Support for Russia’s National Sovereignty Reiterated

President Ebrahim Raisi expressed Iran’s support for Russia’s national sovereignty following the aborted mutiny of a mercenary chief, according to a senior government official in Tehran. 
In a Monday phone conversation, Iran’s president and his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, discussed the Friday mutiny by Yevgeny Prigozhin and his Wagner Group, Mohammad Jamshidi, the Iranian president’s deputy chief of staff for political affairs, said in a post on Twitter.
The mutiny started over differences between Prigozhin and Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoygu. 
The Wagner chief had accused Russia’s military top brass of ordering a rocket attack on the group’s field camps in Ukraine, where Russia has been leading a military operation, killing “huge numbers” of his paramilitary forces. Authorities in Moscow denied his claim.
Following negotiations with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko aimed at deescalating the situation, the leader of Wagner paramilitary forces ordered his fighters on Saturday to turn around from their march toward Moscow to avoid bloodshed.
According to Jamshidi, Putin briefed Raisi on the recent developments in his country and emphasized that the events failed to challenge Russia’s national sovereignty.
Meanwhile, the Kremlin confirmed the phone call between Raisi and Putin and said, “The Iranian president expressed full support for the Russian leadership in connection with the June 24 events.”
In a phone conversation with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov on Saturday, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian rejected any foreign interference in the domestic affairs of countries.
Amir-Abdollahian said the events in Russia were of an “absolutely domestic nature” and added that Iran supports the rule of law in all countries, including in the “neighboring and friendly country of Russia.”