March 12, 2012 - 12:39 AMT
Iran will respond toughly to Azerbaijan’s hostile moves – expert

Foreign political and economic interests of Iran will impose the need to establish “special relations” with Turkey, Pakistan and China, Igor Pankratenko, editor of Contemporary Iran magazine said.

“The current gold and foreign currency reserves of Iran allow implementation of economic cooperation programs with Armenia and Tajikistan, in case no serious external complications emerge,” Pankratenko told a PanARMENIAN.Net reporter.

“By employing the “Putin’s factor”, Iran will try to strengthen its political and technological cooperation with Russia as much as possible. However, it should be taken into account that Vladimir Putin will not manage to overcome the “pro-Western orientation” of the Russian diplomacy in the near future, so no “Russia’s turn to Caucasus and East” is to be expected shortly. The process will mostly be limited to declarations and tactic coordination of some joint moves in foreign policy,” Pankratenko said.

He also emphasized that the outcome of the elections, and some of those elected in Iran demonstrate that official Tehran (at least on parliament’s level) will provide a much tougher response to Baku’s U.S.- and Israel-oriented position and Azerbaijan’s hostile moves towards Iran.