TEHRAN – Seyed Rasoul Mousavi, the head of the South Asia bureau at the Iranian foreign ministry, has lauded the documents signed by Iran and Pakistan during the recent visit by Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian to Pakistan.

Mousavi, who accompanied the Iranian foreign minister during his Pakistan visit, offered an assessment of Tehran-Islamabad relations in the wake of Amir Abdollahian’s trip. 

“Regarding the relations between Iran and Pakistan, it should be noted that the relations between the two countries are independent of their internal issues,” Mousavi said in remarks to Iran’s state news agency IRNA. “Iran and Pakistan are two neighboring countries that have many areas for cooperation between them. There are areas between the two countries in which if there is no cooperation regarding them, problems will arise for both countries.”

He added, “The matter of what kind of internal development is happening in Iran or in Pakistan in today's political environment has no effect on expanding our cooperation as two neighboring countries. That should be noted. Of course, when a government comes into office, it may pay more attention to a series of priorities that are given less attention in another government. For example, the neighborhood policy that Ayatollah Raisi declares as his priority policy will strengthen and further develop relations with neighbors. Therefore, it can be said that a level of our relations are stable relations, and the change and transformation of governments may cause the relations to intensify or slow down, but it does not disturb the principle of the relationship.”

Mousavi also pointed to the political uncertainties in Pakistan, saying, “Regardless of what is happening in the domestic scene of Pakistan, we put the principle on neighborly relations and made our own move.”

“As regards economic issues, the fact is that almost due to the economic structures that Pakistan has, you can see a kind of stability in economic decisions, either in terms of expanding or even stopping work in those structures,” he added. “Therefore, in terms of economic issues, we have not seen an obstacle to expand our discussions, and if the current government in Pakistan leaves in the coming days and the caretaker government takes office, the economic structures will still be in place.”
The Iranian diplomat also said that due to its military structure, Pakistan is always stable. 

“Therefore, we believe that the foreign minister's visit to Pakistan has come at a good time and we are very optimistic about the future,” Mousavi noted. 

He pointed out that Iran and Pakistan signed three cooperation in order to resolve bureaucratic issues between the two countries.

“We have a bunch of small issues that are getting in the way of big things. We may have solved small things in this trip, but these small things lead to the movement of big things like the barter trade,” he noted. 

Amir Abdollahian said he was pleased with the outcome of his meetings with his Pakistani counterpart and other high-ranking Pakistani officials and described the talks between the two sides as fruitful.

The Iranian foreign minister and his Pakistani counterpart Bilawal Bhutto Zardari met for the purpose of assessing the results of the Iranian delegation’s three-day visit to Pakistan. 

Amir Abdollahian said the trend of bilateral ties is satisfactory and the relations are on the right track, according to the Iranian foreign ministry.

In the meeting, the Pakistani foreign minister also described the outcome of Amir Abdollahian’s trip and his talks with high-ranking officials of Pakistan as successful. Zardari said the visit was the most successful trip by a foreign minister from another country during his tenure as the top diplomat of Pakistan.