MOSCOW, February 7 (RIA Novosti) - Russian Security Council Secretary Igor Ivanov will meet with a special envoy of Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khameini, in the Kremlin on February 8, the council's press service said Wednesday.
The envoy, Ali Akbar Velayati, is a former foreign minister of the Islamic Republic.
Mikhail Kamynin, the Foreign Ministry's official spokesman, said Velayati will also meet with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
Iranian media reported that the supreme leader's envoy will meet with the head of the Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Yevgeny Primakov, a leading Russian expert on Mideast issues.
During his visit to Tehran on January 27-28, Igor Ivanov met with Ali Khameini, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, National Security Council Secretary Ali Larijani and Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki.
The sides discussed bilateral issues, including the construction of a nuclear power plant in Bushehr, southern Iran, and the international situation surrounding Iran's nuclear problem.
Russia is building Iran's first nuclear power plant under a $1 billion contract signed in 1995. The plant is scheduled to be commissioned in the second half of 2007, after the original date at the end of 2006 was put off.
The Bushehr facility has been a source of international dispute, with the United States and other Western countries raising concerns that Iran may use the project as part of a covert weapons program. Iran has consistently denied that its nuclear program has military goals.
The UN Security Council adopted a resolution in December imposing sanctions against Iran.
Russia, a key economic partner of Iran, has consistently supported the country's right to nuclear power under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and resisted harsh sanctions.
