Arab leaders call on Iran to stop destabilizing role in region

By Ahmad Majidyar | Fellow and Director of IranObserved Project - The Middle East Institute | Mar 29, 2018
Arab leaders call on Iran to stop destabilizing role in region

The UN Security Council should hold Iran responsible for disrupting regional and international security and providing ballistic missiles to the Houthi militants in Yemen to attack Saudi Arabia and other Gulf nations, the speaker of the Arab Parliament has said. According to the Arab press, Meshaal bin Fahm al-Salami made the remarks during a meeting with French Senate President Gerard Larcher in Paris. In the meeting, Salami emphasized the need to deter the Iranian government from meddling in the internal affairs of Arab countries and destabilizing the region through its militant proxies, al-Youm al-Sabay reported.

Separately, Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi also called for an end to Iran’s acts of meddling in Yemen and the broader region. He made the remarks during a meeting with US Ambassador for Yemen Matthew Toler. The two sides discussed ways to find a negotiated settlement to the Yemeni civil war.

Comment: Sunni Arab leaders want European powers to take a tougher stance on Iran’s malign activities in the region. While France, Germany and Britain – the three signatories of the Iran nuclear deal – oppose the Trump administration’s potential decision to withdraw from the nuclear accord, they share Washington’s concern about Iran’s ballistic missile program and support for regional militant groups.

The frequency and range of Houthi missiles into Saudi Arabia in recent months have heightened tension between Riyadh and Tehran and triggered angry reactions in Washington. Both Riyadh and Washington hold Iran responsible for the latest Houthi missile attacks against civilian and military targets in Saudi Arabia.

Iranian leaders deny providing weapons to Houthi rebels in Yemen. But UN-sponsored reports and investigations by the militaries of the United States and its allies have found evidence Iranian support for the Houthi’s growing missile power.

In December, US permanent ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, presented “concrete evidence” of Iran’s weapons support to the Yemeni rebels and called for international action to punish Iran for it. She said the debris of the missile used to target the Saudi airport had Iranian marking.

 

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