Iran and Nicaragua have discussed military cooperation, according to a leaked report

Iran and Nicaragua held talks in February to boost their military cooperation counter American influence in Latin America, according to an intelligence update contained in a cache of leaked documents that appears to be based on wiretaps collected by the CIA.

The trip of an Iranian delegation to Nicaragua that month was no secret.

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Both the Nicaraguan and Iranian authorities praised the visit, although their statements were vague on the details, generally focusing on the trade and they didn’t mention any conversation about it military cooperation.

But the intelligence report, dated February 23, notes that the delegation, led by the Iranian foreign minister, Hossein Amir Abdollahianhe had met with senior Nicaraguan army commanders.

According to the report, the commanders told Amir Abdollahian that Nicaragua has opposed “perceived U.S. efforts to expand its influence in Latin America and has expressed a willingness to collaborate with Tehran and other related countries.

The paragraph-long intelligence update was included in a series of leaked images that were posted on a server discordand was provided to The New York Times.

US officials, while acknowledging that documents from a previous set of leaked documents posted on the same server were genuine, warned that some had been alteredwhile others were out of date or inaccurate.

The Times described the new set of documents to multiple US officials, who did not dispute the information or confirm it was genuine.

Iran has long sought closer relations with Latin American countries, particularly those it considers outside the US sphere of influence, while Tehran seeks to break the international isolation imposed on it by Washington and its Western allies.

Over the past two decades, Iran has signed a number of trade agreements and promised other investments with countries in the region, however, constrained by the same economic woes as Tehran, it has a mixed record of satisfying them.

Iran said it spoke about Amir Abdollahian economic, trade and energy cooperation during his trip to Nicaragua, but did not mention any encounters with military figures.

But the official announcement made no secret that the grievance both countries share towards the United States was strengthening the bilateral relationship.

The Biden administration has imposed sanctions on the government and the president’s family in recent years Daniele Ortega of Nicaragua, as the country descended into autocracy and repressed its opponents in civil society, the Church and the media.

Both Nicaragua and Iran experienced revolutions in 1979.

That year, the Iranians overthrew the US-backed shah in what became known as the Islamic revolutiontaking 52 Americans hostage at the US Embassy in Tehran.

It was also the year that Nicaragua’s Sandinista revolutionary movement overthrew the country’s president, a key US ally in the region.

According to Iran’s state news agency IRNAOrtega, who was a member of the Sandinista movement, met Amir Abdollahian during his February visit and noted that their two countries “had a common enemy” that they had fought against that same year and managed to defeat.

Amir Abdollahian, according to IRNA, said that the name Nicaragua connotes “independence and the search for freedom in the minds of Iranians, because Nicaragua has rebelled and is rebelling against imperialism”.

Ortega’s son Ortega graduateswhich manages foreign relations and the most important diplomatic agreements in Nicaragua, had welcomed Amir Abdollahian with a message of friendship, according to El 19, a newspaper linked to the Nicaraguan government.

“We are countries with sister revolutions defending our right to choose our own path towards development and prosperity,” said Laureano Ortega.

He also underlined that, in the last year, “we have had important Iranian delegations here in our country and we have also had Nicaraguan delegations that have visited Iran”.

c.2023 The New York Times Society