Iran Won’t Let Saudi Fuel Syria Crisis, Says Zarif
Iran says it will not allow Saudi Arabia’s provocations to adversely affect ongoing efforts aimed at resolving the crisis in Syria.
“What we are [currently] witnessing in the arena of regional developments is Saudi Arabia’s agitating approach,” Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told the visiting United Nations Special Envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, in Tehran on Sunday.
“Saudi Arabia intends to leave a negative impact on Syria’s crisis through its escalating actions,” he said, adding, “We will not allow Saudi Arabia’s tension-generating approaches to leave a negative impact on [the efforts aimed at the] resolution of the crisis in Syria.”
Zarif’s remarks come amid growing criticism of Saudi Arabia following the January 2 execution of prominent cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, who was a vocal critic of Riyadh’s policies, alongside 46 other people.
The execution has provoked widespread global backlash, including in Iran.
Saudi Arabia severed diplomatic relations with Iran on January 3 following demonstrations held in front of the Saudi embassy in Tehran and its consulate in the northeastern city of Mashhad by angry protesters censuring the Al Saud family for the killing of Nimr. Some people mounted the walls of the consulate in Mashhad while incendiary devices were hurled at the embassy in Tehran. Some 60 people were detained over the transgression.
Saudi regime facing crisis of identity, legitimacy, says Ansari
On the other hand,Iran’s Foreign Ministry Spokesman HosseinJaberi Ansari says thatthe Saudi regime is currently facing a crisis of identity, legitimacy and efficiency.
Unlike the government of the Islamic Republic, which understands regional developments and adopts its policies accordingly, the regime in Riyadh is battling those developments and that is the reason why Saudi Arabia is faced with crisis, the Iranian official said in a televised interview Saturday night.
Jaberi Ansari also pointed to Riyadh’s move to close its embassy in Tehran and said Saudi Arabia will not win “the war of embassies” and it has to accept realities sooner or later.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman also praised positive stances and goodwill gestures of Islamic and non-Islamic countries vis-à-vis the recent developments in Tehran-Riyadh relations.
“We explicitly announce that Iran’s policy is not [based on] the intensification of tensions among neighbors and Muslim countries,” he said.
Following Saudi Arabia’s severance of ties with Iran, there have been several offers for mediation between the two countries including from Russia, Iraq, Indonesia and Pakistan.
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