EXCLUSIVE: A nonpublic Russian government document obtained and reviewed by Fox News Digital reveals how Moscow sought to deepen its relationship with Iran far beyond conventional trade — laying out plans for alternative financial channels, nuclear cooperation, Iranian production of Russian aircraft components, major energy projects and new transportation routes stretching toward the Persian Gulf.
The 44-page Russian-language document, titled "Plan for Cooperation Between the Russian Federation and the Islamic Republic of Iran for 2024-2026," is marked "For official use" and was approved on the Russian side on Sept. 2, 2024. It assigns ministries, agencies and state companies responsibility for projects and sets deadlines extending through the end of 2026.
The document predates the current war involving Iran and the United States by well over a year, meaning it does not establish which projects remain active or how the conflict may have altered Moscow’s plans.
But an independent review of the Russian-language document, along with subsequent public reporting, shows that a number of initiatives described in the roadmap later advanced or materialized.
Keti Korkiya, a research analyst with the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Russia Program, reviewed the document for Fox News Digital and said its significance lies less in any single project than in the architecture Moscow was trying to build around the relationship.
"The roadmap is not revelatory: people paying close attention to the relationship between Russia and Iran will see many collaborations between the two countries that have been public for years," Korkiya said in written analysis provided to Fox News Digital.
"What is more revealing is the architecture of the relationship Moscow is trying to build," she said, pointing to financial mechanisms, transportation routes, energy investment and aviation cooperation as different ways of reducing vulnerabilities created by sanctions and Western economic pressure.
"These are nonpublic high-level documents that illustrate the comprehensive cooperation between Russia and Iran," a European intelligence source who reviewed the material told Fox News Digital.
"It is also strategic, sensitive and highly politicized, focusing on areas like nuclear programs, energy trade and financial transactions that aim to evade the U.S. sanctions," the source said.
A U.S. official, responding on background to questions from Fox News Digital about the financial provisions, said U.S. sanctions have "severely isolated Russia and Iran from the international financial system," adding that efforts by the two countries to develop alternative financial channels and other sanctions-evasion schemes were therefore "not surprising."
The official said Washington closely tracks attempts by sanctioned jurisdictions to develop alternative cross-border payment mechanisms and would seek to disrupt those that facilitate sanctions evasion or illicit finance.
The Russian document itself does not use the phrase "sanctions evasion." Instead, it repeatedly calls for increased use of national currencies, independent financial channels and measures to counter what Moscow describes as "unilateral restrictive measures."
Some of the clearest provisions concern how Russia and Iran intended to move money.
The plan set a target of increasing the share of bilateral trade conducted in national currencies from 68% in 2024 to 71% by 2026, while also seeking to expand correspondent accounts denominated in national currencies.
More ambitiously, the roadmap calls for the Bank of Russia and the Central Bank of Iran to develop the use of central bank digital currencies for cross-border settlements.
Another provision calls for "ensuring the use of independent systems for transmitting financial messages," including connecting financial institutions to independent channels for exchanging financial information.
The document does not identify which messaging system would be used or explicitly state that the goal was to bypass SWIFT or U.S. financial controls.
But some of that financial integration later became public.
In February 2025, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk said Russia and Iran had "practically completely" shifted bilateral settlements into national currencies using their own systems for transmitting financial and banking messages. Interfax, a Russian news agency, reported that the effort was part of a broader push toward independent payment infrastructure between the two countries.
Iran’s ambassador to Russia also said in February 2025 that Tehran and Moscow no longer needed SWIFT for bilateral banking relations and were using their own confidential bank-messaging systems. He said the initial phase of linking Iran’s Shetab payment network with Russia’s Mir system had begun the previous year.
Korkiya said the significance of those measures is cumulative.
"Individually, none of these initiatives is transformative," she wrote. "Collectively, however, they amount to an attempt to remove single points of vulnerability and build redundancy into the Russia-Iran economic relationship."
The financial effort is paired with a political one.
The roadmap calls for Russia and Iran to coordinate through BRICS and other international institutions against "unilateral trade restrictions," while another provision proposes studying ways to counter "unilateral restrictive measures" and their impact on global markets.
Korkiya said that goes beyond simply finding workarounds.
"Especially interesting is that the roadmap also goes beyond practical sanctions workarounds and includes an effort to build an intellectual and diplomatic campaign against sanctions themselves," she wrote, citing plans for expert communities, discussion platforms and an international forum focused on unilateral restrictions.
