A new security arrangement and a collective effort is needed to bring inclusive peace and security to the region, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Sunday, dismissing claims of Iran's hegemonic ambitions.
"Iran believes that our Persian Gulf region requires a fresh regional security architecture," Zarif told the annual Munich Security Conference, which draws security and defense officials and diplomats from across the world.
Unless there is a collective effort to bring inclusive peace and security to the region, it will be engulfed in turmoil and potentially far worse for generations to come, he added, proposing the idea of a "strong region" as opposed to a "strong man in the region".
A strong region is where small and large nations, even those with historical rivalries, contribute to stability, Zarif noted, according to the text of his speech.
"This is simply recognizing the need to respect the interests of all stakeholders, which by its very nature will lead to stability, while hegemonic tendencies by any regional—or global—power will, by its very nature, lead to insecurity," he added, denying that Iran is seeking "hegemony" in the Middle East.
The minister said one of the main features of the new arrangement is accepting differences rather than trying to ignore conflicts of interests.
Refraining from the threat or use of force, peaceful resolution of conflicts, respect for the territorial integrity, inviolability of borders, non-intervention in the domestic affairs of states, and respect for self-determination within states are the other parameters.
Zarif also said the recent shooting down of an Israeli jet shattered Israel’s “so-called invincibility”, Reuters reported.
“Israel uses aggression as a policy against its neighbors,” he told the conference, criticizing Israel’s “mass reprisals against its neighbors and daily incursions into Syria, Lebanon.”
“Once the Syrians have the guts to down one of its planes it’s as if a disaster has happened,” he added.
He was responding to Benjamin Netanyahu’s address to the conference hours before, in which the Israeli prime minister, holding a piece of what he said was an Iranian drone, accused Tehran of trying to impose an “empire” across the Middle East.
“What has happened in the past several days is the so-called invincibility [of Israel] has crumbled,” Zarif said of Netanyahu’s remarks, which followed the Feb. 10 downing of an Israeli F-16 jet which Israel claimed was returning from a bombing raid on Iran-backed positions in Syria. Tehran has denied any involvement in the incident.
Zarif also called Netanyahu’s presentation “a cartoonish circus, which does not even deserve the dignity of a response.”
