At the end of his visit to Tehran, the Italian Foreign Minister, Lamberto Dini, told reporters that Iran's alleged support of international terrorism is a thing of the past. He also said that he believed that Iran no longer presented an obstacle to the Middle East peace process. The BBC's Iranian affairs reporter, Sadeq Saba, looks at Italy's burgeoning friendship with Iran:

The European Union lifted its 10-month ban on ministerial contacts with Iran last week as a signal to the new moderate Iranian President, Mohammad Khatami, that the Europeans were anxious to encourage reform in Iran.

The ban was imposed in April 1997 after a German court implicated Tehran's leadership in a political assassination in Berlin. But the EU made it quite clear that it still wanted to talk to Tehran about international terrorism, weapons production, the Middle East peace process and the death sentence imposed on the British writer, Salman Rushdie.

Just 48 hours after the EU decision was made public, Italy announced that Mr Dini would visit Iran to promote bilateral relations and explore President Khatami's policy of openness.

It was reported that the speed of the Italian move puzzled some of its European partners. In fact, Italy had been so eager to improve its relations with Iran that Mr Dini met the Iranian Foreign Minister, Kamal Kharrazi, last January during an international gathering in Switzerland.

Now Mr Dini has dismissed two of the most important Western concerns about the Islamic Republic.

He said that Iran's alleged support of international terrorism was a thing of the past and that Mr Khatami's condemnation of terrorism had to be taken into account. On the question of Iran's opposition to the Middle East peace process, Mr Dini also said that Iran did not intend to interfere with the peace talks.

These statements have delighted Iranian leaders who have long rejected allegations of any involvement in terrorism. Mr Khatami has already praised Italy for what he termed its fairer and more realistic stand towards the Islamic Republic.

But it has to be seen how Italy's partners in the EU will react to, what seems to be, a unilateral shift from the Western position on Iran.