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Asharq Al-Awsat
Asharq Al-Awsat
World
Asharq Al-Awsat

China's Xi to Meet Iran's Raisi at Regional Summit

Iran's newly elected President Ebrahim Raisi speaks during his swearing-in ceremony at the Iranian parliament in the capital Tehran on August 5, 2021. (Photo by Atta KENARE / AFP)

Chinese President Xi Jinping will have his first face-to-face discussion with his Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi on Friday, state media reported.

The meeting comes days after the Europen Union warned that negotiations to bring Iran and the US back into a nuclear deal curbing Tehran's nuclear program are in "stalemate", AFP said.

China is one of the key members of the multilateral dialogue -- alongside France, Germany, Britain, Russia and the United States -- that is trying to revive the troubled 2015 nuclear deal.

"On the morning of September 16, President Xi Jinping will meet with Iranian President Raisi in Samarkand," Chinese broadcaster CCTV said, announcing the meeting on the sidelines of a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) in the city of Uzbekistan.

Iran, one of four SCO observer states, applied for full membership in 2008 but its bid was slowed by UN and US sanctions imposed over its nuclear program.

Raisi said on Wednesday Iran still intends to pursue membership of the SCO, but several members do not want a country under international sanctions in their ranks.

Xi also met Russian President Vladimir Putin at the regional security summit -- the Chinese leader's first trip abroad since the early days of the coronavirus pandemic.

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