DUBAI (Dispatches) -- The UAE is working to send an ambassador to Tehran as it seeks to rebuild bridges with Iran, the president’s diplomatic adviser said on Friday, adding that the idea of a confrontational approach to Iran was not something Abu Dhabi supported.
The UAE started engaging with Iran in 2019 following mysterious attacks on tankers off Persian Gulf waters and has held direct talks ever since. Its climate change minister was in Tehran earlier this week.
“Our conversation is ongoing ... we are in the process of sending an ambassador to Tehran. All these areas of rebuilding bridges are ongoing,” Anwar Gargash told reporters ahead of a visit to Paris by Sheikh Muhammad bin Zayed al-Nahyan.
Asked about talk of an anti-Iran alliance, Gargash said a Middle East NATO was a “theoretical” concept and that for Abu Dhabi confrontation was not an option.
“We are open to cooperation, but not cooperation targeting any other country in the region and I specifically mention Iran,” he said. “The UAE is not going to be a party to any group of countries that sees confrontation as a direction, but we do have serious issues with Iran with its regional politics.”
The United States and the occupying regime of Israel are seeking to lay the groundwork for a security alliance with Arab states that would connect air defense systems to purportedly combat Iranian drone and missile attacks in the Middle East.
However, Gargash said the UAE could be part of anything that protects the country from drones and missiles as long as it did not target a third country.
“We have an open eye. We are very clear if something is defending the UAE and its civilians, of course we are open to these ideas, but not to the idea of creating any axes against this or that country,” he said.