US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is to arrive in Doha today to meet with senior Qatari officials, news agency Reuters said, quoting the US State Department.
Tillerson ended talks with ministers from Saudi Arabia and three Arab allies in Jeddah yesterday over how to end a month-long rift with Qatar, but there was no immediate word of a breakthrough.
The senior US diplomat has been in the region since Monday in pursuit of a solution to end the worst dispute in decades among the US-allied Gulf Arab states.
Tillerson also met separately with Saudi King Salman and Crown Prince Mohamed bin Salman to discuss cooperation in combating terrorism and its financing.
Al Jazeera's Rosiland Jordan, reporting from Kuwait, said Tillerson had left Jeddah and returned to Kuwait for another round of talks with the country's Emir Sheikh Sabah al -Ahmad al- Sabah. Kuwait is trying to mediate the dispute.
Tillerson is scheduled to return to the US today, Al Jazeera said.
The visit to Jeddah followed meetings in Doha with His Highness the Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al -Thani and HE the Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohamed bin Abdulrahman al -Thani.
During that meeting, Tillerson and the Qatari foreign minister announced that the US and Qatar made an agreement on combating "terrorism" and its financing.
The four countries, led by Saudi Arabia slapped sanctions on Qatar on June 5, accusing it of financing extremist groups and allying with Iran -- allegations that Doha has repeatedly denied.
The US official's talks come after similar efforts by British Foreign
Secretary Boris Johnson and German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel
last week.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian will head to the region on
Friday. He is scheduled to visit Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and the
UAE to hear their views and "contribute to the Kuwait mediation
efforts".
The crisis transcends the financing of terrorism, said Jean-Marc Rickli, a risk analyst at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy.
"The United States worries the crisis could affect its military and counter-terrorism operations and increase the regional influence of Iran."
Qatar hosts Udeid Air Base, the largest US military facility in the Middle East, from which US-led coalition aircraft stage sorties against Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. Pages 2, 7, 8, 22, 24