An Iranian lawmaker said on Tuesday that Israeli intelligence operations during the June war were likely aided by a Mossad network operating inside Iran that leaked information on the movements of senior officials.
Ahmad Bakhshayesh Ardestani, a member of parliament’s national security and foreign policy committee, said it appeared the network helped identify Iranian targets on the ground rather than relying on intelligence gathered from Israel.
“It seems that the Mossad network formed inside Iran leaked information showing our officials were targeted, not that there was a center in Israel obtaining it,” Bakhshayesh said, according to Iranian media.
He said Iran’s counterintelligence services had already detained and executed several people accused of cooperating with Israeli intelligence.
Bakhshayesh added that Israel, the United States, and NATO acted together during the June conflict, but said the attacks failed to weaken Iran.
Hassan Salarieh, head of the Iranian Space Agency, told a media event in Semnan that the Zafar-2, Paya and the second batch of Kosar imaging satellites are ready for launch.
He said Iran’s space sector had advanced to the point where “satellites with one-meter and sub-five-meter imaging resolution are now under construction.”
Salarieh said the first experimental launch from the Chabahar Space Center – a coastal site under development in Iran’s southeast – will take place next year.
“Chabahar is becoming one of the most important launch centers in West Asia,” he said, adding that its construction began in 2023 and that the site is designed to support heavier, liquid-fuel launch vehicles.
His comments come as Iran accelerates work on Chabahar’s second development phase. In April, the agency said the facility would eventually handle semi-heavy liquid-fuel rockets and serve as Iran’s main space gateway, with a geographic position suited for placing satellites into sun-synchronous and geostationary orbits.
Salarieh said Iran had also signed its first private-sector contracts for satellite constellations, including the narrow-band Kosar system intended for emergency data transfer, and highlighted recent milestones such as the launch of private-built satellites on a Russian rocket, the successful 2023 flight of the solid-fuel Sorayya launcher, and the deployment of the Nahid-2 communications satellite in 2025.
Iran has long said its space program is civilian and scientific, though Western governments argue that technologies used for orbital launches can advance long-range ballistic missile capabilities.
President Masoud Pezeshkian has said Iran’s missile and space work supports national deterrence, while Defense Minister Aziz Nasirzadeh has said Tehran could eventually offer launch services to allied states.
Salarieh said domestic expertise had raised Iran’s launch capacity to “several hundred kilograms” and that efforts in propulsion, solid-fuel and liquid-fuel systems had advanced in parallel over the past three years.
Iran’s space program has picked up pace since the 2009 launch of the Omid satellite, with universities and state-linked research centers producing a series of experimental spacecraft.
In 2023 and 2024, Iran also carried out multiple sub-orbital tests, launched reconnaissance satellites via foreign rockets and unveiled new satellite buses and transfer stages, including the Saman-1 upper stage designed for higher-altitude orbits.
Salarieh said the government sees space as a strategic industry with economic, security and industrial implications. “We have strong human capital and significant infrastructure,” he said. “The development of space capability will continue rapidly.”
Speaking at the opening of the first international governors’ conference of Caspian coastal provinces in the northern city of Rasht, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the Caspian region now holds the same weight in Iranian strategic planning as the Persian Gulf.
Araghchi told delegates that Iran’s neighborhood is “the main pillar” of its diplomacy and that cooperation among Caspian states had expanded across political, economic and security fields.
He said the five littoral governments – Iran, Russia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan – had already built regular platforms for coordination, including leaders’ summits, ministerial meetings and now, for the first time, a gathering of provincial governors.
In outlining Tehran’s priorities, Araghchi said the Caspian basin is central to Iran’s plans for transport corridors and energy cooperation.
“The Caspian Sea basin … in the field of energy and transit corridors has extraordinary importance for all Caspian countries,” he said.
Regional officials at the event echoed his remarks.
Gilan Governor Hadi Haghshenas told the conference that joint action was essential to protect the Caspian’s environment as water levels fall and coastal ecosystems come under strain.
“We can, with shared cooperation, minimize the impact of falling water levels and the environmental damage caused by shipping and offshore oil activity,” he said.
Kazem Gharibabadi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister for legal and international affairs, said the provinces bordering the Caspian handle key responsibilities in fisheries, energy and transit.
On the region’s commercial role, he said: “By developing joint projects among Caspian coastal provinces and creating avenues for reciprocal investment, we can expand this region’s potential in ways that benefit all its people.”
"The Caspian is a natural crossroads for North-South and East-West transit routes, and by strengthening port capacity, improving transport infrastructure and coordinating logistics, we can significantly increase the Caspian’s share of international trade and turn existing corridors into stable, reliable routes,” the diplomat added.
Caspian Sea’s growing role
Iran is placing new emphasis on the Caspian Sea as a strategic anchor for its north-south trade ambitions, viewing the basin as a vital link in the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC), which connects Indian Ocean ports to Russia and Europe.
The northern provinces of Gilan, Mazandaran and Golestan handle most of Iran’s Caspian traffic and host its main ports at Anzali and Amirabad.
