Russia vowed Saturday to maintain military cooperation with Iran amid reported US entreaties for Tehran to stop selling drones to Moscow.
“There are no changes, and cooperation with Iran will continue,” Deputy Foreign Minister Ryabkov said in a report carried by state news agency RIA Novosti, according to Reuters.
“We are independent states and do not succumb to the dictates of the United States and its satellites,” Ryabkov added.
The senior diplomat’s comments came days after the head of Iran’s ground forces said during a visit to Russia that military cooperation between the countries was expanding every day. They also followed a Financial Times report last week on US efforts to pressure the Islamic Republic to stop supplying Russia with drones that can be used in its invasion of Ukraine.
According to the British business daily, the Biden administration raised the request as part of broader talks with Iran that included a recent prisoner exchange deal and are also meant to address the Iranian nuclear program.
An unmanned Iranian official quoted in the report claimed Iran asked Russia on numerous occasions to stop using the Iranian-made drones in Ukraine but the US was seeking “more concrete steps.”
Along with drone sales, Iran has also been helping Russia develop its own version of the drones, leading to a strike on a facility in Tehran earlier this year that has widely been attributed to Israel’s Mossad spy agency.
An Iranian Shahed-129 drone is displayed at a rally in Tehran, Iran, February 11, 2016. (Ebrahim Noroozi/AP)
Last week, the Washington Post reported that Russian officials visiting Tehran at the time were forced to take cover at their hotel.
The US, the European Union and the United Kingdom in recent months all have issued rules designed to cut off the flow of drone components to Russia and Iran, with the Biden administration repeatedly publicizing intelligence findings that detail how Tehran is assisting the Russian invasion.
Iran has claimed it provided drones to Russia before the start of the war but not since.
The Shahed drones that Russia has already purchased are packed with explosives and programmed to loiter overhead until they nosedive into a target — unmanned versions of World War II kamikaze pilots who would fly their explosives-laden planes into US warships in the Pacific.
The White House has said for months that it has seen troubling signs that the military cooperation between Moscow and Tehran could flow both ways, supplying Iran with new advanced military technology as well.
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Russia vows more military cooperation with Iran as US pushes to stop drone supply - The Times of Israel
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