Saudi hopes to reach deal with Qatar soon: Manama Dialogue

TDT | Manama

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Signs of thaw between the bitter Qatar-Gulf crises emerged at the IISS Manama Dialogue 2020 yesterday with a top Saudi Minister announcing that the Kingdom is looking forward to reaching an agreement with Qatar soon.

“There has been a progress in the last few weeks,” said Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud, the Saudi Minister of Foreign Affairs.

He was speaking during a plenary session on the second day of the premier security summit that has ministers, chiefs of defence and intelligence and the expert and opinion-forming communities from all around the globe.

To a question, Al Saud said the Kingdom is hopeful of concluding the dispute with Qatar very soon.”

The deal thus reached “will be satisfactory to all parties involved,” he said.

The minister also assured that the Kingdom will continue to work closely with its allies and the resolution reached thus will be “one that involving all parties in the dispute.”

The minister also said that Kingdom is hopeful of announcing the details of the deal soon.

The announcement came soon after Kuwait announced progress towards ending the Qatari row that Washington says hampers a united Gulf front against Iran.

Reportedly, US President Donald Trump’s senior adviser Jared Kushner had held talks in Doha on Wednesday following a visit to Saudi Arabia.

Reuters quoting an unnamed source said that Washington is working towards “taking what’s an agreement in principle and getting it signed.”

Kuwait’s Emir Sheikh Nawaf Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah on Friday welcomed the developments, state-run news agency KUNA said.

The US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, speaking remotely at a Bahrain summit on Friday, said the United States was “very hopeful” to resolve the dispute.

In a Twitter post, Qatar’s foreign minister, Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani, welcomed the Kuwaiti statement as “an imperative step” towards resolving the rift.

On the Palestinian and Israel conflict, Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al Saud said the focus should now be on getting them back to the negotiation tables.

When asked about Saudi joining the Abraham Accords, the minister said that the Kingdom is completely open to full normalisation of relations with Israel, but for that to remain sustainable Palestinians should get their state.

The summit ends today with a concluding plenary session on “New Security Partnerships in the Middle East.”

Before that, the summit will hold its fourth and fifth plenary sessions on “Diplomacy, Proliferation and Regional Security” and “Defence Diplomacy and Modernisation in the Middle East”, respectively.