CAIRO, 30 January 2005 — Some 40 Palestinian police officers will come to Egypt for training next week as part of Egypt’s contribution to the new security arrangements in Gaza, Palestinian Foreign Minister Nabil Shaath said yesterday.
Egypt will also receive delegations from the Palestinian Islamist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, which new Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is trying to coax into a truce with Israel, he told Reuters by telephone after talks between Abbas and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
Under an earlier plan, Egypt had offered to host a dialogue between the Palestinian Authority and the Islamists but Shaath said that would no longer be necessary.
“We have concluded really the agreement with them but Egypt needs to support that agreement and continue to monitor and so we are happy that they are going to do that,” he added.
The training for Palestinian police officers has been under discussion for months and almost took place late last year but the officers were unable to cross the border into Egypt.
Abbas, also known as Abu Mazen, has tried to end attacks on Israelis by deploying Palestinian security forces more widely in the Gaza Strip. Israel has responded by reducing its military operations in the area.
Shaath said this cleared the way for Egypt to carry out its part in the Gaza security plan, including the training. “They (the Egyptians) will implement what has been agreed before. The training will start immediately, in the first week of February, with probably 42 officers,” he said.
“So things are going well and President Mubarak is very pleased with our progress,” he added.
Abbas left Cairo yesterday for Moscow, while Shaath will go to Damascus to brief the Syrian government, linking up with Abbas in Moscow today.
Speaking on Egyptian television yesterday, the former Egyptian ambassador in Tel Aviv said Egypt had agreed in principle to replace police forces on the Egypt-Gaza border with some 750 more heavily armed border guards.
The border guards would meet Israel’s request that Egypt try harder to stop Palestinians smuggling weapons into Gaza.
Mohamed Bassiouny, who was withdrawn from Tel Aviv in 2000 and has not been replaced, said: “There is no doubt that the presence of the Border Guard in this area cannot allow the smuggling of weapons through this area.”
Bassiouny, who is now the chairman of the foreign relations committee of the upper house of parliament, said the change could take place as soon as the Egyptian and Israeli foreign ministries sign a memorandum on the border, separate from the peace treaty the two countries signed in 1979.
