Iran, Turkey Leaders Resolve To Negotiate Differences Over Syria
Meeting Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Tehran noon Tuesday, Iran’s leader Ali Khamenei stressed the importance of Syria’s territorial integrity.
Meeting Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Tehran noon Tuesday, Iran’s leader Ali Khamenei stressed the importance of Syria’s territorial integrity.
Tehran opposes any plan, being considered in Ankara, for expanded Turkish military intervention in Syria aimed variously at bolstering Syrian rebels, allowing refugees to return, and weakening Kurdish groups linked to Kurdish rebels inside Turkey.
Khamenei stressed Iran accepted Erdogan’s hatred of “terrorist groups,” presumably a reference to PYD (Democratic Union Party), which is linked to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), active mainly in Turkey, and Pejak, which operates in Iranian Kurdistan. The Iranian leader said Tehran would cooperate with Turkey “against terrorism” and emphasized Tehran’s respect for Turkey’s security and borders.
But Khamenei also said that ‘terrorism’ in Syria was not limited to one group and suggested that an attack in north Syria would “benefit terrorists,” destabilize the region, and “impede Syria’s political actions.” Turkey has generally supported mainly Sunni rebels, including militant Islamist groups, against President Bashar al-Assad, who has been supported by both Iran and Russia.
Khamenei and Erdogan agreed on the importance, according to Iran’s official news agency IRNA, of resolving differences through negotiations, citing the Astana process between Turkey, Iran and Russia, whose president Vladmir Putin arrives in Tehran for a three-way summit on Tuesday.
Both also stressed the importance of “Muslim unity,” with Khamenei describing the plight of the Palestinians as the most important issue for the “Islamic world.” Israel has a mixed relationship with Turkey, seen in Erdogan scaling back anti-Zionist rhetoric over the past two years and trade reaching around $7 billion in 2021, largely in Turkey’s favor.
IRNA noted Erdogan’s expressed opposition to unilateral sanctions – a reference to United States measures against Iran – and its commitment to Iran’s “legitimate expectations” from reviving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, currently subject to year-long talks between Tehran and world powers.
Boosting trade
Khamenei talked of boosting economic links in both quantity and quality, saying Erdogan and Raisi would address the issue in other meetings. US ‘maximum pressure sanctions’ after 2018, threatening punitive action against third parties dealing with Iran, saw bilateral trade drop by around two-thirds by 2020 from $10.7 billion in 2017.
While analysts question figures suggesting trade has now rebounded beyond 5.6 billion in 2021, Erdogan said in Tehran he believed it could reach $30 billion.
Aside from resolving difference over Syria, where Russia continues its military presence in support of Assad, the three-way summit in Tehran is set to address a possible safe corridor through Turkey of grain from Ukraine and Russia. Iran is one of many countries importing grain from Russia and facing steep increases in prices with the Ukraine crisis.
The visit also comes in the wake of US President Joe Biden’s visit to Israel and Saudi Arabia, where he committed Washington to avoid leaving a “vacuum” in the Middle East to be filled by Russia, China, and Iran. Saudi Arabian officials have rejected talk of a new “defensive alliance” against Iran, as Riyadh continues to look to Moscow to coordinate global oil supplies through Opec+, which meets early in August.
The formal reason for Putin’s visit is a tripartite summit with his Iranian and Turkish counterparts to discusses Syria, where Tehran and Moscow back Bashar al Assad and Turkey backs the residual rebel forces in the north of the country.
Turkey's President Rcep Tayyip Erdogan also arrive in Tehran and received by President Ebrahim Raisi.
However, Iranian government-owned media has been portraying the visit as a major event to counter the West. Fars news website affiliated with the Revolutionary Guard on Tuesday splashed a headline decaling, “The end of Western monetary and financial hegemony”.
Presumably, Iran and Russia are setting up a mechanism to interchange currencies, but the outline is so vague it is impossible to clearly describe it.
Last week, the US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan twice warned that Iran might provide military drones to Russia to be used in the Ukraine war. Iran’s foreign ministry tried to deny it, saying Tehran is neutral in the war and will not aid any side.
US State Department spokesperson Ned Price on Monday [July 18] reiterated that Washington is monitoring the situation. “Well, we’ve spoken about our concerns regarding a potential Iranian provision of UAV technology to Russia. We will continue to watch very closely. All of our sanctions remain in force,” he said, adding that such a transaction might violate of host of American and other sanctions on the two countries.
Despite their political alliance, which since the invasion of Ukraine has increasingly taken an anti-Western tone, economic transactions between Iran and Russia remain small.
Bilateral trade rose to $4 billion in 2021, but this is far less than, for example, Russia’s trade with Turkey at $33 billion, while Moscow’s exports to Iran are mainly foodstuffs, which are less vulnerable to US third-party sanctions than other sectors.
Before its costly adventure in Ukraine, Russia was mindful of US third-party sanctions on Iran and there were no major cases of, for example, banking violations.
The specter of an emerging US-backed Arab-Israeli bloc that could tilt the Middle East balance of power further away from Iran has accelerated its clerical rulers' efforts to strengthen strategic ties with the Kremlin.
"Considering the evolving geopolitical ties after the Ukraine war, the establishment tries to secure Moscow's support in Tehran's confrontation with Washington and its regional allies," Reuters quoted an unnamed senior Iranian official as saying.
Sending a clear message to the West that Russia will seek to boost ties with anti-West Iran, Putin will meet the Islamic Republic's most powerful authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, just a few days after US President Joe Biden visited Israel and Saudi Arabia.
Emboldened by high oil prices after the Ukraine war, Tehran is betting that with Russia's support it could pressure Washington to offer concessions for revival of a 2015 nuclear deal.
Almost a year of indirect talks between Tehran and Washington in Vienna stalled in March, with Iran questioning the US resolve and Washington calling on Tehran to drop extra demands.
But Moscow and Tehran, both subject to US sanctions, have overlapped interests. Iran, whose oil industry has struggled for years under US sanctions, has long relied on exports to China to keep the economy afloat. Since the start of Ukraine war, Moscow has taken away a big chunk of Iran's oil market in Asia.
In May, several reports said that Iran's crude exports to China have fallen sharply as Beijing favoured heavily discounted Russian barrels, leaving almost 40 million barrels of Iranian oil stored on tankers at sea in Asia and seeking buyers.