Iran, NATO hold first talks in 30 years

Iran and NATO have held their first talks since the Iranian revolution 30 years ago, officials at the military alliance said Thursday, in a new sign of a thaw in Tehran's ties with the West.

At allied headquarters in Brussels last week, an Iranian diplomat and a senior NATO official had an "informal contact" focused on Iran's neighbor Afghanistan, where the alliance is battling a stiff Taliban-led insurgency.

"The diplomat met with Assistant Secretary General for Political Affairs and Security Policy Martin Erdmann," chief NATO spokesman James Appathurai said.

"It was a first informal contact about the subject of Afghanistan," he said, adding: "We have not yet programmed a second meeting."

A NATO official, speaking on condition of anonymity given the sensitive nature of the talks, said the visit by the diplomat, who was not identified, was the first "since the regime of the Shah" of Iran, which collapsed in 1979.

He noted that "the Iranians are interested in possible cooperation on Afghanistan" to better confront the problems posed by opium production there and an influx of Afghan refugees across their border.

A second NATO official said: "There were exploratory contacts recently. Nothing of substance was discussed. It was a first informal contact between an Iranian diplomat and a representative of the secretary general."

Earlier Thursday, Iran confirmed that it would attend a major international meeting on Afghanistan in The Hague in the Netherlands next week.

The meeting on Tuesday comes as the United States undertakes a vast review of its strategy in Afghanistan, expected to be made public in coming days, and amid new efforts by Washington to reach out to Tehran.

The review puts all of Afghanistan's neighbors, notably Pakistan, at the heart of a solution to choke off the Taliban-led insurgency, which has dented NATO's efforts to spread democracy and foster reconstruction.

"The fact that Iran has accepted to go to the conference in The Hague is good news and constitutes a new step in the regionalization of the Afghan issue," Appathurai said.

Iran has close ethnic and religious ties with Afghanistan, but the Islamic republic has suffered badly from the effects of surging opium production, with cheap and readily available heroin fueling a sharp rise in drug use.

A spokesman at the Iranian embassy in Brussels declined to comment immediately on the visit last week.

In a video message to Iranian leaders marking the Persian New Year, U.S. President Barack Obama called for a "new beginning" in ties between Washington and Tehran.

They have had no diplomatic relations since the aftermath of the Islamic Revolution of 1979.

Yet both share an interest in restoring stability to Afghanistan, where a US-led coalition ousted the Taliban regime in late 2001 for harboring al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden.

Obama has given the conflict top foreign policy priority since coming to power, above the war in Iraq which divided NATO allies.

The Hague conference is officially being co-hosted by Afghanistan, the United Nations and the Dutch government. It will be opened by U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

About 80 countries and 20 organizations and observers have been invited.

© Wire reports