TEHRAN -- Russia is trying to flex its muscles at the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) through war games in the Caspian Sea, remarked former Iranian foreign minister Ali-Akbar Velayati here Sunday.

Velayati, in a meeting with academicians of Mashhad's Ferdowsi University, said that Russia is trying to tell NATO that the Caspian Sea is its own security zone and that they are not welcome there.

Elsewhere in his remarks, Velayati said that the Zionist regime has always been pursuing interventionist policies in its dealings with other countries, adding that there is documented proof at the Iranian Foreign Ministry that Tel Aviv had been active inside Iran during all the years after the CIA-backed coup in 1953.

He also said that the U.S. is not satisfied with the administration of Turkish Prime Minister Bulent Ecevit, given that Ecevit is opposed to U.S. strikes against Iraq.

Velayati stated that Washington intended to encourage Iraqi Kurds to move to divide the Iraqi territory so that this might provoke Turkish Kurds, who constitute the largest minority in the country, to call for an independent state in turn.

He said that Ecevit is opposed to the attack because he fears that it could threaten Ankara's security.