On Sunday, September 18, 2022, IPI held its seventeenth annual Ministerial Working Dinner on the Middle East in its Trygve Lie Center for Peace, Security, and Development. The dinner drew the participation of foreign ministers and other high-level representatives.

The event was chaired by Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein, President of IPI, and co-hosted by the United Arab Emirates and Luxembourg, represented respectively by Khalifa Shaheen Almarar, Minister of State of the United Arab Emirates, and Jean Asselborn, Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Affairs of Luxembourg.

Participants had a frank discussion on regional issues held under the Chatham House Rule.

Attendees included Hadja Lahbib, Minister of Foreign Affairs and European Affairs, and of Defence of the Kingdom of Belgium; Jeppe Kofod, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Denmark; Fuad Mohammad Hussein, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Iraq; Ayman Safadi, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs and Expatriates of the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan; Mukhtar Tileuberdi, Deputy Prime Minister, and Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan; Abdallah Bouhabib, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Emigrants of Lebanon; Dominique Hasler, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Education, and Sport of the Principality of Liechtenstein; Livia Leu, State Secretary of the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs of the Swiss Confederation; Anne Gueguen, Director of North Africa and Middle East Department, Ministery for Europe and Foreign Affairs of France; Mohammed bin Abdulaziz Al-Khulaifi, and Assistant Foreign Minister for Regional Affairs of the State of Qatar; and Abdullatif bin Rashid Al Zayani, Minister for Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Bahrain.

Also present were Nayef Falah M. Alhajraf, Secretary General of the Gulf Cooperation Council; Peter Maurer, President of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC); Amr Moussa, Former Secretary General of the League of Arab States and member of IPI’s International Advisory Council; Prince Turki AlFaisal, Chairman of the King Faisal Center for Research and Islamic Studies and member of IPI’s International Advisory Council; Ahmed Aboul Gheit, Secretary General of the League of Arab States; Hissein Brahim Taha, Secretary-General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation; Kevin Rudd, Former Prime Minister of Australia, Chair of the IPI Board of Directors; Miguel Moratinos, High Representative for the United Nations Alliance of Civilizations; Philippe Lazzarini, Commissioner-General of United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East; and Ferid Belhaj, Vice President of the World Bank.