MOSCOW, January 3. /TASS/. Iran and Russia are preparing a personal meeting on cooperation in producing the vaccine against the novel coronavirus, Iranian Ambassador to Russia Kazem Jalali said in an interview with Izvestia newspaper published on Sunday.
"The phone conversations in April-October 2020 between the presidents of Iran and Russia underlined Iran’s interest in cooperation with Russia in the field of producing the coronavirus vaccine and exchanging the experience. Currently, Russian documents on the vaccines are being studied. It has been decided that soon a personal meeting will take place," the envoy said.
The ambassador also noted that although Tehran had declared the launch of the first phase of testing the first Iranian vaccine on humans, the republic was still considering all vaccines being produced, including the Russian.
On December 22, Deputy Speaker of Iran's Parliament (Majlis) Amir-Hossein Ghazizadeh-Hashemi told the Russian media that Iran and Russia were in talks on creating a joint venture on producing the coronavirus vaccine.
To date, two domestic vaccines against the coronavirus have been registered in Russia: a vaccine developed by the Gamaleya National Research Center for Epidemiology and Microbiology of the Russian Healthcare Ministry and a vaccine by the Vector State Research Center of Virology and Biotechnology of the Federal Service for Surveillance on Consumer Rights Protection and Human Wellbeing. Soon the registration of a third vaccine is possible, developed by the Chumakov Federal Scientific Center for Research and Development of Immune and Biological Products of the Russian Academy of Sciences.