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Barak meets Arafat in Tel Aviv

JERUSALEM: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat met late into the night in Tel Aviv on Monday, apparently to thrashout a new timetable for their bogged down talks.

Arafat was accompanied to the talks by his second-in-command, Mahmud Abbas (also known as Abu Mazen), and by the speaker of the Palestinian Legislative Council, Ahmed Qurei, also known as Abu Ala, a Palestinian official who asked not to be named told AFP.

Those accompanying Barak included his security advisor, Danny Yatom, and Yossi Ginossar, a former secret service officer who has carried out several delicate missions with Arafat on Barak's behalf, he added.

The talks are focusing on the indefinite postponement of the next scheduled Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank, and on the negotiations to achieve agreement on the final status of the Palestinian territories, Israel radio reported.

The final status talks, which started in November, have made little progress, and it appears unlikely that the two sides will manage to reach a framework accord by the agreed date of February 13.

The two leaders might discuss the possibility of a two-month postponement of that date, which was set at September's key Sharm al-Sheikh deal between the two sides, the Palestinian official said.

The latest delay in the Israeli troop pullback, originally scheduled for Thursday, has made a postponement of the framework agreement all the more likely.

Barak's office tied the delay to the results of a summit between Arafat and US President Bill Clinton in Washington, also due on Thursday.

"Prime Minister Ehud Barak wants first to hear Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has to say during his meeting in Washington with US President Bill Clinton before deciding which zone to pull out of," a spokesman for the office said.

Palestinian chief negotiator Saeb Erakat charged that the delay was "a message against Arafat's visit to Washington."

"Israel wants us to focus (at the summit) on the issue of the redeployment while Israel is taking many one-sided measures, such as settlement activities, destroying houses and confiscating land," he said.

The Palestinian cabinet issued a statement on Saturday saying Arafat's meeting with Clinton would be "very important" in view of the deadlock in the peace process with Israel.

Until Monday, Barak himself was also expected to be in the United States Thursday, attending talks with Syria, which sparked forecasts of a three-way summit. AFP