Report of negotiations with Israel ‘a joke’: Iran
Tehran (KNA) - The Iranian Foreign Ministry has dismissed as “a joke” allegations that Russia has mediated indirect talks between Iran and Israel.
"Claims of this nature can never be true," Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qassemi told reporters in a press briefing on Monday."News like this sound more like a joke to those who are familiar with Iran's foreign policy," he added.
Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jarida claimed Friday that Moscow had arranged indirect talks between Tehran and Tel Aviv over a number of issues, including Iran's peaceful nuclear program and its military presence in Syria.
The paper claimed that the recent trips to Moscow of senior Iranian official Ali Akbar Velayati and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were arranged by the Russian government to facilitate the alleged talks.
"Russia passed the Israeli demands to Tehran and asked [the Iranian government] to dispatch a representative with full power to reach a solution for the Iranian issue with Syria," the paper quoted an unnamed diplomat as saying.
Velayati, a senior adviser to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, traveled to Moscow on Wednesday to convey a message from Ayatollah Khamenei to Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani's written letter.
Source: PressTV