British Prime Minister Tony Blair and his foreign secretary, Jack Straw, will call Monday the visiting Israeli prime minister, Ariel Sharon, to take urgent steps to protect the peace process.
At a dinner in Downing Street, Blair will urge Sharon to dismantle Israeli outposts in the West Bank, release Palestinian prisoners from Israeli jails and halt construction of a segregation fence in the West Bank.
According to the Monday edition of the Guardian newspaper, the British Foreign Office is also expected to disagree with Sharon's insistence that visiting officials should not meet Yasser Arafat, the president of the Palestinian Authority (PA).
The FO said it was unacceptable of the Israelis to determine who British politicians should meet in Israel and the Palestinian territories. It added the fence takes more Palestinian land and isolates Palestinian villages. (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
