Russian Rocket Launches 2 Iranian Satellites, Signaling Growing Ties
A Russian rocket successfully launched two Iranian satellites into space Tuesday in a symbol of the growing cooperation between Tehran and Moscow under the weight of aggressive Western sanctions.
The Soyuz rocket, which is owned and operated by Russia’s state-owned Roscosmos space corporation, was launched from the Vostochny spaceport in Russia’s far eastern region with a payload including Kowsar and Hodhod, Iran’s first privately sponsored satellites, along with more than a dozen Russian Earth observation crafts.
This collaboration follows Russia’s previous launches for Iran, including the Russian-manufactured Khayyam satellite in 2022 and Pars-1 in February.
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While Iran’s civilian space program has suffered multiple recent launch failures, including a deadly 2019 fire at the Imam Khomeini Spaceport, the country’s paramilitary Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has achieved success from a separate site near Shahoud east of the capital. Satellite imagery indicates this facility may have been targeted during Israel’s Oct. 26 attack.
Fueling these worries, and potentially a main driver in Israel’s choice to target the IRGC’s Shahroud facility, is Iran’s growing stockpile of weapons-grade uranium. Since the collapse of the 2015 JCPOA nuclear deal, Iran has developed enough highly enriched material for several weapons, the UN’s watchdog nuclear agency warned last year.
Cooperation between Tehran and Moscow has intensified in several other strategic areas as well, namely their shared support of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad in the country’s ongoing civil war and Iran’s alleged attack on drone sales to the Kremlin to be used in Ukraine, the latter of which both parties deny.
New Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is also set to sign and officialize a “comprehensive strategic partnership” between the two countries during his next not yet planned visit to Moscow.
