Iraq must walk a fine line amid Iranian, Saudi tensions

Pakistan, an ally of Saudi Arabia, said that disunity in the region could provide advantageous grounds to the dark forces of extremism and terrorism.

He criticised attacks on Saudi missions in Iran and he also criticized Saudi Arabia’s execution of a Shia Muslim cleric, which triggered the dispute.

The diplomatic stand-off between Iran and the kingdom began on Saturday, when Saudi Arabia executed Mr al-Nimr and 46 others convicted of terror charges – the largest mass execution carried out by the kingdom since 1980.

The attacks on the diplomatic outposts follow Saudi Arabia’s execution of Nimr al-Nimr, an outspoken critic of the Sunni Muslim-dominated state’s treatment of its Shiite minority, who look to Iran for spiritual leadership.

He also expressed Kuwait’s support for Saudi Arabia in the measures it is taking to safeguard its security. But the country did summon Iran’s ambassador Tuesday to give him a note of protest over the failure to protect Saudi Arabia’s diplomatic missions, calling the breach “a flagrant violation of worldwide conventions and norms”.

European countries and regional power Turkey voiced concerns over the row, while US Secretary of State John Kerry called his Iranian and Saudi counterparts on Monday and Moscow offered to act as an intermediary.

In addition, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) made a decision to downgrade its diplomatic relations with Iran Monday and reduce the number of Iranian diplomats in the country.

The US has been trying to de-escalate the tensions between the two countries by contacting Saudi and Iranian officials in the past two days.

The announcement comes after Saudi Arabia and Bahrain severed ties with Iran this week.

The spark for Sunday’s attacks appears to have been Nimr’s execution a day earlier, which triggered angry reactions in Shiite-led Iraq and Iran. State media in Iran showed still photographs it said were of the diplomats arriving in Tehran on a Meraj Airlines jet.

Forty people were arrested and investigators were pursuing other suspects, Tehran prosecutor Abbas Jafari Dowlatabadi said, according to the Associated Press.