Saudi-Led Investigation Finds Saudi Arabia Did Not Attack Iranian Embassy

An Associated Press reporter who reached the Iranian Embassy in Sanaa on Thursday just after the government announcement that it had been hit saw no damage to the building.

The diplomatic crisis followed the storming of the Saudi embassy in Tehran by protesters angry at Saudi Arabia’s execution of Sheikh Nimr al-Nimr, a Shia cleric.

Iran on Thursday accused the Saudi-led coalition of bombing its embassy in Yemen’s capital of Sanaa.

The Saudi-led coalition fighting in Yemen will investigate Iran’s accusation, said coalition spokesman Brigadier General Ahmed Asseri, according to Reuters.

Yemeni supporters of Iran-backed Shiite Huthi rebels hold banners bearing portraits of prominent Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr during a demonstration on Jan 7, 2016 outside the Saudi embassy in the capital Sanaa.

Foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council have expressed their support for Saudi Arabia in its diplomatic dispute with predominantly Shi’ite Iran.

Saudi Arabia doesn’t rank among Iran’s top trading partners but the ban on pilgrimages could hurt: it makes around $18 billion a year from religious tourism, and Iranians comprise one of the biggest groups of visitors. The execution immediately drew outrage from the Shiite world and culminated in an Iranian mob torching the Saudi Arabian embassy in Tehran and clashes between the Shiite majority in Bahrain and the police in the Sunni-run country on January 3.

“The Zionist regime plans, the USA supports and Saudi Arabia sources the necessary funds”, Kashani said, according to state news agency IRNA.

Mr Jubeir said: “The escalation is coming from Iran, not from Saudi Arabia or the GCC…”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani responded by saying that Saudi Arabia can not hide its “great crime” of beheading the cleric by cutting diplomatic ties with Tehran.

“This deliberate action by Saudi Arabia is a violation of all worldwide conventions that protect diplomatic missions”.