TEHRAN, Jan. 18 (MNA) – Iran's Deputy foreign minister for international affairs and the head of Tajikistan Academy of Sciences in a meeting agreed on the need to broaden bilateral scientific cooperation.

Deputy Foreign Minister Vahid Haddadi-Asl and Tajik scientific official Fahad Rahimi in their meeting at Science Ministry agreed on the need for strengthening scientific relations between the two countries' universities' science faculty members and researchers and implementing joint scientific projects.

In the meeting in the presence of the Ambassador of Tajikistan in Iran Zahedi Nezameddin Shamseddinzadeh, the two sides stressed the need for having broader scientific and technological cooperation and it was agreed that a Joint Scientific Cooperation Committee will be established in very near future.

Haddadi-Asl in the meeting referred to the joint languages and religions, as well as geographical proximity as factors that can deepen bilateral cooperation, noting that the past of the two countries, too, has always been a history of cooperation and friendship.

He said that cooperation in the field of exchanging university students and providing opportunities for higher education studies for both sides' students were agreed in a recent meeting with the ambassador of Tajikistan.

"It was also agreed that science faculty members of the two countries universities, too, will be exchanged and their presence in scientific projects and seminars will be more frequently facilitated," added the Iranian deputy foreign minister.

The head of Tajikistan Academy of Sciences, too, said in the meeting that his country is enthusiastically waiting for broader scientific cooperation with Iran and exchange of professors of sciences of the two countries is an appropriate first step in that respect.

Farhad Rahimi added, "During the recent years when I was a deputy science and knowledge of Tajikistan I had visited of the Iranian universities and research centers and I am well aware of the scientific progress in different fields in Iran."

MNA