![\"Russian](\"https:\/\/media.cnn.com\/api\/v1\/images\/stellar\/prod\/gettyimages-2193752964-20260302120329018.jpg?c=original&q=w_1280,c_fill\/f_avif\")
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\n Russia has offered expressions of concern and condemnation following the recent outbreak of conflict involving its key ally, Iran, but it has so far remained largely on the sidelines.\n <\/p>\n
\n The Kremlin said Monday that it is in \u201cconstant contact\u201d with Iran\u2019s leadership \u2013 though Moscow didn\u2019t clarify who that now includes following the killing of Tehran\u2019s supreme leader in strikes.\n <\/p>\n
\n Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists that \u201cthese are troubled days,\u201d referring to the United States and Israel\u2019s war with Iran, adding that Moscow is also continuing contacts with the leaders of the countries affected by the conflict, including the states of the Persian Gulf.\n <\/p>\n
\n When asked if the Kremlin is consulting BRICS states \u2013 the China- and Russia-backed group of emerging economies of which Iran is a member \u2013 Peskov stated membership of BRICS does not oblige members to provide mutual assistance during an armed aggression, underscoring the limit of Moscow\u2019s friendship.\n <\/p>\n
\n \u201cIt is an organization of a different nature, and it involves cooperation in other areas,\u201d Peskov said.\n <\/p>\n
\n Iran and Russia signed a 20-year treaty in January 2025 strengthening their economic, military and political partnership. But, crucially, it stopped short of a mutual-defense pact that would obligate Moscow to come to Tehran\u2019s aid in the event of military aggression. The limits of Moscow\u2019s power were also on show following Israeli-US strikes on Iran in June 2025, when Moscow offered rhetorical condemnation but did not intervene or offer military support.\n <\/p>\n
\n Russian President Vladimir Putin, in his first official comments on Sunday since the US-Israeli strikes on Iran and Tehran\u2019s retaliatory strikes, called the killing of Iran\u2019s supreme leader a \u201ccynical murder\u201d that violated \u201call norms of human morality and international law.\u201d But these strong words are just that \u2013 words.\n <\/p>\n
\n The supreme leader now joins a growing list of partners Moscow has been unable to protect. The Kremlin was unable to stop the US from seizing Venezuelan president Nicolas Maduro in a raid by American troops in January, and longtime Syrian ally Bashar al-Assad was ousted by rebel forces in December 2024.\n <\/p>\n
\n These episodes reinforce a growing perception among many observers that the Kremlin\u2019s alliances are increasingly symbolic rather than strategic guarantees.\n <\/p>\n
\n It\u2019s clear Moscow lays the blame for the recent outbreak of hostilities in the Middle East on the US and Israel, with the Russian Foreign Ministry on Saturday calling the military campaign a \u201cperilous course\u201d intent on regime change.\n <\/p>\n
\n But with the Kremlin mired in a long, grinding war of its own in Ukraine and increasingly constrained economically and militarily, Moscow\u2019s role in the widening Middle East conflict may be limited to rhetoric.\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Russia has offered expressions of concern and condemnation following the recent outbreak of conflict involving its key ally,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":499251,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,3,21,19,22,20,25,24],"class_list":{"0":"post-499250","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-united-states","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-united-states-of-america","12":"tag-unitedstates","13":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","14":"tag-us","15":"tag-usa"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=499250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/499250\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/499251"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=499250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=499250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=499250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}