Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi stands next to Chinese President Xi Jinping during a welcoming ceremony in Beijing, China, February 14, 2023. Photo: Iran’s President Website/WANA (West Asia News Agency)/Handout via REUTERS

As the annual opening of the UN General Assembly unfolds this week, US adversaries are taking steps to bolster their burgeoning network of alliances, touting an alternative to the established international order to overcome Western opposition.

At the heart of this campaign are efforts by Iran and its Middle Eastern allies to deepen ties with China and Russia — efforts that appear to be yielding results.

Speaking during a visit to Iran’s capital city of Tehran on Wednesday, Russia’s Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said that relations between Russia and Iran had reached a “new level.”

“We are aiming at an entire range of planned activities, despite opposition from the United States and its Western allies,” Shoigu said, according to Russian media reports. “Sanctions pressure on Russia and Iran shows its futility, while Russian-Iranian interaction is reaching a new level.”

Iran in recent years has become a critical defense partner for Russia, supplying it with kamikaze drones and other arms for its ongoing invasion of Ukraine.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Wednesday called out that relationship at a special meeting of the UN Security Council.

“Russia is using Iranian drones to attack Ukrainian civilians, drones that Russia procured from Iran in violation of Security Council resolution 2231,” Blinken said. “It’s hard to imagine a country demonstrating more contempt for the United Nations and all that it stands for. This from a country [Russia] with a permanent seat on this council.”

Iran has also stepped up its cooperation with China, which is now the primary buyer of Iranian oil at around 1.5 million barrels a day. And Iran’s key Middle Eastern ally, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, on Tuesday announced that he would be visiting China later this week at the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping. The trip will be Assad’s first visit to the country since 2004. 

A bipartisan group of US lawmakers on Tuesday wrote to Blinken to raise concerns about growing ties between Iran and China and Iran’s violations of US sanctions.

“The Chinese-Iranian alliance presents a unique challenge and dangerous partnership antithetical to American national security interests,” the letter says. “China is participating in the Iranian oil trade, bolstering Tehran’s ballistic missile program, supplying drone parts for Russia’s use against Ukraine, and disregarding Iran’s backing of terror groups and their proxies. This cannot be tolerated.”

The letter, led by Reps. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) and Claudia Tenney (R-NY) and signed by 19 other members of Congress, concludes with a call to sanction Chinese entities engaged in business with Iran.

Speaking at the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, Iran’s President Ebrahim Raisi boasted that such sanctions imposed by the US have been ineffective.

“I am saying today that these sanctions have not yielded the desired results,” Raisi said. “It is time now for the United States to bring a cessation to her traveling on the wrong path and choose the right side. Ladies and gentlemen, humanity is entering a new framework. Old powers will keep their current downward trajectory. They are the past and we are the future. I repeat once again, they represent the past and we represent the future. We are the future.”