Khatami Reaffirms Armenia’s Importance To Iran
By Ruzanna Stepanian 10/09/2004 08:46

Radio Free Europe, Czech Republic
Sept 10 2004

Iranian President Mohammad Khatami ended on Thursday a two-day
official visit to Armenia, lavishing more praise on Armenians and
their long-standing contribution to the development of his country.

Khatami said the Iranian and Armenian peoples remain part of the
same ancient “civilization” despite their cultural and religious
differences developed over the centuries.

“Every Iranian seems to again find his identity by coming to
Armenia,” he declared in a speech at Yerevan State University (YSU).
“The poetry, the art works and the sparkles of kindness of this land
are all testimony to the existence of bonds between Iran and Armenia.”

“Since the dawn of history Armenia has had deep and strong links with
Iranian culture and civilization,” he went on. “Even religious and
ideological differences, which usually create serious divisions in
geopolitical regions, have been unable to destroy the civilizational
unity of the Iranian world and the Armenian people.”

Khatami also paid tribute to Iran’s ethnic Armenian citizens that
currently number more than 100,000. “The role and participation of
the Armenians and Armenia in the opening of new horizons and paths
of Iran’s development has been significant,” he said in a speech
tinged with philosophical passages about the worldwide “dialogue of
civilizations” promoted by Tehran.

The Iranian leader began the second day of the trip with a visit to
the genocide memorial in Yerevan where he laid a wreath in memory of
some 1.5 million Armenians slaughtered in Ottoman Turkey.

He further underscored the Islamic Republic’s strong interest in
its sole Christian neighbor by receiving leaders of the Armenian
Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun), an influential nationalist
party which favors close ties with Russia and Iran and a hard line
on Turkey and Azerbaijan. It is represented in Armenia’s government
and has branches in all major Diaspora communities, including Iran.

A statement by Dashnaktsutyun’s office in Yerevan cited Khatami as
praising the party’s “pan-Armenian essence and Armenia’s “important
role” in the region. The Dashnaktsutyun leaders, for their part,
welcomed his visit as “a new stage” in the Iranian-Armenian
relationship.

Khatami and his Armenian counterpart Robert Kocharian signed
on Wednesday a framework treaty on the “principles and bases”
of bilateral relations. They also formalized the release of a $30
million Iran loan to Yerevan to be used for the construction of a
gas pipeline that will link the two neighboring countries.

Answering questions from YSU students, Khatami was asked to comment
on his recent remark that Iran recognizes Azerbaijan’s territorial
integrity in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. He said Tehran respects
the “sovereignty and territorial integrity of countries,” but stopped
short of describing Karabakh as an integral part of Azerbaijan.

Khatami’s Thursday schedule also included a visit to an 18th century
Persian mosque in Yerevan renovated by the Iranian government and a
meeting with the head of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Catholicos
Garegin II.