Iranian President Mohammad Khatami expressed hope Thursday for a "collective agreement" on the Caspian sea's legal regime at the upcoming five-nation summit in Turkmenistan, the state IRNA news agency said.
Khatami, who was spoke to his Turkmen counterpart, Saparmurat Niyazov, by phone, reiterated the need for a "collective agreement" among littoral states to "avoid interference and mischief" in the region by foreign powers," IRNA reported.
For his part, Niyazov said success at the summit would depend on the exercise of "mutual respect" among the five state -- Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Russia and Turkmenistan.
At the October summit, the presidents of all five states are scheduled to discuss the delimitation of zones and the attribution of the sea's huge mineral resources.
Two meeting set for earlier this year were postponed.
The sea's bordering states have been at loggerheads about how to divide up the inland sea, whose oil and gas reserves are believed to be the third largest in the world, after the Gulf and Siberia.
Since the start of August, Azeri media have reported at least two incidents of Iranian planes flying over Azerbaijan after an Iranian warship last month trained its guns on an Azeri research vessel prospecting for oil in a disputed sector of the Caspian, unleashing a diplomatic row.
Russia, Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan all support keeping the status quo in the Caspian, under which each country's share of the sea corresponds roughly to their national boundaries.
But Tehran, backed by Turkmenistan, wants the division renegotiated to give each of the littoral states an equal share of the sea, an arrangement that would put at least two Azeri oil fields inside Iranian territory.
AFP
