Iran dismissed as “baseless and absurd” the UAE foreign minister’s allegations that Tehran is fueling regional insecurity, saying Abu Dhabi is making such remarks while it has joined a deadly campaign spearheaded by Saudi Arabia and continues to bomb Yemeni civilians.
Abbas Yazdani, the first secretary of Iran’s Permanent Mission to the United Nations, made the statements in an address to the world body’s General Assembly, according to Press TV.
“It is absurd and hypocritical for the official of a country whose jet fighters are bombing innocent civilians in Yemen to accuse Iran of interfering in domestic affairs of other countries,” he said.
Abu Dhabi has joined Saudi Arabia in its deadly war on Yemen, which has claimed about 10,000 lives since its onset in March 2015, to reinstate the fugitive president, Abd-Rabbuh Mansur Hadi.
Farcical
Yazdani said, “It is also farcical to witness a regime which, along with some other accomplices, has been spreading extremist, takfiri ideologies for decades and funding and arming terrorists in Iraq and Syria and in many other places, to take the UN floor to accuse Iran of stoking tensions.
On September 24, Emirati Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan claimed during the UN General Assembly’s annual ministerial meeting that Iran is seeking to undermine regional security since it signed a nuclear agreement with major powers last year. The Emirati patron of terrorists also alleged that Iran is “sponsoring terrorism”.
The minister once again repeated the baseless UAE claims of sovereignty over three Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf, namely Greater Tunb, Lesser Tunb and Abu Musa, calling on Iran to “return them”.
Yazdani censured the Emirati official for repeating the groundless claims, reminding it once again that “these islands have been and continue to be part of Iranian territory.”
The three Persian Gulf islands have always been part of Iran historically, the proof of which can be found in and corroborated by countless historical, legal and geographical documents in Iran and other parts of the world.
However, the UAE has repeatedly laid baseless claims to the islands. In addition, the Iranian diplomat drew a parallel between Al Nahyan’s anti-Iran comments and those of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
This “clearly shows that the two respective regimes are coming together and how the UAE and some of its allies in the Persian Gulf are now coalescing with the Israelis, which could only tantamount to betraying the Palestinian people,” Yazdani said.
Yazdani also reacted to similar allegations by Bahraini Foreign Minister Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed Al Khalifa on September 27 that Iran is attempting to jeopardize the miniscule Persian Gulf monarchy’s security and peace.
He rejected the claims as “an obvious lie”.
The Iranian diplomat stressed that Tehran has always made efforts to help remove tensions in the Middle East and is developing friendly relations with neighbors, including those in the Persian Gulf.
