TEHRAN, March 3. /TASS/. Geography and history bring Russia and Iran closer," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin on a visit to Iran said after talks with his Iranian counterpart Ibrahim Rahimpur, also noting common problems, with "artificial problems coming from the West" among them.
"It would be naive to think sanction measures can to some extent shake the will of Russia and the will of Iran," Karasin told TASS in Tehran.
"The lifting of sanctions against Iran has made Iran a more active player on international arena. We see on a daily basis that activity of Iran is aimed at the settlement of problems, conflict situations, not at creating new ones," he went on.
"This comes in in sharp contrast with other states of the region that criminally ignore the existing realities and directly pursue their confrontation policy," he went on, pointing to Turkey.
"And this is one of the problems that we must discuss with the Iranian side and on which some coordinated decisions are needed," the top Russian diplomat said.
The crisis in Ukraine, Caspian Sea status, problems facing the Central Asian region and fight against terrorism were in the focus at talks of the two diplomats, Grigory Karasin and Rahimpur in Tehran.
"Our contacts with Iran on foreign policy have become more extensive," Karasin told TASS after the talks. "The post-sanction Iran becomes an increasingly active political player not only in the region, but in international affairs on the whole," the diplomat said.
"Tehran and Moscow have a lot of areas of common interest on which we need to compare approaches," the Russian diplomat added.
He said they had exchanged in detail opinions on the development of relations with Ukraine, on ways to overcome the Ukrainian crisis, as well as on implementation of the Minsk agreements.
"We also compared the nature of our relations with other partners in the Caucasus: Azerbaijan, Armenia, and discussed the Nagorno Karabakh settlement," he went on.
"We also touched upon an important for both countries advance towards a convention on the Caspian Sea status," he said, noting that meetings of the Caspian Five foreign ministers could become a regular mechanism on all issues connected with the Caspian.
Karasin said they had discussed the Central Asian region in the light of fight against terrorism, noting that the two countries were interested in stability and prosperity of region’s countries and stating a bid to help in their economic and social development.
Karasin and Rahimpur also discussed the international North-South Transport Corridor project to connect into one logistic system Russia, Iran, Caucasian and Central Asian countries, ensuring cargo transit from Europe to Persian Gulf ports.