TEHRAN, July 25 (AFP) - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan is to visit Tehran this week to discuss gas sales, a dispute over an airport contract and operations against Kurdish rebels, Iran's foreign ministry said Sunday.
"The Imam Khomeini International Airport (IKIA) and Iran's gas exports to Turkey are of interest to both sides and will be discussed," foreign ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi told reporters.
Asefi said he hoped the visit, which Ankara has said would take place on Wednesday and Thursday, would "boost the existing good bilateral relations" between the two Muslim neighbours.
The visit will come in the wake of a major internal dispute here following the awarding of an operating contract for Tehran's new international airport to a Turkish-led consortium.
Iran's Revolutionary Guards shut down the sprawling capital's new showpiece airport on May 8 after just one flight landed.
The Guards argued that the contract with Tepe-Akfen-Vie (TAV), an Austrian-Turkish consortium, endangered the Islamic republic's security because the operators also had business dealings with arch-enemy Israel.
But President Mohammad Khatami said in mid-July that the dispute had been resolved and the airport could now reopen.
Tehran and Ankara have also been at odds over a 1996 deal over the sale of natural gas to Turkey. Turkey halted imports, complaining of poor quality and asking Iran to reduce the price.
But there have also been recent signs that the two, which have large ethnic Kurdish minorities, have been cooperating in fighting rebels from the former Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), now known as Kongra-Gel.
Earlier this month press reports here said Iranian troops killed two of the Turkish Kurdish rebels in clashes close to the Iraqi border.
Turkey and Iran have in recent years intensified cooperation on security matters, including against the former PKK, after a chilly period during which the two sides accused each other of sheltering their respective dissidents.
Iran has a large Kurdish minority of its own and shares Turkey's determination to stamp out any moves by the community towards greater autonomy.
Asefi confirmed that the "security issue" would also be discussed during Erdogan's visit.