With hours left before the US deadline to Iran’s regime expired, Qatar issued a direct warning on Tuesday “urging all parties to find a resolution out of this, to find a way of ending this war before it spirals out of control.”
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
In a series of stern warnings about attacks by any party on civilian infrastructure, Qatar’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Dr Majed al-Ansari told reporters in Doha that “we have been warning since 2023 that escalation left unchecked will get us into a situation where it cannot be controlled. And we are very close to that point.”
Underlining the gravity of this moment, the Qatari foreign ministry spokesperson moved beyond the diplomatic tone of press briefings to say that “we are quite concerned with all that is happening right now and we are all waiting for what is going to happen in the next couple of hours.”
“We are supportive of the efforts of Pakistan and other mediators in finding a resolution to this before it escalates beyond anyone’s control.”
In a message to the US and Israel as well as Iran, Al-Ansari expressed Qatar’s position that “any targeting of civilian infrastructure in the region is going to cause the civilian infrastructure in other countries, including Qatar, to be targeted and we therefore stand against any attacks on civilian infrastructure by any party.”
He further insisted that “attacks on civilian infrastructure, especially energy infrastructure, is putting all of us in danger.”
“These attacks are completely useless and have a domino effect on global energy markets,” he said.
“The attacks on the critical infrastructure since the war has begun has taken us to the brink and we don’t want to see more of that happening,” Al-Ansari warned.
“There are lots of dangers to that happening, when it comes to food security, water security, environmental security, that we are still at the threshold of these challenges.“
‘Every day was a red line crossed’
Qatar’s foreign ministry spokesman issued a specific warning on nuclear dangers in region, stating that “it’s very dangerous when we see this kind of attacks on nuclear facilities, we have seen this happen in the war in Ukraine, we have seen this happen now in this war, and it puts the people in the region into unbelievable risk.”
The Qatari diplomat said Doha is in constant communication with the United States and “working very closely with them … even if we don’t see eye to eye all the time,” but also that Qatar’s prime minister talked to the Iranian foreign minister to “make it clear that attacks on civilian infrastructure, by any party, should not be accepted.”
“Since this war started every day was a red line crossed, whether it be an attack on critical infrastructure, whether it be civilian targets in our region, whether it be the fact that our countries had been dragged into this war,” Al-Ansari said.
“There are no winners in the continuation of this war, there are only losers and the net of losers is expanding every day as a result of the ramifications of the economic situation.”
Qatar is not directly involved in the ongoing Pakistan-led mediation efforts, but it supports them in seeking a swift resolution to the conflict.
“We remain of course supportive and hopeful that a form of escalation will happen through the work of mediators led by Pakistan and we stand ready to help, but right now from a defensive posture we are absolutely ready for any challenge that might come in the next days,” the foreign ministry spokesman said.
“We will defend our country against any aggression coming from any party,” he made it clear.
Meanwhile, addressing the crisis in the Strait of Hormuz, Al-Ansari said the war should end first before discussing how the world’s key waterway would be run.
He expressed Qatar’s position clearly: “This is an open strait, a naturally occuring open strait, that all of us share and all of us should have a say on how it is run. We never had the need to do that because it is a natural opening and everybody was using it in the benefit of all the peoples in the region and beyond.”
