When a supreme leader is assassinated, the Global South trembles |
The killing of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in joint United States–Israeli strikes has torn a hole not only through Iran’s leadership, but through the fragile architecture of the international order itself. The shockwaves are no longer confined to Tehran. They ripple through the Strait of Hormuz, across Gulf capitals, into energy markets in Singapore and Sydney, and deep into the conscience of a world already fatigued by war.
Iran now stands at a precipice. An interim council – President Masoud Pezeshkian, Judiciary Chief Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Eje’i, and a senior Guardian Council cleric – has assumed authority, promising continuity under the constitution.
The Assembly of Experts is expected to appoint a successor within days. Yet history offers little comfort. As the Journal of Democracy observes, the death of an autocrat rarely ushers in democratic rebirth; entrenched systems often outlive their architects. Iran’s hybrid theocratic–republican state, built upon velayat-e faqih, is deeply institutionalised, anchored by the Revolutionary Guards and a clerical establishment that fuses ideology with coercive power.
But something has changed. For nearly two years, Israel’s military campaign across the region has expanded from Gaza to Lebanon and now to Iran itself, creating a widening arc of confrontation. Tehran’s response – missile salvos, drone warfare, mobilisation of proxy networks in Iraq, Yemen, Syria and Lebanon – has transformed a shadow conflict into open regional war. The Atlantic Council warns that Iran is likely to deploy ‘everything it has’, including its full missile arsenal and proxy forces. Chatham House cautions that aerial bombardment alone is unlikely to topple such an entrenched regime. Escalation, once ignited, rarely respects borders.
The economic consequences are immediate and unforgiving. Brent crude surged roughly 10 per cent in a single day, trading near US$80 a barrel, with analysts warning of spikes towards US$100 should disruption in the Strait of Hormuz intensify.
The economic consequences are immediate and unforgiving. Brent crude surged roughly 10 per cent in a single day, trading near US$80 a barrel, with analysts warning of spikes towards US$100 should disruption in the Strait of Hormuz intensify.
Nearly 20 per cent of global oil flows through that narrow corridor. Tanker traffic has already slowed. Capital Economics estimates a 0.6–0.7 percentage point addition to global inflation if prices remain elevated. For emerging economies dependent on energy imports, this is not an abstraction; it is a fiscal and political stress test.
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Iran itself is not a marginal actor in global trade. Despite sanctions, it remains one of the world’s largest proven holders of oil and gas reserves. Its geography links Central Asia, the Caucasus, the Gulf and South Asia. A destabilised Iran reverberates through supply chains from Mumbai to Marseille. It also tests whether economic interdependence still restrains conflict, or whether geopolitics has decisively overtaken globalisation.
Legally and morally, the strikes have triggered fierce debate. Under Article 2(4) of the UN Charter, the use of force absent an armed attack or Security Council mandate is prohibited. Legal scholars at Just Security and Chatham House describe the action as a manifest violation of that foundational principle. Preventive war – striking because a rival might one day pose a threat – sits uneasily within the post-1945 order. If powerful states normalise such doctrines, the Charter risks becoming ornamental.
Yet Iran’s own conduct cannot be divorced from scrutiny. Human Rights Watch has documented missile strikes on Israeli civilian areas as likely war crimes. The United Nations Human Rights Council recently censured Tehran for its ‘brutal repression’ of protests, with thousands reportedly killed in crackdowns since 2022. No party in this widening conflict stands cloaked in innocence. Civilians, as always, bear the cost.
For global policymakers, the essential question is not who struck first, but how this spiral ends. A region already scarred by proxy wars now faces direct confrontation between states possessing advanced missile capabilities and deep ideological grievances.
For global policymakers, the essential question is not who struck first, but how this spiral ends. A region already scarred by proxy wars now faces direct confrontation between states possessing advanced missile capabilities and deep ideological grievances.
The Revolutionary Guards – a self-financing military-industrial complex controlling vast segments of Iran’s economy – remain intact. Hudson Institute analysts warn of a potential drift towards an overtly militarised state if hardliners consolidate power. The window for a managed transition may be narrow.
