All Stories Archive

The Dutch government has asked local firms not to deal with Israeli companies working in illegal settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories because this violates international law. Israel fears that this move will become a trend among EU member states. According to a report in Haaretz, the Dutch government...

Turkey's prime minister has questioned why it is the Americans, and not the Israelis, who have responded to his criticism of the State of Israel. "Why would the United States make statements on this subject?" asked Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "Surely, if anyone is going to respond on this topic...

Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth has claimed that several European countries have warned their businessmen against trading with companies based in or producing goods on Israeli settlements. The newspaper said that Israeli ambassadors in Britain, Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands and Denmark had told the Foreign Ministry that the campaign to...

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has brushed aside criticism that his foreign policy has isolated Turkey by insisting that "God and the people are with us." Speaking from his home town of Rize, he stressed that he cannot "overlook" the killing of children in Egypt and Syria. The...

Turkish PM Erdogan got very emotional when a letter written by leading Muslim Brotherhood leader Beltaji to his daughter, who was killed in Cairo's Rabaa al-Adawiya Square, was read out during a live broadcast. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan got very emotional when a letter which was written...

EU foreign ministers decided on Wednesday to suspend exporting arms that could be used in repressing Egyptians, however aid programmes will remain untouched. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius announced that, "It was decided to suspend all arms deliveries that can be used in internal repression." The ministers held an...

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu revealed that Turkey has been conducting secret diplomacy in Egypt to meet with deposed President Mohammed Morsi. However, Davutoglu also said that releasing former President Hosni Mubarak while the legitimate President Morsi is still in detention reverses the mediation efforts. In an interview with...

Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday that accepting the military coup in Egypt means that people will not be able to speak up in the future if another, similar coup takes place in another country. Erdogan also confirmed that only the ballot box reveals the true...

EU countries are meeting to discuss their positions towards Egypt and reassess their relations after the continuous bloody crackdown on peaceful protesters. Foreign ministers of the EU were called to Brussels to hold an emergency crisis meeting to assess the relations of their countries with Egypt if the on-going...

Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia performed funeral prayers in absentia for Egyptian martyrs who were killed by the Egyptian military. The prayer was performed at mosques on Friday August 16 2013, upon instructions from the Grand Mufti of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Hussein Cavazovic. Cavazovic said...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, has said that the decision to freeze German arms shipments to Egypt will limit the escalating violence in the intensely divided state. Merkel made her remarks to German channel ZDF on Sunday. Israeli news site, Times of Israel, published the interview on their site. Merkel...

Douglas Alexander MP, Labour's Shadow Foreign Secretary, responding to the situation in Egypt, said: "I am horrified by the reports of killings and escalating violence emerging from Egypt. The international community should not be silent and must urge the Egyptian regime to exercise restraint during these dangerously turbulent times."...

Turkey's ambassador to Cairo, Huseyin Avni Botsali, has been recalled to Ankara for consultations on developments in Egypt following the violent crackdown by the security forces on supporters of deposed President Mohamed Morsi. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Cairo said in a brief statement on Thursday evening that...

The military and police state has returned in full force to Egypt. A country that for a brief period after 60 years of dictatorship was on a path of democratic transition saw a reversal of that process with the coup on 3 July against Egypt's first freely elected president....

Yesterday Egypt saw its third bloody massacre in the six weeks since their democratically elected President Mohammed Morsi was removed from power by a military coup. A press conference today on the bloody crackdown opened with a minute's silence for all those who died yesterday. Over 2,000 were killed,...

The European Union's Foreign Policy chief has condemned the state of emergency announced by the Egyptian regime on Wednesday, as it leads Egypt to an uncertain future. "It could have been different if all political parties were engaged in the political process," Cathy Ashton added. She expressed her condolences...

Israeli newspaper Maariv has revealed that US Secretary of State John Kerry scolded Benjamin Netanyahu about Israel's latest plans to expand settlements; they will, Kerry said, reduce the country's legitimacy in the international arena. The secretary of state's telephone call was an attempt to deflect Palestinian criticisms of settlement...

