Hollande Invites Iran's Rouhani to Visit France in November

"I have a letter from the president of my country Francois Hollande in which he is inviting Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to visit France in November," French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said after a meeting with his Iranian counterpart Javad Zarif.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) – French President Francois Hollande has invited his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani to visit France in November, French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said Wednesday.

"I have a letter from the president of my country Francois Hollande in which he is inviting Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to visit France in November," Fabius said, as quoted by the ISNA news agency.

The statement was made after Fabius met Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

Fabius is currently in Tehran discussing trade, the first French foreign minister to visit the Islamic Republic in over a decade, and is slated to meet Rouhani later in the day, according to media reports.

Earlier this month, Tehran and P5+1, comprising Russia, the United States, France, the United Kingdom, China and Germany, reached a historic deal ensuring the peaceful nature of the Iranian nuclear program and stipulating the lifting of sanctions imposed upon the Islamic Republic.

Several Iranian lawmakers, including Chairman of the Iranian Parliament's National Security and Foreign Policy Commission Alaeddin Boroujerdi, believe that Fabius, during his visit, should tender an official apology for tainted, diseased and infected 'emergency' blood supplies given to Iran while he was the country's prime minister.

In 1991, doctor and journalist Anne-Marie Casteret revealed that France knowingly distributed blood contaminated with HIV to hemophiliacs, including those in Iran. Fabius, among other French officials, was charged with manslaughter but later acquitted.