ANKARA - Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan charged Saturday that Western powers were "keeping mum" over mounting bloodshed in the Middle East, warning that they would "pay the bill" by facing more terrorist attacks, Anatolia news agency reported.
"Bombs are exploding, innocent people are being killed, infrastructures are being destroyed... The powerful continue to crush the weak, but unfortunately those who hold the power in the world are keeping mum," Erdogan said in the northeastern city of Artvin.
"Those who back global peace (only) with words will sooner or later pay the bill by facing global terrorism... This is what is provoking terrorism," he was quoted as saying.
Erdogan complained that violence in the Middle East was also damaging the United States' efforts to enhance democracy and human rights in the region, hinting that Ankara might reconsider its role in such initiatives.
He urged the Group of Eight leaders to push for a ceasefire in the crisis and harshly criticized Israeli military offensives.
"I appeal to the G8 countries to take a joint decision... (for) the UN Security Council to ask for a ceasefire... They have to work this out," Anatolia quoted him as saying.
The leaders of the G8 nations -- Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia and the United States -- gathered in Saint Petersburg Saturday for a summit expected to tackle the turmoil.
On Friday, a UN Security Council debate ended with no action on Lebanon's demand for an end to Israeli air strikes, as the US envoy refused to even caution restraint from Israel over its offensives in both Lebanon and Gaza.
Israel launched the strikes in retaliation to the capture of two of its soldiers by the Lebanese Shiite group Hezbollah Wednesday and another soldier by Palestinian militants in Gaza on June 25.
"If the abduction incident in Palestine is negative, responding to it with disproportionate force is worse," Erdogan said. "Nothing can justify the showering of bombs on innocent civilians and the merciless destruction of cities."
"The children of Palestine are as precious as those of Israel," he said, as several people from the crowd he was addressing shouted "Down with Israel," Anatolia reported.
Turkey, one of Israel's few Muslim allies, sought to mediate in the early stages of the crisis when it sent a special envoy to Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad in a bid to convince Damascus to use its influence over Hamas to secure the release of the Israeli soldier.
Erdogan, whose government has its roots in a now-banned Islamist party, has often slammed Israel's heavy-handed policies against the Palestinians, most notably in May 2004 when he condemned as "state terror" a deadly raid on the Rafah refugee camp and recalled the Turkish ambassador from Tel Aviv.
07/15/2006 15:07 GMT