Wrap: G8 focus on Mideast, nuclear threat, democracy - Putin aide
17/07/2006 15:29 STRELNA (near St. Petersburg), July 17 (RIA Novosti) - The Middle East has dominated talks between Vladimir Putin and his counterparts from the industrialized world during a three-day summit that ends Monday, a presidential aide said.
Sergei Prikhodko said leaders of the Group of Eight particularly focused on the violence in Israel and Lebanon, while they also raised the controversial nuclear programs of Iran and North Korea, as well as the state of democracy in Russia. President Putin also held a number of bilateral meetings, he said.
Against the backdrop of Israeli air strikes against targets in Lebanon and rocket attacks launched by extremists against the Jewish state, Prikhodko said Russia would not oppose the possible deployment of international peacekeeping forces in the country, which UN Security-General Kofi Annan and British Prime Minister Tony Blair called for earlier in the day.
"We will have no objections if the situation requires this," he said.
Israel launched a military operation in Lebanon after the Hizbollah Islamist group took two Israeli soldiers hostage last Wednesday and conducted air strikes against its infrastructure. Over 100 Lebanese civilians have since been killed in fighting and more than 200 have been wounded.
But Prikhodko said Russia was not planning to propose an initiative on Lebanon at the UN Security Council.
"Russia does not intend to put forward an initiative for the UN Security Council to address the situation in Lebanon, [but] we will contribute to collective action of governments," he said.
Asked to comment on the French prime minister's intention to visit Beirut, Prikhodko said: "At the moment, we are not considering sending a high-level Russian delegation to the Middle East."
The Russian Foreign Ministry also said Monday it was preparing to evacuate its 1,400 nationals from Lebanon.
Iran
Prior to the fresh outbreak of violence in the Middle East, Iran's controversial nuclear programs had been expected to be high on the agenda of the G8 summit and Prikhodko said the leaders had found common ground to the problem during the talks they held on the subject.
"We have no differences over the details," he said, adding that the G8 countries were in favor of ensuring Tehran's further cooperation with the IAEA and a response to the Iran-6 proposals.
But he said there had been no discussion of sanctions being imposed on Tehran, which the United States and United Kingdom - both G8 member countries and veto-wielding members of the UN Security Council - have been pushing.
"I am not aware of any concrete proposals from any party to impose sanctions against Iran," the aide said.
Russia and China have consistently resisted calls for sanctions, but Moscow softened its position last week by indicating that it would returning the Iranian nuclear problem to the UN Security Council.
Prikhodko also said that G8 leaders might adopt a separate statement on North Korea's missile program after the communist state's missile tests on July 5.
"Russia, as the G8 president, has no restrictions on any topic for discussion," he said. "Let us be patient."
Democracy
With much criticism being leveled overseas at President Putin on his democracy record during his tenure in office, Prikhodko said the Russian leader had also discussed democracy in Russia and his plans for the country's development.
"The importance of democracy in accomplishing global tasks was discussed, including those on the G8 agenda, and not only concerning Russia," he said. "He [Putin] was satisfied with the reaction from his colleagues,"
Democracy in Russia was one of the themes addressed by Putin and his United States counterpart George W. Bush at talks on Saturday in advance of the summit.
At a news conference after the discussions, Bush said he had told the Russian president about his hopes for "institutional change" in the world, citing Iraq as an example of a new democracy, to which the Russian leader retorted: "We would not want to have a democracy like in Iraq."
"We believe that no one knows better than us how to strengthen our state. Yet we know that we cannot strengthen it without developing democratic institutions. But we will do this independently," Putin said.
Bilateral ties
Prikhodko said Vladimir Putin and Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi had discussed a peace treaty to mark a formal end to World War II during a bilateral meeting and that both leaders were seeking to improve bilateral cooperation despite a territorial dispute dating back more than 60 years.
Russia and Japan have been unable to sign a peace treaty that would formally end hostilities because of a dispute over four islands in the Kuril chain, which the Soviet Union claimed at the end of the war.
Last month Putin told a news conference at the Russian Foreign Ministry: "In relations with Japan, the line toward continuing political dialogue and boosting economic cooperation is completely justified while maintaining a principled approach toward a peace treaty and a sincere desire to see it concluded."
The aide said Putin and Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili could meet this weekend in Moscow as Saakashvili had asked for a meeting with the Russian president during an informal summit of the Commonwealth of Independent States on July 21-22.
"As to requests from Mr. Saakashvili, we always regard them with particular attention," he said. "The timing is another matter...We just have to fit it [the meeting] in the timetable of the summit."
Bilateral relations between Russia and Georgia have been strained in recent months over the role of Russian peacekeepers in the two breakaway regions, and ultimately over Georgia's aspirations to join NATO and leave the CIS, a loose association of former Soviet republics.
Georgia also announced last week that it was withdrawing its signature to a protocol on Russia's bid to join the World Trade Organization, which could have huge repercussions. Tbilisi has said that a Russian ban on its mineral waters and wine over health concerns had inflicted great economic damage.
Putin and Saakashvili met last in mid-June in St. Petersburg to discuss controversial issues in bilateral relations. Both leaders did not come to any specific agreements but decided to work further on ways to resolve them.
The G8 leaders of Russia, the United States, the United Kingdom, Italy, France, Germany, Canada and Japan will wrap up their three-day summit Monday.
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