The presidents of Russia and Iran have held talks in the Kremlin before the signing of a broad cooperation pact to deepen their partnership amid stinging Western sanctions.

The agreement is focused more on trade than military issues, but it will bring two countries with a shared desire to challenge the West closer together.

Russia signed a strategic partnership treaty with Iran on Friday that follows similar pacts with China and North Korea. All three countries are adversaries of the United States, and Russia has used its ties with them to help blunt the impact of Western sanctions and boost its war effort in Ukraine.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian on Friday signed a 20-year strategic partnership treaty that includes closer defence cooperation, something likely to worry the West.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart, Masoud Pezeshkian, signed a broad cooperation pact Friday as their countries deepened their partnership in the face of stinging Western sanctions.

Iran has already supplied Russia with self-detonating "Shahed" drones that Moscow fires on Ukraine in nightly barrages, according to Ukrainian and Western officials. Sitting next to Putin in the Kremlin after signing the treaty, Pezeshkian called for a political settlement to end the nearly three-year conflict.

Iran has long sought an alliance to protect it in the face of potential conflict with adversaries, but the text of the agreement falls short of obligating either party to provide military support in the event of foreign aggression.

Advisers to President-elect Donald Trump are crafting a wide-ranging sanctions strategy to facilitate a Russia-Ukraine diplomatic accord in the coming months while at the same time squeezing Iran and Venezuela,

The loose arrangement of hostile powers could pose a series of conundrums for President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for secretary of state.

Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted his Iranian counterpart Friday for the signing of a broad pact between Moscow and Tehran. The Kremlin says the “comprehensive strategic partnership” agreement between Putin and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian will take their cooperation to a new level.

(Reuters) - Russia signed a strategic partnership treaty with Iran on Friday that follows similar pacts with China and North Korea. All three countries are adversaries of the United States, and Russia has used its ties with them to help blunt the impact of Western sanctions and boost its war effort in Ukraine.