Tehran: Iran’s ex- Minister of Foreign Affairs, Kamal Kharrazi, said that Iran would support rubble, rial trade deal with Russia.
“This is a very important step that Iran and Russia should take. And there is no other way to get rid of the dominance of the dollar in trade exchanges,” Kharrazi said.
Kharrazi is now director of the Strategic Council for Foreign Relations, having served as Iran’s foreign minister from 1997 to 2005.
Iran “will very seriously consider the question” of using Russian and Iranian national currencies to settle bilateral trade, adding it was “natural for Iran to welcome such an agreement,” Kharrazi said.
Russia-Iran trade is currently worth $5 billion a year. A so-called ‘oil-for-goods’ contract has long been discussed, by which Moscow would buy oil from Tehran and export products and expertise in machinery, rail, trucks, metals and grain. The West worries that the deal will push Iran to exceed its 1 million barrels per day limit, which is part of its nuclear deal with Russia, China, the US, Britain, France, Germany and Iran.
