Baku, Azerbaijan, Jan. 18
By Emil Ilgar – Trend:
There is no reason for hostility between Iran and Saudi Arabia, while cooperation between them can bring stability to the region and the world, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has said.
“I do not see any reason Iran and Saudi Arabia should have hostile policies towards each other,” Zarif said during the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in Davos, Switzerland on Jan. 18.
“We can in fact cooperate for future stability of our region. We can in fact work together in order to put an end to the miserable condition of the people in Syria, in Yemen, in Bahrain, elsewhere in the region,” he added.
He further mentioned the previous successful cooperation between Iran and Saudi Arabia regarding Lebanon.
“We have a success story and neither Iran nor Saudi Arabia lost in the process, so we do not have a zero-sum game. Actually zero-sum games no longer exist. We all either have positive-sum games or negative-sum games.”
Relations between Tehran and Riyadh have been strained over the past years after their conflicting views on regional developments, particularly on Yemen and Syria, became more noticeable.
Saudi Arabia cut diplomatic relations with Iran after protesters stormed the kingdom’s embassy in Tehran and consulate in Mashhad on January 2, 2016 in response to Riyadh's execution of a prominent Saudi Shia cleric Nimr al-Nimr.