Turkish President says “Israel” attacks aimed to sabotage Iran nuclear talks
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday that “Israel’s” attacks on Iran right before a new round of nuclear talks with the United States aimed to sabotage the negotiations, and it showed “Israel” did not want to resolve issues through diplomacy.
Speaking at a foreign ministers’ meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation in Istanbul, Erdogan urged countries with influence over “Israel” not to listen to its “poison” and to seek a solution to the fighting via dialogue without allowing a wider conflict.
He also called on Muslim countries to increase their efforts to impose punitive measures against “Israel” on the basis of international law and United Nations’ resolutions.
Earlier, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told his counterparts from Muslim countries that “Israel” was dragging the region into “total disaster” with its attacks on Iran, and added world powers must prevent the war from spiralling into a wider conflict.
FM Fidan called on Muslim countries to stand with Iran against “Israel”, and said the region had an “Israel problem” after its assault on Gaza and attacks on Lebanon, Syria, Yemen, and Iran.
The 51st session of the Council of Foreign Ministers of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) is held in Istanbul on June 21-22, under the theme “The Organization of Islamic Cooperation in a Transforming World.”
On Friday in Istanbul, the Arab League’s foreign ministers issued a final statement after the emergency meeting, condemning the “Israeli” attacks as “a blatant violation of the sovereignty of a UN member state and a threat to regional peace and security.” Moreover, it urged the UN Security Council to act swiftly and assume its responsibilities to stop the escalation, warning that failure to do so could plunge the region into deeper instability.
Earlier, and on the sidelines of the OIC meeting, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told reporters that Tehran cannot go to negotiations with Washington while the Iranian people are under bombardment, adding that the United States has been involved in the attacks since the beginning.
“They deny, they keep saying they are not involved, but we have many indications they have been involved from day one. And now the interviews by the US president are quite clear, that he’s talking about a US leadership on this question,” Araghchi said, adding that a US intervention “would be very dangerous for everybody.”
Meanwhile, Trump reiterated that he would take up to two weeks to decide whether the United States should enter the conflict on “Israel’s” side, enough time “to see whether or not people come to their senses,” he said, adding that he was unlikely to press “Israel” to scale back its airstrikes to allow negotiations to continue.
“I think it’s very hard to make that request right now. If somebody is winning, it’s a little bit harder to do than if somebody is losing, but we’re ready, willing, and able, and we’ve been speaking to Iran, and we’ll see what happens,” he said.
In parallel, the Zionist forces claimed on Saturday that their forces carried out a targeted strike in western Iran that killed Behnam Shahriari, commander of the Combat Vehicle Transport Unit (Unit 190) of Iran’s Quds Force, in addition to Saeed Izadi, head of the Palestine Corps of Iran’s Quds Force, in a strike on an apartment in the city of Qom.
Since June 13, the Zionist aggression has killed 430 Iranians and injured more than 3,500 others, according to the Iranian Health Ministry.