Turkey's President Abdullah Gul has told the people of Egypt to remember how the conflict in Syria began as they contemplate the massacre in Cairo's Rabaa Al-Adawiyya Square on Wednesday. Commenting on the security forces' violent break-up of the anti-coup protests, Gul said, "I hope everyone remembers how the...

Israel's Maariv newspaper has revealed that the EU is discussing with Israel ways to circumvent the new EU policy that bars it from funding Israeli projects beyond the green line, which will exclude Israeli businesses and institutions operating in the West Bank from receiving EU loans. According to the...

A report in the Washington Post claims that, last year, the Turkish government passed to the government in Tehran a list of ten Mossad agents active in Iran. The report was quoted in Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth. According to the Post, the Israeli Mossad spy agency directed part of...

Former Israeli naval commander, Major General Eli Marom, was detained this morning on his arrival at London's Heathrow airport. General Marom was the commander of the Israeli navy during Operation Cast Lead and during the Israeli raid on the Mavi Marmara in 2010. Now retired, he is being tried...

The Sunday Times newspaper in the UK has obtained a draft report by the EU that underlines the concern that the Palestinian Authority has lost 2.5 billion euros in aid over the last four years. The newspaper obtained the unpublished draft report from the European Court, an official EU...

France is to take a tough line over Iran's nuclear programme, President Francois Hollande told Israel's prime minister on Friday. He is expecting hard concessions from his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani. According to AFP, Hollande said that his country is waiting to see whether Rouhani's remarks at the UN...

The EU's Middle East envoy, Andreas Reinicke, has confirmed that the union's policy regarding companies based in Israeli settlements will be implemented as scheduled on the first of January 2014. He stressed in a press release on Thursday that these decisions are nothing new but have actually been EU...

German Die Zeit newspaper has published an article stating that Egypt's coup authorities have failed to stop protests despite the use of force and state repression. Meanwhile, the divisions within the Egyptian society are deepening and political agitation prevails. The translated version of the German article has been published...

The International Parliamentary Union has renewed its demands to the Israeli government for the immediate release of all Palestinian parliamentarians held in Israeli jails. "The arrest and trials of the parliamentarians are invalid," said the IPU. According to Saffa news agency, the Palestinian delegation to the IPU has asked...

Turkey's Deputy Prime Minister Besir Atalay has denied rumours that the government intends to build a fence along the border with Syria. He insisted that all security procedures have in any case been tightened along the lengthy frontier. Atalay's statements came after a meeting in Ankara in which he...

British Foreign Secretary William Hague said that London and Tehran are exchanging chargé d'affaires in a move to rebuild their diplomatic ties. Hague explained on Tuesday that, "the two countries agreed to exchange non-resident chargé d' affaires who will work to rebuild bilateral ties and open embassies." Relations...

The Arab League has condemned the "violence and terrorism" in Egypt, Iraq and other Arab countries, Turkish news agency Anadolu reported. Political Undersecretary General of the Arab League Fadel Jawad said on Monday that: "The Arab League denounces the violence, terrorism and killing of innocents, whatever the context is."...

France has condemned the latest violence in Egypt and expressed regret over the casualties. Philippe Lalliot, a spokesman for the French Foreign Ministry, told a press conference on Monday that his country reminds everyone of the need to respect freedom of assembly and protest as long as this right...

Russia announced on Thursday that it has evacuated the staff from its embassy in Tripoli after the Libyan authorities said that they couldn't guarantee their safety. The building was attacked on Wednesday. A spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Aleksandr Lukashevich, said, "Due to the current situation, the decision...

PHOTOS The inter-Parliamentary Union, an international organisation of parliaments which seeks to promote dialogue and ensure peace and co-operation between peoples and their representative democracies, suspended the membership of Egypt at its 129th Assembly in Geneva. The Assembly welcomed two new members, Somalia and Bhutan, but said that Egypt...

The Turkish Parliament has approved the renewal of a mandate that allows the Turkish government and Armed Forces to carry out military operations outside Turkey's borders when necessary. This decision came after the Turkish government submitted a request to parliament to ratify a renewal of the mandate. According to...

The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation has signed a framework agreement for cooperation with Russia. Secretary General Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu met the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Moscow this week. The agreement covers political, social, economic, scientific and technical development. It also provides for regular consultations between the two parties....

