Vladimir Putin is heading to Tehran on his second visit outside Russia since the start of the Ukrainian war, where he will hold talks on lifting the Ukrainian grain blockade, the future of Syria and the possibilities to reactivate the Iranian nuclear deal with its Turks and Iranians. counterparts.
Russian President’s three-party talks with Iranian Ebrahim Raisi and Turkish Recep Tayyip Erdogan will be presented by the Kremlin as a sign of Putin’s continued influence in the region, following the recent visit of the President of the Middle East. Units, Joe Biden.
The three leaders are expected to meet both bilaterally and together in the context of the Astana Process, a dialogue established by the three countries to resolve their differences over the future of Syria, where they all have military forces but conflicting interests.
Erdogan will look for a signal from Putin that he is willing to lift the Russian naval blockade that prevents Ukrainian grain from leaving Black Sea ports. The EU has pledged not to sanction Russian food, transport or fertilizers, but Putin has been avoiding calls from Turkey to hold a joint meeting in Turkey with Ukraine on the issue.
Turkey, a member of NATO, has a special responsibility under the 1936 Montreux Convention with respect to naval traffic entering the Black Sea. He proposes that Russia allow Ukrainian grain ships to leave Odessa on designated routes as long as it is verified that the ships do not carry weapons.
“The issue of sending grain from Ukraine will be discussed with Erdogan … We are ready to continue working on this path,” Yuri Ushakov, Putin’s foreign policy adviser, said on Monday.
The invasion of Ukraine by Russia, the world’s largest supplier of wheat, has caused grain prices to soar around the world, exacerbating pre-existing food crises. Dozens of ships have been stranded and 22 million tons of grain are trapped in the silos of Ukrainian ports.
Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar has said Russia, Ukraine, Turkey and the UN would sign an agreement this week on the grain export corridor following talks in Istanbul. A coordination center will be opened in Istanbul that will allow these exports to be routed through the Black Sea.
Putin will seek to use talks to bolster regional opposition to any U.S.-proposed defense pact between the Gulf states and Israel, an idea some in Washington see as a necessary bulwark if Iran were to pursue its program. nuclear. Russia is part of the nuclear talks that are stalled in Vienna due to the US refusal to lift sanctions on the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The U.S. says these sanctions were not imposed because of the nuclear deal, but because of the IRGC’s malicious activities throughout the region.
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Talks may also affect Iran’s long experience of circumventing US sanctions and whether there is room for cooperation between Moscow and Tehran to defeat US measures. The long-term vision is for both countries to reduce their reliance on the dollar for trade, but in the short term there may be discussions about buying Iranian drones for Russia for use in Ukraine.
Russian Ambassador to Tehran Levan Dzhagaryan said last Saturday in an interview with the Shargh newspaper that Iran and Russia were now in a “single fortress.”
As for Syria, the three guarantors of the peace process are expected to be joined by Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal al-Miqdad. Turkey supports opposition groups and threatens a new offensive in northern Syria, a move that opposes Tehran and Moscow.