| Abstract [eng] |
he history of the Russia-Iran alliance has witnessed numerous twists and turns after the fall of communism. With the domination of pro-western political elites under President Boris Yeltsin in Russia after the USSR dissolution, the Moscow-Tehran alliance was subjected to developing relations between Moscow and Washington D.C. The special attention that Moscow paid to its dialogue with Washington made the authorities in Kremlin to use Iran as a leverage in their political games with the United States, which the Gore-Chernomyrdin agreement of 1995 is the best example as such (Kozhanov, 2015, P.5). Vladimir Putin’s rise to power as the new president of Russia in 2000, paved the way for increased military cooperation between Iran and Russia; however, the decision taken by Moscow to bandwagon with the West on imposing sanctions on Iran after the disclosure of Iran’s nuclear program, on one hand, and the re-construction of relations between Moscow and Washington D.C., on the other hand, provided little room for Iran and Russia to enhance their relations. The above-mentioned situation changed after the re-election of Putin as president in 2012, and Hassan Rouhani’s coming to power in August 2013; the break-out of tensions between Moscow and Washington D.C. as a result of 2014 Ukraine crisis and subsequent economic sanctions imposed by the European Union (EU) on the Kremlin, draw Moscow to strengthen cooperation with Tehran. 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine also marked another turning point in the Russia-Iran alliance. Iran’s position on the Russian invasion of Ukraine was supportive and contributed to the perceived threat of NATO expansion felt by the Russian side. In the nuclear cooperation between Russia and Iran, Tehran-Washington ongoing confrontation and Iran’s concern regarding U.S. threat during 1991-2012 was the most important factor in Iran-Russia convergence. Concerning the nuclear agreement, Moscow-Washington confrontation and Russia’s concern regarding growing U.S. threats played the most important factor. And at the end, in the recent case of Ukraine war, facing and coping with common threats, they decided to cooperate at military and financial level. |
