Pakistan will host Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt for talks from Sunday on the Iran war as Islamabad positions itself as a potential venue for U.S.-Iran negotiations on the month-old conflict.
Islamabad, Pakistan © Mena Today
Pakistan will host Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Egypt for talks from Sunday on the Iran war as Islamabad positions itself as a potential venue for U.S.-Iran negotiations on the month-old conflict.
The four countries' foreign ministers will hold "in-depth discussions on a range of issues, including efforts to de-escalate tensions in the region" during the two-day talks, Pakistan's foreign ministry said in a statement on Saturday.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said the meeting would seek to establish a mechanism aimed at de-escalation.
“We would discuss where the negotiations in this war are heading and how these four countries assess the situation and what can be done," he told broadcaster A Haber late on Friday.
The four nations have been involved in trying to mediate between Washington and Tehran in the war launched by the U.S. and Israel on February 28, and all are acutely vulnerable to threats to energy supplies and trade routes.
Pakistan has conveyed to Tehran a U.S. proposal for ending the war and offered to host talks, with Iranian officials indicating any negotiations could take place in Pakistan or Turkey.
U.S. President Donald Trump has said talks with Iran were going "very well," but Tehran denies talking with Washington.
Iran has been reviewing the 15-point U.S. proposal, although one official has dismissed it as "one-sided and unfair". Its demands range from dismantling Iran's nuclear programme to curbing its missile development and effectively handing over control of the Strait of Hormuz, according to sources and reports.
Turkey's Fidan told an Istanbul conference on Saturday that the world's new "polycentric system" requires a solution to guarding vital energy and trade routes. He said Turkey's high-level dialogue aims to swiftly chart out "actionable steps" to end the war before there is further destruction to the region and global economy.
Reporting by Ariba Shahid in Islamabad and Jonathan Spicer in Istanbul
Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan will sign a joint defence agreement on Friday, regional sources with direct knowledge of the matter said, at a time of regional turmoil with Gulf states coming under fire from Iran after it was attacked by the U.S. and Israel.
An Iranian parliamentary committee is reviewing a preliminary bill that would bar U.S., Israeli and other "hostile" vessels from transiting the Strait of Hormuz, Iran's semi-official Fars news agency reported, citing a lawmaker.
With President Donald Trump’s war against Iran now in its sixth month, this week's flurry of threats and diplomacy has underscored the ever-tighter bind he finds himself in as he tries to extricate the U.S. from an unpopular conflict he originally claimed would last just weeks.
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