Araqchi: Iran Faces Off Saudi Arabia in Syria Talks

Local Editor

Iranian FM Mohammad Javad Zarif took on Saudi Arabia's FM during recent negotiations on the Syrian crisis in the Austrian capital of Vienna, said a senior Iranian official.

The ministerial summit on Syria was held in Vienna on October 30. Apart from the Islamic Republic and Saudi Arabia, foreign ministers and representatives from the US, Turkey, France, Germany, Egypt, Russia, Jordan, the UK, Qatar, the UAE, Iraq, Lebanon, China and Oman also attended the talks.

Envoys from the United Nations and the European Union were also present at the summit.

"There was much give-and-take, and the conversations between us and Saudi Arabia were tense, and voices were raised," said Abbas Araqchi, Iran's deputy FM, in an interview on Monday night.

"At one point there was a quarrel between Zarif and Adel al-Jubeir," said Araqchi.

Referring to Zarif's efforts to establish the Islamic Republic's viewpoints in the final statement of the summit, Araqchi said, "Had the preliminary draft been published, one would have seen how different it was from the final text, where our principled demands can be seen."

In a joint statement at the end of the second round of the Vienna talks, the participants called for a nation-wide truce in Syria. They said "substantial differences" remained but stressed the need to "accelerate all diplomatic efforts" to end the conflict in Syria.

In the statement, the participants called on the UN to bring together the representatives of the Syrian government and opposition to launch "a political process leading to credible, inclusive, non-sectarian governance, followed by a new constitution and elections."

"The reality on the ground is that if Iran's demands are not met, which are rooted in the legitimate outlook of the Syrian people, nothing will happen" regarding the resolution of the Syrian crisis, Araqchi said.

"Iran's diplomatic scope and capabilities as well as its confidence in that area following the conclusion of the agreement between the country and the P5+1 resulted in Iran being the main actor in the Syria talks," he added.

Previous talks on Syria, mediated by the UN and dubbed Geneva I and II, failed to find a solution to end the conflict in the war-raged country. Iran had not been invited to any of the talks.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team