Jordan to host Syria FM for regional meeting

Jordan’s official Petra news agency made the announcement on Sunday, saying the meeting would gather the foreign ministers of Egypt, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Syria in the capital Amman on Monday.

Jordanian Foreign Ministry spokesman Sinan Majali was quoted by the news agency as saying that the meeting follows a similar gathering held in Jeddah two weeks ago and “builds on the contacts that these countries made with the Syrian government.”

The foreign ministers of the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Egypt, Iraq and Jordan agreed at the summit in the Red Sea city on April 14 that the Arab world must play a “leadership role” in efforts to find a political solution to the crisis in Syria.

The nine-nation talks came after Mekdad had earlier visited Jeddah on an unannounced trip, the first since the outbreak of the war, during which he and his Saudi counterpart discussed “the necessary steps” to return Damascus to the Arab League.

Syria’s membership in the Arab League was suspended following the eruption of a foreign-backed militancy in the country in 2011.

In 2015, Syrian activists said that Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Jordan, and Turkey supported both al-Nusra Front, which is affiliated with al-Qaeda and the Daesh terrorist group in Syria by giving them money or allowing Wahhabi mosques to collect money for them.

Around the same time, former US Senate candidate, Mark Dankof said the United States, Israel, and Saudi Arabia had been involved in creating the Daesh terrorist group to overthrow the legitimate Syrian government.

Saudi Arabia closed its embassy in Damascus and withdrew all diplomats in March 2012. The two governments agreed last month to resume diplomatic relations and re-open embassies.

The UAE also cut its relations with Syria in 2012, a year after Damascus found itself in the grips of foreign-backed violence, but it reopened its embassy in Damascus in 2018.