ISTANBUL (CIHAN) - Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Ehud Olmert declared on Thursday that the Syrian President Bashar Assad had refused to meet with him in China.
Olmert told reporters in Istanbul he had wanted to meet the Syrian President two weeks ago. "However, Assad refused to meet me in China," Olmert said.
The Israeli Deputy Prime Minister said that Chinese officials had attempted to organize a meeting. He added that the Syrian President had cited injuries his wife sustained while skiing and had left China.
Asked if the visit of the Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to the Dome of the Rock Mosque (built on the site of the earlier Jewish temple) in Jerusalem had provoked the outbreak of the second intifada, Olmert said that Jewish people should have the right to visit their sacred temples as Muslim people did.