Amir Abdollahian made the comment upon arriving in Baku on Wednesday.
He said he will put forth those ideas during a meeting with Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev.
Amir Abdollahian added that he will also hold talks with other high-ranking Azeri officials during his visit to the country.
He added that he has numerous contacts with his Azeri counterpart Jeyhoun Bayramov and that the two top diplomats agreed on good frameworks to expand ties. Amir Abdollahian added that the two sides will finalize those frameworks during this visit and then there will be more visits by economic and cultural delegations of the two countries.
Iran’s Ambassador to Yemen Hassan Irloo passed away of COVID-19 complications on Tuesday. He had earlier this week been repatriated from Yemen amid a Saudi-led blockade of the war-torn Arab country to receive treatment at a hospital in Tehran.
Speaking to reporters on the sidelines of the ambassador’s funeral procession in Tehran on Tuesday, Amir-Abdollahian said prior to Irloo’s death, the Foreign Ministry had been trying for several days to obtain a permission from Riyadh via a third country to send a plane either from Iran or another state to Sana’a to bring the coronavirus-stricken diplomat home and immediately transfer him to a hospital in Tehran for treatment.
“However, the Saudi side was unfortunately very late in making a decision in this regard and some executive bodies of Saudi Arabia dragged their feet,” he added.
“We will formally lodge a protest in accordance with international conventions, and at the same time, we hope that Yemen will be able to get out of this war and severe humanitarian siege as soon as possible through a political solution,” the top Iranian diplomat continued.
He once again reiterated Iran’s stance on the need to solve the ongoing crisis through political channels, saying Tehran believes all Yemenis should play a role in determining their country’s future.
The chief diplomat condemned the military campaign that the Saudi regime and its allies have been waging on Yemen since early 2015.
“The experience of six years of war showed that the aggressors cannot achieve any victory through military means. Yemen must be left to the Yemenis themselves so that the problems will be solved through the intra-Yemeni talks,” he stated.
During his two-year mission in Sana’a, the Iranian ambassador made efforts to help find a political solution to the Yemen conflict, end the war in the impoverished country and restore stability, security and peace to it, Amir-Abdollahian noted.
Saeed Khatibzadeh, spokesman for Iran’s Foreign Ministry, said Irloo was transferred to the country in a “bad state” and due to the “late cooperation” of some countries, a reference to Saudi Arabia.
A war veteran, Irloo had sustained injuries from chemical warfare attacks on Iran during Iraq’s 1980-88 imposed war, backed by the West.
He contracted the coronavirus at the place of his mission and passed away early on Tuesday “despite undergoing all stages of treatment to improve his condition”, Khatibzadeh added.
Irloo officially began his diplomatic mission to Yemen in November 2020, in defiance of the US opposition to close ties between Tehran and Sana’a.
In December 2020, he was sanctioned by the former US president Donald Trump for his links to the Islamic Revolution Guard Corps (IRGC)’s Quds Force.
Saudi Arabia, backed by the US and regional allies, launched the war on Yemen in March 2015, with the aim of reinstalling the unpopular regime of Yemen’s former president Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi and to crush the popular Ansarullah movement.
The Saudi war has left hundreds of thousands of Yemenis dead, and displaced millions more. It has also destroyed Yemen’s infrastructure and spread famine and infectious diseases in the Arab country.
Despite Saudi Arabia’s relentless bombardment of the impoverished country, Yemeni armed forces and the allied popular committees have grown in strength against the Saudi-led invaders.
The shortlist, one of 10 lists that were revealed by AMPAS after a first round of voting, contained relatively few surprises, also including high-profile films from Germany (I’m Your Man”, starring Dan Stevens), Spain (“The Good Boss”, with Javier Bardem), Denmark (the animated documentary “Flee”, which also made the doc shortlist), Finland (“Compartment No. 6”) and Iceland (“Lamb”).
But it did not include France’s entry, Julia Ducournau’s drama “Titane”, which won the Palme d’Or at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. The dark and bloody critics’ favorite was by far the highest-profile film not to advance, with Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s dreamy “Memoria”, starring Tilda Swinton, also getting lots of attention from critics and cineastes but not clicking with Oscar voters.
