Russian, Iranian Leaders to Discuss S-300 Deliveries Deadlock

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RIA Novosti, PUBLISHED September 12, 2013

Russia is hoping to settle Iran’s litigation with Moscow over a failed S-300 air defense system deal during a Friday meeting between President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani, a Russian presidential aide said Thursday.

The presidents are expected to meet on the sidelines of an upcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Kyrgyzstan.

“I am certain that various aspects of military-technical cooperation will be thoroughly discussed during the meeting,” Yury Ushakov said.

“We have made our proposal, and we are hoping that this issue will be settled,” Ushakov said, without specifying the details of the Russian offer to the Islamic Republic.

Moscow froze the original S-300 deal in 2010 under then-President Dmitry Medvedev, after the UN Security Council passed a resolution banning certain arms exports to Iran. The renege prompted a $4 billion lawsuit by Tehran against Russia’s state-run arms exporter, Rosoboronexport, in a Geneva court.

Military sources have told RIA Novosti that Russia has been trying to persuade Iran to drop the suit and sees this as a necessary prerequisite for any new deal to proceed, whether it involves S-300s or some other defense system like the Tor or Pantsir. The sources have asked not to be named as they are not authorized to speak publicly on the topic.

Iran in June rejected Russia’s proposal to substitute the S-300s with Tor-M1E air defense systems, saying the Tor cannot be integrated into the country’s air defense network.

Ushakov said the Russian and Iranian leaders are also expected to address bilateral trade in general, as it has suffered substantially due to US and EU sanctions against Tehran over its controversial nuclear program.

“The US and EU sanctions led to the reduction of Russian-Iranian trade in 2012 by 37.9 percent to $2.33 billion as Russian exports to Iran dropped by 44.1 percent to 1.9 billion,” the Kremlin official said.

Topics: Asia, Iran, Russia

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