FNA -� Iran's Communication and Information Technology Minister Mohammad Javad Azari Jahromi announced that the country is willing to broaden cooperation with the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in the field of communication.

"Iran is after cooperation with its Northern neighbors in the communication and information technology sector to attain a more powerful regional stance," Azari Jahromi said, addressing a meeting of the Council of Heads of Communications Administrations of the Regional Commonwealth in the Field of Communications (RCC) in Ashgabat on Wednesday.

He described digital trade as a priority for Iran's communication sector to cooperate with the CIS states.

"Iran is ready to cooperate for mutual talks in the ICT sector," Azari Jahromi said.

The CIS was created in December 1991. In the adopted Declaration the participants of the Commonwealth declared their interaction on the basis of sovereign equality.

At present the CIS unites: Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine.

In September 1993 the Heads of the CIS States signed an Agreement on the creation of Economic Union to form common economic space grounded on free movement of goods, services, labor force, capital; to elaborate coordinated monetary, tax, price, customs, external economic policy; to bring together methods of regulating economic activity and create favorable conditions for the development of direct production relations.

Integration of the countries within the framework of the Commonwealth of Independent States is executed through its coordinating institutions (charter bodies, executive bodies and the bodies of branch cooperation of the CIS).