Velayati Says Iran Ready to Cooperate with France on Syria

Iran’s Presidential Candidate, former Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Velayati said in an inerview with AFP that he would cooperate with France to resolve the conflict in Syria should he win the June 14 presidential election.

“My offer, if I am victorious, is that Iran and France sit together to talk, and work together, to find a political solution to the Syrian crisis,” Velaytai said.

“I am ready to do it,” he added.

“France has lost its chance for a positive intervention” to solve the Syrian crisis, said Velayati, but he added that having a “long history of relations with Syria and Lebanon” puts France in a “better position” than other Western countries to resolve the Syria crisis.

France along with Britain had a major role in the deicison issued by the European Union to lift the embargo on arms to Syrian armed groups.

Velayati, who is also the International Affairs Advisor to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, considered the Geneva meeting presented “an opportunity” in a reference to the meeting initiated by Moscow and Washington for negotiations between Syria’s regime and opposition to reach a political solution.

Asked about Iran’s stance should Geneva lead to progress, he said Tehran
wanted a “political and not a military solution. Iran will not make a decision
on behalf of the Syrian government. If they accept (the outcome of Geneva), we will support it.”

On the Iranian file, Velayati reiterated that the Islamic republic was not seeking
nuclear weapons which are banned by the Islamic religion.

“We have announced repeatedly that we are against developing nuclear bombs,” he said, indicating that the supreme leader had announced that developing a bomb was religiously forbidden.”

“We have tried to respond to all the questions they have raised in more than 10 years…but a new question is raised every time we answer the previous ones. This is a vicious cycle that we have to get rid of,” he added.