IRAN HOPES FOR FAIR SETTLEMENT OF KARABAKH DISPUTE
Press TV, Iran
April 17 2015
A senior Iranian official has called for the fair settlement
of a lingering dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the
Nagorno-Karabakh region.
“The territorial integrity of the Republic of Azerbaijan is very
important to us and we hope the Karabakh dispute could be resolved
fairly,” Ali Rabiei, Iran’s minister of labor, welfare and social
security, said Friday.
The Iranian minister, who was meeting with Azerbaijan’s Prime Minister
Artur Rasizade in Baku, called Azerbaijan a major regional ally for
Iran, attaching importance to relations between the two countries.
The decade-long conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia over the
Nagorno-Karabakh region has yet to be resolved permanently. The area
which is inhabited by ethnic Armenians is internationally recognized
as part of Azerbaijan. A deadly war in the 1990s which killed some
30,000 people on both sides saw the ethnic Armenian troops capture
the entire area.
Rabiei also urged the removal of existing obstacles to cooperation
between Tehran and Baku, saying that Iran is ready to engage in joint
projects with Azerbaijan in various fields, including energy, mining,
the pharmaceutical industry, rehabilitation services and the training
of workforce.
The Azeri premier, for his part, described the current state of
relations between Iran and Azerbaijan as very good, saying, however,
that the two countries should put more efforts into bolstering
bilateral ties.
Rasizade called Iran a powerful and influential country in the region,
adding that Baku is keen to continue cooperating with Iran as a matter
of strengthening Islamic unity among the regional countries.
He also emphasized the need for the two countries to up their level
of economic cooperation and urged the Iran-Azerbaijan Joint Economic
Commission to be more active.
MS/NN/HMV