Iran’s defense minister has traveled to diplomatic and economic ally China on his first reported trip abroad since a 12-day clash with Israel that briefly dragged the US into a new regional conflict. Aziz Nasirzadeh is one of nine defense ministers that Chinese state media say attended a gathering of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a China- and Russia-led regional security grouping that has grown in prominence as Beijing and Moscow look to build alternative international blocs to those backed by the United States. The two-day gathering began Wednesday in the Chinese coastal city of Qingdao, a day after a ceasefire between Iran and Israel quelled what had been days of aerial assaults between the two, punctuated by a US strike on three Iranian nuclear facilities. The SCO gathering coincided with a meeting of NATO leaders at The Hague, where US President Donald Trump said the US would meet with…
