Norbert Schmeltzer, the Netherlands Foreign Minister, says he is personally convinced after meeting with Egyptian leaders, that Egypt wants a peaceful solution to the Middle East conflict. Schmeltzer, currently in Cairo, made that assessment in an interview with Dutch journalists who accompanied him on his trip. “The Egyptian position toward a solution of the Middle East conflict is cooperative,” the Foreign Minister said, according to the interview published here today.
He said the Egyptians envisaged a solution based on the Security Council’s Resolution 242, arrived at through the good offices of the United Nations special mediator, Gunnar V. Jarring “or another intermediary.” He described his talks with Egyptian Foreign Minister Murad Ghaleeb as “most cordial, open and fruitful.” He said that he had conveyed to the Egyptian leaders his own and all of Western Europe’s growing concern over the widening Soviet influence in the Middle East region and his government’s interest in the prompt reopening of the Suez Canal.
The Dutch journalist reported that the two ministers accompanied by their wives emerged from the conference calling each other by their first names.
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