Iran, Azerbaijan FMs talk on phone, call for keeping up interactions

Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian held phone talks with his counterpart from Azerbaijan Republic, Jeyhun Bayramov, over the situation of bilateral ties.

During the lengthy talks, held on Thursday evening, the two sides stressed the necessity of keeping up interactions and exchanges of technical and expert teams in various fields with the goal of overcoming problems and achieving results.

They reviewed the latest issues between the two countries, emphasizing the need to get rid of misunderstandings and restore the relations between the two countries to a natural path that would serve the mutual interests of the two countries based on good neighborliness.

Ties between Iran and Azerbaijan have been tense over the past few months.

In late January, a man stormed the Azerbaijani embassy in Tehran, killing its head of security and wounding others.

Investigations in Iran found the attacker had personal motives, but Baku blamed the Iranian government and later expelled a number of Iranian diplomats in April.

In a tit-for-tat move, Iran expelled four Azerbaijani diplomats last month.

Baku’s close ties with Israel have also been a bone of contention. Iran has repeatedly warned of Israeli plots to gain a foothold in the region. In his recent visit to the Republic of Azerbaijan, Israel’s President Isaac Herzog described Baku as Israel’s close friend.