At a meeting with Omani Foreign Minister Yusuf bin Alawi and Omani Minister of Commerce and Industry Ali bin Masoud Al Sunaidy, Iranian Industry Minister Mohammadreza Nematzadeh said Oman has always backed Iran in times of trouble and the two countries hold strategic, friendly, and historical relations; “the level of cooperation between Iran and Oman needs to be escalated.”
“Economic, Cultural and Social ties between the two sides need to be strengthened similar to the existing political relations,” he asserted.
Nematzadeh stressed the need for joint investment particularly in railroad, maritime, aviation, oil and gas areas voicing willingness to double the amount of collaboration between the two countries with deepening of banking ties as the first priority.
The official announced the activity of an Iranian automaker in Oman in near future on the basis of reached agreements expressing hope that similar initiatives will be taken in other fields like steel and petrochemical industries.
Iran’s industry minister appreciated the Omani government’s measure in facilitating visa issuance for Iranian traders; “we will design a trustable system for the issue at the Chamber of Commerce in order to permanently alleviate the need for visa issuance.”
Omani FM Yusuf bin Alawi, for his part, referred to an upcoming international conference on global investment in Tehran or Muscat commenting “the important event will convene in October and an Iranian or Omani representative needs to be assigned to prepare the agenda of the congress.”
Yusuf bin Alawi highlighted that “facilitated visa issuance is only offered to Iranian businessmen and a total of 2000 traders will be able to visit Oman in the current year.
Also at the meeting, Minister of Commerce and Industry of Oman Ali bin Masoud Al Sunaidy expressed his country’s determination for bolstering bilateral ties enumerating possible venues of cooperation including ease of visa issuance for Iranian traders and industrialists, closer ties through ports as well as joint investments.
He also pointed to import of Iranian copper as another ground for cooperation also expressing hope that the purchase of Iranian gas would provide Oman with the opportunity to implement petrochemical projects.
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