Iran has invited the king of Saudi Arabia to visit the country, according to reports on Monday in regional media and Reuters.
The important development has been widely covered in the Gulf. This is the latest move in the Iran-Saudi reconciliation that is moving quickly forward as the countries seek to heal ties and also re-open embassies and normalize relations. This move could have major ramifications for the region. If Iran wants a leader by Saudi Arabia’s king to happen it may need to reduce tensions in the region, at least momentarily. On the other hand while Iran and Saudi Arabia are rushing to repair ties, both countries may find their expectations are not met.
According to Al-Arabiya, “Iran has officially invited Saudi Arabia’s King Salman bin Abdulaziz to visit the country, an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson said on Monday, after the two regional rivals agreed to end years of hostility following a China-brokered agreement in March.” The report says that “Iranian President [Ebrahim Raisi] has sent an invitation to the Saudi King in return for an invitation by Riyadh for him,” Nasser Kanani told a televised news conference. The report also says that delegations from both countries are preparing to officially reopen their missions, and Tehran said these missions would restart their activities by May 9.
The report about Iran-Saudi ties was contained in a long series of responses that the Iranian Foreign Ministry provided reporters on Monday. Overall Iran does appear to value the ties with Riyadh but it is not yet major news in Iran. This is in contrast to the reports in the Gulf which highlighted the invitation. However, there was some lack of clarity on how the invitation came about, because there were also reports that Iran’s leader had been invited to Saudi Arabia, but Riyadh did not confirm those reports.
Saudi Arabia wants to do outreach to Iran
The overall trend is clear. Saudi Arabia is quickly trying to do outreach to Iran and the Iranians want to reciprocate the efforts. Iran says it is optimistic about the “promising path” that is developing with Riyadh. This also dovetails with other developments, such as Saudi Arabia’s hopes to end the conflict in Yemen. Iran also wants the conflict to end. In addition, Iran looks positively at developments regarding Saudi Arabia and Syria, hoping that Syria might rejoin the Arab League.
Iran’s overall view is that Israel is in “decline,” according to Iran’s Foreign Ministry. For that reason, Iran is pleased to show off the new developments regarding ties with Riyadh and also how Syria appears to be working more closely with Arab countries. Iran complained for years that Gulf countries were growing closer to Israel. In fact, in the wake of the Arab Accords Iran pushed extreme rhetoric against the UAE, Bahrain and also Saudi Arabia. Now Iran has reversed that rhetoric. This shows how quickly the state media of countries like Iran can be mobilized to follow the government line. From complaining only a few years ago about how the Gulf countries were basically working for the US and normalizing ties with Israel, to praising the new ties with Saudi Arabia.
Now the question is whether Iran and Saudi Arabia’s expectations will be met in the coming days and months. Will the Saudi King actually visit Iran? What about the Crown Prince? How will the reopening of embassies take place? What about Iranians visiting Saudi Arabia?
There are many more complex issues to be addressed. It’s easy to put out news about invitations, but making these high-level visits work and having both countries be satisfied with developments is another issue entirely. For instance, is it likely that Iran will continue to pursue a nuclear weapon, as it tries to show it is going to do diplomacy first with Saudi Arabia. Clearly, Riyadh would still be concerned if Iran appeared to be weaponizing a nuclear device.
It’s plausible that the news of an invitation to the king and other moves will slow down the nuclear file or at least the kinds of threatening rhetoric that comes out of Iran. If, on the other hand, Iran uses this new era of diplomacy to suddenly increase its militancy in the region, this could rock the boat with the new Saudi ties.