Section A·Page 9
The University Daily Kansan
Wednesday, January 19, 2000
World
Israel, Palestine agree to speed treaty process
The Associated Press
JERUSALEM — Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat agreed yesterday to accelerate peace talks, but a senior Israeli aide warned that the sides may still miss a Feb. 13 deadline for an outline of a final peace treaty.
The Barak-Arafat meeting began just hours after a pipe bomb exploded Monday night in the northern Israeli coastal town of Hadera, injuring 22 Israelis. The blast, blamed on Islamic militants, served as a reminder that the longer the negotiations drag on, the greater the opportunity for militants to derail them.
Cabinet Minister Haim Ramon cautioned that despite the decision to pick up the pace of talks made in a pre-dawn meeting between Barak and Arafat, the framework agreement might be delayed by up to two months.
"That is a timetable that was laid out and agreed to by the parties," White House representative Joe Lockhart said.
"I think it will be quite reasonable to delay it." Ramon said.
The Clinton administration urged both sides to keep aiming for the Feb. 13 target.
The decision to intensify talks with the Palestinians was seen as a signal to Syrian President Hafez Assad that Israel has other options if Syria does not want to return to negotiations.
The Syrians insisted Monday that Israel commit to a withdrawal from all of the Golan Heights before peace talks resume. A round of talks set to start today has been postponed indefinitely.
Barak was elected in May with a pledge to renew both Palestinian and Syrian peace tracks. He has rejected accusations that he has played the two tracks against each other, although Palestinians have complained in recent weeks that they were being neglected because of Israel's efforts with the Syrians.
Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat held a secret meeting Monday night just hours after a pipe bomb injured 22 Israeliers in Hadera.
After announcing Monday evening that he would not fly to the United States for peace talks with Syria, Barak instead met Arafat, with the talks ending at 2 a.m. yesterday.
Arafat adviser Nabil Aboundeneh said that the gaps between the two sides remained wide, and that Arafat would ask President Clinton tomorrow to directly intervene.
Still, Abourdeneh said the two leaders agreed to work harder to tackle the problems.
Palestinian negotiator Yasser Abed Rabba said the two sides might meet outside the region for intensive negotiations.
On Monday, Barak announced that he would postpone a partial troop withdrawal from 6.1 percent of the West Bank, originally set for tomorrow, by up to three weeks, a decision the Palestinians said was unacceptable.
In explaining the delay, Barak had said he needed the time to focus on peace talks with the Syrians, but Ramon, who is in charge of Jerusalem affairs, suggested the real reason for putting off the withdrawal was that it is so large.
Middle East talks hit road block; Clinton, Albright still optimistic
Negotiators have made little progress in resolving four complex issues, including the demarcation of the final borders between Israel and the Palestinian entity, the status of Jerusalem, the fate of Palestinian refugees, and the future of Jewish settlements in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
WASHINGTON — Israel and Syria each will send a pair of experts to Washington to try and whittle away at their differences on how to reach a land-for-peace accord.
The Associated Press
But with full-scale negotiations suspended indefinitely, the outlook is cloudy.
All main issues remain in dispute — borders, peace terms, security, water — and top Clinton administration officials are searching for a formula to put the talks back on track.
In a setback to American diplomacy, however, the administration was forced Monday to call off the scheduled next round amid sharp disagreement between the Middle East neighbors about a projected Israeli pullback on the Golan Heights.
At the windup of a round of negotiations last Monday in Shepherdstown, W.Va., a nine-day recess was set to give Israel and Syria time to consider a U.S.-drafted document designed as a basis for an eventual accord.
secretary of State Madeleine Albright and senior U.S. mediator Dennis Ross telephoned Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Foreign Minister Farouk al-Sharaa to try to find a way to move ahead.
"If it isn't comfortable for the Syrians to come now, and they need some time, they should take the time," Barak said. "We will come when there are discussions, and the delay, if in fact it is agreed on, does not bother us."
