Iran, Russia meet at rare Turkmenistan peace forum

Vahid Razavi, a member of Vadi’s family, told Iran International that the researcher was detained about 18 months ago following a dispute at work and was later accused of spying for Israel.

“Rouzbeh was tortured intensely, to the point that bones in his leg and two ribs were broken, and then his mother was arrested and jailed,” Razavi said. Interrogators, he added, photographed her in custody and showed the images to Vadi “to extract a forced confession.”

“They had told Rouzbeh that if he did not confess to espionage and agree to appear in a televised interview, they would torture his mother.”

Vadi, who held a doctorate in reactor engineering, had co‑authored a 2011 research paper with senior Iranian nuclear experts later killed during the June conflict with Israel, according to his Google Scholar profile.

The judiciary said he was convicted of transferring classified information about one of the scientists killed in those attacks to Mossad.

According to Razavi, interrogators warned Vadi that unless he admitted to espionage and appeared in a televised confession, “they would torture his mother.” He said Vadi accepted what he called a fabricated charge under those conditions.

Televised confession questioned

Vadi, a member of the Nuclear Science and Technology Research Institute affiliated with the Atomic Energy Organization, was executed on August 6. The judiciary said at the time he had been “recruited via cyberspace by Mossad.”

The confession, Razavi said, broadcast on state television was the sole basis for the conviction. He said authorities “moved quickly” after the 12-day conflict in June and carried out the execution without notifying the family.

Razavi also questioned state media remarks that Vadi received a black bag stuffed with cash. “In an era of digital transactions, why would a highly educated scientist accept cash in a bag?” he said.

Vadi, Razavi said, was portrayed as having copied sensitive files onto a hard drive and handed them over in a public park restroom. Such accounts, he argued, were “nonsensical” given the availability of secure digital platforms such as Signal or Telegram.

Rights organizations have long raised concerns about forced confessions obtained under torture in Iran’s judicial system.

Razavi described Vadi as intelligent, devoted to his family and focused on work, noting that he lived with his mother and had modest means. He said Vadi had no political involvement and was committed to supporting peaceful nuclear research.

Following the June war, Iranian courts have arrested, tried and executed several people on espionage charges involving Israel. In one recent case, political prisoner Javad Naeimi was executed on October 18 in Qom. These executions have drawn criticism from international human rights groups and UN rapporteurs.

The sudden reversal and the stilted language of the announcement of her return in an Instagram post led to concerns by some about her wellbeing.

“I must tell you that I am present in my country, Iran. Undoubtedly, my country, my homeland, and my soil are the safest place in the world for me. As an Iranian, Iran is always my safe home,” the post said. “With the support and help of the Supreme Leader, I will return to the warm family hearth.”

A Quranic verse follows the message in Arabic: “When He decrees a matter, He only says to it, ‘Be,’ and it is.”

Ahmadi, 23, was the only Iranian woman to compete at the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics and had been seen as one of the country’s top alpine skiing prospects.

Ahmadi remained in Europe after a training and competition trip in early 2023 and applied for asylum in Germany, later appearing in media and campaign material that highlighted her story as a refugee athlete.

The announcement sparked mixed reactions among Iranians on social media. Some users accused authorities of pressuring Ahmadi or using her case for propaganda.

Iranian intelligence agents and police have routinely compelled dissidents to recant their views and disavow past activism in social media posts, sometimes even mandating a set number of favorable posts in exchange for restored internet access.

“It’s unclear how they made that place unsafe for the poor girl and how much pressure they put on the family in Iran for her to write ‘My homeland is the safest place in the world for me.’ As long as the Islamic Republic exists, no person in the world will have security,” one user posted on X.

Others framed her decision as a personal choice driven by homesickness, economic insecurity abroad or family ties. Accounts close to the government praised the move.

“Atefeh Ahmadi, the former national athlete of Iran’s skiing team who had sought refuge in Germany, has returned to the country with the support of His Holiness the Supreme Leader,” one account said. “Praise be to God, we have a compassionate leader who, like a father, keeps an eye on all his children and supports them.”

Iranian officials have provided no details about the conditions of Ahmadi’s return, including whether she will rejoin the national team or what guarantees she has received.

