ARMENIAN PRESIDENT DISCUSSES TIES, MIDDLE EAST WITH EGYPTIAN COUNTERPART

Arminfo
17 Apr 07

Yerevan, 17 April: Armenia defends position of Arab countries in all
international bodies, Armenian President Robert Kocharyan has said
during his meeting with ambassadors of the Arab League in Cairo.

Speaking of the Iraq issue, Kocharyan said that it should be settled
first of all through gradual reduction of foreign military presence
in Iraq; secondly, through a dialogue between ethnic groups of
the county, as well as engagement of interested countries in the
process of peaceful settlement in that country. "The developments in
Iraq showed that the initial calculations were not right, and that
no simple solutions could be applied in a country with complicated
structure. The Armenian community [in Iraq] too suffers from the war
in Iraq. Armenia did not participate in the initial phase of the war,
and its presence mission is only humanitarian," Kocharyan said.

At their meeting, Egyptian President Husni Mubarak and Kocharyan
discussed political and economic cooperation as well as the situation
in the Middle East. "The Egyptian president and I spoke in different
languages but understood each other quite well," Kocharyan told
journalists following the meeting.