MOSCOW: Russia has stepped up diplomatic efforts to facilitate dialogue between Iran and Arab countries, with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov saying Moscow is working to bring the parties to the negotiating table.
According to a foreign news agency, Lavrov said the proposed dialogue process would include the support of Pakistan, China and Egypt. He added that Iran had expressed its readiness to engage in talks with Arab states.
The diplomatic initiative comes amid heightened tensions in the Middle East following continued military exchanges between Iran and the United States.
According to the report, Iran has claimed responsibility for targeting US military installations in Kuwait, Bahrain and Jordan in response to what it described as the seventh consecutive night of US attacks, alleging that significant damage was inflicted.
Iran’s military also claimed to have launched a cruise missile attack on a US naval vessel in the northern Indian Ocean and warned that it would continue to respond if US strikes persisted.
Separately, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) claimed it had struck a US drone storage facility in Bahrain and destroyed what it described as an artificial intelligence centre using ballistic missiles and drones. These claims have not been independently verified.
