ISTANBUL: Top European diplomats will hold talks in Istanbul Friday with their counterparts from Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Egypt for a meeting initiated by Ankara, a Turkish foreign ministry source said.
Foreign ministers from the so-called E3 group — Britain, France and Germany — will meet counterparts from the newly created R4 group to discuss the Palestinian issue, developments in Yemen and the Strait of Hormuz, and ways to end the Russia-Ukraine war, the source said.
Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan will host the meeting, the first to bring together the two groups.
“The seven countries will come together for the first time in the R4+E3 format, at Turkey’s initiative,” the source said, indicating they would explore “opportunities for cooperation and coordination that could be put into practice … in the coming period.”
In chairing the meeting, Fidan was expected to focus on the international community “increasing pressure on Israel” in response to its settlement expansion and its “encouragement of settler terrorism”, the source said.
Fidan would also underline support for Saudi Arabia’s security in the face of attacks by Yemen’s Houthis, and stress the need for permanent freedom of navigation in the Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb Straits.
And he would reiterate Turkey’s ongoing “warnings and proposals” to prevent the Russia-Ukraine war from spreading to the Black Sea and to draw a line under the civilian deaths there.
The E3 was set up more than 20 years ago to advance diplomatic coordination over Iran’s nuclear programme, while the R4 was formed this year and brings together Egypt with the signatories to the Mecca Defence Agreement — a mutual defence pact set up by Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan in August.