According to an analysis by Mostafa Mohammadi, a political-economy researcher at Mazandaran University, the Caspian has long been an underused asset for Tehran despite its economic and geopolitical potential.
He describes the area as “the strategic depth of the Islamic Republic,” saying Iran’s priorities rest on securing its northern frontier, limiting foreign military presence in the basin and strengthening ties with Russia, Turkey and the Central Asian republics.
Mohammadi said that Iran is the only littoral state that has yet to exploit its offshore Caspian energy reserves, while neighbors have developed theirs for decades.
He argues that Iran’s geography gives it unique logistical leverage between the Caspian and the Persian Gulf, making it a natural bridge for rail, road, air and maritime flows across Eurasia.
“Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan remain significantly dependent on Iran’s geography for global trade access,” he wrote.
Iran aims to use this position to increase INSTC cargo volumes, upgrade its northern ports, and attract investment in shipping, fisheries, tourism and coastal industries.
Officials say the governors’ conference this week in Rasht reflects a shift toward integrating provincial-level diplomacy into national foreign-policy planning.
Littoral states see gains as trade grows
Regional cargo data show strong growth across the Caspian basin.
Freight volumes on the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route (TITR) – the Middle Corridor linking China and Europe – rose 63% to 4.1 million tons in the first 11 months of 2024, according to Caspian News. Container traffic increased 2.6-fold to 50,500 TEU over the same period.
Kazakhstan reported 2.3 million tons of cargo along the corridor in the first half of 2025, a 7% year-on-year rise, Eurasian Star said. Azerbaijan handled 6.17 million tons of sea freight in January-August 2025, up 9.3%, according to Caliber.az.
Infrastructure upgrades are also accelerating. The Port of Baku plans to expand capacity from 15 million to 25 million tons, while academic research identifies Caspian ports as “critical logistics nodes” linking maritime trade to inland transport networks across Russia, Central Asia and the Caucasus.
For landlocked Central Asian states, the Caspian provides a route to global markets that reduces dependence on Russian transit.
For Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, it has become an increasingly important leg of east-west trade amid geopolitical realignments and Moscow-related sanctions on traditional routes.
Infrastructure and environment challenges
Despite rising volumes, structural weaknesses continue to constrain the region’s full potential.
A 2024 study by the he Central Asia Regional Economic Cooperation (CAREC) Program cited limited multimodal integration, fragmented logistics operators and inconsistent customs procedures as major bottlenecks slowing cargo transfers between sea, rail and road.
Environmental risks are also mounting with Iranian officials warning that up to a quarter of the Caspian Sea's water levels may dry up within the next 20 years.
Azerbaijan’s environment ministry reported in August that the Caspian Sea’s water level had fallen 2.5 meters over three decades, with annual declines of up to 30 cm disrupting port operations and increasing shipping costs.
Officials at the Caspian governors’ conference urged coordinated action.
Gilan’s governor said during the event that joint monitoring could “minimize the consequences of falling water levels” and safeguard fisheries, while Gharibabadi said environmental protection was inseparable from energy, transport and port-development planning.
Government spokesperson Fatemeh Mohajerani said on Tuesday that fuel quotas will stay in place for now, with monthly allocations of 60 liters at 15,000 rials ($0.013) and 100 liters at 30,000 rials ($0.027) continuing as before.
But she said Iran is being forced to spend $6 billion on gasoline imports this year as consumption soars past domestic output.
“It is natural that when foreign currency that should be used for other priorities is instead spent on gasoline – and some of this gasoline is smuggled – the government is obliged to act,” she said.
Mohajerani added that ministers must protect both the public’s livelihood and the country’s health and safety.
She said the government is preparing “serious programs” to curb fuel smuggling and added that the president has ordered automakers to expand production of low-consumption vehicles. “He made it clear they are required to manufacture more fuel-efficient cars,” she said.
Mohajerani also said that officials have examined the inflationary impact of potential adjustments but stressed that no final decision has been made on introducing a third pricing tier, one of several fuel-reform scenarios under discussion.
Her comments come as President Masoud Pezeshkian and senior lawmakers warn that the country cannot maintain ultra-cheap fuel indefinitely. Energy officials say domestic consumption has surged well beyond refining capacity, forcing costly imports and widening the subsidy gap.
Iran’s last major gasoline price hike in 2019 triggered nationwide protests in which at least 1,500 people were killed, according to rights groups and Reuters reporting at the time. The government says any future change will be gradual and tied to broader energy-sector reforms to avoid a repeat of that unrest.
New prices appear in Iran Energy Exchange
A few hours after Mohajerani’s press conference, new signs emerged that Iran is edging toward the higher fuel pricing.
The Iran Energy Exchange announced it will begin offering premium gasoline as of early December with a base price of 658,000 rials per liter (about 58 US cents) and a final settlement price of roughly 750,000 rials (around 67 cents) once additional costs are included.
The notice – the first such listing for premium fuel – immediately drew attention because the exchange price is more than ten times the current subsidized pump rate, adding to expectations that Tehran is preparing the ground for broader fuel-price reform.