Other films to make the shortlist were Mexico’s “Prayers for the Stolen”, Austria’s “Great Freedom”, Belgium’s “Playground”, Kosovo’s “Hive”, Bhutan’s “Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom” and Panama’s “Plaza Catedral”.
The films from Kosovo, Bhutan and Panama mark those countries’ first appearance on the Oscar shortlist.
The shortlist is heavily European, with 10 of the 15 films coming from that continent. Four of the European films are from Scandinavia, with Denmark, Norway, Iceland and Finland on the list. (Of the five Nordic countries that submitted films, only Sweden failed to advance.)
Two of the shortlisted films were from the Americas, and three from Asia.
Four of the films are directed by women: Blerta Basholli with Kosovo’s “Hive”, Tatiana Huezo with Mexico’s “Prayers for the Stolen”, Maria Schrader with Germany’s “I’m Your Man” and Laura Wandel with Belgium’s “Playground”.
A record-tying 93 films qualified in the category, but Jordan later withdrew its entry, “Amira”, after the film was criticized by Palestinian families and prisoners-rights organizations.
The shortlist:
Austria, “Great Freedom”
Belgium, “Playground”
Bhutan, “Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom”
Denmark, “Flee”
Finland, “Compartment No. 6”
Germany, “I’m Your Man”
Iceland, “Lamb”
Iran, “A Hero”
Italy, “The Hand of God”
Japan, “Drive My Car”
Kosovo, “Hive”
Mexico, “Prayers for the Stolen”
Norway, “The Worst Person in the World”
Panama, “Plaza Catedral”
Spain, “The Good Boss”
The corvettes are dubbed Gorz (mace) and Khanjar (dagger). The homegrown vessels officially joined the Iranian Navy at a ceremony in the southern port city of Bushehr on Tuesday.
Iranian Navy Commander Rear Admiral Shahram Irani attended the ceremony.
Gorz and Khanjar are each 50 meters long and weigh 300 tons. They are equipped with advanced radar-controlled missiles, anti-surface and air defense guns, modern radars, sea-to-sea missiles, and radar jamming systems that enable them to operate in oceans.
In another ceremony, attended by the Iranian vice president for science and technology, the first Iranian marine engine was unveiled.
The engine is named Makran. This is a 3,600 horsepower engine that can be installed on naval vessels.
The Navy ships propelled by the new engine can hit a speed of 30 knots, which is twice more than their previous speed.
Rear Admiral Irani says the diesel engine has been fully manufactured by Iranian experts. He also said Makran will drive the country’s first missile-launching warship. Iran has in the past years beefed up its naval, air and ground deterrence amid repeated threats of attack by the US and the Zionist regime.
Malley, in an interview with CNN, warned of a “period of escalating crisis” if diplomacy failed to restore the 2015 nuclear agreement between Tehran and world powers known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
Negotiations restarted in November, after a five-month hiatus, to try to restore the deal with Iran, which the United States withdrew from under former president Donald Trump in 2018.
The indirect talks have been suspended but Malley noted he hoped they would resume “relatively soon.”
Washington has warned recently that it may soon be too late to revive the JCPOA.
“It really depends on the pace of their nuclear process,” Malley, the US special envoy for Iran, noted, adding, “If they halt the nuclear advances, we have more time.”
“If they continue at their current pace, we have some weeks left but not much more than that, at which point the conclusion will be there’s no deal to be revived,” he said.
“At some point in a not-so-distant future we will have to conclude the JCPOA is no more and we would have to negotiate a wholly different deal and we would go through a period of escalating crisis,” he added.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Tuesday that he was not going to set a deadline for the talks.
“I’m not going to put a time limit on it,” Blinken told reporters, but the remaining runway for a deal is “getting very, very, very short.”
“We continue to have a strong interest in seeing if we can put the nuclear program back into the box that it was in,” he continued, adding, “But if we can’t do that, because Iran will not engage in good faith, then we are actively looking at alternatives and options.”
Iran has submitted two draft proposals to the other parties concerning the removal of sanctions and Tehran’s nuclear commitments.
Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister and chief nuclear negotiator Ali Bagheri Kani has said Tehran will not retreat from its demands in the Vienna talks.
Bagheri has emphasized Iran’s clear stance that all oppressive US sanctions against Iran must be lifted, adding that it was the US that first left the Iran nuclear deal, JCPOA, and Washington now must take the first step toward reviving the agreement.
He noted that Iran’s proposals to the other signatories to the JCPOA for the purpose of reviving the deal are substantiated and logical and they can serve as a basis for talks.
The JCPOA was signed with Iran in 2015 in order to overcome the crisis over its nuclear program by the permanent five of the UN Security Council and Germany. In 2018, former US President Donald Trump made the decision to withdraw from the JCPOA. Current US President Joe Biden has shown the US was ready to return to the nuclear deal with Tehran.
The seventh round of negotiations to re-establish the Iranian nuclear deal had previously ended in Vienna. European negotiators decided to take a break for the Christmas holidays.
Yalda Night , the longest night of year, marks the last day of autumn and the beginning of the cold season. It is known as the lesser Chelleh or the fortieth day.
That’s when people warm their family gatherings by eating watermelons, dried nuts, all kinds of local foods and by playing group games. Over the past two years, the Covid pandemic affected the rituals of Iranians and forced people to hold feats apart. It looks like Iranians have to get along with virtual gatherings this year as well. According to The Tehran-based Hamshahri newspaper, the Covid map of Iran is now yellow and blue and more beautiful than the past two years. But over the past days, the Omicron strain of the Covid has reportedly made its way to Iran to remind people that this year again we have to be patient, hold virtual gatherings and read the rituals of our own city and other cities until we all get together next year in good health.
One of the most ancient traditions in West Azerbaijan Province on Chelleh Night is the holding of the Prophet Khedr Feast. On this night, ready-for-marriage youths would collect beans and, after cooking, would beat them with salt in the mortar. Each youth would put some 7 nails of the food under their tongues and would sleep. Their dreams would then be interpreted by the elder ones. Young girls would also cook āsh with the collected beans. The āsh woulf mean to untie the knot for them so they would marry.
Ardabil and Yalda Night
People in Ardabil traditionally beseech the greater Chelleh Night to not be tough on them and they usually eat roasted wheat (Qorqa), watermelon, green, walnut, chickpeas and raisin. In the past, the grownups would become playmates of kids and they would play golyapuch (a traditional Iranian game). But such scenes are rare now.
Alborz and Yalda Night
Shawl-throwing was the most important ceremony observed on Yaldā Night and it is still done by some families. The youngsters would send the shawl down through the hatch over the roof until late at night, and the housekeeper would tie food to it. Sometimes there was a message of apology or even courtship in these shawls.
Tehran and Yalda Night
Jafar Shahri writes in his book “Old Tehran”: “On the night of Yaldā , the people of Tehran welcomed guests with fresh fruits of autumn and dried fruits of summer and nuts, and they believed that Yaldā ‘s dinner dishes, such as Haftsin’s tableware, could cool hot nature and warm cold nature”. Among the hobbies of Tehran families is storytelling included the story of good and evil, the sange saboor (patient listener), the mahpishooni (beautiful girl), and so on.
Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari and Yalda Night
Baking a thick bread called gerdeh, in which blue beads are placed, is one of the rituals of the people of Chaharmahal and Bakhtiari. They distributed this bread among the family members and the person who had a blue bead in his piece of bread was introduced as a lucky person.
South Khorasan Province and Yalda Night
In addition to the traditional gatherings in Iran, the ceremony of foam mixing and the fortieth night of new grooms is one of the special customs of the people of South Khorasan, which is performed on the night of Challeh. At the ceremony, family members gather on the night of Yaldā , and in cold weather, they mix the foam, which is a kind of local dessert similar to ice cream, until it foams, and then they eat it. During the ceremony, new grooms go to visit the new bride with different gifts like nuts and sweets.
