The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud chaired the Cabinet's session at Al-Yamamah palace here on Tuesday afternoon. At the outset of the session, the King briefed the Cabinet on the two phone calls made to President Mahmoud Abbas of the State of Palestine and President Nursultan Nazarbayev of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the message received from the President of the Republic of Azerbaijan Ilham Aliyev, and the outcome of his meeting with Japanese Minister of Economy, Trade, Industry and Energy Hiroshige Seko. The Minister of Culture and Information Dr. Awwad bin Saleh Al-Awwad said in a statement to the Saudi Press Agency (SPA) that the Cabinet was briefed on a number of reports on latest developments at Arab, regional and international arenas. In this context, the Cabinet reiterated the Kingdom's condemnation and denunciation of double suicide bombings in central Iraqi capital, Baghdad, which resulted in dozens of the dead and the wounded, offering its condolences to the Iraqi government, people and victims' families, wishing the wounded a speedy recovery, reiterating the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia's stand by the Republic of Iraq against the acts of terrorism and extremism. The Cabinet also expressed the Kingdom's condemnation of Israeli occupation authorities' approval of the construction of more than one thousand new settlement units and their bidding for the construction of more than six hundred and fifty other units in a number of settlements in occupied Palestinian territories which is challenging the will of the international community and indulging in a blatant aggression against the rights of the Palestinian people aiming at imposing a new reality to prevent the establishment of an independent Palestinian State. He further said that the Cabinet appreciated the United Nations' report on Iran's violation of the United Nations embargo on the shipment of weapons to Yemen, as the report considered Iran as non-compliant with Security Council resolution No. 2216 on the arms embargo, and facilitating Al-Houthi rebels' access to drones and ballistic missiles launched against the Kingdom and their arrival in Yemen after the arms embargo imposed in 2015. --More 15:24 LOCAL TIME 12:24 GMT www.spa.gov.sa/1710393