Comparison sharpens perspective. When Mao Zedong died in 1976, China faced factional struggle but ultimately pivoted towards economic reform. When the Soviet Union collapsed, geopolitical shock reverberated for decades. Iran’s trajectory will not mirror either precisely, yet the lesson endures: leadership vacuums in ideologically rigid systems can either entrench repression or catalyse recalibration. Outcomes are not predetermined.
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There is also a quieter dimension often overlooked in strategic calculus: Iran’s society is young, urban and deeply connected to global culture despite censorship. Waves of protest since 2022 revealed a population impatient with isolation and economic stagnation. Many Iranians distinguish between nation and regime, between cultural pride and political frustration. Any durable peace must account for that social reality.
Across the Global North and Global South alike, the crisis in Iran has become more than a regional confrontation; it is a referendum on the future of international order.
For energy-importing nations in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, a 10 per cent spike in oil prices is not a line on a Bloomberg terminal but a direct blow to food security, transport costs, and political stability.
For energy-importing nations in South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa, a 10 per cent spike in oil prices is not a line on a Bloomberg terminal but a direct blow to food security, transport costs, and political stability.
For European and East Asian economies already navigating inflationary aftershocks, the threat of Brent crude surging towards US$100 a barrel reopens wounds barely healed since the pandemic and the war in Ukraine. Nearly one-fifth of the world’s oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz; if that artery clogs, it is Cairo and Karachi, Berlin and Bangkok that feel the constriction.
Meanwhile, the legal tremors are just as profound. When Article 2(4) of the UN Charter is strained by preventive force, smaller states — particularly in the Global South — read the message with unease: sovereignty appears conditional, restraint selective.
The credibility gap between proclaimed commitment to a rules-based order and the lived experience of power politics widens. In such a climate, diplomatic voice is not ornamental; it is existential. Calls for an immediate ceasefire, renewed nuclear negotiations, and guaranteed humanitarian corridors are not gestures of softness. They are acts of preservation — of markets, of norms, of fragile social compacts from Lagos to Lahore.
A more horizon demands imagination beyond containment and deterrence. It calls for a new diplomatic geometry that bridges North and South rather than dividing them into blocs of grievance and suspicion. Emerging powers — from Brazil to India, from South Africa to Indonesia — possess both credibility and distance to convene dialogue unburdened by decades of hostility. Gulf states, long positioned between rivalry and rapprochement, can transform their mediation channels into structured security guarantees that protect shipping lanes and civilian infrastructure.
Europe and East Asia, heavily exposed to energy disruption, can leverage economic instruments to incentivise de-escalation and reintegration rather than perpetual isolation. Such a coalition would not erase ideological differences, nor would it sanctify repression. It would, however, affirm that perpetual war in the world’s energy corridor is a collective liability. The future peace of Iran — and by extension, regional equilibrium — must be framed not as a concession to one camp, but as a shared investment in global stability.
In an era defined by fragmentation, the moral imagination to choose diplomacy over escalation may be the most radical act of statecraft left.
The Washington Institute has argued that moments of leverage can be converted into negotiation – reviving nuclear constraints, limiting missile proliferation, and integrating regional security guarantees. Such diplomacy will demand political courage from all sides. It will also require restraint from actors tempted to interpret military advantage as strategic inevitability.
Peace with Iran is not an endorsement of its system; it is an indictment of how this war began. The opening strikes by Israel and the United States shattered an already brittle equilibrium and set the region alight. Acknowledging that reality does not erase security anxieties — it confronts the consequences of acting on them through force. Perpetual war in the heart of the world’s primary energy corridor is not a strategy; it is a sabotage of global stability.
Without urgent negotiation, retaliation will harden into routine, economies will bleed under rising oil and inflation, the norm against extrajudicial force will erode, and another generation will inherit grievance instead of hope.
In the end, the crisis in Iran is a test of whether global politics remains governed by law and diplomacy, or by accelerating retaliation. Oil prices and missile ranges capture headlines. The deeper stakes lie in trust – trust that sovereignty is respected, that civilians are shielded, that dialogue remains possible even between adversaries.
History will record this moment not merely as the death of a leader, but as a crossroads for international order. The choice is stark: escalation that entrenches division, or a deliberate turn towards principled engagement. The path to a more stable Middle East, and a more credible global system, runs through restraint, accountability and renewed diplomacy. The world can ill afford another lost decade of war.
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The views expressed in this article belong to the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial policy of Middle East Monitor.