Azerbaijan, Baku, November 12 / Trend, T. Konyayeva /
Russia's Security Council intends to cooperate with its Iranian colleagues in the fields of combating drugs trafficking from Afghanistan and terrorism but will not back Iranian nuclear program, said Yevgeny Satanovsky, President of the Middle Eastern Studies Institute.
"Cooperation between the Security Councils of the two countries does not mean that Russia will back Iranian nuclear program or somehow hide consequences of when the Iranian nuclear program, which undoubtedly develops, involves Russia in big regional war," Satanovsky telephoned Trend.
Deputy Secretaries of Iranian and Russian Security Councils Ali Bageri and Yevgeny Lukyanov on Friday signed an Agreement of strategic cooperation.
Under the agreement, the countries will expand bilateral cooperation in the fields of policy, economy and information, and in security issues.
Satanovsky says the Russian-Iranian agreement of a joint work of the two Security Councils no way hurts the joint work of Russian and Israeli Security Councils.
Combating drugs trafficking from Afghanistan and terrorism are the common security matters for both states, the expert noted.
"Combating Afghani drugs is the common problem for Iran and Russia. Indeed, Iran combats drugs strongly, unlike all the rest having any attitude to this, because neither Afghani government nor representatives of European and US armed forces in the region pay even a littlest attention to drugs trafficking from Afghanistan," Satanovsky noted.
As the Global Drugs Combat Report-2011 reads, Iran occupies the world's first position on the volume of seized drugs: 89 percent of total opium and 41 percent of heroin. Iranian government spends millions of dollars to combat drugs, and thousands of policemen secure the country's border to cut drugs trafficking ways.
The expert says Iranian nuclear program is a big problem for Russia that can rather hardly be solved.
"Russia is very cool to the idea of striking Iran as it perfectly realizes that such will result in destabilization and influx of refugees, including the one to Azerbaijan and Russia," Satanovsky stressed.