Iran will build a mobile phone network and petrol terminal in Syria under deals signed in Tehran Tuesday during a visit by Prime Minister Imad Khamis, Iranian media reported.
The five deals include a “license for a mobile phone operator, the transfer of 5,000 hectares for the creation of a petrol terminal and 5,000 hectares for farmland” in Syria, according to the IRNA news agency.
Iran will also have the right to operate phosphate mines in Sharqiya, about 50 kilometers south of the militant-held ancient city of Palmyra, and to invest in an unnamed Syrian port.
Tehran is the chief backer of Syrian President Bashar Assad, providing military advisers and coordinating thousands of “volunteer” fighters on the ground considered vital to last month’s recapture of the rebel stronghold in Aleppo. First vice president, Eshagh Jahangiri, said Khamis’ visit marked “a new page for economic activities between the two countries.”
At a separate news conference later in the day, President Hassan Rouhani welcomed the fragile cease-fire in Syria. “Iran wants the cease-fire to continue, that the negotiations continue, that the war against Daesh [ISIS] and the Nusra Front continues so that Syria achieves a stability and a peace so that it can hold a real election,” Rouhani said.
He was also due to meet Ali Shamkhani, secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, which oversees political and military cooperation with Russia and Syria.
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