Meeting with President of Iran Masoud Pezeshkian

Attending the meeting on the Russian side were Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, deputy prime ministers Alexander Novak and Alexei Overchuk, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office, Special Presidential Representative for Financial and Economic Cooperation with BRICS States and Interaction with the New Development Bank Maxim Oreshkin, Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office – Presidential Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov, Presidential Aide Yury Ushakov, Minister of Economic Development Maxim Reshetnikov, Minister of Transport Roman Starovoit, Director of the Federal Service for Military Technical Cooperation Dmitry Shugayev, Head of the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia faction in the State Duma, Head of the State Duma Committee on International Affairs Leonid Slutsky, Head of the Republic of Tatarstan Rustam Minnikhanov, Presidential Advisor Igor Levitin, Head of the Federal Service for the Oversight of Consumer Protection and Welfare Anna Popova, and Director General of the State Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom Alexei Likhachev.

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Beginning of Russian-Iranian talks

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr President,

Colleagues, friends,

This visit to Russia is your first as President of the Islamic Republic of Iran, and this has great symbolic importance.

Iran has become a full participant of BRICS, and you know that we strongly supported your application. Earlier, we also vigorously promoted your accession to the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation. This has given us additional opportunities for cooperation in the international arena.

Recently, we had a very substantive and, I am sure, useful meeting in Ashgabat, where we reviewed the main aspects of bilateral cooperation and the most relevant regional issues. Most importantly, we reaffirmed our policy of mutually strengthening ties in every possible way. Our interaction is on the rise; it is genuinely friendly and constructive. Soon we will be able to consolidate the results achieved with a new major interstate agreement on comprehensive strategic partnership between Russia and Iran.

We are grateful to you for accepting the invitation to pay a separate visit to our country to sign this document and other important documents in a ceremonial atmosphere.

As I said in Ashgabat, one of our priorities is to consolidate the emerging positive trends in trade and economic cooperation. We expect this issue to be addressed by the intergovernmental commission, chaired by our Minister of Energy, Mr Tsivilev, and Iranian Minister of Petroleum Mohsen Paknejad.

Other priorities include the implementation of major joint initiatives such as the development of Iranian railway infrastructure as part of promoting a major project, the International North-South Transport Corridor project, as well as the construction of the second and third power units at the Bushehr NPP.

To be continued.