Reuters, Moscow :
Russian President Vladimir Putin had telephone discussions with the leaders of Qatar and Bahrain, stressing the need for diplomacy to end the dispute between Qatar and several other Arab states, the Kremlin said on Saturday.
Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain severed ties with Qatar last month, accusing it of supporting terrorism and opening up the worst rift in years among some of the most powerful states in the Arab world.
Moscow is trying to tread cautiously in the dispute, since it wants good relations with both Qatar and Saudi Arabia.
Russia backs President Bashar al-Assad in the six-year-long Syria conflict and is close to Iran, which has fraught ties with the Saudis.
Moscow sold a stake in its state oil champion Rosneft to Qatar last year and has been coordinating oil output cuts with the Saudis as part of a global pact to lift oil prices.
The Kremlin, which announced the phone calls with the leaders of Qatar and Bahrain in two separate statements on its website on Saturday, did not say when they happened.
It clarified that they happened on the initiative of Qatar and Bahrain.
“Vladimir Putin stressed the importance of political-diplomatic efforts aimed at overcoming differences of opinion and the normalization of the difficult situation that exists,” said the statement on the talks between Putin and Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani.
The Russian and Qatari leaders also discussed cooperation between their countries in energy and investment.
Putin told Bahrain’s King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa that there should be direct dialogue between all sides of the dispute with Qatar.
The Kremlin said last month that it was in Russia’s interest for there to be a “stable and peaceful” situation in the Gulf.
Meanwhile, a demand by Saudi Arabia and three other Arab nations for Qatar to close down its al-Jazeera TV channel is an “unacceptable attack” on the right to freedoms of expression and opinion, the United Nations human rights chief said on Friday.
Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Egypt imposed a boycott on Qatar three weeks ago, accusing it of backing militants, then issued an ultimatum, including demands it shut down a Turkish military base in Doha, shutting Al Jazeera and curbing ties with Iran.
U.N. High Commissioner Zeid Ra’ad al-Hussein is “extremely concerned by the demand that Qatar close down the Al Jazeera network, as well as other affiliated media outlets”, his spokesman Rupert Colville told a news briefing.
“Whether or not you watch it, like it, or agree with its editorial standpoints, Al Jazeera’s Arabic and English channels are legitimate, and have many millions of viewers. The demand that they be summarily closed down is, in our view, an unacceptable attack on the right to freedom of expression and opinion,” Colville said.
