Foreign Ministers of member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) held here Monday evening an annual coordination meeting on the fringes of the 63rd session of the General Assembly of the United Nations. The meeting was attended by GCC Secretary General Abdulrahman bin Hamad Al-Atiyyah. After the meeting, Al-Atiyyah told reporters that the meeting chaired by Qatari Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Ahmed Bin Abdullah Al-Mahmoud, who is also the current head of the GCC Ministerial Council, focused on all issues that would be taken up by the GCC foreign ministers during their meetings with counterparts in friendly countries and groups including the United States, the Peoples' Republic of China, Russia, the European Union and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), countries of the Rio Group, India and Australia. Al-Atiyyah added that they also discussed coordination of positions and reviewed the political files, which will be presented to the foreign ministers of these countries and groups in addition to political and economic relations, trade ties along with the issues of sustainable development and climate change. "Moreover, these meetings emphasize the care undertaken by the GCC Foreign Ministers on all subjects that could strengthen ties on issues of common concern, " he said. The meeting was attended by ambassadors of the GCC countries in Washington and New York as well as the ambassador delegate of the GCC to the United Nations.
