Erdogan calls for fair Mideast peace

Erdogan calls for fair Mideast peace

Turkey's Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan arrives for a news conference in Riyadh on Tuesday. (Reuters)

By GHAZANFAR ALI KHAN | ARAB NEWS


RIYADH: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has urged the international community to exert pressure on Israel to help secure a fair and lasting peace in the Middle East.

Speaking to reporters in Riyadh yesterday, Erdogan also stressed the need to ensure unity among the Palestinian leadership, adding that the talks between the Palestinians and Israel, which at the moment only Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas will attend, will not yield healthy results.

The Turkish premier, who offered to mediate talks between Syria and Israel, called on the international community to put necessary pressure on Israel to end all its anti-peace actions, such as attempts aimed at changing the demography, character and the status of Jerusalem.

Erdogan spoke on a range of regional and international issues with special reference to Saudi-Turkish ties.

He said that Turkey did not want the Middle East to be dubbed the region of conflicts, adding that his country aims to create a joint understanding for "political dialogue through economic interdependence and cultural interaction."

He advocated diplomacy in resolving tensions with Iran, expressing concerns about reports that Israel planned to attack the Muslim country. "It is really worrying that such questions are being asked. It is a very sensitive issue, we should never allow an Iraq-like situation to occur again in this region."

On the Turkish role in Syrian-Israeli talks, he said that Ankara mediated several rounds of indirect negotiations between the Middle East rivals in 2008, but little progress was made. Syria later suspended the talks in response to Israel's 2008 military offensive in Gaza, and Israeli officials said Turkey's scathing criticism of Israel's role in the conflict had disqualified it as a mediator.

Referring to the move by Israel to include Islamic monuments on the list of its heritage sites, Erdogan said that Al-Aqsa Mosque, the Cave of the Patriarchs and Rachel's Tomb "were not and never will be Jewish sites, but Islamic sites."

He called for unity and solidarity between the two factions of the Palestinian leadership, while also asking for support for Iraq and Lebanon.

The Turkish prime minister said that Yemen had been a regional ally where peace and security must be restored, in light of troubles involving militants and terrorists.

He added that Turkey would not send its ambassador back to Washington until it receives "clarity" on a US congressional panel's resolution describing the killing of Armenians in World War I as genocide. Turkey, a secular Muslim democracy that has applied for membership of the European Union, is crucial to US interests in Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and the Middle East.

He pointed out that more than 40,000 Turks have lost their lives so far fighting different forms of terrorism.

On a bilateral level, Saudi Arabia and Turkey have forged closer ties. Erdogan hoped visa restrictions between the two countries would be removed in the near future.