The people of Khuzestan wait until dawn to welcome the legendary Qarun. Qarun brings pieces of wood in wood-breaking clothes for poor families. The wood turns to gold, bringing wealth and blessings to the family. Shahnameh reading, poetry reading and breaking hazelnuts on Yaldā Night are other rituals of the longest night of the year in thise.
Zanjan and Yalda Night
In ancient times, the people of Zanjan on the night of Yaldā , placed a container of halva and qavut on the ledge behind the window and placed a beautiful vase full of flowers and a mirror next to it, and they believed that the Prophet Khezr would come to their house at night to eat halva and qavut. When dawn broke, if they saw a fingerprint on a food, they considered it a sign that their needs were being met.
Fars and Yalda Night
In addition to reading Shahnameh and reciting poetry from the Shirin and Farhad love story, other customs of sacrificing in Kazerun, making vegetable seeds, rice milk in Marvdāsht, cooking komach (a kind of sweet) in Darab and Āsh Doogh in Firoozabad are some of the customs of the people of Fars province on Yaldā Night.
Kordestan and Yalda Night
A few months before Chelleh Night, the people of the capital city of Sanandaj put small melons brought from the village of Sarab Qamish in vinegar pulp to make Kalektorsh which is one of the main items on the table, for this night. The food of this night is usually a mixture of grape tree leaves and cabbage, which the meat is placed between each one.
Kermanshah and Yalda Night
The people of Kermanshah eat fruits on this night which are a symbol of the sun; Such as red watermelon, red pomegranate, red apple or yellow lemon. They also tell stories of the eternal love of Shirin and Farhad, Rostam and Sohrab, the story of Hussein Kurd Shabestari and the recitation of beautiful and pleasant poems by Shami Kermanshahi.
Kerman and Yalda Night
On this night, like what was done by their ancestors, the Kermanis gather on the Yaldā Night in the big house of each family, spread a tablecloth on pateh on a Kerman rug, and place the poshtis adorned with pateh around the room. In the middle of the table, they put a dish of pistachios, watermelon, black pomegranates from the surrounding villages, kalempe (traditional sweet of Kerman), qovatu coffee and other snacks.
Gilan and Yalda Night
In some parts of Gilan, it is believed that all the waters of the world close and freeze at an indefinite moment in this night, and whoever realizes that moment, he will be granted whatever he intends and asks God for. Some also believe that on this night, the trees lower their heads and at this moment, if a person wakes up, whatever his intention is, his wish will be granted.
On this night, Yazidis have a special dish called Āsh-e-Shouli, which is still popular in families and they make a plan to cook it, and on Yaldā Night, the fragrance of this local food can be smelled in homes. Another custom of the night is to light a fire.
In a speech to Moscow’s senior military officers on Tuesday, Putin stated he no longer viewed the West as a dependable partner.
Russia has been seeking written assurances about the presence of US troops and hardware near its borders, he said, but even those assurances could not be depended on.
“We need long-term legally binding guarantees. But you and I know them well. And that is something that cannot be trusted,” Putin went on, noting that the US “easily withdraws from international treaties that it becomes uninterested in,” apparently referencing Washington’s unilateral withdrawal from the landmark Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002. The accord, inked between the USSR and US in 1972, intended to limit both sides’ missile defense capabilities.
“You and I both know very well: under various pretexts, including the purpose of ensuring their own security, that they act thousands of kilometers away from their national territory,” he continued, adding, “When international law and the UN Charter interfere, they declare it all obsolete and unnecessary.”
The president added that he considered NATO’s further expansion into Eastern Europe a consequence of the “euphoria” that stemmed from the West’s apparent victory in the Cold War and the result of a misanalysis. He also expressed his confusion at the US-led military bloc’s encroachment on his country’s borders despite the friendly relations between Moscow and the West at that time.
Putin stressed that Russia was ready to take both military and technical measures as a response to what it perceived as the unfriendly steps taken by Washington, insisting that it was Moscow’s right to do so.
Putin’s remarks come shortly after Moscow issued two documents, one addressed to NATO and the other to US officials, requesting a range of guarantees it said were aimed at boosting the security of all parties.
