India And Iran Have Common Interests; Diplomacy Is about Finding Intersections: Jaishankar to News18

External affairs minister S Jaishankar on a two-day visit to Tehran this week held meetings with his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amirabdollahian and minister of roads and urban development Mehrdad Bazrpash and discussed various issues ranging from the Chabahar port situation, the Gaza war, and attacks on commercial ships in the Red Sea.

Jaishankar, who was in Tehran as part of the ongoing high-level exchanges between the two sides, also called on Iranian President Dr Ebrahim Raisi and conveyed the greetings of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

In an exclusive conversation with CNN-News18 after his return, the minister said, “Our relationship with Iran is growing and we have been negotiating a long-term framework for Chabahar because till now it has been running on a series of short-term contracts…We finalised a long-term contract in 2016 and then the Iranians asked for a change. Lot of issues got reopened. Since 2016 it has been running on short-term contracts. All the while people have been negotiating a long-term contract. My purpose of going there was to impress on them that there is so much riding on the North-South corridor and on Chabahar port that we really need to push together to get a long-term contract done…I think today there is a realisation that we need to do it."

Located in Sistan-Balochistan province on the energy-rich Iran’s southern coast, the Chabahar port is being developed by India and Iran to boost connectivity and trade ties.

Jaishankar during his visit also discussed with his Iranian counterpart the Red Sea crisis, which holds the potential to hurt global trade. The situation escalated in early December after Yemen’s Houthi militants stepped up their assault on commercial vehicles as they demanded a ceasefire in Gaza. Cargo vessels with Indian crew members were also attacked last month.

“So we have our own relationship on one side, but we also have problems to discuss. There are attacks going on on maritime shipping, both drone and missile attacks. And endangering maritime shipping is a very dangerous game to play," Jaishankar told CNN-News18. “We have seen some attacks close to our waters. I discussed it at some length, and I was fairly forthright in expressing our anxiety publicly when I was there."

India has been closely monitoring the unfolding situation in the Red Sea. The issue figured in a phone conversation between Jaishankar and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken last week.

“Also when one looks at what is today the no. 1 issue in world politics, which is the fighting going on in Gaza. They have their point of view, we have our point of view, they are not the same. They obviously laid theirs out, and I was equally straight in expressing our point of view," Jaishankar said to CNN-News18. “A lot of diplomacy is partly communication but at the end of the day, a lot of it is finding intersections. Finally I think Iran and India have a lot of common interests. Diplomacy is that from a very amorphous set of issues out there you pick out the positive ones and take them forward."