Dubai: The UAE said on Monday it’s delegation to a US-led Bahrain meeting on Palestine would be led by its minister of state for financial affairs.
In a statement to Reuters, the country’s foreign ministry said Obaid Al Tayer would lead the delegation.
The June 25-26 conference in the Bahraini capital Manama, which the Palestinian National Authority is boycotting, will discuss US-led proposals for an economic vision to be presented by US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, part of a wider plan to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
Saudi Arabia and the UAE are taking part in the two-day meeting but it is not clear if other US allies - Kuwait, Oman and Qatar - will attend.
Israel - which Bahrain does not recognise - has said it will take part but did not specify if it would be represented by government officials or business leaders.
The workshop - led by Kushner - will focus on the economic aspects of the US president’s long-delayed plan to resolve the decades-old Middle East conflict.
On Saturday the US unveiled details of the plan, saying it aims to raise more than $50 billion for the Palestinians and create one million jobs for them within a decade.
Senior Palestinian official Hanan Ashrawi rejected the plan, saying the United States should instead press Israel to withdraw from occupied land and allow the Palestinians to thrive.
Palestinian National Authority President Mahmoud Abbas said it was not possible to discuss the economic aspects before finalising a political solution.
Egypt and Jordan - the only two Arab countries to have peace treaties with Israel - will be represented in Bahrain by senior finance ministry officials.
US officials have hinted that the political part of the plan - which could come out later this year - will not mention the creation of an independent Palestinian state, a goal of decades of US diplomacy.
