TEHRAN, Dec. 20 (Xinhua) -- Iran's First Vice-President Parviz Davoudi said on Saturday that his country is seeking expansion of ties with Latin American states, the official IRNA news agency reported.

    "The expansion of ties with Latin America is a priority of Iran' s foreign policy," the report quoted Davoudi as saying.

    "The Latin American states are powerful countries that can play key role in international arena," he said, adding that therefore, "promotion of trade and industrial cooperation with developing states, particularly the revolutionary Latin American countries, is a principle of the Islamic Republic's foreign policy."

    Iran has made a considerable progress to participate in Latin America's base and superstructure projects after President Mahmud Ahmadinejad seized the power in Iran in 2005.

    Observers concede that Iran follows a strategic presence in political and economic life of Latin American nations which is ultimately a threat to the neighboring United States.

    The country's diverse contacts and contracts with Bolivia, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Venezuela, put in the context of the foreign policy objectives, has primarily ideological intentions in its core.

    While the other impetus behind these long-standing bilateral relationships can be extracted that Iran is determined to overcome the diplomatic and economic isolating efforts orchestrated by the United States in the past few years.