China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi has pledged Beijing's commitment to respecting Iran’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.
Wang made the remarks in the western Russian city of Nizhny Novgorod on Monday as he met with Iran's interim Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani on the sidelines of a ministerial meeting of the BRICS group of emerging economies.
The remarks came a few days after the Iranian Foreign Ministry summoned China’s ambassador to Tehran to protest Beijing’s support for “baseless claims” regarding three Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf.
Earlier, the Chinese government had expressed support for the United Arab Emirates’ claim about the triple islands, which have historically been part of Iran.
Wang went on to assert that “China is resolved to expand [its] strategic relations with the Islamic Republic in all areas.”
For his part, Bagheri Kani described the Sino-Iranian relations as historical, deep-rooted, and undergoing enhancement in all areas.
He considered Iran and China to be “flag-bearers of multilateralism,” which he described as a “distinct solution for resolution of the international problems.”
The Iranian official, meanwhile, described the eight-month-long genocidal war that is being waged by the Israeli regime against the Gaza Strip as exemplary of defeat of unilateralism.
Bagheri Kani also thanked China for its supportive stance towards the Islamic Republic in the latest meeting of the Board of Governors of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which passed an anti-Iranian resolution accusing Tehran of insufficient cooperation with the UN nuclear organization.
Iran showed to the world the peaceful nature of its nuclear program by signing the 2015 nuclear agreement, formally known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), with six world powers.
But, Washington’s unilateral withdrawal in May 2018 and its subsequent re-imposition of sanctions against Tehran left the future of the deal in limbo.
Iran officially became a member of the BRICS at the beginning of 2024, five months after it announced its acceptance as full member into the group along with Argentina, Egypt, Ethiopia, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia.