US Middle East envoy Mr William Burns will hold talks in Paris and London this week but will return home in time for the July 4th holiday without visiting the Middle East, a senior State Department official said today.
Mr Burns, assistant secretary of state for Near East affairs, will meet in London tomorrow with envoys from the "quartet" -- an informal group trying to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict -- before traveling to Paris for talks with the French, said the official, who asked not to be named.
The other quartet envoys are Mr Andrei Vdovin of Russia, Mr Miguel Angel Moratinos of the European Union and Mr Terje Roed-Larsen, special representative of UN Secretary-General Mr Kofi Annan. "They're going to review steps to support and implement the president's (George W. Bush's) vision for progress on security, institution building and reform, economic reconstruction and resumption of an Israeli-Palestinian political dialogue," said US spokesman Mr Richard Boucher.
Mr Boucher conceded that some of the other participants do not agree with the United States on ostracizing Palestinian President Yasser Arafat but said they did agree on other aspects of the new US approach.
"What people do agree upon is the need to move toward this vision of a Palestinian state. What they do agree upon is that both sides have obligations. What they do agree upon is the need for reform, and support for reform in the Palestinian community is an essential part of that," he said.
EU leaders said today they would continue to deal with Mr Arafat if he were re-elected, despite Washington's rejection of him as "compromised by terror". US Secretary of State Mr Colin Powell said yesterday that he was not talking to Mr Arafat and had no plans to do so.
