Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Visits Saudi Arabia

KABUL: ( Middle East Press) Iran’s deputy foreign minister has arrived in Saudi Arabia for the first bilateral talks between the Middle East’s rivals since Iran’s political landscape shifted in 2013.

Hossein Amir Abdollahian left Tehran Monday, Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported. Riyadh officials were not available to comment, but Saudi-owned satellite news channel al-Arabiya said the Iranian minister would arrive Tuesday for talks.

Iran and Saudi Arabia are enmeshed in a struggle for influence across the Middle East and they support opposing sides in wars and political disputes in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Bahrain and Yemen.

But both Riyadh and Tehran welcomed this month’s nomination of Haider al-Abadi as prime minister-designate of Iraq, which is battling ISIL terrorists who have seized swaths of that country in recent months.

In another bout of diplomacy Monday, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif met senior Iraqi clerics who played a key role in the country’s political crisis by urging Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki to step down.

“The significance of Abdollahian’s visit to Saudi Arabia is that it coincides with efforts to form a new government in Iraq. It also coincides with Zarif’s tour of Iraq, his second since becoming foreign minister,” said Mohammad Ali Shabani, an Iran analyst based in Tehran.

 “It is very important for Iran and Saudi Arabia to talk because they both play a role in the region,” said Abdullah al-Askar, head of the foreign policy committee on Saudi Arabia’s appointed Shoura Council, which advises the government on policy.