Lavrov backs Tehran, but does Russia also profit from the US‑Iran clash?
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov travelled to Tehran on Monday, where he met his Iranian counterpart Abbas Araghchi and President Masoud Pezeshkian, pledging Moscow’s support for Iran. The following day Araghchi posted on X that “never in our history have Iran and Russia worked as closely as now.”
The backdrop to the visit is the war launched by the United States and Israel against Iran on 28 February, which has pushed oil prices higher and delivered a windfall to Moscow. Washington has also eased sanctions on Russian energy in an effort to curb fuel costs, a move that has drawn criticism from U.S. consumers ahead of the mid‑term elections.
Why did Lavrov choose this moment for a trip to Tehran? Nader Hashemi, an associate professor of Middle East politics at Georgetown University, told Al Jazeera that both Moscow and Tehran are engaged in wars and Lavrov’s main goal is to cement the partnership that serves each side’s objectives – Russia’s fight in Ukraine and Iran’s confrontation with the United States. Hashemi added that the U.S.–Israeli attack has destabilised the regional order, and Moscow wants a role in shaping the new balance, suggesting a longer‑term agenda.
Russia and Iran now enjoy a strategic partnership, though it stops short of a formal military alliance. In January 2025 Putin and Pezeshkian signed a 20‑year Comprehensive Strategic Partnership Treaty in Moscow, which entered into force in October. Unlike the pact with North Korea, it contains no mutual‑defence clause. Their ties deepened after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, when Iran supplied Shahed drone technology that enabled Russia to develop its own variants. In 2024 Washington accused Tehran of also providing ballistic missiles to Moscow. In Tehran, Lavrov said Russian experts who had left the damaged Bushehr nuclear plant would gradually return.
Other regional actors are aware of the closeness. Lavrov had been in Bahrain on Sunday for a strategic dialogue with the Gulf Cooperation Council, where members urged him to use Moscow’s influence with Tehran to push for “serious dialogue” and to reopen shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, a waterway that Iran effectively shut after the war began.
Has Russia openly assisted Iran in the conflict with the United States? Not directly. The Russian Foreign Ministry has condemned what it calls “unlawful aggression” by the United States and Israel, but Moscow has not deployed troops. U.S. media, citing intelligence, have reported that Russia and China have supplied Iran with satellite imagery and weapon components, claims dismissed by former President Donald Trump.
The economic benefits for Russia have been significant. When Iran closed the Hormuz Strait, cutting a route that carries about one‑fifth of global oil and gas supplies, Brent crude jumped from roughly $72 a barrel to as high as $120 in March and April, later settling above $109. Reuters calculations show that by April Russia’s main oil tax revenue had roughly doubled to about $9 billion as buyers turned to Russian supplies. Since March the U.S. Treasury has issued waivers allowing sales of Russian oil already loaded at sea, and this month it waived sanctions on Russian diesel until April 2027. On Friday Trump suspended newly passed sanctions on Russia and on purchasers of its oil and gas, a move that provoked backlash from Republicans who supported the sanctions bill. Trump later said he did not want to “drive, foolishly, Russia away from the bargaining table” in Ukraine talks.
John Lough, an associate fellow at Chatham House’s Russia and Eurasia Programme, told Al Jazeera that the Kremlin is using the situation to align Russian and American interests on Ukraine, hoping to blunt Ukraine’s attacks on Russian refineries. He added that this dynamic has strained relations between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, a development that benefits Moscow by creating a split between U.S. and European policies on Ukraine.
Does Russia want the U.S.–Iran confrontation to end? For now, the stand‑off appears to serve Moscow’s interests, as higher oil prices and a diesel shortage have prompted the United States to relax sanctions, allowing Russian fuel into the American market, according to Lough. However, Nikita Smagin, an analyst of Russia’s role in the Middle East, cautioned that while Russia has a partial interest in keeping the conflict alive, an escalation could produce unpredictable consequences that Moscow would likely prefer to avoid.