The US State Department defended Secretary of State Colin Powell's meeting on Friday with the authors of an unofficial Mideast peace plan as constructive and said the initiative did not contradict a US-backed peace "road map."
But deputy spokesman Adam Ereli also said the meeting left the administration "more convinced than ever" of the road map's viability. He stressed that in the end, peace between Israel and the Palestinians will be decided by governments, not by some informal process.
Ereli briefed reporters after Powell met leading Israeli dove Yossi Beilin and former Palestinian minister Yasser Abed Rabbo for about a half hour. Including talks with other senior State and White House officials, the two men were at the State Department for nearly two hours, much longer than expected.
"It was a good, constructive meeting with this private group who has drafted a private plan," Ereli said, and "the ideas discussed today were not in any way contradictory or at cross purposes with the president's vision or with the road map."
Moreover, "we come away from this meeting more convinced than ever that the road map is the way to go," said the spokesman. He also reaffirmed that "a peace agreement between Israelis and Palestinians is going to be decided on by the governments, and there's no question or doubt about that."
Powell's decision to meet the co-authors of the peace plan launched in Geneva last Monday and President George W. Bush's embrace of that process has added fuel to a rare public spat between Israel and its chief ally, the US.
Israel dismissed the unofficial plan, saying its two authors had no authority to negotiate the peace process.
"The decisions of the future of the peace process will be made by the elected government [of Israel] and not by anyone else, especially not by people who have no political constituency whatsoever in Israel," an Israeli government official said.
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