Saudi, Iranian foreign ministers set to meet before end of Ramadan

According to a 27 March report by Saudi Press Agency (SPA), Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Faisal bin Farhan and his Iranian counterpart Hossein Amir-Abdollahian are set to meet before the end of the holy month of Ramadan to ratify the reconciliation agreement between Tehran and Riyadh, brokered by China earlier this month.

Bin Farhan and Amir-Abdollahian agreed to meet in April following their second phone conversation in less than a week. However, SPA report did not mention a specific date or location of the upcoming meeting.

According to the report, the two foreign ministers discussed several common issues related to regional developments following the signing of their country’s reconciliation deal in Beijing.

Saudi officials claim that the foreign ministers’ meeting is the next step in restoring bilateral relations after severing ties seven years prior.

Diplomatic relations between Tehran and Riyadh were severed in 2016 after Riyadh executed prominent Saudi Shiite cleric Nimr Baqir al-Nimr, and Iranian demonstrators attacked the Saudi embassy in Tehran and its consulate in the eastern city of Mashhad in response.

According to Iran’s Tasnim News Agency, Saudi Arabia’s military campaign against Yemen starting in 2015 as well as the death of hundreds of Iranian Hajj pilgrims in a deadly crush in Saudi Arabia’s Mina in September of the same year, also led to the deterioration of relations between Tehran and Riyadh.

Those seven years of rivalry between Saudi Arabia and Iran contributed to promoting sectarianism in West Asia for decades, starting with Saudi support for extremist militant groups in Syria as part of the US-led war against the Syrian government in 2011.

Since Iran and Saudi Arabia reconciled, Iran has also engaged in talks with the UAE and Bahrain, with Tehran appointing its ambassador to Abu Dhabi on 17 March, who is expected to depart for the Gulf nation “in the near future.”