{"id":16113,"date":"2026-01-10T23:32:26","date_gmt":"2026-01-10T23:32:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/16113\/"},"modified":"2026-01-10T23:32:26","modified_gmt":"2026-01-10T23:32:26","slug":"south-africa-defends-naval-drills-with-iran-russia-as-essential","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/16113\/","title":{"rendered":"South Africa defends naval drills with Iran, Russia as ‘essential’"},"content":{"rendered":"

SIMON’S TOWN, South Africa: South Africa on Saturday (Jan 10) began naval drills<\/a> with Russia, Iran and China, describing the manoeuvres off its coast as not merely a show of force but a vital response to rising maritime tensions.<\/p>\n

The week-long “Will for Peace 2026” exercises come just days after the United States seized a Russian-flagged oil tanker in the North Atlantic, saying it carried crude bound for Venezuela, Russia and Iran in violation of Western sanctions.<\/p>\n

The seizure followed an American raid<\/a> that toppled Moscow’s ally Nicolas Maduro in Caracas.<\/p>\n

The drills – led by China – were more than a military exercise and a statement of intent among the BRICS group of emerging nations, Captain Nndwakhulu Thomas Thamaha, South Africa’s joint taskforce commander, told the opening ceremony.<\/p>\n

“It is a demonstration of our collective resolve to work together,” he said.<\/p>\n

BRICS, originally made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, has expanded to include Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and, more recently, Indonesia.<\/p>\n

China and Iran deployed destroyer warships, while Russia and the United Arab Emirates sent corvette vessels. Host South Africa dispatched a frigate.<\/p>\n

Indonesia, Ethiopia and Brazil joined as observers.<\/p>\n

“In an increasingly complex maritime environment, cooperation such as this is not an option, it is essential,” said Thamaha.<\/p>\n

The exercises were to “ensure the safety of shipping lanes and maritime economic activities”, he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SIMON’S TOWN, South Africa: South Africa on Saturday (Jan 10) began naval drills with Russia, Iran and China,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16114,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[52],"tags":[176,10430,584,131],"class_list":{"0":"post-16113","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-south-africa","8":"tag-iran","9":"tag-naval-drills","10":"tag-russia","11":"tag-south-africa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16113"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16113\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16114"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}