British Prime Minister David Cameron said tensions between Iran and Saudi Arabia were “hugely concerning” and condemned the death penalty following Riyadh’s execution of the Shia cleric.
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He said the United States maintains that the Saudi government should allow peaceful expression of dissent and cooperate with all community leaders to defuse tensions.
Sudan and the island kingdom of Bahrain said they would sever ties with Iran, as Saudi Arabia did on Sunday.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE), home to hundreds of thousands of Iranians, partially downgraded its relations.
“What we have seen during the last 24 hours is unprecedented…” Saudi Arabia also grows increasingly suspicious of Iran as it reaches a deal with world powers over its nuclear program. U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry and others spent significant time trying to bring the countries to the negotiating table and they both sat together at talks aimed at ending the civil war.
The moves come after the Saudi embassy in Tehran was attacked and ransacked in the wake of the execution on Saturday of Shiite cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr and 46 others convicted of terror charges – the largest mass execution carried out by Saudi Arabia since 1980.
In Istanbul, people gathered outside Saudi Arabia’s consulate holding posters of al-Nimr, and shouted “Saudi Arabia will pay the price”. Carrying out his execution sparked new unrest among the OPEC powerhouse’s Shiite minority.
In Tehran, a protest outside the Saudi Embassy early Sunday quickly grew violent as protesters threw stones and gasoline bombs at the embassy, setting part of the building ablaze, according to Gen. Hossein Sajedinia, the country’s top police official, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported.
Switzerland’s Foreign Ministry has said that it summoned the Saudi charge d’affaires to reiterate its opposition to the death penalty in all circumstances after a mass execution in the kingdom.
The group said it was speaking on behalf of the “Islamic resistance”, a term commonly used for Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias, but did not specify which groups it represented. Riyadh, along with the UAE, sent tanks and troops to Bahrain in 2011 to quell widespread anti-government protests spearheaded by Bahrain’s Shiite majority. It has pointed to Iran’s support for Shi’ite militias and accused the country of smuggling arms to groups in Gulf countries – which Iran denies.
Speaking on Iranian state television, Deputy Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said in Tehran’s first response that by cutting diplomatic ties, Riyadh could not cover up “its major mistake of executing Sheikh Nimr”. Sudan once was closer to Iran, but in recent years has tilted toward Saudi Arabia, and has contributed forces to the Saudi-led coalition battling Shiite rebels in Yemen. “It certainly is going to be even more hard to get everybody back around the table if you have the Saudis and the Iranians trading public barbs and public expressions of antagonism between the two countries”, Earnest said.
In a letter to the council, the Saudi ambassador called on the council to “take all appropriate measures to ensure the inviolability of diplomatic facilities and the protection of all Saudi diplomats in Iran”. In al-Daih, west of the capital, Shiite protesters chanted against Saudi Arabia’s ruling Al Saud family, as well as against Bahrain’s ruling Al Khalifa family.
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“We’ll not make any comment or issue any statement”, one official said.
