The agreement to restore relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran has caused an extremely painful reaction in the United States and Britain, Director of Russia's Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Sergei Naryshkin said on Wednesday at an international meeting of high-ranking security officials.
"According to our information, the agreement reached in March this year with the active assistance of China on the restoration of relations between Saudi Arabia and Iran is causing an extremely painful reaction in the United States and Britain," Naryshkin said.
According to him, Washington and London are "used to playing on inter-Islamic contradictions." "They see the positive processes in this region as a failure of their longstanding policy of strangling Tehran and a direct threat to their strategic positions," Naryshkin pointed out. - "The specialized Anglo-Saxon structures have been tasked with undermining the emerging dialogue and discrediting the mediation role of Beijing. Traces of this destructive work are already clearly visible in the world information space."
Naryshkin is confident that "the seeds of discord will not sprout" in the new geopolitical realities. "The normalization of Saudi-Iranian relations is an important step not only toward defusing tensions around the Islamic republic, but also toward strengthening peace and security in the Middle East as a whole," he stressed.
"A unique chance is opening for the resolution of acute crisis dossiers in the region, above all the conflict in Yemen and the de-escalation of the situation around Syria, Iraq and Lebanon. Such a scenario is beneficial for all regional players," concluded Naryshkin.
GSV "Russia - Islamic world"
Photo: official website of the President of the Russian Federation
Based on materials from TASS