US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice expressed hope Sunday that key Arab nations, including Syria, will attend a Mideast peace conference this fall hosted by US President George W. Bush.
Rice said invitations have not been issued yet but "we would hope that the invitations would include the members of the Arab follow-up committee ... charged by the Arab League with following up with the international community on an Arab Peace Initiative" to end the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
The committee members are Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Morocco, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia and Yemen. Only two, Egypt and Jordan, have peace deals with Israel and some, notably Syria and Saudi Arabia, remain technically at war with the Jewish state.
The Mideast Quartet, comprised of the US, EU, UN and Russia issued a statement saying it was fully supportive of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's ongoing talks with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, also expressing hope that the conference would be a success.
The Quartet, represented by Rice, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, EU Foreign Policy Chief Javier Solana and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, also called on Israel to continue giving "essential aid" to the Gaza Strip and expressed its concern for the effect that closed border crossings between the Strip and Israel were having on the Palestinian economy.
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