The agreement marked the first time that Iran has signed such a long agreement with a major world power. In 2001, Iran and Russia signed a 10-year cooperation agreement, mainly in the nuclear field, which was extended to 20 years through two five-year extensions.
Before the ceremony on Saturday, Yi met with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and the Iranian special envoy in charge of the deal, Ali Larijani.
Saeed Khatibzadeh, a spokesman for Iran’s foreign ministry, on Friday called the agreement “deep, multilayered and in its own right”.
The deal, which had been discussed since 2016, also supports tourism and cultural exchange. It takes place on the 50th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Iran.
The two countries maintained warm relations and both participated in a joint naval exercise in 2019 with Russia in the northern Indian Ocean.
Iran and China are reported to have carried out about $ 20 billion in trade annually in recent years. This is a drop from almost $ 52 billion in 2014, however, due to the drop in oil prices and U.S. sanctions imposed in 2018 after then President Donald Trump unilaterally pulled the United States out of a nuclear deal between the Iran and the world powers, saying it needed to be renegotiated.
Iran withdrew from the restrictions imposed by the agreement under these sanctions, in order to pressure the other signatories – Germany, France, Britain, Russia and China – to provide new economic incentives to offset US sanctions.