Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Saturday held talks with Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in New Delhi, in a significant high-level engagement between Tehran and Abu Dhabi amid the ongoing West Asia conflict.
The meeting assumes significance as relations between Iran and the UAE have come under considerable strain since the outbreak of the war, with Iranian attacks targeting US military assets in the UAE as part of Tehran’s retaliation for American strikes on Iranian installations.
The Iranian embassy in UAE confirmed the meeting.
"Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian met with UAE Crown Prince Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan on the sidelines of the BRICS Summit," the Iranian embassy said on social media.
The talks also come ahead of a proposed meeting between Iran, members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and Iraq in Oman on September 14. The meeting is expected to focus on an agreement concerning transit through the Strait of Hormuz, a key global energy route that has been at the centre of the conflict.
It would be the first such meeting involving the Gulf states since the start of the West Asia conflict.
The US-Iran war, which began with American and Israeli strikes on Iranian targets, has since expanded into a wider regional crisis, with Iran carrying out missile and drone attacks against US-linked military assets and targets in Gulf states. The conflict has also severely disrupted shipping and energy flows around the Strait of Hormuz.
Iran and the UAE had sought to improve ties in recent years after Abu Dhabi restored diplomatic relations with Tehran in 2022, following a period of strained ties. The two countries, however, have taken sharply different positions on the current conflict. The UAE has condemned attacks on its territory, while Iran has maintained that its military action was directed at US interests and facilities in response to American attacks.
The Pezeshkian-Sheikh Khaled meeting came against this backdrop, and coincided with efforts at the BRICS summit to find common ground among members on the escalating West Asia crisis.
Iran and the UAE were among the countries that backed a joint BRICS statement calling for restraint and stressing the need to protect civilians and global trade and energy flows.