Staff recount horror during attack on Saudi embassy in Tehran

On Saturday, Saudi Arabia announced the execution of prominent Shiite cleric Nimr al-Nimr along with 46 other men over terror charges.

Saudi Arabia “cannot cover its crime” in executing a Shiite cleric by severing ties with the Islamic Republic, Iran’s president has said. Late Sunday, Saudi Arabia announced it was severing relations with Iran because of the assaults.

Kuwait’s announcement, which was carried on the state-run Kuwait News Agency on Tuesday, did not elaborate or say how the Kuwait-Iran diplomatic ties would be affected.

The move was met with an angry reaction from both Iranian government and protesters, who launched attacks on Saudi missions in Tehran and Mashhad on Sunday.

The UN envoy for Syria headed to Riyadh and Tehran to defuse tensions, and a U.S. official said Washington was “urging calm and de-escalation”.

Zarif, meanwhile, blamed Saudi Arabia for exacerbating the situation.

“The kingdom of Saudi Arabia reiterates that all convicted persons were granted fair and just trials without any consideration to their intellectual, racial or sectarian affiliation and that the final rulings against them was reached based on their own criminal and illegal actions”, said a statement from the Saudi mission.

Professor Azyumardi added that Indonesia has maintained good relations with both Saudi Arabia and Iran.

“Iran has acted in accordance with its (diplomatic) obligations to control the broad wave of popular emotion that arose”, foreign ministry spokesman Hossein Jaberi Ansari said, according to Business Insider.

Saudi Arabia and Iran have long vied for influence in the Middle East, with their rivalry deepening following the toppling of Saddam Hussein in Iraq, which allowed Iran to assert dominance there, and the chaos of the Arab Spring, which gave rise to proxy wars in Syria and Yemen.

The new crisis has had the effect of hardening a wider confrontation between the loose-knit coalitions of allies each can call upon in the region; some of Riyadh’s allies also cut diplomatic ties with Tehran after the embassy attack, while Iran’s warned of repercussions.

Iran and Saudi Arabia, which support opposing sides in the conflicts in Syria and Yemen, play key roles in the ongoing peace efforts to end fighting in these countries.

Sudan has given Iranian diplomats two weeks to leave the country, following Khartoum’s decision to cut diplomatic relations with the Islamic Republic in solidarity with Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates sent in troops to help quash the revolt, viewing it as an Iranian bid to expand its influence.