Ahmadinejad Warns About Public Unawareness of Iran-China 25-Year Agreement
Iran is concluding a comprehensive 25-year cooperation agreement with China. An agreement that reportedly has not been communicated to the public regarding its content. Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has compared the signing of this agreement to the signing of the JCPOA and has issued a warning in this regard.
News about meetings and joint sessions between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the People’s Republic of China had previously been published in the media. There was talk of cooperation between the two countries. This is despite the fact that no news has been released about the content of this cooperation agreement. Now Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s former president, has warned about the signing of this cooperation agreement.
Some media outlets have reported the approval of a draft of this agreement by Iran’s cabinet. The website “Dolet-e Bahar,” attributed to Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, has published a report about his statements regarding the signing of a new “25-year agreement.”
Ahmadinejad, who is himself one of the Islamic Republic’s controversial and contentious figures and whose eight-year presidency faced considerable criticism, has now spoken in defense of “national interests.”
Ahmadinejad, who has recently become active again in Iran’s political arena, met with a number of people from Gilan Province on Saturday, June 27th, and without mentioning any country by name, announced concerns about concluding a “new 25-year agreement” with a foreign country.
He emphasized that the conclusion of this agreement took place without informing the people and claimed that the content of this agreement is contrary to the people’s interests. Ahmadinejad stated: “Any agreement that is concluded secretly and without considering the will and wishes of the Iranian nation with foreign parties and is contrary to the interests of the country and nation is not valid, and the Iranian people will not recognize it.”
JCPOA and Cooperation Agreement with China
The former president of the Islamic Republic compared this 25-year cooperation agreement to the 2015 nuclear agreement between Iran and the 5+1 countries, and stated that representatives in the Islamic Consultative Assembly did not have precise information about the content of the nuclear agreement at the time of its approval.
Ahmadinejad said: “Now I have also heard that they are negotiating and want to conclude a new 25-year agreement with a foreign country, and no one even knows about it.”
Without naming anyone, he condemned keeping the “facts” hidden from the Iranian nation and asked: “Are you the owner of the country that you give away from the nation’s treasury to others without the nation’s knowledge?”
The “Rah-e Dana” news network website also reported today, Monday, June 29th, about the approval of the draft text of the 25-year cooperation agreement between Iran and China by Iran’s cabinet.
This website has claimed that a similar agreement was approved by the Chinese government last year. Based on information published by this website, the agreement involves massive Chinese investment in Iran’s oil and gas industries.
Without providing any explanation about the source of its report, this website announced that the main axis of the Iran-China agreement is centered on China’s $280 billion investment in the aforementioned industries.
Following the visit of Iran’s delegation led by Mohammad Javad Zarif, the country’s foreign minister, to Chinese officials in August of last year, some media outlets had also reported negotiations between the two countries regarding economic cooperation.
Despite the probable approval of the draft text of this 25-year cooperation agreement, no detailed information has been released about the scope of economic cooperation between the two countries and China’s conditions for major investment in Iran’s aging oil and gas industries.
Source: DW
