Damascus, (SANA) – President Bashar al-Assad said on Sunday "achieving peace and stability necessitates compelling Israel to withdraw from the occupied Arab land and to return Arab rights."

President al-Assad's remarks came during a meeting with Head of Foreign Policy Committee of the Parliament of Denmark Eva Kjer Hansen.

President al-Assad and Hansen reviewed the situation in the Middle East and Syria's vision towards it, stressing the importance of the European role in this regard.

The President added "The West's misunderstanding of Arab issues and the subsequent policies that ignore the region's reality and its social and cultural status have increased extremism and terrorism in the region," underlining the importance of dialogue to overcome these problems.

On the situation in the occupied Palestinian territories, there was agreement regarding the importance of unifying efforts to achieve the inter-Palestinian reconciliation which constitutes the inevitable base for any peace negotiations.

As for Iran's nuclear file, President al-Assad reiterated Syria's support to Iran's right to develop nuclear power for peaceful purposes, stressing that dialogue is the only way out of the crisis.

In a statement to SANA, Kjer Hansen described her talks with President al-Assad as good, touching upon Syrian-Danish bilateral relations and Syria's important role in the region.

She expressed hope that the Syrian-Danish relations would further enhance in the future.  

In the same context, Speaker of the People's Assembly Mahmoud al-Abrash and Kjer Hansen discussed means of activating Parliamentary relations between the two countries.

R. Raslan /Ibrahim