Iran has been pushing to re-establish diplomatic relations with Saudi Arabia and reopen missions following a five-year rift, Bloomberg reports.
The two countries cut ties in 2016, when Saudi’s embassy in Tehran was attacked by Iranian protesters in retaliation to the kingdom’s execution of a revered Shiite cleric.
The Islamic Republic of Iran and Saudi Arabia have been holding ongoing rounds of talks in Baghdad since April, with the last one held on Sept. 21, and another expected soon. The focus of the discussions has been Yemen, where the Sunni Saudi kingdom and the Shiite Iranian regime back opposing sides.
Saudi Arabia has been battling the Iranian-affiliated Houthi militia in Yemen since 2015, and its oil facilities have become targets of the Houthis’ drone and missile attacks.
Saudi wants an end to this conflict before rebuilding diplomatic ties, but Iran insists on normalizing relations as a prelude to ending the war in Yemen. Iran is pushing to reopen consulates in its Mashhad city and Saudi’s Jeddah city as a sign of goodwill, two knowledgeable sources have told Bloomberg.
Although the negotiations between the two countries have progressed overall, there seems to be disagreements in the details, one of the sources has claimed.
The Iranian Foreign Minister, Hossein Amirabdollahian, on Oct. 8 said that several agreements had been reached, although Saudi’s Foreign Minister, Faisal Bin Farhan Al Saud, has been quoted by Bloomberg as saying the talks were still at an “exploratory stage,” but hoped that dialog would “resolve the issues stuck between the two countries.”
Amidst this, Yemen’s Saudi-backed Prime Minister Maeen Abdulmalik, fearing a deal would come at his government’s expense, has warned that his country “should not be a bargaining chip”, Bloomberg quoted him saying.
Meanwhile, the parliamentary elections in Iraq this week, the country which has been facilitating the Iran-Saudi talks, may set back the negotiation process if Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, who is seen as a trusted go-between, is replaced, Bloomgerg claims.
