Qatar rejects demands, ready to talk; EU affirm support for Kuwait mediation

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TURKEY HOPEFUL AS ERDOGAN MEETS QATAR DEFENSE MINISTER – BAHRAIN INVOKES NATIONAL SECURITY CLAUSE AT WTO

Minister of State for Cabinet Affairs Sheikh Mohammad Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah meets with Germany’s Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel

ROME, July 1, (Agencies): Qatar will reject a series of demands made by several other Arab states, its foreign minister said on Saturday, adding that their ultimatum was aimed not at tackling terrorism but at curtailing his country’s sovereignty. But Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani, speaking to reporters in Rome, said Doha remained ready to sit down and discuss the grievances raised by its Arab neighbours.

The comments came ahead of a deadline set by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt for Doha to accept 13 demands. Officials say they are aimed at ending a rift that erupted last month over accusations that Qatar supports terrorism, charges it denies. “This list of demands is to be rejected, not to be accepted. We are willing to engage in dialogue but under proper conditions,” he said. The demands included severing ties with terrorist groups, closing down the pan-Arab Al Jazeera satellite channel, downgrading ties with arch-rival Iran and closing a Turkish air base in Qatar.

Arab states have said the demands are not negotiable and warned that further unspecified measures will follow if Qatar does not comply. Sheikh Mohammed said Qatar would not close down the Turkish base in his country or shut Al Jazeera as demanded by the Arab countries. He spoke after arriving in Rome from the United States. Washington is helping Kuwait, which has retained ties with Qatar, to mediate in the dispute.

Turkey hopeful
Turkey on Saturday said it remained hopeful of a solution to the Gulf crisis that has seen its ally Qatar diplomatically and economically isolated, after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held talks with the emirate’s defence minister.

In Ankara’s latest show of support for Qatar, Erdogan hosted Defence Minister Khaled bin Mohammed al- Attiyah for talks at the headquarters of the ruling party in Ankara. The meeting came as Ankara, which has stood by Doha throughout the crisis, resists pressure to shutter a Turkish military base on the emirate that Qatar’s neighbours want to see closed.

Ankara’s attempts to mediate between the sides have so far come to nothing but after the talks in the Turkish capital presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said he was hopeful of a resolution. “There are some indications that a solution is possible. This is our general impression. We need to continue efforts to take measures that go in the right direction,” he said.

Crucially, Ankara is also setting up a military base on the emirate that is set to give Turkey a new foothold in the Gulf, sending in a first deployment of two dozen troops. Kalin defended the base, saying its aim was ensuring “defence and security” in the region. Riyadh and its allies issued 13 demands to Qatar for resolving the crisis, including the closure of the Turkish military base and the Doha-based broadcaster Al- Jazeera.

Turkey criticised the ultimatum but has also taken care not to directly target Saudi Arabia, the key protagonist in the crisis.

Putin makes phone calls
Russian President Vladimir Putin had telephone discussions with the leaders of Qatar and Bahrain, stressing the need for diplomacy to end the dispute between Qatar and several other Arab states, the Kremlin said on Saturday. Moscow is trying to tread cautiously in the dispute, since it wants good relations with both Qatar and Saudi Arabia.

Russia backs President Bashar al- Assad in the six-year-long Syria conflict and is close to Iran, which has fraught ties with the Saudis. Moscow sold a stake in its state oil champion Rosneft to Qatar last year and has been coordinating oil output cuts with the Saudis as part of a global pact to lift oil prices.

The Kremlin, which announced the phone calls with the leaders of Qatar and Bahrain in two separate statements on its website on Saturday, did not say when they happened. It clarified that they happened on the initiative of Qatar and Bahrain. “Vladimir Putin stressed the importance of political-diplomatic efforts aimed at overcoming differences of opinion and the normalisation of the difficult situation that exists,” said the statement on the talks between Putin and Qatar’s Amir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani.

Bahrain invokes
Bahrain told a WTO meeting on Friday trade restrictions imposed on Qatar by Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates were justified on national security grounds, a trade official who attended the meeting said. Speaking on behalf of all three countries, Bahrain’s representative told the WTO’s Goods Council the measures were “in accordance with Article XXI of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade”, which allows the usual rules to be broken for national security reasons, the official said. Reuters could not immediately find any precedent in the WTO’s 22-year history of a country explicitly and formally citing the “national security exemption” to pre-empt a potential trade dispute.

Some trade experts say that using national security as a defence risks weakening the WTO by removing the taboo and enabling countries to escape international trade obligations. On Thursday the head of Qatar’s WTO office told Reuters that his country was exploring all legal avenues to challenge the “blockade”, including a complaint to the WTO. He said that a national security defence could be challenged on the grounds of necessity and proportionality.

