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Turkey urges Syria, Iraq to unite in fight against terrorism
Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu's remarks came on Thursday after the foreign ministers of Syria and Iraq met in İstanbul for talks. It was not clear whether any tangible results were reached during the meeting between Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem and his Iraqi counterpart, Hoshyar Zebari. Davutoglu and Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa also attended the meeting.
“We are very happy to see that both ministers are committed to this common security and solidarity against terror,” Davutoğlu said, adding that Turkey and the Arab League urged Syria and Iraq to refrain from inflammatory remarks to the media and to take “concrete steps” in the fields of security and diplomacy.
“This process should continue, and all efforts should be exerted to find out the reasons and prevent future terrorist attacks,” Davutoğlu said.
 Hoshyar Zebari (L), Ahmet Davutoğlu (second from L), Walid al-Moallem (second from R) and Arab League's Amr Moussa are seen during a fast-breaking dinner aboard a boat on the Bosporus on Thursday. |
Iraq is demanding that Syria hand over two members of Saddam Hussein's now-outlawed Baath Party who are blamed by Iraq for the Aug. 19 truck bombings that killed more than 100 people in Baghdad. Syria rejected Iraq's request, saying it had failed to provide evidence implicating the two suspects.
İstanbul, which on Thursday hosted the quadrilateral meeting on Iraq-Syria tension, meanwhile continued hosting a landmark meeting of Iraqi and Turkish ministers, which kicked off on Thursday.
The two-day meeting was the first ministerial meeting between the High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council, a mechanism of joint meetings of the Iraqi and Turkish cabinets, and was jointly led by Davutoğlu and Zebari.
As of yesterday, executive ministers from both sides were dealing with technical aspects of cooperation in the fields of politics, economy, energy, water, culture and security.
Davutoğlu and Zebari were scheduled to hold a joint press conference upon closing the meeting after Today's Zaman went into print.
Ankara and Baghdad hope that efforts by the High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council will eventually lead to the formation of a shared economic basin between the two neighboring countries. This week's meeting in İstanbul also served as preparation for the upcoming meeting of the High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council, which will be held in Baghdad, with Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki presiding over the meeting.
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