The proposals focus on the movement of military personnel and hardware, and include the requirement that Ukraine’s long-held requests to become a member of the bloc would not be granted. A separate document calls for current NATO members to desist from any military activity on Kiev’s territory, as well as in Eastern Europe, the South Caucasus, and Central Asia.
In the draft agreement sent to Washington, Moscow requested that officials make a firm commitment to ruling out the enlargement of the bloc to include any other former Soviet republics. Speaking via video link earlier in December, Putin told his US counterpart, President Joe Biden, that Russia was “seriously interested” in getting “reliable and firm legal guarantees” that would prohibit NATO’s expansion further eastwards, as well as the deployment of “offensive-strike weapons systems” nearby.
Putin has previously insisted that his predecessor, Mikhail Gorbachev, was given guarantees by Western leaders that the bloc would not expand into the space left after the collapse of the USSR. In 2017, a tranche of documents was declassified, and subsequently widely interpreted as showing that American, British, and German officials gave verbal assurances to the Kremlin in the 1990s that NATO would not push into Eastern European nations, before then admitting as members nations such as Poland, Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.
“It is most important that all three guarantor countries support this process and see no alternatives to the constitutional committee in Geneva. All sides will furnish comprehensive support for its activities,” Russia’s special presidential representative for Syria, Alexander Lavrentiev, stated on Tuesday.
The 6th round of sessions by the Small Group (editorial board) of the Syrian Constitutional Committee took place in October. The UN Secretary-General’s special envoy, Geir Pedersen, acknowledged that key disagreements and mutual distrust remained among the participants in the Geneva dialogue, which prevented them from discussing the drafts of a constitutional reform.
The Small Group is expected to produce recommendations regarding amendments to the country’s fundamental law. General elections under the UN auspices are to follow.
Lavrentiev added Russia, Iran, and Turkey have discussed some concrete measures to maintain a ceasefire in Syria.
“We held talks with the Turkish delegation, and prior to that, we negotiated with the Iranian side. We addressed all issues in a very constructive manner,” the Russian envoy noted.
As Lavrentyev mentioned, the sides focused on stabilizing the situation in Syria to reach a ceasefire.
“This refers both to Idlib and the south, including the Syrian-Turkish border in the north, where the clashed have recently intensified,” the diplomat pointed out.
The 17th International Meeting on Syria in the Astana format is taking place on December 21-22 in Kazakhstan’s capital. The participants are likely to address the future prospects of the Syrian Constitutional Committee in Geneva, the recent developments in Syria, efforts focused on maintaining the ceasefire in the de-escalation zones in line with the previous agreements as part of the Astana format. A working group on captives, with the participation of guarantor countries, as well as the UN and the International Committee of the Red Cross are going to hold a meeting.
Lavrentyev said Moscow expects that the sanction pressure on Syria, levied by several states, will be rolled back in 2022.
“Unfortunately, the Astana format members and [the Syrian] Constitutional Committee stick to somewhat different approaches. <…> The position and policy of exerting pressure on Damascus through sanctions still remains. But we hope for some changes as early as next year,” the Russian envoy noted.
Lavrentyev pointed out that it would be challenging to stabilize the situation in the war-ravaged Middle Eastern nation without providing humanitarian aid and launching some projects to revive the Syrian economy.
“It is just going to take much longer,” the diplomat mentioned.
Moscow sees no challenges in adopting a joint statement of the Astana format member countries following the 17th International Meeting on Syria in the Astana format, he added.
“We are still hammering out the final statement, it needs some adjustment. All states have their own approaches, however, there are no any insoluble difficulties, which would prevent the adoption of a joint statement,” the Russian envoy continued.
The joint statement is likely to be adopted by the Astana format member states on Wednesday.
The next meeting of the Syrian Constitutional Committee in Geneva may take place in January 2022, Lavrentyev told reporters.
He recalled that Pedersen was in Damascus on December 12.
“His impression was quite positive. We believe this allows us to expect the next, seventh session of the Constitutional Committee to be convened in January. We all hope that during this session the Syrian parties will be able to find a compromise solution,” he said.
He added that the results of the previous session were very modest but the parties were able to sit down at the negotiating table.