Qatar, which had asked for the issue to be discussed at the Council on Trade in Goods, following a similar debate at the Council on Trade in Services earlier this month, said the restrictions affected commercially important sectors such as aluminium. The UAE’s representative said there were treaties against the funding of activities that threaten other countries’ national security, and warned against the WTO intervening in the matter, the official who attended the meeting said. Egypt’s representative also said the measures fell under “exceptional circumstances” and were therefore consistent with WTO rules.

A US trade diplomat said that all parties should remain open to negotiations, the trade official said, and that the United States would not get ahead of current diplomatic discussions and would continue to support the mediation efforts of the Amir of Kuwait. Turkey’s representative at the meeting said Turkey hoped for a quick resolution, emphasising “hundreds years of fraternal and strong ties” among the countries involved.

Trump, Erdogan talk
US President Donald Trump spoke with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday regarding the diplomatic isolation of Qatar by its Gulf neighbors, whose demands include the closure of a Turkish military base in the emirate. Trump called on all sides to “work to stop terrorist funding and to combat extremist ideology,” according to a readout of the call. Ankara, which has close ties with Doha but also maintains good relations with other Gulf states, is seeking to mediate the crisis.

Kuwait mediation hailed
Germany’s Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel Friday affirmed backing to Kuwait’s efforts to heal the rift among the Gulf countries, calling on all parties to solve the crisis within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). Gabriel, in a meeting with visiting Kuwait’s Minister of State for Cabinet Affairs and Acting Minister of Information Sheikh Mohammad Al-Abdullah Al-Sabah, commended His Highness the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al- Jaber Al-Sabah’s mediation efforts to address the Gulf crisis “and the exploration of possible solution methods,” a joint statement said following the meeting.

The two officials, meeting at the Foreign Ministry’s building in Berlin, discussed developments in region, “specially the dispute between Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt on one hand and Qatar on the other,” it said. Sheikh Mohammad Al-Abdullah is touring major world capitals to discuss the Gulf crisis, with calls on parties to exercise self-restraint and to solve the dispute within the GCC. He visited Washington, London and Paris. The European Union (EU) on Friday reiterated “full support” to Kuwaiti efforts to put an end to the Gulf crisis within the framework of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). This came in a joint statement issued following talks between EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherini and Kuwaiti Minister of State for Cabinet Affairs and Acting Minister of Information Sheikh Mohammad in Dubrovnik in Croatia. She “expressed the EU’s full support for the efforts of His Highness the Amir of Kuwait (Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al- Jaber Al-Sabah) to heal the rift in relations between some Gulf countries and reduce tension in the region as a whole,” said the statement.

During the meeting, which was attended by Kuwaiti Ambassador to Belgium Jassem Al-Budaiwi, they discussed the latest developments of the Gulf crisis and the perspectives for overcoming current tensions, according to the statement. Mogherini and Sheikh Mohammad “expect all parties involved to reduce tension and to engage urgently in a dialogue to resolve their differences,” it added. They reiterated the importance of the unity and stability of the Gulf region, emphasizing that a solution should be found within the framework of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), and discussed ways in which the EU could best support this work.

In particular, they stressed that it was important to avoid other regions being drawn into this dispute. Sheikh Mohammad shared with Mogherini the elements of the mediation that Kuwait has been undertaking. They agreed to continue working in close cooperation for the swiftest possible resolution of the situation. Sheikh Mohammad Al-Abdullah is in Croatia as part of a tour that has taken him to Washington, London, Paris and Berlin within the framework of Kuwait’s efforts to resolve the Gulf crisis.

Last August, Ankara launched its Euphrates Shield offensive aimed at ousting Kurdish militias and IS fighters from the border area. Although the operation ended in March, Turkish officials have indicated there could be another offensive in Syria if necessary. Local media reports this week suggested a military buildup on the Turkish border close to the Kurdishheld Afrin region, but there has been no official confirmation. Erdogan spoke with US President Donald Trump and expressed his frustration with Washington’s decision to arm Syrian Kurdish forces fighting the Islamic State group, a Turkish official said Friday.

Mahir Unal, a spokesman for Erdogan’s ruling party, said the two leaders spoke by phone but did not provide details on their discussions. He told reporters, however, that the Turkish leader later also spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Turkey considers the US-backed Syrian Kurdish militia group — the People’s Protection Units, or YPG — to be terrorists linked to outlawed Kurdish insurgents in its country.

The YPG is the largest group within the Syrian Democratic Forces battling to oust IS from its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa. Ankara has vowed to intervene if the YPG poses a security threat. This week Turkey’s military returned fire in response to a cross-border attack by the group. Earlier, Brett McGurk, the top US envoy for the international coalition against IS, met with Turkish foreign ministry and military officials, a Turkish official said. He spoke on condition of anonymity in line with government regulations. McGurk said on Twitter he was holding consultations with Turkey on “mutual efforts to defeat (IS) and ensure it can never return.”

 

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