Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian are set to sign a “comprehensive strategic partnership” treaty in Moscow on January 17 as Moscow and Tehran seek to further strengthen their relationship after years of deepening cooperation.
The Kremlin announced earlier this week that Pezeshkian would visit Moscow and sign a new partnership agreement.
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmail Baghaei confirmed at a news conference on January 14 that a treaty would be signed, saying that the process of preparing it took about two and a half years. Baghaei described it as an “updated text” of a decades-old agreement.
The new treaty is set to be valid for 20 years, Iranian Ambassador to Russia Kazem Jalali said, according to TASS.
The new treaty aims to strengthen Tehran and Moscow’s “military-political and trade-economic” relations, the Kremlin said. It provided no further details, but Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said at a news conference on January 15 that the treaty “is constructive in nature and is aimed at strengthening the capabilities of Russia, Iran, and our friends in various parts of the world.”
Jalali was quoted by TASS as saying the agreement will not include a mutual defense clause.
“The nature of this agreement is different from other treaties signed by Russia,” Jalali said. “Belarus and North Korea are cooperating with Moscow in areas that we have not entered into.”
Jalali said separately on January 16 that Iran and Russia have opened their own “confidential messenger” and “no longer need SWIFT,” a secure financial system used to make cross-border payments. Several Russian banks were removed from the system in February 2022 in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
According to Jalali, the head of Iran’s Central Bank is also consulting with Russia regarding a bilateral monetary agreement.
Russia and Iran are both under severe Western sanctions, including restrictions on their energy industries.
Pezeshkian’s visit and the signing of the treaty are further signs of the deepening relationship between Tehran and Moscow. The two countries have also expanded their military cooperation despite warnings from Western countries over the supply of Iranian-made Shahed drones to Russia.
Europe and the United States have imposed several rounds of sanctions on Iranian entities and individuals for providing various types of support to Russia, including the Shaheds. Iran claims to be “neutral” in the Ukraine war.
Pezeshkian’s visit to Russia comes just days before President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House. Trump, who withdrew the United States from an international deal designed to curb Iran’s nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief and ordered the killing of one of Iran’s top generals in 2020, was the target of an alleged Iranian plot to kill Trump last year.
By RFE/RL
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