Explainer: Iran's Relationship with Latin America

“Iranians have worked hard to build connective tissue with the region,” said Brian Fonseca, director of the Jack D. Gordon Institute for Public Policy at Florida State University, in a 2025 interview with AS/COA Online. “But I’m not convinced these are deep ties. They are more transactional.”

What do those relations look like?

Iran has embassies in 11 Latin American countries, many of which were opened during a 2007 diplomatic push, shepherded by then-Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez (1999-2013). Iran’s military has performed naval tours of the region, including a 2023 voyage that saw Iranian warships dock in Brazil and travel through the Panama Canal. The Iranian government also runs a Spanish-language media company, HispanTV, which has produced content for broadcast and social media since 2011.

Latin America, a region with no nuclear warheads, has a history of promoting nuclear non-proliferation. In the past, leaders such as Lula have pushed for agreements with Iran to control its atomic activity.

Tehran’s ties in the region are not static. Several relationships have fluctuated depending on the parties in power. Some countries, like Bolivia, Ecuador, and Paraguay, grew closer to Iran under prior governments, but have since distanced themselves from the regime.

Iran doesn’t rank as a top 10 trade partner for any country in Latin America. Tehran maintains a large trade deficit with the region, importing far more than it exports. In 2022, Latin America exported a record $4.9 billion in goods to Iran, with $4.3 billion of that coming from Brazil. Corn, soybeans, coffee, sugar, beef, and poultry make up most of the exports. Still, it represents a modest share of Brazil’s total exports—under 1 percent. In 2023, Iran joined BRICS, the bloc of which Brazil was one of the founding members.

The majority of Brazil’s imports from Iran, which stood at $173 million in 2022, are of fertilizer. In 2025, it accounted for 80 percent of imports, totaling almost $80 million. 

While that’s only 2.5 percent of Brazil’s fertilizer imports, the war is also disrupting fertilizer shipments through the Strait of Hormuz, blocking shipments from Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, and the UAE. Already, fertilizer prices rose by 35 percent in the first weeks of March and governments, such as the Dominican Republic, have announced measures to subsidize fertilizers. 

Moreover, the Iran war is causing the largest supply shock to the global oil market in history, according to the International Energy Agency. Not only is warfare disrupting the output of Iran, a top-ten oil producer, but 20 percent of global oil passes through the shuttered Strait of Hormuz. So far, Brent crude prices have risen 55 percent since the start of the conflict. Moreover, Iran has struck refineries and oil fields in oil-producing Gulf countries. 

Still, 90 percent of Iran’s oil goes to China; it is not a meaningful exporter to Latin America. Iran used to help Venezuela to evade U.S. sanctions, but that relationship is now defunct, given Washington’s new cooperation with Caracas after the fall of Maduro.

Even if Iran doesn’t export much oil to Latin America, prices are still surging in the region. Leaders are deciding whether to use subsidies to keep prices low or let the cost pass to consumers. High oil prices are likely to cause inflation across the region.

The overall impact of the war may, though, may depend on each country’s oil balance sheet. Countries who are major oil producers—like Brazil, Guyana, and Colombia—may be better able to offset global prices with domestic production. And the war could drive interest in investment in Latin American energy projects. 

Countries that import most of their oil—such as Chile and Caribbean and Central American countries—may be left more vulnerable.

Iran lost perhaps its greatest ally in the region when Maduro lost power, a move that’s jeopardized those ties.

Jumpstarted by a series of state visits by Chávez and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (2005-2013) between 2005 and 2007, the two countries had expanded their trade and security cooperation with annual bilateral summits. “What brought the Iranians to Chávez in the first place was Ahmadinejad’s attempt to get some legitimacy and look for a way to push back against the United States,” explained Fonseca. The relationship has endured beyond both leaders’ tenures. In 2022, Nicolás Maduro, Venezuela’s current leader, offered Iranian officials asylum if they were forced to flee their country.

Iranian sources valued trade with Venezuela at $3 billion in 2023. In June 2025, Iran reported that it was in the process of finalizing a bilateral trade deal.

A cornerstone of the economic relationship, though, was Iran’s aid in helping the Maduro regime evade sanctions. The U.S. government strengthened sanctions on the country after its 2019 presidential election, and Iran was one of several countries to accept Venezuelan crude oil shipments in return for cheap gasoline and financial assistance. Cooperation between the countries’ oil sectors continued. In 2021, Iran and Venezuela agreed to a swap of oil products with the goal of improving the quality of Venezuelan crude. In 2022, Tehran helped repair a Venezuelan oil refinery. 

In exchange for its help on the oil sector, the Maduro regime struck deals to build and sell Iranian cars and to allow Iran to lease farmland in Venezuela, according to CSIS. The Maduro regime has also purchased oil from Iran by paying in gold. 

Iran and Venezuela cooperated on security matters. In 2009, Iran and Venezuela were collaborating on efforts to find uranium in the South American country. At the time, Chávez said he believed Iran has the right to have a nuclear program.

Delcy Rodríguez, the interim president of Venezuela, visited Tehran in 2015 as foreign minister. Shortly after assuming the presidency in January, she said, “We have the right to have diplomatic relations with China, with Russia, with Iran, with Cuba, with all the peoples of the world. Also with the United States. We are a sovereign nation.” Since the start of the war, she’s been quiet on the issue, however. Her government condemned U.S. and Israeli strikes, as well as Iran’s retaliation.

In recent years, Iranian officials have signed agreements with Cuba and Nicaragua. These relationships are, in part, “a product of those countries looking to build global alliances,” explained Fonseca. 

While Nicaragua has not signed any recent agreements with Iran, its top officials have met to discuss military cooperation. Fonseca noted that in the past there have been questions about the large number of Iranian diplomats stationed in Managua.

Neither of these countries recognize Israel; Nicaragua severed ties in 2024 and Cuba in 1973.

Bolivia was another country that was moving closer to Tehran, signing a joint equipment accord in 2023. However, President Rodrigo Paz, who assumed office in November 2025, has moved La Paz closer to Washington. In January, Reuters reported that the U.S. government is pushing Paz’s administration to take a stronger stance against Iran.

Hezbollah, a Lebanese political party and paramilitary group backed by Iran, is believed to have been behind the 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires that left 85 dead. Several Latin American governments—including Argentina, Colombia, Guatemala, Honduras, and Paraguay—designate Hezbollah a terrorist group.

Since the start of the Israel-Hamas war in 2023, Latin American intelligence agencies have thwarted several terrorism plots allegedly linked to Hezbollah, including a 2023 plan in Brazil to attack a Jewish community center. “Latin America presents soft targets for Iran to strike back against Jewish and Israeli interests," explained Ryan Berg, director of the Americas program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said in a 2025 interview with AS/COA Online. “Iran doesn’t make a distinction between what is Jewish and what is Israeli.”

The Milei government has redoubled efforts to raise awareness of Hezbollah's activities in the region. In April 2024, his security minister, Patricia Bullrich, said that Hezbollah has a presence in Bolivia, Chile, and the tri-border area between Argentina, Brazil, and Paraguay. Milei has vowed to renew the investigation into the AMIA bombing. To this day, no one has been convicted for the terrorist attack, though in October 2024, Bullrich said the government had identified the man they believe masterminded the bombing.

What might Hezbollah’s presence in the region mean amid the war in Iran? “Iran has a history of attacking in an asymmetrical manner. [It has] a history of reacting outside of the country,” said Douglas Farah, president of IBI Consultants, in a 2025 interview with AS/COA Online. If Hezbollah has the capacity for an attack, he said, Latin America could be a priority location.