There is no reason for disagreement — Vasily Koltashov on Russia-Iran relations

Speaking with Alpha News, Russian political scientist Vasily Koltashov commented on Russian-Iranian relations amid recent misunderstandings around unblocking communications in the South Caucasus region and the so-called “Zangezur corridor”.

“Let’s look at Moscow’s goals in the region. The goal is to ensure that there is no war. Iran, in turn, does not want Turkey to strengthen its position in the region. Turkey shows that it considers Russia as its enemy. That is, it wants Russia to disintegrate and Crimea to become part of Ukraine, and then Turkey. What happened in the end? As a result, there is no ‘Zangezur corridor’ at Azerbaijan’s disposal, no war, no final solution to the issue. Because the final solution to the issue has no benefits for Russia and Iran.

And by the final solution to the issue, we should understand that the contradictions between Armenia and Azerbaijan will be completely closed, and everything will calm down, and Armenia will, for example, enter the EU and NATO calmly due to the fact that all border disputes will already be eliminated. Is this development of events beneficial for Russia? No. Is it beneficial for Iran? No. Thus, on the one hand, Turkey is restrained, Azerbaijan is restrained, on the other hand, Armenia is restrained. This is what needs to be understood in the events that have occurred. There is no reason for disagreement here, at least the final disagreement between Russia and Iran. We can rather say that both countries have achieved their goals in the current circumstances,” the expert said.

According to Koltashov, it is important for Iran not to lose its influence in Armenia, and Iran is making efforts in this direction.

“Iran needs that, in the conditions of the strongest anti-Russian propaganda in Armenia, Iran’s influence on the Armenian society at least should not be undermined. Imagine that Pashinyan will now launch a campaign of denunciation of Iran, will say that Iran is anti-democratic, women’s rights are not respected, is an imperialist, dangerous neighbor who must be hated because Iran can betray Armenia, and so on. This whole Soros campaign will begin, all these NGOs that are sponsored by Americans will start a campaign against Iran. Then who will protect Armenia? Russia has already been reprimanded and pushed away. Only Iran is left. Therefore, Iran believes that in this situation it is beneficial for it to try to increase its own influence and at the same time keep the Northern Iran region in balance,” the political scientist concluded.