The indefinite suspension was announced in Jerusalem, where Barak had been preparing to return to Shepherdstown for the scheduled round of talks.
Syria had hesitated during the weekend. It was frustrated that the negotiations did not met its territorial demands, a promised pullback by Israel from all of the Golan, a strategic border plateau.
Disclosure via an Israeli leak that Syria had offered Israel diplomatic relations, as well as arrangements on trade, tourism and transportation, may have contributed to Syria's frustration.
In Damascus, an informed Syrian source said Monday that Syria had not suggested the delay, but al-Sharaaa concluded from telephone conversations with Albright that Israel was not serious.
Al Sharaa told Albright the Syrians would not participate in a third round until the Israelis were prepared to demarcate a new border at the line prior to the Six-Day War in 1967, said the source, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Had the United States insisted on proceeding with the negotiations today, a senior U.S. official said at the State Department, they would have been held. In fact, he said, Israel and Syria had not proposed changes in the U.S.-prepared document.
With the two sides in sharp disagreement on
how to proceed, however, each insisting its priority demands be dealt with first, the outlook for progress was not bright.
For Syria, that demand is recovery of the Golan Heights, which Israel captured in 1967, all the way to the Sea of Galilee, Israel's water source.
way to the sea of Guinea, Liberia. Israel and Syria agreed to send two experts from each side to Washington to work on issues that are not central to the negotiations. After that, the administration will decide how to proceed, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
In a statement, Albright blamed neither side for the postponement. She said only that their approaches to the U.S.-prepared document differed.
Earlier in the day, before the talks were postponed, Clinton sounded an optimistic note.
"The good news is, I'm convinced that both still want to do it," he said during a Martin Luther King Jr. Day appearance. "And they are not as far apart as they might be. They're not as far apart as they have been."
Prodding Israel and Syria to the negotiating table after an impasse of almost four years was considered a diplomatic accomplishment for the administration. It raised hopes that Clinton might be able to preside over the closing of the circle of peace in the Middle East with Israel coming to terms with both Syria and the Palestinians.
Russia says it will take Chechen capital soon
The Associated Press
URUS-MARTAN, Russia — Russian troops claimed yesterday to have finally broken through into central Grozny after weeks of ferocious fighting, and the army said its forces would control the Chechen capital within days.
Taking the capital would be a major boost for the Russian forces, which have been fighting for months to take Grozny only to be beaten off by the much smaller, lightly-armed rebel forces. While not confirming the Russian claims, Chechen commanders said there was heavy fighting in central Grozny.
Russian troops were pushing into the center from two directions and had established control of part of central Grozy, said Konstantin Kukharenko, a Defense Ministry spokesman.
Russian aircraft and artillery bombarded rebel positions as the Russian units advanced on the ground. Kukharenko claimed the Chechen capital would soon fall to Russian forces.
"The decisive phase of the liberation of Grozny has started," Kukharenko said. Federal commanders told the ITAR-Tass news agency that three to four more days would be needed to take Grozny.
Valentin Astafayev, denied any timeframe had been set.
"Of course, we could have put an end to [the rebels] faster, but this would be linked to large losses among our troops and civilians, so we are avoiding such harsh actions," he told NTV television.
Another military spokesman,
The military's claims of progress yesterday could not be immediately confirmed. There was no immediate indication that the estimated 2,000 well-entrenched rebels in Grozny had fled the city.
Russia has boasted several times that it was close to capturing Grozny, only to be driven back by rebel attacks in recent weeks in and around the capital.
Aslanbek Ismailov, the Chechens' deputy chief of staff, told the Interfax news agency that fighting in the capital had dramatically intensified, with clashes reported in six separate districts. He said the Russians were trying to reach the most strategically important site in Grozny, a bridge crossing the Sundzha River that is a major transit route for rebels moving about the city.
Meanwhile, a delegation from the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe continued its fact-finding mission. On Monday, delegation head Lord Russel-Johnston had demanded that Russia immediately stop the fighting and begin negotiations with the Chechens.
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