Saudi Arabia Live Blog

Confidence in the peace plan for Syria brokered by international mediator Kofi Annan is diminishing due to continued violence in the country, Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud al-Faisal said on Monday.

"The violence is still continuing, the bloodshed is still continuing. Nothing has been accomplished except the violence has lessened. The violence continues... nobody is satisfied," Saud al-Faisal told reporters at a news conference in Riyadh after a meeting of Gulf Arab leaders.  

"Confidence in the efforts of the envoy of the United Nations and the Arab League has started to decrease quickly," he added. [Reuters]

Saudi Arabia on Sunday renewed a warning to its citizens to leave Syria and not to travel to the country, hit by over a year of deadly unrest.

"Due to the continuing deterioration of the security situation in Syria, the foreign ministry renews its warning to all citizens from travelling to Syria," the ministry said in a statement carried by the SPA state news agency.

It also "urged citizens there to leave." The kingdom, which has repeatedly called for world action against Damascus and called for rebels there to be armed, issued a similar warning in November.

Saudi Arabia was one of six Gulf countries to expel Syria's ambassadors and withdraw their own in February. The following month it shut down its embassy in Damascus and withdrew all its staff. [AFP]

Saudi King Abdullah ordered on Friday the return of the kingdom's ambassador to Egypt and the reopening of the mission after it was shut last week in the wake of angry protests, the state news agency said.

The king "instructed the kingdom's ambassador to Cairo to resume his post on Sunday, and ordered the reopening of the embassy and the consulates in Alexandria and Suez," state news reported, quoting an unnamed official.

The decision was announced after the monarch received a top ranking Egyptian delegation, which arrived in the kingdom Thursday on a mission to defuse tension.

Riyadh on Saturday recalled its ambassador after angry protests outside the Saudi embassy in Cairo over the arrest of an Egyptian human rights lawyer in the Gulf kingdom which claimed he was in possession of drugs.

King Abdullah told the delegation that the recent deterioration in relations was "painful to every honest Saudi and Egyptian citizen," adding that the kingdom's decision to shut its mission "was only to protect its staff".

He welcomed the visit by the large delegation, saying it was a source of "joy", adding that with "such an honourable position I can only say that we shall not allow this passing crisis to last long."

The delegation is headed by parliament speaker Saad al-Katatni and the head of the consultative council Ahmed Fahmi. [AFP]

Syrian opposition members and international officials say Saudi Arabia and other wealthy Arab Gulf states have yet to start distributing money from a multimillion-dollar fund designed to prop up Syria's anti-regime rebellion and entice defections from President Bashar al-Assad's army.

The challenges facing the fund underscore the larger problem involved with providing aid of any kind to the Syrian rebellion.

The fund was created two weeks ago amid disagreement among the US and its Arab partners on arming Syrian rebels.

But officials say several million dollars per month in salaries and logistical support cannot go forward without monitoring.

And with the opposition holding no territory and struggling even to maintain communications among its members inside and outside Syria, there is no clear way to deliver the money.

- Associated Press