New Delhi
12 November 2009
India and Iran will take tentative steps towards improving trade and investment
linkages when Minister of External Affairs SM Krishna meets with his Iranian counterpart
here next week.
Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki of Iran will be in New Delhi on 16 and 17
November. He will be accompanied by a delegation comprising deputy ministers and
officials.
It will be the first high-level contact between India and Iran after Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won second consecutive terms
in office earlier this year.
The focus of the talks will be on banking, insurance, investment, energy cooperation and
preferential trade agreement (PTA). Some of the investment projects will relate to setting
up of a steel plant in Iran and an off-shore refinery in India.
Both sides are also expected to review the situations in Afghanistan and Pakistan and to
hold general discussions on the India - Pakistan - Iran (IPI) gas pipeline project.
The agenda of Mr Mottaki's two-day visit here will be to "open a new chapter of
cooperation" between the two countries, Iran's Ambassador to India Seyed Mehdi
Nabizadeh told this newspaper.
Nabizadeh said that Iran will be open to the idea of delivering natural gas at the Pakistan
- India border but for that to happen, the negotiations on price of gas and other technical
aspects of the project will need to be revisited.
The Iranian envoy hoped that Prime Minister Singh, who has accepted an invitation to
visit Iran, will make that journey early next year.
India and Iran have intensified their dialogue, leading up to Mr Mottaki's visit. Last week,
a delegation comprising officials from the Central Bank of Iran held talks here with the
Reserve Bank of India and public sector banks.
On Friday, representatives from the Iran Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Mines
will meet with members of the Indian industry here.
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