TEHRAN - Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani says his country and Russia have deep-rooted and expanding relations in various economic, defense, military, security and scientific fields.
Shamkhani made the remarks upon his arrival in Moscow where he is scheduled to participate in the fifth round of the regional security dialogue in the Russian capital of Moscow on Wednesday.
He noted that it was necessary to review the roadmap drawn up by the two countries’ top officials for strengthening bilateral cooperation over the next two decades.
Back in January, Iran’s Foreign Minister Hussein Amir-Abdollahian said the Iranian and Russian presidents have tasked the top diplomats of the two countries with working out the 20-year roadmap for cooperation.
Elsewhere in his remarks, Shamkhani said the participants at the regional security dialogue meeting would discuss the latest political, economic and security developments in Afghanistan.
Iran’s top security official noted that the problems of the Afghan people are rooted in the ineffectiveness of the occupying forces and the post-occupation incidents.
The ways to settle issues in the war-stricken country would be discussed in the Moscow meeting, given the fact that “Afghanistan can become a crisis point in the region,” he said.
Looking at all regional countries hit by foreign intervention, he went on, one can see that the problems in those countries are caused by two central issues, namely “creating discord within them and preventing the resolution of regional crises by the countries of the region themselves.”
He further emphasized that extra-regional powers are the ones sowing discord in regional countries and interfering in their internal affairs in an attempt to limit their power to solve regional crises.
The U.S. invaded Afghanistan in October 2001 following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the United States, despite the fact that no Afghan national was involved in the attacks. Hundreds of thousands of Afghans died in the U.S. war of aggression on the country.
American forces had occupied the country for about two decades on the pretext of fighting against the Taliban. But as the U.S. forces left Afghanistan in August last year, the Taliban stormed into the capital Kabul, which was weakened by continued foreign occupation.
The Taliban took over the capital Kabul on August 8, 2021, and declared that the war in Afghanistan was over. The militants entered the presidential palace after President Ashraf Ghani fled the country.
Hundreds of thousands of Afghans died in the U.S. war on the country while Washington’s irresponsible withdrawal is also leading to a humanitarian crisis in the war-torn state.
Secretaries, advisers and representatives of the national security organization of Afghanistan’s neighboring countries plan to take part in the Moscow meeting to exchange views about the political, economic and security developments in the country.
Shamkhani is scheduled to meet some of his counterparts and discuss bilateral, regional and international issues on the sidelines of the meeting.
The regional security dialogue was established on Iran’s initiative in 2018. The first and second meetings of the regional security dialogue were held in Tehran, and the third and fourth meetings were also hosted by India in New Delhi and Tajikistan in Dushanbe.