Brussels, 10/02/2005 (Agence Europe) - The Russian Foreign Affairs Minister Sergei Lavrov announced on Wednesday in Moscow that the Foreign Ministers of the Quartet on the Middle East (USA, EU, Russia and UN) will meet at the initiative of the Russians on 1 March in London, the same day as the conference on support for economic development and reform in Palestine (proposed by Tony Blair). Mr Lavrov used the opportunity to state that it must not be forgotten that it will not be possible “to bring about peace in the Middle East without solving the problems in relations between Israel and Syria and Israel and Lebanon”.
The High Representative for the CFSP Javier Solana spoke to the Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on the telephone on Wednesday to congratulate him personally on the outcome of his summit in Sharm el-Sheikh with the Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, a communication indicates. Mr Solana assured President Abbas of the “European Union's full support for his efforts to re-engage in dialogue with Israel and encouraged him to work towards a negotiated solution”, the communication continues. It concludes that Mr Solana expressed “his satisfaction with President Abbas's determination to make all the necessary efforts to ensure an end to violence, and with each side's willingness to work together and to uphold their respective commitments undertaken yesterday in Egypt”.
The Party of European Socialists, led by MEP Poul Nyrup Rasmussen also adopted a declaration welcoming the truce between the Israelis and the Palestinians which was declared at the summit in Egypt and which should “put an end to the Palestinian intifada that began more than four years ago”. The declaration emphasises that “the Quartet's (US, EU, Russia and UN) responsibility is engaged and it must therefore commit Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and President Mahmoud Abbas to open negotiations. These negotiations should include the core problems - the settlements, the refugees, the borders, the status of Jerusalem - or there is a risk that the Palestinian people's disillusionment will create more frustrations and more tensions in the region”. Poul Nyrup Rasmussen insisted: “now the international community must back up new steps (…)and must engage all efforts to relaunch the commitment fixed by the Road Map of a Palestinian State in 2005”.