Iran warns Riyadh on troops in Syria

Saudi Arabia certainly appears to be playing up the importance of these military exercises, describing them as the “largest and most important” military drills in the region’s history.

In what is termed the “Thunder of the North”, the military exercise involves ground, air, and naval forces, the report said.

Zarif whose country supports the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was questioned about Saudi Arabia’s announcement that it could deploy ground forces as part of the US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State group.

Earlier, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel al-Jubeir said his country was ready to deploy its special task force in Syria in case the worldwide coalition took a decision to launch a ground operation in that country.

Saudi Arabia, a main supporter of Syrian rebels fighting to overthrow Assad, has been an active member of the U.S.-led coalition that has been fighting Islamic State in Syria since 2014, and has carried out more than 190 aerial missions.

“First, Saudi Arabia is taking no effort to do away with the Islamic State and terrorism”.

According to Saudi officials, an invasion of Syria would aim at toppling Assad – the main goal of the U.S., Saudi Arabia and Turkey since the outbreak of war in Syria five years ago.

“Switzerland offered to … handle the (consular) interests of Saudi Arabia in Iran, and we in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia appreciated that and accepted”, Jubeir said. They also identified the containment of the so called Islamic State (IS) insurgency, which controls some territory in Syria and Iraq, as an objective.

SYRIAN President Bashar al-Assad will be removed by force if the Syrian peace process fails, Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister has said.

Riyadh has also signalled that the kingdom is prepared to send ground troops into Syria, and has sent aircraft to a Turkish airbase in preparation to expand their involvement in the Syrian civil war.

Switzerland will represent Iran’s interests in Riyadh, in the absence of formal relations between the two countries, Hossein Jaber Ansari, the Iranian foreign ministry spokesman said, Fars news agency reported February 14.

He stressed that Saudi had made its decision in coordination with the coalition and said that a ground operation was being planned.

“Military experts will meet in the coming days to finalize the details, the task force and the role to be played by each country”, he added.