Dubai: Saudi Arabia and its allies Saturday welcomed an accusation by President Donald Trump that Qatar was bankrolling terrorism but ignored a separate US call for them to ease their economic blockade.
Trump's comments came as Washington joins intensifying international efforts to heal the worsening rift between the key Western Gulf allies, which has escalated into the region's worst diplomatic crisis in years.
Qatar denies the allegations and has sent its top diplomat on a tour of European capitals in a bid to drum up support.
But its neighbours seized on Trump's remarks as vindication of their position and of the crippling sanctions they imposed on Monday.
The United Arab Emirates welcomed "President Trump's leadership in challenging Qatar's troubling support for extremism".
"The next step is for Qatar to acknowledge these concerns and commit to reexamine its regional policies," its ambassador to the United States Yousef al-Otaiba told the official WAM news agency.
"This will provide the necessary basis for any discussions," he added.
Saudi Arabia said an immediate change of policy by Qatar was essential.
"Fighting terrorism and extremism is no longer a choice, rather... a commitment requiring decisive and swift action to cut off all funding sources for terrorism regardless of its financier," the Saudi Press Agency cited an official source as saying.
Bahrain "stressed the necessity of Qatar's commitment to correct its policies and to engage in a transparent manner in counter-terrorism efforts", its official BNA news agency said.
The three governments made no comment on separate remarks by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urging them to ease their land and sea blockade of Qatar, which he said was hindering the US-led campaign against ISIS and having humanitarian consequences for ordinary people.
Qatar's neighbours have given its citizens 14 days to leave, banned Qatari flights from their airspace and closed its only land border.
Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani was in Moscow on Saturday after talks in Germany on Friday.
Qatar ally Turkey meanwhile hosted the Bahraini foreign minister for talks on the crisis.
Trump's comments came as Washington joins intensifying international efforts to heal the worsening rift between the key Western Gulf allies, which has escalated into the region's worst diplomatic crisis in years.
Qatar denies the allegations and has sent its top diplomat on a tour of European capitals in a bid to drum up support.
The United Arab Emirates welcomed "President Trump's leadership in challenging Qatar's troubling support for extremism".
Advertisement
"This will provide the necessary basis for any discussions," he added.
Advertisement
"Fighting terrorism and extremism is no longer a choice, rather... a commitment requiring decisive and swift action to cut off all funding sources for terrorism regardless of its financier," the Saudi Press Agency cited an official source as saying.
Advertisement
The three governments made no comment on separate remarks by US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urging them to ease their land and sea blockade of Qatar, which he said was hindering the US-led campaign against ISIS and having humanitarian consequences for ordinary people.
Advertisement
Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani was in Moscow on Saturday after talks in Germany on Friday.
Advertisement
COMMENTS
Advertisement
Faced "Grave Threat" Due To Qatar's Support For Terrorism, Extremism: UAE Ex-Trump Aid Denies Nikki Haley's Claims, Says Didn't Work Against Him Trump "Less Prepared" Than Putin For Key Meet, Says Ex-State Secretary Windows Computers Lead To 'Blue Screen Of Death' Due To CrowdStrike Error In 1st Statement After Outage, CrowdStrike CEO Says... Massive Worldwide Microsoft Outage: Flights, Markets, Stock Exchange Down Woman Says Jindal Group Executive Groped Her On Flight, Naveen Jindal Reacts How World Scrambled To Deal With One Of The Biggest IT Crashes: 10 Points Fighting And Kisses: 5 Big Takeaways From Trump's Speech Track Latest News Live on NDTV.com and get news updates from India and around the world.