Syria: Israel's offer to talk useless without Golan

Resuming peace talks between Syria and Israel would be "useless" without a commitment by the Jewish state to withdraw from the Golan Heights, Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moualem said on Friday.

Responding cautiously to an Israeli offer to open the talks without preconditions, Moualem reiterated Syria's calls for an Israeli commitment to restore the Golan and described it as "not a pre-condition, but a requirement for peace".

"If Israel does not honor these requirements then there is no point of conducting useless negotiations," Moualem said.

"Negotiations will be futile if there is no true Israeli will to make peace and no US involvement. We will not go back to wasting time," he told Syrian state television.

Turkey urges renewal of talks

Indirect talks between Syria and Israel, which were being mediated by Turkey, were formally suspended in December during the Israeli invasion of the Gaza Strip.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday after meeting US President Barack Obama in Washington that he was ready to resume the talks with Syria immediately but indicated that would not make any commitments on land first.

Last week, Turkish President Abdullah Gul said Ankara was ready to continue as a mediator. Diplomats in the Syrian capital said Gul has been urging Syrian President Bashar aAssad and Netanyahu to resume the talks.

Assad said the Turkish mediated talks had stopped just as Syria was waiting for an Israeli response to Damascus's definition of what constitutes the Golan boundary, which would have set the benchmark for any Israeli withdrawal.