Mubarak, Arafat and Syria

The Jordanian daily al-Dostour on Sunday quoted sources close to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat as saying that he may head with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to Damascus in order to convene a tripartite meeting with Syrian President Hafez al-Assad.

The Jordanian paper added, citing information derived from these sources, that a team representing high-ranking Palestinian officials is holding talks in Damascus with Palestinian opposition groups in Syria. The paper added that among these officials is the chairman of the PLO political department, Farouk Qaddoumi, and PLO executive committee member Asaad Abdul Rahman, who is also the chairman of the refugee department at the PLO.

In Abu Dhabi, the official in charge of the Palestinian refugees in the Palestinian Authority, Asaad Abdul Rahman, said in a statement to the Abu Dhabi daily al-Itihad that a Syrian-Palestinian summit bringing together President Hafez al-Assad and Yasser Arafat will be held within the next two weeks in the Syrian capital, Damascus.

Abdul Rahman, who is also in charge of the Palestinian relations with Syria, said in a statement to al-Itihad in its Friday issue that the past phase had witnessed a rehabilitation of relations between the Syrian leadership and the PLO leadership.

He indicated that ties have not ceased between the two sides during the past years. Abdul Rahman stated that the summit was agreed upon due to the two presidents' (al-Assad and Arafat) agreement as a result of their conviction on the need for a mutual meeting through "generous efforts made by Arab and Palestinian sides to this end."