Reasons behind canceling Arafat's visit to Damascus

The Lebanese daily al-Sharq ( the Orient ) tackled the reasons behind canceling Arafat's visit to Damascus. The visit which was due last Wednesday.

The paper said that what happened that Arafat received a telephone call from an American official informing him about the date of his meeting with the Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres and asked him not to miss that date because of its very importance and for the impossibility to set another date. That date was also Wednesday, the same day Arafat was supposed to go to Damascus.

The paper added that Arafat started then contacts with leaders of the Arab states who were in direct contacts with the efforts to hold his meeting with Peres asking them to contact the Syrian leadership so as to announce the postponement of the meeting or just to confine to a visit of two hours to Damascus.

The paper said that the contacts were made promptly but the Syrian answer was decisive on that this visit has a certain program and a certain timetable for discussions and Syria is persistent on both and does not agree that a quick visit is good, just to be a paper of bargaining in the hand of Arafat during his meeting with Peres.

On what has been said of Egyptian and Jordanian regret over what happened, the Syrian sources said it did not receive so far no signals confirming that such regret occurred noting that the Syrian position is very clear and well known by both the Egyptian and Jordanian leaderships.