Iran angered at exclusion from Caspian Sea summit
Updated: Wednesday, September 09, 2009
Photographer: WashingtonTV
Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki’s Press Conference (Foreign Ministry, Tehran, 01 June 2009)
11:00GMT—7:00AM/EST
Washington, 9 September (WashingtonTV)—Iran’s Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki on Tuesday criticized a scheduled meeting of Caspian Sea states without Iran’s participation.
The presidents of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Russia are set to hold an “informal” summit in the Kazakh city of Akatu on Thursday to discuss “sub-regional cooperation”.
An official representative of Kazakhstan’s Foreign Ministry told Azerbaijan’s Trend news agency that no decisions on the status of the Caspian Sea or the division of the seabed would be made at the talks.
But Mottaki voiced anger that Iran was not invited to the meeting.
“In our view, the meeting runs contrary to Iran’s national interests,” he said during a meeting with Kazakhstan’s new ambassador to Tehran, reports the state-run Press TV network.
“The summit is against previous agreements, in which the five Caspian littoral states came to the understanding that any decision on the waterway should be made with the participation of all its neighboring countries,” Mottaki added.
The maritime and seabed boundaries of the oil and gas-rich Caspian Sea have yet to be demarcated among the five countries.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Iran is concerned that the four other countries may try to chip away at Tehran’s claims on the Caspian.
Sources: Press TV, Trend news agency, Los Angeles Times
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