RAMALLAH, West Bank, 28 January 2004 — Egypt’s Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher urged Israel yesterday to prove its “good intentions” to breathe new life into the troubled peace process after he met with Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. “Egypt is working for a resumption of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations which requires the Israeli side to make clear its good intentions in order that we can approach peace,.
“ Maher said at a press conference after the talks in Arafat’s West Bank headquarters in Ramallah. Maher, who was accompanied by Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, said that peace talks should resume “on a sound and clear basis and according to a well defined agenda which covers all the issues.”
“The Palestinian people have suffered greatly and it is time that their struggle is rewarded with a just and durable peace,” he added. Arafat for his part thanked Egypt, in particular President Hosni Mubarak, for his efforts to relaunch the peace process.
“We have reached agreement on many important steps” during the talks with Maher, Arafat said without giving details. Egypt has been at the forefront of efforts to persuade militant groups such as Hamas and Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades to declare a cease-fire.
Cairo hosted a meeting between the militants and Palestinian Premier Ahmed Qorei in December but failed to secure even an agreement to halt attacks against Israelis. Suleiman was instrumental in securing a Palestinian unilateral truce last June, but it collapsed seven weeks later amid a flare-up in violence and mutual recriminations by Israel and the Palestinians.
Maher paid his first visit to Israel in more than two years late last month as a sign of a thaw in relations between the two neighbors.
The internationally-backed roadmap peace plan has reached a dead end with top-level talks between Palestinian and Israeli leaders suspended since August. However, Israeli Foreign Minister Silvan Shalom was set to embark today on a rare visit to Jordan in a bid to mend relations, which have taken a turn for the worse in a dispute over the West Bank separation barrier. Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon warned last week that Jordan would damage its ties with Israel with its uncompromising stance over the barrier.
In another development, Jewish settler leaders yesterday said Sharon was planning to dismantle seven settlements in the occupied territories as part of his “separation plan” from the Palestinians.
“A senior official from the prime minister’s office proposed to us that we give our agreement to the evacuation of certain areas in exchange for legislation forbidding the evacuation of any other settlements until a definitive settlement to the conflict,” Bensi Lieberman, president of the settlers council, said.
Lieberman said the council had categorically rejected the offer, which had been presented by the director of Sharon’s Cabinet, Avigdor Yitzhaki, “in the last 48 hours”. But Yitzhaki later denied strenuously that any such offer had been made.
Meanwhile, Israel published the names of more than 400 prisoners to be freed in a controversial exchange with Hezbollah. The full list of detainees was posted on the prison service’s website overnight to allow for any last-minute appeals to the Israeli high court ahead of the exchange, which Israel says will take place tomorrow.
The list includes 371 Palestinians who have been convicted of security offenses as well as 60 others who have been held without trial. Others due to be set free include 23 Lebanese, five Syrians, three Moroccans and British-educated German national Stefan Smyrek, who was jailed in 1999.
