski, there are of course tensions within the relationship [russo-iranienne]but this testifies to their ability to compartmentalize this relationship.