Russia does not deny Iran's right to take legal action but believes it is not the best way to resolve problems in the two nations' bilateral relations, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said on Friday, in an apparent reference to a row over missile sales to Tehran.
"It is of course the sovereign right of any state to forward legal claims in an arbitration court. We have thought, and still think, this is not the best method which could resolve this situation," Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich said.
Iran’s Defense Ministry and The Aerospace Industries Organization, an Iranian state company, launched a $4-billion lawsuit against Russia’s state arms corporation Rosoboronexport in the International Arbitration Court in Geneva on April 13, 2011, seven months after then-president Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree terminating the contract, in line with UN Security Council Resolution 1929, which bans supplying Iran with conventional weapons including missiles and missile systems, tanks, attack helicopters, warplanes and ships.
Iran and Russia signed the original five-battalion deal in 2007.
Earlier this week, Russian daily Kommersant reported that Russia was trying to persuade Iran to drop the suit.
“Iran’s complaint is an irritating issue in our cooperation which we hope to get rid of,” Kommersant daily quoted a source in the Federal Service for Military and Technical Cooperation as saying.
The issue was discussed during Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s visit to Iran in mid-June. Tehran however refused to withdraw the suit, the paper said.
