KUWAIT CITY — Kuwait has recalled its ambassador from Beirut and has
given the Lebanese envoy 48 hours to leave the emirate, the foreign ministry
said Saturday, quoted by state news agency KUNA.
اضافة اعلان
"Kuwait recalls Amb, in Beirut, asks Lebanese envoy to leave country in
48 hours," the ministry said in a brief statement carried by KUNA.
Saudi Arabia and Bahrain made similar moves on Friday after Lebanon's
Information Minister George Kordahi criticized the war in Yemen, where a
Saudi-led coalition backs the internationally recognized government.
Kordahi said in a television interview that Yemen's Iran-backed Houthi
rebels were "defending themselves ... against an external
aggression", adding that "homes, villages, funerals, and weddings
were being bombed" by the coalition.
In the interview — filmed in August but aired on Monday — he also called the
seven-year war in Yemen "futile" and said it was "time for it to
end".
Kuwait's foreign ministry said the expulsion and recall was based on the
"failure" of the Lebanese government to "address the
unacceptable and reprehensible statements against the sisterly Kingdom of Saudi
Arabia and the rest" of the Gulf Cooperation Council countries.
The GCC is a six-member regional body that includes Saudi Arabia, Kuwait,
the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Oman, and Qatar.
Kuwait's decision was also based on "the failure of the Government of
the Lebanese Republic to take the necessary measures to deter the continuous
and increasing smuggling operations of the scourge of drugs to Kuwait and the
rest of the GCC," the ministry added.
The comments on smuggling also echo Riyadh's line, which extended to Saudi
Arabia on Friday imposing a suspension on all imports from Lebanon.
The United Arab Emirates meanwhile has summoned Lebanon's ambassador over
Kordahi's comments.
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