Russia welcomes the initiatives of Saudi Arabia to resolve conflicts in the Middle East and North Africa and supports the leading role of Riyadh in resolving problems in the Persian Gulf region. Leonid Slutsky, chairman of the State Duma’s international affairs committee, told TASS on Thursday.
“In the context of the Russian Concept of Collective Security in the Persian Gulf, we closely followed the tour of the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia Mohammed bin Salman in the Arab Gulf countries, the purpose of which was to prepare the summit of the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Persian Gulf (GCC, Oman, Kuwait, Qatar, United Arab Emirates , Bahrain), which took place in Riyadh. We support the leading role of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in solving the problems of the region, including in the field of security. We welcome the initiatives of Riyadh to resolve conflicts in the Middle East and North Africa region, including Yemen, Iraq, Libya, Syria, the Palestinian-Israeli dossier, “Slutsky said.
The head of the State Duma committee stressed that the multi-vector and peace-oriented policy of Riyadh and bin Salman personally in regional and global affairs indicates that the kingdom “will continue to maintain the historical position of one of the leaders of the Arab world” and remain a factor of stability in the region.
“We also welcome the successes in the field of domestic policy and the development of the kingdom,” Slutsky continued. as stated by Mohammad bin Salman. As a member of the G20, Riyadh is doing a lot for the pressing issues of our time – from the climate agenda to the fight against the pandemic, from technology to sports. ”
A regional tour of the Crown Prince ahead of the 42nd GCC Summit, which took place on December 14 in the capital of Saudi Arabia, covered all five countries of the Cooperation Council. Moreover, his visit to Qatar was his first since 2017 and was held within the framework of the normalization of relations between the two states.
The Russian Concept for ensuring collective security in the Persian Gulf zone was developed in the late 1990s and supplemented in 2004, 2007 and 2019. The concept presupposes a phased advance, based on equal interaction of all regional and other interested parties, to unblock conflict situations, develop confidence-building measures and control, and ultimately to form an integral mechanism of collective security and cooperation in this subregion with the creation of appropriate organizational structures.
