Negotiators vow further Mideast peace talks

SHARM EL-SHEIK, Egypt – Israeli, Palestinian and international negotiators pledged Sunday to continue peace talks launched last year by President Bush, even though the quest for peace will certainly outlast his administration.

Despite the impending failure to meet the year-end target set at a November 2007 peace conference in Annapolis, Md., Israel and the Palestinians affirmed their commitment to the process.

The chief negotiators “asked that the international community support the parties’ sustained efforts in the framework of the Annapolis process,” the international diplomatic quartet of Mideast peacemakers said following several hours of talks at Egypt’s Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheik.

At the same time, the Quartet – the United States, the United Nations, the EU and Russia – said in a joint statement that it “emphasized the importance of continuity of the peace process.”

“I believe that the Annapolis process is now the international community’s answer and the parties’ answer to how we finally end the conflict between the Palestinians and the Israelis,” U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters after the talks.

Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat praised Sunday’s meeting as a positive step toward making the peace process irreversible. But he also said Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, known as Abu Mazen, had warned Israel the next few months are a sensitive time.

“Abu Mazen has warned against the possibility of Israel using this transition period in Israel and the U.S. to accelerate settlement activity and attacks and incursions,” said Erekat.

Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, the country’s chief peace negotiator, is running evenly with hawkish, former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in polls to become the country’s next prime minister.

Netanyahu’s spokeswoman, Dina Libster, indicated Sunday the former prime minister would not continue the Annapolis process if he won.

“The process as it has been until now is not helpful, and there is no point in continuing with it,” she said. “We are talking with a side that has no power to put into effect an agreement.”

Quartet envoy Tony Blair urged Barack Obama on Sunday to carry on with the process, saying, “The single most important thing is that the new administration in the United States grips this issue from day one.”