17 - 23 May 2001
Issue No.534
|
Al-Ahram Weekly On-line 17 - 23 May 2001 Issue No.534 |
||
| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 | Current issue | Previous issue | Site map | ||
Paris meeting
A SENIOR Palestinian official said yesterday that preparations were under way to arrange a meeting in Paris on 23 May between Palestinian President Yasser Arafat and US Secretary of State Colin Powell. The official, who declined to be identified, said the meeting would be on the sidelines of scheduled talks between Arafat and French President Jacques Chirac. He said the aim of the talks would be to inform the US administration about Israeli crimes against the Palestinian people. Powell met on Tuesday with top Palestinian official Mahmoud Abbas who urged the US to take a more active role in the Middle East.Top aides to Arafat are fanning out in the US to promote the idea of restarting peace talks even as violence keeps escalating. Their efforts centre on getting the Bush administration to embrace a report written by a US-led commission which calls for a Jewish settlement freeze as a basis for negotiations. The EU has publicly endorsed the Mitchell Commission's demand and called yesterday for an end to the violence, Reuters and AFP reported.
Meanwhile, Powell said Egypt and Jordan were making a major contribution to ending the fighting between Israel and the Palestinians. He urged Congress not to cut the $2 billion in aid for Egypt included in a foreign aid bill. A few powerful Republican members in the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee questioned the aid package, complaining that the Egyptian press was mounting a campaign against Jews and Israel.
© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved
 |
|
|||||||||||||||||
| ARCHIVES Letter from the Editor Editorial Board Subscription Advertise! |
WEEKLY ONLINE: www.ahram.org.eg/weekly Updated every Saturday at 11.00 GMT, 2pm local time weeklyweb@ahram.org.eg |
 Al-Ahram Organisation |
Recommend this page