Iran: Syria, Yemen wars must end

A senior Iranian official has called for an immediate end to ongoing conflicts in Yemen and Syria, saying these countries are bogged down in critical conditions.

“The war in Yemen and Syria must end quickly and we must exhaust [our potential] in favor of establishing peace,” Ali Akbar Velayati, the foreign affairs’ adviser to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, said in a meeting with United Nations Deputy Secretary General Jan Eliasson in Tehran on Tuesday.

“Terrorists from more than 80 world countries are present in the [Middle East] region and have engaged in a war with legitimate governments in the region through forming extremist groups,” he added.

Velayati also said that Saudi Arabia is conducting airstrikes on residential areas across Yemen and damaging the country’s infrastructure.

Yemen has been under military strikes on a daily basis since Saudi forces launched their military aggression against their southern neighbor on March 26, in a bid to undermine the Houthi Ansarullah movement and restore power to fugitive former Yemeni President Abd Rabbuh Mansour Hadi, a staunch ally of Riyadh.

The UN envoy, for his part, pointed to the critical situation in the Middle East and urged more efforts to establish peace and security in the region.

Eliasson said the UN would spare no efforts to improve peace and security in the region.

UN inaction on Yemen war unacceptable

Meanwhile, Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC) Ali Shamkhani said the UN failure to show serious reaction to foreign intervention in Yemen is “unacceptable.”