President Masoud Pezeshkian has arrived in Armenia’s capital, Yerevan, to attend the 17th Summit of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity.

Pezeshkian arrived on Friday for the summit, which brings together participating heads of state and government.

Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baghaei said on Thursday that the president’s visit would be brief. He added that Pezeshkian was also scheduled to hold talks and exchange views with some of the participating leaders on the sidelines of the summit.

Explaining the convention’s significance, Baghaei said the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity was established in 1992 and currently has 196 parties. He noted that all countries except the United States are parties to the convention.

Baghaei said that Iran was among the convention’s original signatories and officially became a party to it in 1996. Over the past three decades, he said, Iran has played an important role in developing mechanisms and rules for protecting biodiversity and the environment.

The spokesman also highlighted the environmental damage inflicted on Iran and the wider region during the US and Israeli regime’s military aggression against Iran.

He specifically referred to damage affecting the environment of the Persian Gulf and the Sea of Oman.

Baghaei emphasized that the Islamic Republic of Iran would use every opportunity to document and explain the crimes committed against the environment.