News - World: Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a bill ratifying the strategic partnership treaty with Iran.

The Russian state news agency RIA reported on Monday that Putin had signed the law ratifying the strategic partnership agreement that had been inked with Iran in January. The bill had been approved by Russia’s State Duma earlier this month.

The pact, signed by Putin and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, has a duration of twenty years and establishes the legal framework for long-term cooperation in various sectors, including defense, energy, industry, agriculture, finance, transportation, science, culture, and technology.

Primarily, the long-term agreement seeks to promote investments in oil, gas, and the development of peaceful nuclear energy. It also aims to establish an international payment system that is independent of third-party countries and operates using national currencies.

Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi said the level of cooperation between Iran and Russia had reached its “apex.”

Araghchi met with Putin and other senior Russian officials on his visit to Moscow last week.

"We are at the apex of collaboration with Russia in the history of our 500-year-old relationship,” Araghchi wrote on Friday in a post on X, formerly Twitter.

The top diplomat described the two neighboring countries as “strategic partners” committed to pursuing their shared interests.

“In this critical juncture, Iran and Russia are strategic partners and will continue to be so in pursuit of shared interests & for the good of the two nations and the world,” he wrote on X. 

Araghchi said that given the US-led sanctions placed on both countries, the cooperation between them would strengthen their economic ties.

"Of course, this does not mean that the two countries recognize the legitimacy of the sanctions, but they have designed their economic cooperation in such a way that even in the presence of sanctions, they can achieve desirable results,” he said.

Source: Press TV