Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has sent the country’s foreign minister to Moscow to seek increased support from Russia following the most significant U.S. military action against the Islamic Republic since the 1979 revolution.
Over the weekend, tensions spiked as U.S. President Donald Trump and Israeli officials publicly speculated about targeting Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and pursuing regime change, moves that Russia fears could plunge the Middle East into deeper chaos.
While Russian President Vladimir Putin has condemned recent Israeli airstrikes, he has yet to comment on U.S. attacks on Iranian nuclear sites.
However, last week, he called for calm and reiterated Moscow’s willingness to mediate over Tehran’s nuclear program.
A senior diplomatic source told journalists on Monday that Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi was delivering a letter from Khamenei to Putin, seeking Moscow’s stronger backing.
Iranian sources said Tehran is dissatisfied with the level of Russian support so far and is pushing for a more assertive stance from Putin against both the U.S. and Israel.
However, the Iranian sources stopped short of specifying the exact form of support Tehran is seeking from Moscow amid the rising hostilities.
Meanwhile, the Kremlin acknowledged that President Putin would receive Foreign Minister Araqchi, though it declined to provide details about the scheduled discussions.
According to Russia’s TASS news agency, Araqchi said Iran and Russia were coordinating their positions on the current Middle East escalation.
Putin has repeatedly offered to mediate between Washington and Tehran and claims to have presented both sides with proposals to de-escalate tensions while safeguarding Iran’s civil nuclear program.
Last week, Putin declined to comment on the possibility of U.S. or Israeli forces targeting Khamenei.
He added that Israel had provided Moscow with assurances that Russian personnel working on two additional reactors at Iran’s Bushehr nuclear plant would not be harmed in any strikes.
Russia, a longstanding ally of Tehran, is a key player in the nuclear negotiations with the West.
As a permanent member of the U.N. Security Council and a signatory to the original nuclear agreement abandoned by Trump in 2018, Moscow wields considerable influence.
However, with Russia now in the fourth year of a grinding war in Ukraine, Putin has shown little public appetite for a direct confrontation with the United States over Iran, especially as Trump signals an interest in repairing ties with Moscow.
