TEHRAN (Dispatches) -- Iranian Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani on Sunday underlined the importance of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and said its meetings provide a good opportunity to discuss regional problems with parliament speakers of member states.
Larijani made the remarks before leaving for Serbia to attend the 141st Assembly of Inter-Parliamentary Union.
"The IPU meeting is an opportunity to speak with the heads of parliaments on issues in a variety of areas, including regional and international problems and mutual economic cooperation,” Tasnim news agency quoted him as saying.
Larijani is about to attend the IPU assembly and hold talks with Serbian officials about boosting parliamentary cooperation.
"It is one of the few meetings that bring together (speakers of) world parliaments and decide on important international issues,” the Iranian parliament speaker stated.
The 141st Assembly of the IPU takes place in Belgrade through October 13-17.
All IPU statutory bodies, including the governing council, standing committees, committees on the human rights of parliamentarians and on Middle East questions, as well as the forum of women parliamentarians and the forum of young MPs, will meet on this occasion, according to its official website.
The theme of the general debate is "Strengthening international law: Parliamentary roles and mechanisms, and the contribution of regional cooperation”.
The event is attended by parliamentary delegations from around 180 countries.
The visit comes after Larijani cancelled a trip to Istanbul following Turkey’s military incursion into northeast Syria.
The Iranian speaker had been invited by his Turkish counterpart to take part in a parliamentary conference in Istanbul.
Like most Arab and European governments, Iran has voiced its opposition to Turkey’s military offensive in northeastern Syria.
The Iranian foreign ministry expressed "concern” on Thursday over Turkey’s military operation, which had started a day earlier, and demanded "an immediate stop to the attacks and the exit of the Turkish military from Syrian territory”.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Muhammad Javad Zarif had earlier flagged up a 1998 security pact signed between Turkey and Syria - commonly known as the Adana agreement - as a legal framework for peacefully establishing security on the Turkish-Syrian border.
According to the accord, then-Syrian president Hafez al-Assad pledged to shut down the bases of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) - which Ankara regards a terrorist group - in Syria and expel its leader Abdullah Ocalan from the country.    
"The Adana Agreement between Turkey and Syria - still valid - can be the better path to achieve security. Iran can help bring together the Syrian Kurds, the Syrian government, and Turkey so that the Syrian army together with Turkey can guard the border,” Zarif tweeted, summing up his suggestions in an interview with Ankara’s state-run news channel TRT World.