Report: Iranian scientists visited Russia secretly last year, possibly to acquire nuke technology

Iranian scientists with ties to the regime made a secret trip to Russia late last year, where they met with military experts and may have sought to advance nuclear weapons work, The Financial Times reports.

Citing various documents it had obtained, the paper said the visiting scientists were tied to institutions previously implicated in nuclear work, and that the visit, on November 7 to 11, 2024, was arranged by an organization serving as a front for Iran’s Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research (SPND), the military organization Western officials believe is behind Iran’s nuclear weapons research efforts.

FT says the visit was the second last year, and included meetings with sanctioned Russian company Laser Systems.

Former CIA analyst Jim Lamson, now a senior research associate at the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies, tells FT it appears that the group was “seeking laser technology and expertise that could help them validate a nuclear weapon design without conducting a nuclear explosive test.”

Among the reasons cited by Israeli officials for the June 2025 war with Iran was concrete steps they said Tehran had recently taken toward weaponization.