“Foreign ministers of nations with brotherly and full diplomatic relations need no ‘neutral’ venue to meet,” Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted on X, referring to his counterpart Youssef Raji proposal to meet in a third country.

“His decision not to welcome Iran's reciprocation of his warm hospitality is bemusing,” Araghchi added.

Raji announced on Wednesday that he had declined an invitation to travel to Tehran as Beirut moves forward with its plan to disarm the Iran-backed Hezbollah movement.

Israel’s punishing strikes on Hezbollah in the final weeks of the year-long war that ended in November left the group weakened but still ensconced in traditional support bases in the country's south and east.

Lebanon’s government has since tasked the national army with confiscating Hezbollah’s arsenal by 2026—a move Iran opposes, arguing that continued Israeli attacks justify what it calls the group’s resistance.

“Subjected to Israeli occupation and blatant ‘ceasefire’ violations,” Araghchi wrote, “I fully understand why my esteemed Lebanese counterpart is not prepared to visit Tehran. Hence I will gladly accept his invitation to come to Beirut.”

Hezbollah debate

Iran invited Raji to Tehran earlier this month to discuss bilateral ties, according to Iran’s foreign ministry, amid mounting debate in Lebanon over the future of Hezbollah—which Iran helped found in 1982—and rising calls for the movement to surrender its weapons.

On Wednesday, Lebanon’s foreign ministry said on X that Raji turning down the visit “does not mean rejecting discussion,” but that “the favorable conditions are not available.”

He renewed an invitation for Araghchi to meet in “a neutral third country” and said Lebanon was ready for “a new phase” in relations based on sovereignty, non-interference, and exclusive state control over arms and national security decisions.

“Building any strong state cannot happen unless the state alone, through its national army, holds the exclusive right to carry arms and the sole authority over decisions of war and peace,” he said, adding that Araghchi remained welcome to visit Beirut.

Capital residents shared moments of joy as they beheld the showers and expressed hope that the traditional rainy season could provide relief from a crisis that Iran's president has warned may doom the city.

“Even the rain could not defeat the heavy air pollution of Tehran, but for a short amount of time, the beauty of the northern mountains are visible,” a user posted on X.

"I know not everyone is feeling well; but I hope that wherever you are, this short rain has at least warmed our hearts for a moment with the beauty of nature," posted another user.

Iran is in its sixth consecutive year of drought, with reservoirs at historic lows. Tehran's Latyan Dam is at its lowest in six decades, Karaj (Amir Kabir) holds under 10% capacity, and Mashhad's dams are below 3%.

Nationwide, 19-22 major dams are under 15-20% capacity, while groundwater extraction exceeds recharge, causing land subsidence in Tehran and other areas.

The prolonged dry period has pushed reservoir levels across Iran to historic lows. The country’s Karkheh Dam hydroelectric plant was forced to halt power generation last week due to the shrinking water level in its reservoir.

Officials said the dam’s basin has endured years of drought, with water now flowing only through lower outlets to meet downstream needs.

Water specialists quoted by local media say that if current patterns continue, significant parts of Tehran could face severe supply instability within the next decade.

The crisis is mainly due to decades of mismanagement. Agriculture uses 80 to 90 percent of the country's water but with less than 40 percent efficiency.

Too many dams have been built, leaky pipes waste 15 to 30 percent of supply, wastewater recycling stands at only about 20 percent compared to 85 to 98 percent in neighboring countries, and conservation efforts remain weak.

President Masoud Pezeshkian warned in November that without substantial rain, Tehran faces what he called "Day Zero", necessitating water rationing or even partial evacuation of the capital. Nightly pressure cuts, heavy consumer penalties, and unannounced outages are already common; some cities have already begun rationing.

Recent rain offers hope but is insufficient to refill reservoirs or reverse depletion. Iran risks ongoing shortages in drinking water, farming, hydropower and potential unrest, with calls for structural reforms over water management and agriculture growing.

Its operating model is neither innovative nor cohesive, but a set of pragmatic mechanisms built on three pillars: sanctions-evasion finance, covert oil lifelines and proxy leverage.

