Lavrov discusses Middle East settlement, situation in Syria with Israeli senior diplomat

MOSCOW, February 26. /TASS/. The Palestinian-Israeli settlement and the situation in Syria were among the topics discussed by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s Director General Alon Ushpiz, the Russian Foreign Ministry said. "The sides exchanged views on the situation in the Middle East with a focus on the situation in the Arab-Israeli settlement. The Russian side stressed its readiness along with other members of the Middle East Quartet of international mediators to continue efforts to promote a sustainable peace process via direct dialogue between the Israelis and the Palestinians on the basis of internationally recognized law," the ministry said. "When discussing the situation in Syria, the sides stressed the necessity of a political and diplomatic settlement of it with due respect to Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and extermination of the terrorist threat in that country in line with United Nations Security Council Resolution 2254." The diplomats also discussed a number of current issues of the bilateral agenda in the context of mutual commitment to closer comprehensive and mutually beneficial cooperation between Russia and Israel, the ministry added. A spokesman for the Israeli Embassy in Russia told TASS earlier that Ushpiz had handed over to Lavrov a note of Israeli Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi stressing the importance of relations between the two countries. Read more