Iran ready for talks on Afghanistan crisis

Tehran, March 12 (IANS) Iran Thursday said it has accepted the US invitation to a conference on Afghanistan and was ready for talks to help resolve the crisis in the war-torn country, Press TV reported.

'Afghanistan and Iran share a long border, so Afghan security and development is naturally an important priority of ours,' Iran's foreign ministry spokesman Hassan Qashqavi said Wednesday.

'Iranian officials have played a constructive role in international summits on Afghanistan that were previously held in Tokyo and Bonn,' Qashqavi said, adding that Iran was willing to become actively involved in the reconstruction of the violence-wracked country.

Qashqavi was reacting to the comments by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who announced earlier this month that Iranian officials would be invited to a March 31 conference on Afghanistan.

'If we move forward with such a meeting, it is expected that Iran will be invited as a neighbour of Afghanistan,' Clinton had said at the end of the NATO foreign ministers' meeting in Brussels March 6.