Dubai, Mar 19:
Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister offered harsh criticism Thursday of Iran after its overnight attacks on his country, saying: “What little trust there was before has completely been shattered.”
Prince Faisal bin Farhan made the comments after a meeting between foreign ministers of the Gulf Arab states and others over the Iranian attacks tearing at the wider Middle East.
“The attacks on my country and on my neighboring countries that are not involved in this conflict — that’s all I’m interested in,” Prince Faisal said. “We’re going to use every lever we have — political, economic, diplomatic and otherwise — to get these attacks to stop.”
He criticized Iran’s attacks on Riyadh, the capital hosting the meeting.
“I cannot see it as coincidental,” he said. “That’s the clearest signal of how Iran feels about diplomacy. … It tries to pressure its neighbors, and that’s not going to work.”
Iran hit a major natural gas facility in Qatar, keeping up attacks on its Persian Gulf neighbors’ energy facilities as it continued to squeeze the Strait of Hormuz shipping channel — through which one-fifth of the world’s oil travels.
The price of oil surged another 5 per cent to over $108 a barrel on international markets, increasing the price of gasoline and other goods. The price of Brent crude, the international benchmark for oil, is now up close to 50% since the start of the war.