While Morocco and Iran have initiated a rapprochement, Algiers continues its contacts with Tehran to counter a possible resumption of relations that would be at the expense of the Polisario. The 10th edition of the Forum of the Global Alliance of Civilizations, held yesterday in Cascais, Portugal, provided an opportunity for the Algerian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ahmed Attaf, to meet his Iranian counterpart, Abbas Araghchi. «The two ministers discussed the latest status of bilateral relations and explored ways to strengthen ties across various fields, including economic, trade, cultural, and diplomatic cooperation», said the Iranian Foreign Ministry in a statement. «They also exchanged views on the ongoing developments in West Asia, particularly the continued genocide in Gaza and the Zionist regime's aggressions against Lebanon», the same source specified. For his part, Ahmed Attaf emphasized «the importance of strengthening bilateral relations between Algeria and Iran and advocated for greater coordination and collaboration among Islamic nations to face the expansionist policies of the Zionist regime», indicated the Iranian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. While the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is mentioned, the statement published by Tehran overlooked the issue of Western Sahara. This matter was also ignored by the Iranian ministry, in its intervention on Monday, November 26, via videoconference, at the meeting of the «Group of Friends in Defense of the United Nations Charter», created in April 2021. This meeting in Portugal comes less than a week after the phone call between the two heads of diplomacy and forty-eight hours after the meeting in Algiers between Ahmed Attaf and the president of the Security and Foreign Policy Commission of the Iranian legislative institution, Ibrahim Azizi. Surprisingly, Algerian diplomacy has not yet communicated, through the press or on social media, about the talks between Ahmed Attaf and Abbas Araghchi.
