Syria is participating with a large official and media delegation that arrived in Jeddah on Saturday for the preparatory meetings for the anticipated Arab summit, following Damascus's restoration of its seat after a 12-year absence. Today, the preparatory meetings for the economic and social council at the senior experts' level will commence, with Syria represented by the Assistant Minister of Economy and Foreign Trade. The minister will head the Syrian delegation for the ministerial meeting of the economic and social council, scheduled for tomorrow, Monday.
Preparatory meetings at the level of permanent representatives and senior officials will begin on Tuesday, leading up to a foreign ministers' meeting, where Saudi Arabia will take over the presidency of the summit from Algeria. During the representatives' meetings, recommendations and draft resolutions will be discussed to be submitted to the foreign ministers' meeting scheduled for next Wednesday, with the participation of Foreign Minister and Expatriates Faisal Mekdad, where the agenda for the Arab League Council at the summit level will be adopted.
It is expected that Arab leaders and kings participating in the Arab summit will begin arriving starting Thursday. As part of ongoing consultations regarding the summit's agenda, Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad called his Algerian counterpart Ahmed Attaf. The Algerian Foreign Ministry stated: "The phone call came following the communication that took place between Presidents Abdelmadjid Tebboune and Bashar al-Assad on May 8, which provided the ministers an opportunity to continue their consultations on the main points included in the agenda for the upcoming summit of the Arab League Council, scheduled for May 19 in Jeddah."
Meanwhile, Assistant Secretary-General of the Arab League, Hossam Zaki, deemed that "the decision of the Arab League Council regarding the return of Syrian delegations to the meetings of the Arab League does not involve conditions, nor is there talk about conditions for returning, but it can be said that these are understandings that are hoped to be accepted by all parties for the return to serve as a form of calming the situation in Syria."
