Two hostages released in Sistan-Baluchestan: official
Iran President leaves Damascus for Algiers
IRNA – President of Iran Mahmoud Ahmadinejad departed Syria’s capital for Algeria after being seen off by his Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad on Saturday. President Ahmadinejad started his three-nation tour to Syria, Algeria and the United States on Saturday morning.
His first destination was Damascus, Syria, during which Ahmadinejad held meeting with President al-Assad and conferred with him on the international and bilateral issues.
After visiting Algeria, the Iranian president will fly to New York, the US, to take part in the 65th UN General Assembly in which 130 world leaders are present.
Sanctions have no effect on Iran’s economic position
ILNA: President Ahmadinejad said on Iranian TV before flying to New York “Sanctions will not do any harm to our economy and the west aims to launch a psychological war against us to create problems for us.”
He said sanctions will not affect Iran’s nuclear programme either. “We are always ready for negotiations, but this should be done in the frameworks of international laws.”
“US government has not had economic relations with Iran for 31 years. Now, they are trying to make other countries stop their economic cooperation with Iran,” the president stated.
“Financial turnover in Iran is about 800 to 900 billion dollars. Europe has just about 23 billion dollars of exchanges with us. Only a small amount of Iran’s financial turnover is with the West,” said President Ahmadinejad.
“We have two good opportunities; first, we can produce inside Iran; second, we can replace new countries in our economic exchanges.”
“ Investment in the oil and gas sectors has been multiplied and we can produce 70 percent of our needs ourselves and with taking just one more step, we can become self sufficient in this field completely.”
On his plans in New York, the president said he would convey the message of Islam and Iran to the world public opinion. More…