Mar 28, 2008, 19:12 GMT
Brdo, Slovenia - Syria and Hamas must be brought into the reconciliation process if peace in the Middle East is to be achieved, European Union foreign ministers agreed at an informal meeting on Friday.
But they ruled out direct contact with Hamas, since the EU has no formal relations with the Palestinian organization, as it refuses to recognize the right of the state of Israel to exist.
'We do not have contacts with Hamas directly, but ... we have been talking in particular with our Egyptian friends, to help cooperate with the Egyptians for them to lead potential negotiations between the different factions in Gaza,' Javier Solana, the EU's top foreign-policy official, said.
'We think that Syria is an important country in the region, and we would like it to play the most constructive role possible. We hope (the Syrian leadership) will think about that,' he said.
The EU's relationship with Syria has become increasingly strained in recent years over the issue of Syria's political involvement in Lebanon.
'We are certainly in a more difficult situation than we were last year ahead of the Annapolis peace conference. At that time, there was a hope that (Syria's) participation in the conference could lead to further constructive steps,' German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told journalists.
'It did not happen, and nobody (among the EU's foreign ministers), including me, has exaggerated hopes for a change in Syria's behaviour in the short term,' he said.
But with no signs of a diplomatic breakthrough in the Middle East, EU leaders are now looking at ways in which they can bring indirect influence upon the key players in the struggle.
In particular, the EU believes that Syria, whose largely oil-based economy faces severe challenges from its dwindling oil reserves and its constricted labour market, could be persuaded to play a more cooperative role in the region in return for EU aid in modernizing its economy.
'The EU's relationship with Syria can go very far, and we would like very much to having a real player, a constructive player in the region,' Solana said.
Relations between Syria and the EU are currently governed by a cooperation deal signed in 1977. The two sides agreed an updated treaty in 2004, but EU member states have yet to ratify the deal, saying that Syria has not yet proved its willingness to act on key political and foreign-policy reforms.
Most recently, EU ministers had hoped for Syrian help to solve the ongoing crisis in Lebanon over parliament's failure to elect a new president, a hope which had not been fulfilled, Steinmeier said.
'We had thought and hoped that by the time of the Arab League summit (in Damascus on Friday), a president of Lebanon would have been elected, but that hasn't been the case,' Solana said.
But given the sensitivity of the issue, EU ministers agreed in principle that they should coordinate future visits to the region in order to maximize their influence.
'We agreed that we should coordinate our endeavours with Syria more closely ... We'll discuss visits especially and make our messages more harmonized, so the Syrian side don't take advantage of differences that might arise or be felt on our side,' said Slovenian Foreign Minister Dimitrij Rupel, who chaired the meeting.
Your Talkback on this Story