The Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, stated at the meeting with Putin that, in his opinion, Russia is opposing NATO in the war against Ukraine. According to him, if Moscow had not invaded Ukraine, the Alliance "itself would have started a war against the Russian Federation."
This was reported by the state news agency of Iran, IRNA.
Khamenei said that recent events in the world showed that Iran and Russia "need each other", so the gas and oil agreements should be implemented.
"War is actually a cruel thing and the Islamic Republic of Iran is not happy about the death of innocent people. However, in your case, if you had not come up with an initiative, the other side would have started a war with its own initiative,” Khamenei said.
He also stated that the West is against a strong Russia.
"If the road is open for NATO, this organization will not see any obstacles in front of it, and if you did not oppose it in Ukraine, it would start a war under the pretext of Crimea," said the Ayatollah.
- On July 11, the United States reported that Iran would soon provide Russia with "up to several hundred UAVs" and train the Russian military to use them. Russia wants to get UAVs for the war against Ukraine against the background of significant losses of its drones.
- After that, Iran stated that it has not sold military equipment to Russia since the beginning of the full-scale invasion of the territory of Ukraine and opposes further escalation of hostilities.
- On July 16, CNN reported that a Russian delegation visited Iran twice to inspect the Shahid-191 and Shahid-129 attack drones, which are capable of carrying missiles. CNN published a satellite image taken on the day of the Russiansʼ visit.
- State Department spokesman Ned Price said on July 18 that the United States will impose sanctions on Iran if it transfers attack drones to the Russian Federation.