The lifting of sanctions on Iran as a result of its nuclear deal with world powers will be a harmful development if it uses the extra money to fund “nefarious activities”, Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir told Reuters on Tuesday.
Riyadh says Tehran is fomenting instability across the region. Foreign Minister Jubeir’s comments were the first to directly address the lifting of sanctions on the Iranian regime.
In private, officials have voiced concern that the deal would allow Iran greater scope to back militias and other allies across the region, the report said.
“It depends on where these funds go. If they go to support the nefarious activities of the Iranian regime, this will be a negative and it will generate a pushback. If they go towards improving the living standards of the Iranian people then it will be something that would be welcome,” Jubeir said.
Jubeir said the Iranian regime’s support for militias across the region was the main source of sectarian ill will.
Meanwhile the Foreign Ministry of Saudi Arabia on Tuesday accused the regime in Tehran of a nearly fourdecade record of “sedition, unrest and chaos.”
“Since the Iranian revolution in 1979, Iran has established a record of spreading sedition, unrest and chaos in the region,” the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) quoted a senior foreign ministry official as saying.
“During the same period, the kingdom has maintained a policy of restraint in spite of having suffered — as have neighbouring countries — the consequences of Iran’s continued aggressive policies.” The official said Iranian policy was based primarily on the idea of exporting revolution.
“Iran recruits militias in Iraq, Lebanon, Syria, and Yemen”, the official said.
SPA published a 58-point “fact sheet”, prepared by the foreign ministry, “to illustrate Iran’s aggressive policies”.