UN Foreign Affairs Representative Catherine Ashton left the Shura Council headquarters following her meeting on Wednesday with Amr Moussa without giving any statements. Moussa, Chairman of the 50 Commission to Amend the Constitution, said in a press statement following the closed-door meeting that, "he had sensed improvement in the...

Turkey's military chief of staff has revealed that two F-16 aircrafts took off from the Amasya Merzifon Airport in western Turkey and headed to the Syrian border, following reports that a Syrian 17-H helicopter had approached the Turkish side of the border. On Tuesday, Turkey's Milliyet newspaper reported the...

Every time UN Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Representative Catherine Ashton visits Egypt it fuels speculations about the announced and concealed purposes of her visit, so much so that whenever a political surprise takes place, the echoed slogan is "the password is Ashton". Mrs Ashton's latest visit coincided with...

Russia's Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday that it was still not clear whether Western countries would be able to convince representatives of the Syrian opposition to join an international peace conference in Geneva by mid-November. Syria's pledge last month to abandon its chemical arsenal had increased hopes...

The Italian Coastguard Service announced on Wednesday that it has rescued around 700 asylum-seekers, most of them Syrians including many children, on board three boats in the Mediterranean Sea. One of the boats was spotted by a patrol aircraft about 185 km from the port of Syracuse on the...

Moscow has accused some NATO countries of trying to repeat the Libyan scenario in Syria. In a statement on the fringe of the International Exhibition of Weapons and Military Equipment in the city of Nizhny Tagil on Thursday, Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said that the actions of...

The European Union has requested clarifications from Cairo in regards to the judiciary's recent decision to ban the Muslim Brotherhood and all its activities, as well as confiscate its funds and property. Maya Panjikidze spoke on behalf of Catherine Ashton, the EU's High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security...

On Wednesday Germany's foreign minister warned its citizens against travelling to several locations in Egypt, especially the tourism areas overlooking the Red Sea. In a statement, the ministry said that German citizens are "advised to avoid travelling to the Nile Delta and should keep close to the residential areas...

German Foreign Minister Guido Westerwelle has asked the Egyptian authorities to reintegrate the Muslim Brotherhood into society. The movement was banned by a Cairo court on Monday. Westerwelle discussed the issue with his Egyptian counterpart Nabil Fahmi on the fringe of the UN General Assembly in New York. Sources...

A senior source at Egypt's privately owned Marsa Alam International Airport has announced that Italian tourism companies are postponing flights to Cairo until mid-October because of the continuing unrest in Egypt. The source said that four Italian Charter planes had to cancel flights to Egypt this week because the...

Russia has criticised what it called the "strange" attempts to use the agreement about the elimination of Syria's chemical weapons to obtain a resolution from the UN to use force against the government of President Bashar al-Assad. Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that his country will oppose any such...

The European Union is demanding that Israel provide a full clarification over the Israeli army's assault against European diplomats on Friday, especially the manhandling of a French diplomat. The diplomats were trying to deliver a truck full of tents and emergency aid to Palestinians whose homes were demolished last...

A convoy of diplomats was allegedly attacked by Israeli soldiers on Friday as they oversaw the delivery of humanitarian aid to Palestinians whose West Bank homes had been destroyed. The villagers of Khirbet Makhul, in the Jordan Valley, had been forcibly removed from their homes following a high court...

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has denied that German chemicals exported to Syria were used by the ruling regime to manufacture poisonous gases. Speaking to ARD, a German television channel, Merkel confirmed that chemicals were indeed exported from her country to Syria but they were only used for civilian purposes....

Syria has chemical weapons, claims Vladimir Putin, in order to counter Israel's nuclear threat. The Russian president raised this point in a discussion with Western leaders on Thursday. After admitting that he could not be 100 per cent certain that the Syrian regime would disclose all information about its...

A German government report has revealed that Germany sold the Syrian regime chemicals that have a military potential. The government's response on Wednesday followed an official inquiry made by the Left Party. According to the government's clarification, Germany provided Syria with forty tons of chemicals in 2002 and 2003...