By Mark Trevelyan
(Reuters) -Belarus and Iran – two nations which have backed Russia’s battle in Ukraine – plan to deepen bilateral ties throughout all areas together with defence, their presidents stated at talks in Minsk on Wednesday.
Belarusian state information company Belta stated presidents Alexander Lukashenko and Masoud Pezeshkian agreed to work on a strategic partnership treaty.
“In circumstances of geopolitical turbulence, Minsk and Tehran are endeavor constant and balanced steps to additional develop cooperation, and are working arduous to show every new problem into a brand new alternative,” it quoted Lukashenko as saying.
“We’re prepared to debate any points, we now have no closed matters,” Lukashenko stated, including that the 2 nations may accomplice throughout a spread of areas together with “military-technical cooperation”.
Lukashenko, an in depth ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, allowed Russia to make use of Belarusian territory as a launchpad for its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, and later assented to internet hosting Russian tactical nuclear missiles.
Iran has equipped drones to Russia to be used within the battle and Pezeshkian signed a strategic cooperation treaty with Putin in January, though it didn’t embody a mutual defence clause.
Each Iran and Belarus are below what Pezeshkian described as “unlawful Western sanctions”. Belta quoted him as saying Iran was prepared to assist Belarus “neutralise” such measures, noting that it had greater than 40 years of expertise on this space.
Pezeshkian stated the 2 nations wanted to construct their financial and different ties to a degree that matched the excessive degree of belief between them.
“After all, our widespread views ought to be carried out within the financial and cultural spheres, within the improvement of tourism between our nations, and likewise, as you famous, within the improvement of military-technical cooperation,” Belta quoted him as telling Lukashenko.
(Reporting by Mark Trevelyan; enhancing by Man Faulconbridge and Alex Richardson)