Blinken to hold trilateral talks with Israel, UAE diplomats next week

Blinken to hold trilateral talks with Israel, UAE diplomats next week

US secretary of state will discuss 'progress made' since countries agreed to normalisation last year.

Antony Blinken will meet with Israeli and UAE foreign ministers on Oct 13 to discuss ‘bilateral issues’. (AP pic)
WASHINGTON:
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken will meet next week with top diplomats from Israel and the UAE, the State Department said Saturday, to discuss “progress made” in the year since they agreed to normalisation.

“Secretary of State Antony J Blinken will meet with Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid and the UAE Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah Bin Zayed Al Nahyan on Oct 13 in separate bilateral meetings and then in a trilateral setting,” the State Department said in a statement.

“They will discuss progress made since the signing of the Abraham Accords last year, future opportunities for collaboration, and bilateral issues including regional security and stability.”

Blinken had met virtually in mid-September with Lapid and top Emirati foreign policy adviser Anwar Gargash, as well as top diplomats from Bahrain and Morocco.

The meeting amounted to a full embrace by President Joe Biden of the so-called Abraham Accords, which his predecessor Donald Trump considered a key foreign policy legacy.

“This administration will continue to build on the successful efforts of the last administration to keep normalisation marching forward,” Blinken said at the time.

He said that normalisation has benefitted the people of the region and helps to address broader challenges including terrorism and climate change.

Lapid like Blinken, representing a new administration after the accord forged by a right-wing government – said he would pay a first visit to Bahrain later in September. He had already visited the other two Arab states.

“This Abraham Accords club is open for new members,” Lapid said.

The UAE last year became the first Arab state to normalise relations with Israel since Egypt and Jordan decades earlier, with Bahrain and Morocco following suit soon afterwards.

The UAE agreed to normalisation after Israel’s then-prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu backed away from the prospect, blessed by Trump, of annexing vast swaths of the West Bank.

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