Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Saturday night said Moscow believes in the necessity to maintain contacts with Hamas, Reuters reported.
"We are certain that this is needed," the Interfax news agency quoted Lavrov as saying after a meeting with exiled Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal in Damascus.
Lavrov is in Syria to attend a summit of foreign ministers of Islamic countries and is scheduled to meet Syrian President Bashar Assad on Sunday.
Earlier this month, Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman launched a campaign to get Russia to cut off contacts with Hamas and Hizb'allah, urging Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to raise the issue with Russian leaders.
Lieberman met with the Italian prime minister earlier this month and urged him during an hour-long meeting to convince the Kremlin that Hamas and Hizb'allah were terrorist organizations working against Western interests in the Middle East.
Although most Western countries have boycotted Hamas, Russia has continued to maintain a dialogue with the organization, and Mashaal has been to Moscow several times since Hamas won the Palestinian Authority elections in February 2006.
Herb Keinon contributed to this report
(jpost)
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