ROME Chairman of the national Italian Olympic committee, Mario Pescante, termed as insufficient a recent sports agreement reached between Iran and Italy and called for close cooperation between the Olympic committees of the two countries. According to the agreement signed here last month, Iran and Italy will cooperate in 15 different athletic fields including soccer, and the Italian Olympic committee will despatch a group of its sports educators to Iran for the training of Iranian athletes.

Pescante told Irna that implementation of the agreement has been focussed on soccer so far and the current camping of the national Iranian soccer team in Italy is in this direction. According to the agreement, the Italian Olympic committee is to offer Iran's national soccer team expert advice in the run up to the World Cup France 1998. Pescante added that he might raise the issues of sports installations and equipment as well as investment during his visit to Tehran which is slated for June. The Italian Olympic committee has undertaken to build 15 sports centers in the same number of provinces in Iran over a period of four years.

Italy will reciprocally make use of Iran's experience and assistance in some sports fields, he said. Pescante who is also secretary of the European Olympic committe said that sports relations and contests are beyond politics. Turning to exchanges of sports teams between the U.S. and China as well as South Korea and north korea when they had no diplomatic relations, he said sometimes politics cannot succeed but sports can.

He added that they want to help politics and Tehran-Rome political relations through sports. Pescante referred to his recent meeting with head of the national Australian Olympic committee and quoted him as describing the Iranian team as a praise-worthy team using good tactics under its head coach Tomislav Ivic. (IRNA)