Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Wednesday praised the landmark mutual defence deal signed between Pakistan and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) describing it as a step towards regional security.
Islamabad and Riyadh entered into the mutual defence agreement last week, under which “any aggression against one state will be considered an attack on both”. The pact was signed by Prime Minister (PM) Shehbaz Sharif and Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman at the Al-Yamamah Palace in Riyadh.
The pact was signed days after the Israeli attack on Qatar’s capital Doha and months after Pakistan shot down six Indian fighter jets, including three French-made Rafales, in the May 6-7 conflict that erupted after the April 22 Pahalgam incident in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu and Kashmir (IIOJK).
“Iran welcomes the defensive pact between the two brotherly Muslim countries, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, as a beginning for a comprehensive regional security system with the cooperation of the Muslim states of West Asia in the political security and defence domains,” said Pezeshkian, addressing the General Debate of the 80th Session of the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).
‘We do not seek nuclear weapons’
Pezeshkian clarified that Iran has no intention of building nuclear weapons, just days before international sanctions could be reimposed on his country over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions. “I hereby declare once more before this assembly that Iran has never sought and will never seek to build a nuclear bomb. We do not seek nuclear weapons,” Pezeshkian added.
On August 28, Britain, along with France and Germany, launched a 30-day process to reimpose UN sanctions, accusing Tehran of failing to abide by a 2015 deal with world powers aimed at preventing it from developing a nuclear weapon.
Pezeshkian criticised the move by European powers as “illegal”, saying it was made at “the behest of the United States of America”.
While the US, its European allies and Israel accuse Iran of using its nuclear programme as a veil for efforts to try to develop the capability to produce weapons, Tehran says its nuclear programme is for peaceful purposes only.