TEHRAN – Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) AliShamkhani and his Russian and Pakistani counterparts, Nikolai Patrushev andNasser Khan Janjua, agreed to hold a joint security conference with theparticipation of other regional nations.link>link>link>[image: Iran, Russia, Pakistan Agree to Hold Joint Security Conference]link>
In a meeting in the Russian resort city of Sochi on Thursday, Shamkhani,Patrushev, and Janjua reached the agreement to hold a joint securityconference attended by other regional states and determine its mechanism.
The three top security officials also agreed to continue joint negotiationsand hold talks with other Asian countries to invite them to participate inthe security conference.
During the meeting, they also expressed concerns over the US moves todestabilize the Middle East region and stressed the need for cooperationamong all influential Asian countries to counter US threats.
Addressing the 9th International Meeting of High Representatives forSecurity Issues in Sochi on Wednesday, Shamkhani had cautioned againstWashington’s plots to dominate the Middle East and said the US is seekingto destabilize the region to increase its military presence there.
“As the biggest exporter of arms and ammunition, the US dominates more thana third of the world’s arms market,” he stated.
More than 70 percent of the US arms are sold to the Middle East, he said,adding that the amount of US arms exports has doubled over the past 10years, making the region “a gunpowder storehouse”.
“Given such a lucrative market, would the US have even a willingness to endwars? Would it (the US) had been able to sell more than $100 billion ofweapons to Saudi Arabia without portraying Iran as a security threat?”Shamkhani noted.
“It is natural that all responses (to the above questions) are negativebecause the US’s definitive policy is to manage insecurity and destabilizethe region to strengthen its presence, develop its military bases, sell(more) weapons and interfere in the region’s affairs,” he noted.
The remarks came as the Middle East has been plagued with conflicts andTakfiri terrorist groups like Daesh (also known as ISIS or ISIL), which arebelieved to have been created and supported by the US and some regionalcountries.
Countries like Iraq and Syria have been gripped by insurgency andterrorism, while Yemen has been suffering from a brutal aggression by aSaudi-led coalition for the past three years.