Iran and Russia have signed their first bilateral monetary agreement that they say is to strengthen financial and economic ties and counter the impacts of US sanctions on their economies.

With Iran having joined the MIR payment system, the Russian alternative to Visa and Mastercard, Iranians will be able to withdraw money from Russian ATMs with Iranian bank cards from late August this year, the Governor of Iran Central Bank (CBI) Mohammadreza Farzin announced on Saturday.

“The second part of the plan was to connect Russia's MIR network to Iran's SHETAB. This is a project that the technical teams of the two countries have been working together for a long time, both in the Central Bank of Iran and in the Central Bank of Russia. Fortunately, this work has also been finalized,” Farzin said.

Farzin stated that Iran’s SHETAB system and Russia’s MIR payment systems are now operational, adding that the deal had been finalized during his with Russian counterparts on the sidelines of the Financial Congress of the Bank of Russia in St. Petersburg on July 4th.

“Iranian cards will be able to be used in Russian ATMs, almost in late August. Every person with an Iranian card can receive their funds in rubles from Russian ATMs,” he added.

He added that the second stage of this connection will be for the benefit of Russian nationals in Iran, and in the third stage, Iran's SHETAB cards will be able to be accepted at the point of sale (POS) terminals in Russian stores.

“This plan has three stages. The next stage is that Russian cards will be usable in Iran, and the third stage is that our SHETAB cards will also be usable in their stores,” Farzin stated.