Saudi royal says no space for dialogue with Iran

Saudi Arabia’s deputy crown prince said on Tuesday in a rare and wide-ranging interview that there is no space for dialogue with rival Iran due to its Shia ambitions “to control the Islamic world.”

The interview, which aired on multiple Saudi TV channels, offered a glimpse into how Mohammed bin Salman views the kingdom’s top rival.

The powerful prince, who was appointed by his father, King Salman, in 2015 to become an eventual heir to the throne, is also Saudi Arabia’s defence minister, overseeing the war in Yemen against a rebel group aligned with Iran.

Framing the tensions in sectarian terms, he said it is Iran’s goal “to control the Islamic world” and to spread its Shia doctrine in preparation for the arrival of a revered imam named al-Mahdi. Shia Muslims believe al-Mahdi, the 12th and last Shia imam, who disappeared in the 9th century, will one day reappear to bring justice to earth.

When asked if he sees a possibility for direct dialogue with Iran, the prince replied: “How can I come to an understanding with someone, or a regime, that has an anchoring belief built on an extremist ideology?”

“What are the interests between us? How can I come to an understanding with this?” he said.

Iran and Saudi Arabia’s rivalry has played out in proxy wars across the region. They back opposite sides of the wars in Syria and Yemen, and support political rivals in Lebanon, Bahrain and Iraq. The conflicts have deepened Sunni-Shia enmity between hard-liners on both sides.

Ties between Saudi Arabia and Iran have been strained since Iran’s 1979 revolution, with each side competing to be the more powerful force in the Muslim world.

Tensions escalated last year. Saudi Arabia’s execution of a local Shia cleric sparked the ransacking of the Saudi Embassy in Iran by protesters. The two countries severed diplomatic and trade ties.

“We know we are a main target of Iran,” said Prince Mohammed. “We are not waiting until there becomes a battle in Saudi Arabia, so we will work so that it becomes a battle for them in Iran and not in Saudi Arabia.”