Riyadh:Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir has announced that Saudi Arabia was severing diplomatic ties with Iran after demonstrators stormed its Tehran embassy to protest against Riyadh’s execution of a Shiite cleric.
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Violence erupted in the wake of Saudi Arabia’s execution of Shia cleric Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr and 46 others over the weekend.
Numerous men executed had been linked to attacks in Saudi Arabia between 2003 and 2006, blamed on al-Qaeda.
The spike in tensions, which comes after Iran past year secured a historic nuclear deal with world powers led by the United States, saw oil prices rise Monday in Asian trading.
Iran said this would not distract from Riyadh’s “big mistake” in executing the cleric, the IRNA agency reported. “We have stressed this to the Saudi authorities and also expressed our disappointment at the mass executions”, he noted.
Protesters also renamed the street outside it for the Sheikh.
He said Iran’s “hostile policy” was aimed “at destabilizing the region’s security”, accusing Tehran of smuggling weapons and explosives and planting terrorist cells in the kingdom and other countries in the region.
Saudi Arabia condemned the killing of Jaysh al Islam’s leader Zahran Alloush in an aerial raid in his stronghold east of Damascus, saying his death did not serve the peace process in the war-torn country.
“If our partners Saudi Arabia and Iran show they are ready and willing (to meet), our initiative will remain on the table”, the source said.
The attacks were a violation to the worldwide agreements, the minister said, also referring to the Iranians’ previous attacks on U.S and British embassies.
Insisting Riyadh would react to “Iranian aggression”, Jubeir accused Tehran of despatching fighters to Arab countries and plotting attacks inside the kingdom and its Gulf neighbours.
On Sunday, Saudi Arabia announced it was cutting relations with Iran and urged its allies to follow its move. The Saudi foreign ministry said none of its diplomats had been harmed in the incident. , a predominantly Shia Muslim country, is ruled by a Sunni Muslim royal family and was the center of a the Pearl Revolution, a failed Shia uprising in 2011.
The cleric had railed against Saudi Arabia.
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China said on Monday (Jan 4) it was concerned about the prospect of an intensification of conflict in the Middle East after Saudi Arabia severed diplomatic relations with rival regional power Iran.
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