Thursday, 22 June 2006Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas held informal talks in Jordan, the first such top-level encounter in a year, and pledged to meet again in a bid to revive the moribund peace process.
Olmert pledged he would "put everything on the line" for peace and said there would be more meetings with Abbas after the symbolic encounter over breakfast hosted by Jordan's King Abdullah II.
Israel has refused any contact with the new Hamas-led Palestinian government which took office in March after the Islamist movement trounced Abbas's long-dominant Fatah party in a January election.
"There is an idea to prepare our next meeting and preparations will begin next week," Abbas told АFР on Thursday, after the meeting in a five-star hotel in Petra, a World Heritage site in southern Jordan.
Jordan state television showed Abbas and Olmert embracing and then clasping hands with the Jordanian monarch before sitting on either side of the king for breakfast with a group of select guests.
Although Israeli and Palestinian officials insisted the meeting was nothing but an informal encounter, Olmert and Abbas emerged sounding a hopeful note.
"I am ready to put on (the) line everything for one purpose, to achieve peace, to make compromise, to pull out of certain territories," Olmert said, saying "compromise" was in order.
"I pray the Palestinians will have the courage to get rid of extremists and fundamentalists and put in place the right people to move on recognition," he said in reference to Hamas, which advocates the destruction of Israel.
But Olmert also set down conditions to ensure the success of future meetings with the Palestinians.
"There should be fulfilment on three, non-negotiable conditions: total disarmament of terorist organisations, full implementation of agreements and formal recognition of Israel," he said.
Abbas said the leaders discussed "different general affairs", while his spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeina, told reporters the Palestinians "are ready" to have serious negotiations with the Israelis.
"We are waiting for the Israelis," Abu Rudeina said.
The meeting was held as the moderate Abbas, who remains responsible as head of the Palestinian Authority for peace negotiations, is trying to secure a deal with Hamas that would implicitly recognise Israel.
A royal court statement said King Abdullah urged the two leaders to adopt "confidence-building measures" to renew peace negotiations.
"It is time to break the deadlock in the Middle East peace process" to pave the way for the creation of an independent Palestinian state living alongside a secure Israel, the king said.
But he warned that "any military escalation could bring to a halt efforts to revive the peace process" and voiced concern about "the worsening economic and humanitarian situation in the Palestinian areas."
Thursday's meeting took place against a spiral of violence in the Palestinian territories, where two botched Israeli air strikes in as many days killed Palestinian civilians dead but failed to kill the targeted militants.
It came seven weeks after Olmert was elected to replace Ariel Sharon, who has been in coma since January, pledging to unilaterally set the borders of Israel even without a peace deal with the Palestinians.
Abbas said Wednesday there were "signs" that the Hamas government, which is boycotted by Israel and the West and is battling a financial crisis caused by a cut in international aid, could recognise the Jewish state.
The meeting took place on the sidelines of a two-day Nobel forum attended by 25 laureates and 30 international celebrities to seek cures for global woes and conflicts.
Nobel Peace laureate Elie Wiesel, who co-hosted the forum with King Abdullah, said the conference made a series of non-binding recommmendations to heal rifts between Israel and the Palestinians.
Nobel laureates agreed to help the two sides to "revise academic textbooks" to rid them of hatred, and set up a Palestinian-Israeli civil society forum "to improve discussions," Wiesel said.
They also agreed to "declare suicide terrorism a crime against humanity," he said.
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Thursday, 22 June 2006
BakuToday
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