Russia Says Stalled Arms Deal With Iran Is Signed and Active
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Version 0 of 1. MOSCOW — Russia’s most senior arms executive said Monday that a contract to supply Iran with powerful S-300 air defense missiles was now active. But with no delivery date or any other details, the announcement seemed aimed more at warding off an Iranian lawsuit than a major step toward delivery of the weapon system. Sergei V. Chemezov, Russia’s chief arms trade executive, made the announcement at an air show in Dubai, Russian news agencies reported. “The contract to deliver the S-300 was not only signed by both sides, but has already come into force,” Mr. Chemezov was quoted as saying by the RIA Novosti news agency. The initial contract to deliver the weapons was signed in 2007, before the current international arms embargo against Iran was established. But the contract was canceled in 2010 by Dmitri A. Medvedev, then the president of Russia, under pressure from the United States and Israel, though the Kremlin portrayed it as an act of good will. In response, Iran filed a lawsuit claiming breach of contract that could cost Moscow as much as five times the $800 million value of the original deal. President Vladimir V. Putin reversed Mr. Medvedev’s decision in April, as a nuclear deal between Iran and the world powers began to appear likely. But the system still has not been delivered. In an apparent attempt to avoid the stiff fines, Russia has repeatedly claimed that delivery was imminent but failed to follow through, leading some analysts to conclude that it was just a stalling tactic. The hitch, military experts say, is that Russia wants to keep the unfulfilled contract as a bargaining chip in its relations with the West, perhaps with an eye to ending economic sanctions imposed over its actions in Ukraine. “Russia is trying to use this contract as a tool to pressure the West, so there is a continuous bargaining about it between Moscow, Tehran and other capitals,” said Aleksander M. Golts, an independent military analyst in Moscow. It also remains unclear what specific model of the sophisticated system is to be delivered. Iran wants a more advanced version than Russia wants to supply, military analysts say. Despite being classified as defensive in nature, the S-300 could be used to defend Iran’s nuclear sites, even though that threat has diminished with the signing of the nuclear pact in July. Apart from the arms deliveries, Russia aims to sell Iran its expertise in expanding the country’s nuclear energy program. |