The UK, France, Germany and the US have placed new economic bans on Iran for delivering missiles to Russia during the conflict in Ukraine. The measures are the ban of National carrier Iran Air’s access to the UK and Europe, travel bans, and asset freezes on several Iranians alleged to have provided support to the Russian military.
This emerged during a visit to London by US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who said that Russians had been trained to deploy the short-range ballistic missiles supplied by Iran and could be used against Ukrainians in the coming weeks. Despite this, Iran has vehemently dismissed ever providing such a ‘smart’ guided weapon to Russia.
Blinken said this while addressing a news conference with UK Foreign Secretary David Lammy on Tuesday, delivering a scathing message of Putin, saying that the Russian President was “increasingly relying on support” from Iran and North Korea to assist in “waging his war of aggression on Ukraine” which goes against different UN Security Council regulations.
He said the US had recently provided intelligence to its allies, which detailed that dozens of military personnel had been trained in Iran to use the Fath-360 ballistic missile system with a shoot distance of up to 75 miles (120km). Lammy described the move as a “rather major and risky step.”
Specifically, the missiles are likely to enhance Russia’s capability to target Ukrainian cities that are near the Russian border, those cities that have been occupied by Russia or those which Russia wants to capture in the future while deploying its longer-range missiles deeper into Ukraine.
The UK Foreign Office added that US and UK sanctions hit several people who were very active in integrated supply networks of ballistic missiles and drones. These were identified as Brig Gen Seyed Hamzeh Ghalandari, who it said was director general for international relations at Iran’s Ministry of Defence and was involved in exporting defence products to its allies.
The UK has also declined five Russian cargo ships to transport military supplies from Iran despite conveying a message against it. It has also attacked organizations it claims are involved in producing the kamikaze-style Shahid drones that Russia has repeatedly been using to bombard Ukrainian towns and cities.
In a statement of their own, the UK, France and Germany, commonly referred to as the E3, noted that the provision of missiles by Iran was ‘a direct threat to European security’.
However, Iran said the Western claims of the leader’s role are false and misleading.
Western sanctions arrive as Russia cements its hold on east Ukraine, and Moscow’s forces quickly approach the key town of Pokrovsk-an, an important transport centre. The current UK Prime Minister, Sir Keir Starmer, has made it very clear that the UK will support Ukraine in any way it deems necessary for as long as necessary.
However, the Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelensky, has expressed concern with the slow delivery of weapons and requested permission to hit Moscow-supplied targets within Russia using western-supplied missiles, a request the US has declined.
Secretary of State Blinken and Lammy also said they are to visit Ukraine this week, the first in years. UK diplomats look to present the secretary of state’s visit as a reaffirmation of the close relationship between the two countries, often described as the ‘special relationship’. It was a chance, Blinken said, to “listen to the Ukrainian leadership” about what it wants and “its goals and what we can do with them to address the needs that they have.”
