Israel's Prime Minister Ariel Sharon will meet his Palestinian counterpart, Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas, on Tuesday to discuss the U.S.-backed peace plan despite, Abbas's office said on Monday.
"The prime minister will meet with Mr. Sharon on Tuesday to discuss the implementation of both sides' commitments under the road map," a spokesman for Abbas told Reuters.
On his part, Sharon said Monday that, despite its security agreement with the Palestinian Authority, Israel would not turn a blind eye to the shooting attack in the northern West Bank, in which a Bulgarian laborer was shot and killed.
In Washington, Secretary of State Colin Powell called on Israel on Monday to pull back from cities and towns on the West Bank and relinquish control of them to the Palestinian Authority.
In a round of television interviews after Israel pulled troops out of northern Gaza and agreed to withdraw from the West Bank town of Bethlehem, Powell expressed optimism for Mideast peace prospects and boosted Abbas as a worthy leader.
"We hope that with these actions, the Palestinian people will realize that Prime Minister Abbas is producing for them and thereby they will empower him even further," Powell said on CNN's American Morning.
Meanwhile, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine- General Command (PFLP-GC) firmly rejected any ceasefire with Israel.
"We are not bound by the unilateral truce and it does not influence us at all," the Damascus-based Palestinian group said in a statement. "The fighters and the heros in Palestine will continue the armed struggle until the last inch of our land is liberated," it said. (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
