Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov arrived Thursday in Damascus after talks in Lebanon, and in an arrival statement said that there could be no "lasting" peace in the Middle East without a comprehensive settlement. Lavrov was greeted at Damascus airport by Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Moallem and was expected to meet Syrian President Bashar Assad later in the day. His talks with the Syrian leadership was expected to concern ways to try to revive the stalled Middle East peace process and implement UN resolution 1701 that established the ceasefire between Israel and the Hezbollah in Lebanon. Russia's top diplomat stressed to reporters on his arrival at Damascus international airport that there could be no lasting peace in the region without involving all aspects of the situation. "It is clear that only a comprehensive settlement involving all aspects of the situation could bring the lasting peace to the region," Lavrov said. He said that his visit aims at "discussing what our two countries could do to resolve the long-standing Middle East Crisis," and boosting bilateral relations. The Russian minister is on a Middle East tour that is also to take him to Israel and to the Palestinian territories amid mounting international effort to help reach a settlement to the decades-old Arab-Israeli conflict after the Lebanon war. The 22-nation Arab League discussed Wednesday a plan to request a ministerial meeting later this month by the UN Security Council to advance efforts to settle the Arab-Israeli conflict, through direct talks among Israel, Syria, Lebanon and the Palestinians by the end of 2006, the German News Agency "DPA" reported today. The Arab League believes the Security Council is the best place to launch a new Arab-Israeli peace effort whose goal would be to establish a Palestinian state, settle the Golan Heights issue with Syria, and promote Israeli-Lebanese peace after this summer's brutal conflict. Shortly before leaving to the region, Lavrov voiced his country's backing to the Arab League's proposed international conference under the sponsorship of the UN Security Council on the Middle East crisis. Earlier, Lavrov had met in Beirut with Lebanese President Emile Lahoud. After meeting with Lahoud, Lavrov said that his country was working on finding an overall solution to the problems in the Middle East - a formula that will satisfy all the key players. He added that his country supported the initiative launched by the Arab League on Wednesday, which decided to seek a "new mechanism' to break the impasse in the Middle East peace process.
