Israel demands jailed militants

RAMALLAH - Israel yesterday refused to lift its siege of Yasser Arafat's headquarters, demanding extradition of the men a Palestinian court jailed for killing an Israeli minister.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon dismissed the Ramallah trial, saying he still wanted the four men extradited to Israel, along with a Palestinian official suspected of trying to smuggle weapons from Iran to Arafat's Palestinian Authority.

Sharon, who sent tanks to ring the Palestinian leader's headquarters on March 29 at the start of a West Bank offensive launched after a spate of suicide bombings, said he would keep Arafat confined until he handed over the militants for trial.

A Palestinian Authority statement said the military court had sentenced four men to prison terms ranging from one to 18 years for their part in far-right Tourism Minister Rehavam Zeevi's assassination last October.

But in an interview with the New York Times published yesterday, Sharon indicated he was considering letting Arafat leave his headquarters in Ramallah and move to the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat dismissed the suggestion, saying that it masked plans by Sharon to reoccupy the West Bank and isolate it from Gaza.

Later yesterday, in Texas, US President George W. Bush urged Israel to finish a withdrawal from Palestinian areas and peacefully end standoffs in Ramallah and Bethlehem.

Bush was speaking after meeting Saudi Crown Prince Abdullah, who warned that US ties with the Arab world were at risk. Bush also called on Palestinians to do more to stop terror.

Talks to resolve a standoff between Palestinian militants holed up inside Bethlehem's Church of the Nativity and besieging Israeli troops broke off without result and the Palestinian side said it wanted to consult Arafat before resuming them.

The Foreign Ministers of Greece and Turkey, who are on a joint peace mission to the Middle East, reported making progress in defusing the three-week-old deadlock after nine Palestinian youths and two corpses were brought out .

But Palestinian negotiator Salah Taamari said the latest talks ended without a breakthrough.

"I believe further talks will be determined by Israeli approval for our request to meet President Arafat. We feel this is crucial," he said.

Colonel Marcel Aviv, head of the Israeli negotiating team, said his superiors were weighing the request. "I would say the prospects of things working out are good," he said.

Coffins containing the bodies of two men shot by Israeli soldiers about two weeks ago were taken from the church.

Nine youths also left the shrine under Israeli guard. Aviv said Israel had discovered one of the youths had once planted a bomb, but that the others could go home "as early as tomorrow".

Palestinians in the church again denied that anyone was being prevented from fleeing. They accuse Israel of having blocked the evacuation of the two corpses and holding back food and water supplies. Israel denies both charges.

United Nations-Israeli talks on a UN fact-finding mission to the Jenin refugee camp were suspended overnight but the United Nations insisted the mission would not be delayed, diplomats said.

Secretary-General Kofi Annan "expects the fact-finding team to arrive in the region by the end of the week, as originally planned", said Russian Ambassador Sergei Lavrov, the Security Council president for this month.

- REUTERS

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