Iran’s foreign minister has accused Saudi Arabia of supporting violent extremists and trying to derail its landmark nuclear deal with the US.
In a provocative column in the New York Times on Monday, Mohammad Javad Zarif claimed that Riyadh has promoted “hatred and sectarianism” and drew parallels with beheadings carried out by Isis.
The attack came a week after Saudi Arabia severed diplomatic relations with Iranin a row over the execution of a Shia cleric. The beheading of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr triggered demonstrations and an arson attack at 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,” Zarif wrote in the American newspaper. “Today, some in Riyadh not only continue to impede normalisation but are determined to drag the entire region into confrontation.”The final nuclear deal between Iran, the US and other world powers was signed last July and could be implemented as soon as this month. In an unusually candid broadside, Zarif argued that Saudi Arabia fears a normalisation of relations between Iran and the west could leave it exposed.
“Saudi Arabia seems to fear that the removal of the smoke screen of the nuclear issue will expose the real global threat: its active sponsorship of violent extremism,” he continued. “The barbarism is clear. At home, state executioners sever heads with swords, as in the recent execution of 47 prisoners in one day, including Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, a respected religious scholar who devoted his life to promoting nonviolence and civil rights. Abroad, masked men sever heads with knives.
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