Iran's president lashed out at Saudi Arabia on Wednesday over its role in Yemen's conflict with Shia rebels, saying it should try to foster peace rather than use weapons against fellow Muslims. The comments by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad were the strongest criticism yet by predominantly Shia Muslim Iran of mainly Sunni Saudi Arabia over Riyadh's involvement in the Yemen conflict.
"We were expecting that Saudi Arabian officials act like a mentor and make peace between brothers, not that they themselves enter the war and use bombs and machineguns against Muslims," Ahmadinejad said in a televised speech.
"If only a small part of the weapons of Saudi Arabia were used in favour of Gaza and against the Zionist regime (Israel), today there would be no sign of the Zionist regime in the region," he said on state television. Ahmadinejad said Saudi Arabia, the world's top oil producer and a US ally, used crude oil income to buy weapons which are then used to "kill brothers" and create sedition.
Ahmadinejad, who often rails against the West, also said he believed the United States, Britain and Israel were behind the Yemen conflict, aiming to "set the whole region on fire" in a bid to dominate the Middle East. "I hope that my Yemeni brothers sit down and talk and negotiate and solve the problems," he said.