Iran, Saudi Arabia Sign Security Cooperation PactIran and Saudi Arabia have signed an agreement on cooperation in combating crime, terrorism, money laundering, surveillance of borders and territorial waters, Iran's IRNA news agency reported on Wednesday.After two years of negotiations, the agreement was signed on Tuesday by Iranian Interior Minister Abdolvahed Mousavi Lari and visiting Saudi Interior Minister Nayef Ibn Abdul-Aziz, the official news agency said. "This agreement promises peace and friendship and Iran has always reached out hand of friendship to its neighbors," Lari said after the signing of the pact. He added that Iran and Saudi security is "akin" and the agreement would "initiate a new chapter in the Tehran-Riyadh relations." Nayef, who arrived here on Sunday, said that the agreement was within the framework of confidence-building, adding that "the region should enjoy full security and the agreement should benefit the whole region." Both sides also termed the agreement as "purely related to mutual security," saying that it has no military dimension, notably in the Gulf. Local analysts believed that the pact is a fresh sign of warming relations between the two countries after years of mutual suspicion due to Iran's 1979 Islamic Revolution. Tehran and Riyadh broke off relations in 1988, a year after Iranian Muslim pilgrims in Mecca clashed with Saudi police during an anti-U.S. protest, which left more than 400 people dead. Bilateral relations were restored in 1991 and have warmed since Iranian President Mohammad Khatami's landmark visit to Saudi Arabia in May 1999. |
| People's Daily Online --- http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/ |