“This has fallen on deaf ears in Saudi Arabia”, Zarif said.
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“The gap between Iran and Saudi Arabia is only getting wider by the day”, Saeid Golkar, an Iranian expert at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, told Al Jazeera.
The two leaders agreed to further strengthen the bilateral relations between Pakistan and Saudi Arabia and deepen the cooperation in all fields, including defence security, fight against terrorism, trade and investment and manpower requirements of the Kingdom.
The statement said that Lebanon’s delegation to the meeting decided not to join the communique after the Council of Arab Ministers rejected its request that a phrase mentioning Hezbollah of Lebanon be deleted because the party is an integral part of Lebanon’s House of Representatives and the Council of Ministers.
It sent a large number of Iranians to the street, some of whom stormed Saudi diplomatic missions in Tehran and the northeastern city of Mashhad.
Dammam- Pressures on the Iranian regime have intensified especially after the diplomatic procedures taken by several other countries towards Tehran in their protest against the assaults on Saudi Embassy and its Public Consulate in Iran.
Iran and Saudi relations deteriorated sharply in recent days after the execution of prominent Shiite cleric and dissident Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr by Riyadh last week.
“So this incident is not necessarily within a chain of constantly deteriorating climate” between Iran and Saudi, Tabatabai said, referring to Nimr’s execution and the subsequent sacking of the Saudi embassy in Tehran.
“Following the signing of the interim nuclear deal in November 2013, Saudi Arabia began devoting its resources to defeating the deal, driven by fear that its contrived Iranophobia was crumbling”.
“Through all these diplomatic effort, Saudi Arabia to some extent can achieve its expectations and goals, because both the United States and some European countries must now reconsider their approach to Iran given the current pressure from Saudi Arabia”.
As such, Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif took a more diplomatic tone than his army in addressing the Saudi-Iranian split.
Oman stands apart from its Gulf Arab neighbors in keeping a cordial, even collaborative, relationship with Iran: much to the chagrin of its GCC partners, it played the role of intermediary in opening negotiations between the United States and Iran.
On Wednesday, Saudi foreign minister Dr Adel bin Ahmed Al-Jubeir visited Pakistan held discussed issues of regional security with Pakistan military leadership.
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Zarif concludes his piece in the New York Times by saying that “Iran has no desire to escalate tension in the region”, and adds, “we need unity to confront the threats posed by extremists”.
