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The Washington Post, July 8, 2017 - After weeks of public statements and private phone calls with no apparent result, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has decided to personally intervene in the ongoing Persian Gulf dispute that has threatened U.S. counterterrorism operations in the Middle East.
Tillerson will travel late Monday to Kuwait, where its government has unsuccessfully tried to mediate between Saudi Arabia and three other Arab countries that have blockaded and broken relations with the tiny, energy-rich nation of Qatar, home to the largest U.S. military base in the region.
He plans to spend the week talking to leaders of the warring gulf capitals, receiving them in Kuwait or shuttling among regional capitals, according to senior U.S. officials, who cautioned that a firm schedule is not yet set...
After Qatar refused their demands last week, the Saudis and their partners vowed to impose unspecified harsher actions. Arab diplomats have said they could include freezing Qatari bank accounts as well as other sanctions, a major step in a region where economies and finance often span borders. As the situation now stands, there appears to be no way out that does not involve a humiliating stand-down by one side or the other.
“We’ve become increasingly concerned that the dispute is at an impasse at this point,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Thursday as Tillerson began to plan his shuttle diplomacy. “We believe that this could potentially drag on for weeks. It could drag on for months. It could possibly even intensify.”
The terrorism-financing charge that gained Trump’s attention may be the easiest to resolve with increased U.S. monitoring, administration officials said.
Tillerson will travel late Monday to Kuwait, where its government has unsuccessfully tried to mediate between Saudi Arabia and three other Arab countries that have blockaded and broken relations with the tiny, energy-rich nation of Qatar, home to the largest U.S. military base in the region.
He plans to spend the week talking to leaders of the warring gulf capitals, receiving them in Kuwait or shuttling among regional capitals, according to senior U.S. officials, who cautioned that a firm schedule is not yet set...
After Qatar refused their demands last week, the Saudis and their partners vowed to impose unspecified harsher actions. Arab diplomats have said they could include freezing Qatari bank accounts as well as other sanctions, a major step in a region where economies and finance often span borders. As the situation now stands, there appears to be no way out that does not involve a humiliating stand-down by one side or the other.
“We’ve become increasingly concerned that the dispute is at an impasse at this point,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said Thursday as Tillerson began to plan his shuttle diplomacy. “We believe that this could potentially drag on for weeks. It could drag on for months. It could possibly even intensify.”
The terrorism-financing charge that gained Trump’s attention may be the easiest to resolve with increased U.S. monitoring, administration officials said.
Until now, however, Saudi Arabia has said that its demands are “nonnegotiable.”
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