- Title: GAZA: PALESTINIAN PRESIDENT MAHMOUD ABBAS URGES ISRAEL TO EXPAND PRISONER RELEASE
- Date: 4th February 2005
- Summary: (W4) GAZA (FEBRUARY 4, 2005) (REUTERS) 1. PAN: CAR CARRYING PALESTINIAN PRESIDENT MAHMOUD ABBAS ARRIVING AT MEETING WITH FATAH 0.11 2. PULL OUT: PALESTINIAN FLAG ON TOP OF BUILDING 0.17 3. VARIOUS OF PHOTO-OP OF MEETING WOTH ABBAS AT HEAD OF TABLE 0.30 4. MEN SEATED AT TABLE 0.36 5. VARIOUS OF MEETING (4 SHOTS) 0.54
- Embargoed: 19th February 2005 12:00
- Keywords:
- Location: GAZA
- City:
- Country: Palestinian Territories
- Reuters ID: LVACKOKKA10B2EK7SDZLTALK2B0D
- Story Text: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas urges Israel to
expand prisoner release.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas urged Israel on
Friday (February 4) to expand a prisoner release to ensure
the success of a summit both sides hope will result in a
formal declaration to end violence.
Israel disappointed the Palestinian leadership by
refusing to include those jailed for deadly attacks among
the 900 prisoners whom Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and top
cabinet ministers agreed on Thursday to release in a
goodwill gesture.
But the summit itself, scheduled for Tuesday between
Sharon and new Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas in
Egypt's Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, appeared set to
go ahead.
"Israel stuck to its criteria of not releasing those it
described as having 'blood on their hands'," Palestinian
negotiator Saeb Erekat said after talks with Israeli
officials on the issue broke up without agreement late on
Thursday.
"That means that all the prisoners who were jailed
before (interim peace deals) in 1993 will not be released,"
he said.
Freedom for some 8,000 prisoners, especially Islamic
militants and veteran inmates, is key to Abbas's aim of
consolidating power, ending bloodshed and reviving a
U.S.-backed peace "road map" charting mutual steps to
Palestinian statehood.
The peace plan calls on the Palestinian Authority to
disarm militants and dismantle a "terrorist
infrastructure". Abbas has said he wants to co-opt rather
than confront the gunmen, hoping to avoid civil strife.
Israel would not carry out any steps in the road map,
Sharon's office quoted the Israeli prime minister as
saying, until "the Palestinians stop terror attacks,
dismantle the (militant) infrastructures and carry out
government reforms."
Violence has dropped sharply amid Abbas's efforts to
coax militants into a truce they say must be reciprocated
by the Israeli army. He has also deployed Palestinian
security forces in Gaza to combat militants.
Sharon said that despite such moves, Abbas has still
not done enough to stop anti-Israeli attacks.
"Israel will assist Abu Mazen but does not agree that
the safety of Israelis would be compromised as a result,"
he said, referring to Abbas's nickname.
Israel and the Palestinians have said they hoped to
declare a formal halt to more than four years of violence
at the summit, a dramatic return to top-level contacts
after the death on Nov. 11 of Yasser Arafat, seen by Israel
as an obstacle to peace.
The prisoners issue could bode large in meetings new
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is scheduled to
hold with Sharon and Abbas during a visit to the region
next week.
Israeli officials said a first batch of 500 prisoners
would be freed next week, after the summit, with 400 to
follow over a period of three months.
Israel's plan also calls for a troop pullback from five
West Bank cities, starting in Jericho next week, after the
talks.
Rice, in London, said efforts to achieve Middle East
peace were now "moving effectively" and cited Abbas's views
on "the necessity to have a peaceful resolution" of the
conflict.
"The fact is, though, that there will have to be action
to make certain that terrorists cannot continue to
frustrate both his plans and to endanger the lives of
Israelis," she told a news conference.
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