French Foreign Minister heads to Gulf States to help resolve Qatar Crisis

  15 July 2017    Read: 1030
French Foreign Minister heads to Gulf States to help resolve Qatar Crisis
Jean-Yves Le Drian, French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, is expected to travel to the Persian Gulf region in order to offer France's assistance in mediating the Qatari diplomatic crisis.
French Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs Jean-Yves Le Drian is expected to begin his two-day visit to Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and the United Arab Emirates on Saturday.

During the visit, Le Drian will hear the positions of the countries in their diplomatic row, offer France’s contribution to the mediation effort led by Kuwait and remind his colleagues of the negative consequences of this crisis, according to the French Foreign Ministry.

Le Drian will also reaffirm France’s priority of strengthening the fight against terrorism and, in particular, improving ways to combat its financing and the propagation of terrorist ideas and projects.

In June, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates broke off diplomatic relations and communication with Qatar, accusing it of supporting terrorism and interfering in their internal affairs. Kuwait acting as a mediator in the crisis, handed over to Doha the ultimatum of the four Arab states with 13 demands, including the requests to severe relations with Iran, close Turkey’s military base on Qatar's territory and shut down Al Jazeera TV channel, as well as to end support for the Muslim Brotherhood, a terrorist organization banned in Russia. Doha refused to comply with the demands.

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