A U.S. official told Fox News Digital that financial institutions and intermediaries enabling sanctions evasion expose themselves to "significant sanctions risks," adding that Washington would continue working with partners to "identify, expose and disrupt these networks wherever they emerge."
The official also pushed back on the idea that alternative Russia-Iran systems could displace Western financial infrastructure.
"Russia and Iran can try to build alternative financial channels, but they cannot replicate the reach, liquidity or trust of the U.S. dollar and the international financial system," the official said. "Their efforts will not weaken the effectiveness of U.S. sanctions."
The financial architecture sits alongside another strategically sensitive pillar of the relationship: civilian nuclear energy.
The plan assigns Russia’s state nuclear corporation Rosatom continued responsibility at Iran’s Bushehr nuclear power plant, including fuel and maintenance support for Unit 1 and continuing construction work associated with Units 2 and 3.
The cooperation did not remain solely on paper.
On Sept. 2, 2026, Iranian oil and gas fields where Moscow sought a role.
It names Shadegan, Kish and North Pars, assigning Russia’s Energy Ministry and unspecified "interested Russian companies" responsibility for advancing the projects.
Those companies are not named in the roadmap. For several projects, the financing column is marked "Confidential."
There is evidence that at least one of the named projects advanced.
One of the more unusual provisions goes beyond ordinary trade.
The roadmap calls for Russia to help establish production in Iran of individual parts and assemblies for Russian aircraft.
Russian authorities were instructed to determine which aircraft parts could be repaired or manufactured in Iran, identify Iranian companies capable of producing them, certify selected sites through Russia’s aviation regulator Rosaviatsiya and conclude a localization agreement.
The roadmap set a March 31, 2026 deadline for an agreement on localized production and a Dec. 31, 2026 target for launching prototype production.
Public evidence does show that aviation cooperation advanced in the related area of aircraft maintenance.
In February 2025, Iranian ports on the Persian Gulf.
The proposal remained in the planning and negotiation stage in the roadmap.
Separately, Moscow sought to advance the Rasht-Astara railway, a roughly 162-kilometer missing link in the International North-South Transport Corridor.
That project subsequently moved beyond the purely conceptual stage.
Russia and Iran formally launched engineering surveys for the railway in May 2025, according to Russia’s Transport Ministry.
Korkiya said the project had still not reached full construction by late summer 2026, with Russian and Iranian officials continuing to work on the implementation and construction arrangements. She also identified another provision: Iranian investment in port infrastructure in Astrakhan, Russia.
The roadmap calls for a terminal there using Iranian investment, along with warehouses, a logistics park and grain and vegetable-oil facilities. Korkiya found that an Iranian-owned company later operated a terminal in Astrakhan with a railway spur and was building grain and vegetable-oil storage facilities that closely tracked the roadmap’s description, although the document does not identify that company by name and the match cannot be definitively established.
Taken together, the transport provisions point to an effort to build physical trade routes that are less dependent on traditional European corridors.
The roadmap reaches well beyond finance and heavy industry.
It calls for content exchange, journalist training and joint media production, including at least two joint projects and ‘professional training’ for Iranian journalists.
It also calls for Russian technology companies to secure at least two contracts in Iran involving information and communications technology, including "information security," telecommunications and the video-game industry.
The official overseeing the Russian side of the relationship also has a direct connection to President Vladimir Putin’s extended family.
Russian Energy Minister Sergei Tsivilev chairs the Russian side of the Permanent Russian-Iranian Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation.
Tsivilev is married to Anna Tsivileva, a Russian deputy defense minister and the daughter of Putin’s late cousin, Reuters reported when Putin appointed her to the Defense Ministry in June 2024.
The European intelligence source argued that the connection reflects the political importance Moscow attaches to Iran.
"It should be emphasized that on Russia's part, the economic cooperation with Iran is coordinated and managed by a representative of Vladimir Putin's extended family," the source said.
"This indicates that the Iranian matter is not just one of many bureaucratic issues in the agenda of the Russian government. But it holds significant value for the interest of the Vladimir Putin regime."
"What is also notable is the degree of state coordination and institutionalization behind this effort," she said, pointing to the involvement of central banks, ministries, regulators and state companies, as well as formal deadlines and confidential financing in some projects.
"That suggests Moscow is trying to turn what could otherwise remain a politically convenient partnership into something more durable and bureaucratically embedded," Korkiya said.
Russian and Iranian officials did not respond to multiple requests for comment from Fox News Digital. Fox News Digital also sought comment from Rosatom and from Russian officials responsible for Moscow’s participation in BRICS.