Talabani trip to Cairo gets Turkey concerned

Heading a high-level delegation, Secretary General of Patriotic Union of Kurdistan Jalal Talabani left the Kurdistan Region of Iraq for Tehran on his way to Cairo, Egypt, to take part in the Arabian-Kurdish Dialogue Symposium, scheduled for May 27-28 in the Egyptian capital.

The seminar, which will include several Kurdish parties, has been organized by the Egyptian Committee of Afro-Asian Solidarity headed by the renowned Arab writer and journalist Ahmed Hamroush.

The seminar aims at promoting Arab understanding of the Kurdish issue via direct dialogue between the two nations.

Turkey on Monday expressed its concerns regarding the meeting. "The Turkish embassy will be closely following up the meeting," Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman, Necati Utkan said.

"We hope that Kurdish Workers Party PKK will not be invited to attend the meeting in a formal or informal capacity," Utkan said.