Diplomat: Iran Ready to Help Venezuela Come Out of Current Situation

“The Iranian government and the private sector are quite ready to assist the Venezuelan people and government to improve their current conditions,” Director General for the Americas at the Iranian Foreign Ministry Mohammad Keshavarz-Zadeh said in a meeting with Venezuelan Vice President for Economy Wilmar Soteldo.

During the meeting, the two sides agreed to prepare a “roadmap” for improvement of Iran-Venezuela economic cooperation until the next joint economic cooperation commission in Tehran which is likely to be held in the near future.

The two sides also discussed the status of the Iranian companies, active in projects in Venezuela.

The Venezuelan vice president, for his part, praised the Iranian nation’s self-sufficiency and their resistance against the foreign sanctions.

“The Islamic Republic of Iran was one of the few countries which helped to transfer of technology to Venezuela in recent years,” Soteldo said.

He underlined the Venezuelan nation’s commitment to follow Iran’s policy to decrease dependence on oil revenues.

In relevant remarks in late November 2017, Venezuelan Foreign Minister Jorge Alberto Arreaza Montserrat lauded Iran’s regional policies, and voiced his country’s support for Tehran’s constructive role in the Middle East.

“Venezuela is trying various ways, including consultations with governments to de-escalate tensions in the Middle East region; I assure Iran of my country’s support for Iran and other peace-keeping countries in the region,” Arreaza Montserrat said in a meeting with Iran’s Ambassador to Caracas Mostafa Alayee.

Alayee, for his part, pointed to the efforts by the US, Saudi Arabia and Israel to destabilize Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon, and said, “Saudis are now angry and more aggressive towards Iran and the resistance forces because their plots have been foiled.”

The Iranian ambassador also said that the Iran-Russia-Turkey tripartite summit level negotiations in the Russian city of Sochi on November 22 was successful in guaranteeing peace in Syria.

In relevant remarks in early September, Senior Iranian and Venezuelan officials in a meeting in Tehran underlined the need for developing mutual cooperation in different fields.

During the meeting in the Iranian capital, senior officials from both countries’ private and government sectors discussed ways to enhance mutual cooperation, specially in economic and trade fields.

The two sides focused on mechanism to develop economic and trade cooperation between Iran and Venezuela.