Beneath these pillars sits a twin base: China, the economic enabler which buys its oil, and Russia, a fellow bearer of stiff sanctions whose alignment offers diplomatic cover but also commercial competition.

With the aid of these two powers, the Islamic Republic survives not through mastery but through continual manoeuvre.

Understanding this architecture matters because it now shapes a broader convergence in global security. As the United States expands its military buildup in the Caribbean, Iran faces the potential loss of a Western Hemisphere partner long utilised by the Revolutionary Guards Quds Force.

Should Washington succeed in pulling Caracas away from Tehran, one more long-alleged sanctions evasion route may be blocked.

Sanctions evasion

Tehran continues to move funds with notable agility despite the so-called snapback of UN sanctions triggered by Western Europe in October and successive US-led actions to interdict missile and drone procurement networks.

Dubai, Istanbul, Muscat and Baghdad have been named as transit points in US Treasury press releases. Exchange houses and front companies facilitate conversions that allow restricted revenues to re-enter circulation.

Some networks targeted by Western authorities are alleged to have funnelled substantial sums to Hezbollah through opaque trade and currency channels.

These mechanisms define the Islamic Republic’s financial landscape.

Even so, these flows are tributaries. The main current runs east.

Chinese lifeline

The economic centre of the Islamic Republic increasingly lies in Shandong, Shanghai and the harbors of southern China.

Analysts estimate that roughly 80–90 percent of Iranian crude exports ultimately land in China, often routed through ship-to-ship transfers, re-flagged vessels and blends labelled as Malaysian, Omani or others.

These operations appear in tanker-tracking data and in recent investigations highlighting the Revolutionary Guards tightening oversight of a global shadow fleet.

For Beijing, the rationale is straightforward: discounted supplies, insulation from Western price caps and evidence that sanctions enforcement is no longer uniform. For Tehran, the lifeline underscores deepening dependence on a far more powerful state.

Russia’s role differs. Also under sanctions, Moscow competes directly with Tehran for China’s crude demand while simultaneously normalising sanctions-defiance as a geopolitical posture.

Two sanctioned exporters move in parallel: rivals commercially, yet aligned in resisting Western leverage.

Armed allis

Armed groups in Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen remain central to Tehran’s deterrence and diplomacy. They function, in effect, as strategic currency.

Western intelligence assessments circulated this year suggest Tehran transferred around one billion dollars to Hezbollah—an unusually high figure under any sanctions regime.

While details of the financial conduits remain incomplete, defence officials say Hezbollah is rearming despite the 2024 ceasefire, while Lebanon’s armed forces lack the capacity to enforce disarmament provisions. This comes as Israel maintains outposts in the country and launches deadly air strikes it says target militants.

In this environment, Iranian support is not merely financial but structural.

The Houthis continue to grow more assertive. Their maritime disruptions and drone activity reflect a movement whose operational confidence increasingly exceeds Tehran’s ability to shape or restrain it.

Europe’s reassessment

Europe, long divided over Iran, has entered a period of strategic recalibration. Tehran’s supply of Shahed-series drones to Russia has shifted its significance from a regional issue to a European security concern.

Western officials now warn that such transfers pose direct risks to continental defence.

Germany’s deployment of the Arrow-3 air-defence system—developed jointly with Israel—reflects the jitters. Senior officials from Ukraine and Israel met last week to coordinate responses to Iran’s expanding missile and drone proliferation.

European scrutiny has also grown over Iranian cultural, religious and financial centres suspected of facilitating sanctions evasion or money-laundering.

What was once treated as a bilateral nuisance is now cast as a collective security challenge.

A strained machinery

Thus stands the Islamic Republic in 2025: its revenues routed through offshore channels, its diplomacy reinforced by Russia, its economy dependent on China, its proxies potent but increasingly difficult to manage, and its domestic legitimacy fragile.

It survives on a framework effective in the short term but vulnerable in the long run.

Historical parallels caution that states relying on improvised economic lifelines and brittle alliances can appear stable until stresses accumulate beyond what the system can absorb.

These comparisons do not determine Iran’s trajectory, but they underline that a state held together by constrained revenues and external dependence is off balance and inherently unstable.