By IANS
Tehran : India Sunday underlined its commitment to expand relations with Iran and said that the consolidation of ties between the two countries will contribute to regional stability.
Indian Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon, who is here on a two-day visit, met Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki and held talks on a wide range of bilateral, regional and global issues.
Menon described the relations between the two countries that have centuries-old cultural ties as friendly and stressed that expansion of ties with Tehran is a high priority for India.
“Expansion of ties with Iran is a priority for India’s foreign policy and India seeks to further develop relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran,” Menon said, according to Iran’s official news agency IRNA.
Describing Menon’s Tehran visit as significant, Mottaki reminded that the two countries’ historical relations indicated their joint interests to further develop relations.
“Iran believes that the two countries enjoy joint interests in their bilateral, regional and international relations,” Mottaki said. “The Islamic Republic of Iran is an independent country and makes fully independent decisions in its relations with other countries,” he added.
Mottaki also said that the two countries should not allow certain trans-regional powers to impair Iran-India relations.
Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Secretary Saeed Jalili said at his meeting with Menon that expansion of cooperation between Tehran and New Delhi could lead to upgrading their capacity for developing multilateral cooperation.
Jalili, who is also Iran’s chief nuclear negotiator, said that historical ties and untapped potentials play significant role in long-term cooperation between Iran and India.
Menon’s visit is aimed at arresting the drift in ties between the two countries that came under strain after India voted against the Iranian nuclear programme over two years ago.
The Indian official assured the Iranian leadership that despite its growing ties with the US, India is committed to deepen its relations with Iran with whom it shares centuries-old civilisational and historical ties.
A multi-billion-dollar tri-nation gas pipeline project to transport the Iranian gas via Pakistan to India was also discussed, the sources told IANS. The project is presently stuck due to differences over the gas pricing and the issue of transit fee with Pakistan.
This was be the first visit from the Indian side to Iran after the Dec 3 release of the US National Intelligence Estimate report that said Tehran had halted its nuclear weapons programme in 2003.
The report radically revised world opinion about the nature of Tehran’s atomic energy programme, accused by the West of developing nuclear weapons.
India voted against the Iranian nuclear programme in the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in 2005 and again in 2006 on grounds that it needed to do more to clarify the nature of its atomic programme. However, New Delhi has consistently advocated diplomacy and opposed sanctions to solve the Iranian nuclear crisis.