The Ambassador of Iran, Mohsen Sharif Khodaei arrives on visit accompanied by Abdolhossein Hassan Nezhad, third adviser at the Embassy and Mr Bijan Allaei, Persian and Croatian interpreter. They are to be received by the mayor of the City of Rijeka Vojko Obersnel and the president of the Rijeka City Council Dorotea Pešić Bukovac.

Ambassador Khodaei visited Rijeka already during this year's edition of the International Rijeka Carnival. This first official visit to Rijeka was found to be a good basis for establishing better relationships with Iran in the field of culture and the economy.
In accordance with this, further to the representatives of the City, the Iranian Ambassador also had talks with the representatives of the County and the University of Rijeka, and a visit to the future Islamic Centre is envisaged as well.

His Excellency Mohsen Sharif Khodaei said there is much space for cooperation with our region, stressing the role of the Port of Rijeka which could be a gateway for Iranian products and the ship yards with which conversations were already held, so that even a delegation of the ship yard Viktor Lenac sojourned in Iran. Also, there is a possibility for cooperation with the University through exchanges of professors and for improving cooperation in the field of tourism.

The Iranian Ambassador emphasised the similarity between our county and Rijeka and the area of the city of Bandar-Abbas, a port city and the centre of the Hormozgān province on the southern coast of Iran in the Persian Gulf. The city is an important entrance port for the products imported to Iran, while the islands Qeshm and Hormuz, present together a very interesting tourist destination which attracts many tourists, are situated in its vicinity.

Mayor Obersnel said that during this successful cooperation, a couple of years ago, the Puppet Theatre was on a tour in Iran during a festival held there and last year in Rijeka a cycle of Iranian films was presented. Since the Iranian Cultural Centre operates in Zagreb which hosts various interesting cultural programmes, both parties concluded that there are good conditions to widen this cooperation, and mayor Obersnel said that the Islamic Centre in Rijeka will certainly contribute to this cooperation once it is completed.
(I.N.)