"Iran can be a trustworthy ally, if it plays cooperatively with the international community and neighboring countries," German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier made the remark addressing the underway core group meeting of the Munich Security Conference (MSC) in the Iranian capital city of Tehran on Saturday.
"Some may cast doubt on my words, but believe me, it is up to Iran to prove its reliability in the world," the German official maintained.
Pointing to his eminent visit of Riyadh after leaving Tehran, Steinmeier rejected that the problems are solely because of Tehran-Riyadh frictions, while there are many complex problems “I have no answer for them, and we still have active terrorists like ISIL whose behavior demonstrate the boundaries of diplomacy, but we still have to stick to democracy.”
"There were many years of destructive wars in Europe in the past and the current Ukrainian crisis shows that Europe is still vulnerable to security challenges; hence more efforts have to be made," affirmed Germans’ chief of diplomacy.
Steinmeier proposed to agree, presently, on the main mechanism of peace and let the next steps be taken more cautiously in the long run.
"Trust-building and responsibility are necessary as questions on the intention of Iran’s regional performance, though some of them unfair, need to be addressed, while we still hold that Iran has its own security concerns," said the German foreign minister. "I know that it was past mistakes which led to the outbreak of Syrian crisis; we missed historical opportunities for solving the problem."
He continued that the Syrian problem is still to be addressed, saying that it is waste of time to question the past, while the condition is critical in Syria.
Voicing his discontent with Russian airstrikes against ISIL terrorists in Syria, Steinmeier insisted that as long as Moscow and Washington are in opposition in Syria, there would be no significant success in the Arab country.
Demanding transparency from both Americans and Russians, he lamented that prior to Russian strikes there was, in New York meetings, a good harmony for a political solution in Syria.
Germany’s foreign minister arrived in Tehran on Saturday morning to attend the Munich Security Conference (MSC) and meet with Iranian officials, President Hassan Rouhani as well as the Parliament Speaker Ali Larijani, before leaving Tehran for Riyadh on Sunday.
The meeting is co-hosted with the Institute for Political and International Studies (IPIS) of Iran’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, where besides German FM, the event hosts Afghan Foreign Minister Salahuddin Rabbani, the Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim Al-Jaafari, the Prime Minister of the Kurdistan Regional Government Nechirvan Idris Barzani, the United Nations Deputy Special Envoy for Syria Ramzy Ezzeldin Ramzy, the Deputy Secretary General of the European External Action Service Helga Schmid, the President of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the French National Assembly Élisabeth Guigou and the Chairman of the German Bundestag Foreign Affairs Committee Norbert Röttgen, as well as governmental representatives from various Arab states, numerous parliamentarians from European countries and NGO representatives.
YNG/IRN81802237
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