RUSSIA and Iran are working on the final stages of a free trade deal that would include several countries.
The Free Trade Zone Agreement between Iran and Russia would cover the Vast Eurasian Region spreading from the borders of Eastern Europe to Western China.
According to Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk, talks between Eurasian Economic Union and Iran are now in their final, with a possibility of the deal being signed by the end of 2023.
The Eurasian Economic Union consists of Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Russia.
Ties between the two countries deepened after Western sanctions against Russia limited trade routes and forced the former Soviet Union to look for an alternative market outside Europe.
Russia and Iran are both members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) plus, a group of oil-exporting countries that decides how much crude oil to sell on the world market.
Both countries are also under Western sanctions and their bilateral ties could be traced back more than 500 years ago.
