Paul Goble
Staunton, Aug. 20 – Because of the financial stringencies arising from Putin’s war in Ukraine, Moscow may soon stop dredging the Volga-Caspian Shipping Canal, a move that will put a severe crimp in Russia’s trade with Iran, Russian government sources tell Kommersant (kommersant.ru/doc/7974243).
Russia has long had to dredge this waterway to keep it deep enough to handle ships, but rapidly declining water levels on the Volga and Caspian over the last several years have increased the need for dredging. And the war in Ukraine has limited the amount of money Russia can afford.
(For background on these dredging issues and their national security implications, see windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/08/russians-outraged-kazakhstan-wants.html, windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/06/falling-water-levels-forcing-moscow-to.html and windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2025/04/russia-now-has-only-50000-km-of-fully.html.
If Russia does end its dredging operations, both Iran and China are likely to pull out of their arrangements to help Moscow. That will slow the development of the north-south trade corridor and force Moscow to focus more on train routes especially east of the Caspian now that Azerbaijan has moved so far out of Moscow’s orbit.
But it also means that both Moscow and Tehran will put more pressure on the development of a north-south route through the contested Syunik-Zengezur corridor where such a route would have to cross the east-west route that Baku, Yerevan and Washington have agreed to, potentially triggering new crises there.
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