Middle East News
Status quo in Middle East not sustainable, Obama says
May 19, 2011, 16:48 GMT
Washington - President Barack Obama said Thursday that the United States will strongly support the democratic and economic development of Egypt and Tunisia, and that the two countries could serve as models in a region undergoing dramatic transformation.
'The events of the past six months show us that strategies of repression and diversion won't work anymore,' Obama said in his first comprehensive response to the uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa.
Obama was delivering a major address on US foreign policy in the Middle East designed to show US support for the rapid change brought by mass protests, which ousted longtime rulers in Tunisia and Egypt and spread to other countries.
The United States and Arab nations must work to overcome decades of mistrust in order to build a better future for the region, Obama said at the State Department.
'A failure to change our approach threatens a deepening spiral of division between the United States and Muslim communities,' he said.
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