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Russia, Germany come out for diplomatic solutions to Iranian issue
27/5/2006 11:46

Both Russia and Germany come out for political and diplomatic settlement of Iran's nuclear crisis, Russian Vice-premier and Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov said on Friday in St. Petersburg after talks with visiting German Defense Minister Franz Josef Jung.

"The world experience shows that sanctions prove ineffective, as a rule," Ivanov said in reply to a question whether a possible resolution on Iran if adopted by the UN Security Council might affect military-technical cooperation between Russia and Iran, the Itar-Tass news agency reported.

Ivanov said the two ministers focused on problems of nonproliferation of weapons of mass destruction and missile technologies not only in respect to Iran.

"New threats that did not exist earlier have appeared which makes us focus more attention than before on the nonproliferation problem," Ivanov said.

"This is a very serious problem, international regimes should be strengthened, and in that sense the positions of Russia and Germany are fully identical," he said.

Ivanov said Russia will implement the contract to supply Tor-M1air defense systems to Iran in full. "Russia has signed a contract with Iran on supply of close-range air defense systems Tor-M1 to Iran. The contract will undoubtedly be fulfilled if no force major factors interfere."

"We strictly observe all our commitments, and if told that Russia allegedly helps in certain prohibited programs we say it is mere propaganda, " Ivanov added.



Xinhua