Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 14
By Farhad Daneshvar - Trend:
In the wake of recent strained relations between Tehran and Riyadh, Iran's Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and his counterpart from the UAE Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan have exchanged sharp posts on Twitter.
Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed used the hashtag #DiploMaturity101 to reply to Zarif's following tweet posted January 13.
Zarif posted the comment reacting to Zayed's Jan. 11 critical post of the Iranian foreign minister's recent op-ed published on The New York Times.
"After reading the Iranian foreign minister's article on the New York Times, I thought it was written by a Scandinavian country's foreign minister," read the translation of Zayed's tweet posted on Jan. 11.
In his article on Jan. 10, Zarif wrote, "The Saudi leadership must now make a choice: They can continue supporting extremists and promoting sectarian hatred; or they can opt to play a constructive role in promoting regional stability. We hope that reason will prevail."
The relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia have severely deteriorated following the kingdom's execution of a prominent Shia cleric, Nimr al-Nimr, on Jan. 2.
Saudi Arabia and its allies, including Sudan, Djibouti, Bahrain and the UAE took diplomatic action against Tehran after angry Iranians stormed the Saudi embassy in Tehran and a consulate in Mashhad, protesting against al-Nimr's execution.
Right after the attack on the Saudi diplomatic missions, Riyadh and its mentioned allies broke off or downgraded relations with Iran.