New Delhi, 17 September (H.S.): India strongly objected on the

comment made by the Supreme leader of Iran Ali Khamenei regarding the ‘Indian

Muslims’ recently. The Ministry of External Affairs released a statement and condemned

such unfriendly comment without any base.

In its statement, the MEA said, We

strongly deplore the comments made regarding minorities in India by the Supreme

Leader of Iran. These are misinformed and unacceptable. Countries commenting on

minorities are advised to look at their own record before making any

observations about others.

Iran’s supreme leader Ali Khamenei

made a comment on Indian muslims while showing his solidarity with muslims of Gaza

& Myanmar. In a comment made on social media platform X, Ali Khamenei

wrote: The enemies of Islam have always tried to make us indifferent with

regard to our shared identity as an Islamic Ummah. We cannot consider ourselves

to be Muslims if we are oblivious to the suffering that a Muslim is enduring in

Myanmar, Gaza, India, or any other place.

India and Iran signed a friendship

treaty on 15 March 1950. The visit of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee to

Iran and the signing of the Tehran Declaration in April 2001, followed by the

visit of President Seyyed Mohammad Khatami and the signing of New Delhi

Declaration in 2003 enhanced the India-Iran cooperation. The two documents

identified areas of cooperation and set the strategic vision for India-Iran

partnership.

The bilateral relations were further

boosted by the visit of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to Iran in May 2016.

During the visit, a joint statement titled “Civilizational Connect,

Contemporary Context” was released, and 12 MOUs/Agreements were signed between

India and Iran. The Trilateral Agreement on Trade, Transport and Transit

between India, Iran and Afghanistan was also signed during the visit.

President Rouhani visited India in

February 2018, during which a joint statement titled “Towards Prosperity

Through Greater Connectivity” was issued. The two sides signed 13

MOUs/Agreements during the visit, prominent among them being the contract for

interim operations of Chabahar port and the MoU on Cooperation in the Field of

Health and Medicine.

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Hindusthan Samachar / Nimish kumar