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Russian defense minister arrives in Tehran for two-day visit

Sergei Shoigu and Hossein Dehghan will discuss ways of intensifying military and military-technological cooperation between the two countries as well as questions of regional and global security
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu Mikhail Dzaparidze/TASS
Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu
© Mikhail Dzaparidze/TASS

TEHERAN, January 19 /TASS/. Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu arrived in Teheran for a two-day official visit to meet Iranian Defense Minister Brigade General Hossein Dehghan.

They will discuss ways of intensifying military and military-technological cooperation between the two countries as well as questions of regional and global security at talks on January 20.

Shoigu will also meet General Hassan Firouzabadi, the Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces.

The Russian Defense Ministry press service chief, Major General Igor Konashenkov, said in his previous statements that the two countries were planning to sign a military cooperation agreement during Shoigu’s visit.

The FARS news agency has quoted Hossein Dehghan as saying that it was necessary to develop defense ties between Teheran and Moscow, which in his words are a vital factor of stability and security in the entire Middle East region and Central Asia. General Dehghan expressed his opinion back in October 2013 when he replied to a letter by Sergei Shoigu who had congratulated him on his appointment as Iran’s defense minister. He also said that Russia occupied a special place in Iran’s foreign policy.

“Ongoing cooperation between the two countries will contribute to consolidation of efforts to strengthen regional and global security,” Iran’s defense minister said.

Iran’s news agency IRNA, in turn, has described Sergei Shoigu’s two-day visit as an “outstanding event.” The Russian defense minister’s visit will take the Russian-Iranian relations to a new level of security cooperation, IRNA said.

IRNA stated that Iran and Russia held identical views on many international and regional problems, including an agreement between Iran and the P5+1 group /five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council and Germany/ on Iran’s nuclear programme; the deployment of NATO’s missile defense system in Eastern Europe; the internal political crisis in Syria; problems of anti-terror struggle in the Middle East. IRNA also noted the convergence of the two countries’ approaches to problems of energy markets linked to radical slump of prices for fuel and energy.

Shoigu’s previous meeting with General Hossein Dehghan took place at the third Moscow International Security Conference in May 2014.