Iran and China have signed 17 MOUs (memoranda of agreement) to the tune of $600 billion over the next ten years according to a Jan. 23, 2016 article by Golnar Motevalli for Bloomberg Business,

China and Iran mapped out a wide-ranging 25-year plan to broaden relations and expand trade during the first visit by a Chinese leader to the Islamic republic in 14 years.

President Xi Jinping met with his counterpart Hassan Rouhani on Saturday [Jan. 23, 2016], a week after the lifting of international sanctions against Iran over its nuclear program. The Chinese leader is the first head of state of the six-country bloc that negotiated the historic deal to visit Iran.

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“Today we discussed the strategic relationship between both countries, setting up a comprehensive 25-year plan and also promoting bilateral relations of up to $600 billion over the next 10 years,” Rouhani said.

The two countries signed 17 documents and letters of intent, IRNA reported, including treaties on judicial, commercial and civil matters. Long-term contracts in the energy and mining sectors were also discussed, Rouhani said. Iran is seeking to attract $50 billion annually in foreign investment for the country’s ailing $400 billion economy.

According to a Jan. 31, 2016 news item on Mehr Agency website, many science and technology agreements were included at the Jan. 23, 2016 meeting,

Iranian and Chinese officials inked several agreements to expand scientific and technological cooperation between the two countries, INIC [Iran Nanotechnology Initiative Council] reports.

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Creation of Silk Road Science Fund, establishment of advanced technology parks in association with China, development of nanotechnology centers (INCC) and establishment of Iranian station to export therapeutic plants in China are among the most important MoUs signed in the field of science and technology.

The joint financial fund entitled Silk Road Science Fund facilitates mutual cooperation between the two parties by providing financial support through one of the following methods: Carrying out joint research, organization of joint workshops and exchanging researchers and university lecturers. …

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… the INIC and Suzhou Technology Park agreed to develop activities of Iran Nano China Center (INCC), located in Suzhou Park in Nanopolis area. [emphasis mine]

For anyone interested in Nanopolis, I have two posts about the project (Jan. 20, 2014 and Sept. 26, 2014) but nothing more recent, until now.

This deal between China and Iran seems to have interested at least one observer who suggests that Russian interests might be threatened,from a Jan. 28, 2016 post by Olga Samofalova on the Russia Beyond the Headlines website (originally published by Vzglyad),

China has agreed to construct two nuclear power plants in Iran and import Iranian oil on a long-term basis. Such cooperation could threaten Russian positions, since Moscow had earlier announced that it would simultaneously be building eight nuclear plants in Iran. Russia’s place in the Chinese oil market, which for the last years has been squeezing out the Arabic countries, could also be affected.

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Iranian-Chinese oil agreements will not have a direct impact on Russian-Chinese trade relations, according to Ivan Andriyevsky, the chairman of the board at the 2K engineering company. Firstly, the Russian oil that is supplied to the East is better in quality with respect to oil provided by the Persian Gulf countries. Secondly, the logistics supply lines of Russian and Iranian oil do not intersect, emphasizes Andriyevsky. This is why Iranian oil will primarily compete not with Russian oil, but with supplies from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and other regional producers.

There’s some intriguing positioning noted in Samofalova’s piece.

As for what this might mean for the recently announced Russia-China high technology fund (the RUSNANO Zhongrong United Investment Fund featured in my Jan. 21, 2016 posting), I have no idea but this China-Iran deal does give me food for thought as the future unfolds. For example, Iran does a lot of ‘green chemistry’ research as per this Feb. 11, 2016 posting, April 22, 2014 posting, and Dec. 26, 2013 posting amongst others can attest and this is an area of research which China seems to be quite interested in supporting as this July 28, 2014 posting (scroll down about 75% of the way for the reference to China) about a washing detergent that cleans air pollution suggests. It makes one wonder about the Russian volte-face at the Paris Climate talks in December 2015 (my Dec. 14, 2015 posting).