June 3 (Reuters) - Iran's navy commander said his country and Saudi Arabia, as well as three other Gulf states, plan to form a naval alliance that will also include India and Pakistan, Iranian media reported on Saturday.
"The countries of the region have today realized that only cooperation with each other brings security to the area," Iran's navy commander Shahram Irani was quoted as saying.
He did not elaborate on the shape of the alliance that he said would be formed soon.
Iran has recently been trying to mend its strained ties with several Gulf Arab states.
In March, Saudi Arabia and Iran ended seven years of hostility under a China-mediated deal, stressing the need for regional stability and economic cooperation.
Naval commander Irani said the states that will take part in the alliance also include the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, Qatar, Iraq, Pakistan, and India.
Saudi Arabia's rapprochement with Iran has frustrated Israel's efforts to isolate Iran diplomatically.
The UAE, which was the first Gulf Arab country to sign a normalization agreement with Israel in 2020, resumed formal relations with Iran last year.
Bahrain and Morocco later joined the UAE in establishing ties with Israel.
Reporting by Dubai Newsroom; Editing by Toby Chopra
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
NihilSineRatione on June 6th, 2023 at 23:38 UTC »
Very interesting.
The current rapprochement between Iran & the Gulf monarchies has been pretty astonishing given the establishment of the Abraham Accords just a few years ago.
It's also kinda funny actually. One of the major strategic goals of the Obama Administration with regards to the Middle East was convincing Saudi Arabia and Iran to "share the neighborhood" – a non-trivial motivation in him orchestrating the JCPOA – so that the US could "pivot" to Asia. As I'm sure many are aware, many of the Gulf monarchies had an apoplexy over this statement, and it was a significant motivation in their (successful) opposition to the JCPOA. So it's kinda funny for them to essentially do an about-face years after the fact and pursue normalization with Iran anyway, but (due largely to their own efforts) without even the benefits of stalling Iran's nuclear weapons program. Kinda reminds me of that Thanos failure meme.
chengbaofangan on June 6th, 2023 at 17:56 UTC »
If this lasts any serious amount of time it could very well be the stepping stone for some form of normalization between the US and Iran. It doesn't make any sense for the US to remain hostile towards Iran when Iran doesn't threaten the energy-rich Gulf monarchies. Even Soleimani wanted to try and normalize relations before the invasion of Iraq.
Hidden-Syndicate on June 6th, 2023 at 17:28 UTC »
You need a submission statement friend.
While this is laughable given Iran’s very poor foreign policy and inability to work with those who view the world differently, I hope that this is how the world develops moving forward. A regionally homogenous world where institutions like the EU are common place will probably become more stable that the current configuration.
But again, Iran isn’t the nation to lead this currently, and we are likely generations away