Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met French President Nicolas Sarkozy for talks on the crisis in the Middle East peace process on Wednesday and appeared to open the door to talks with Syria.
Neither leader spoke to reporters after their two-hour meeting at the Elysee Palace and Netanyahu set off for the airport immediately afterwards. The pair had addressed the media after both their previous Paris meetings.
A short statement from Sarkozy’s office said that the talks had included only the leaders and one senior advisor each.
They discussed “international issues and notably ways to restart the Middle East peace process,” it said.
While the mood surrounding the meeting was downbeat, however, afterwards an Israeli official did hold open the chance of progress in one of the overlapping negotiating tracks that make up the stalled regional peace plan.
“Mr Sarkozy raised the issue of the Syrian track,” the senior aide said. “The prime minister said he is willing to meet with the Syrian president at any time and anywhere to move on the peace negotiations on the basis of no preconditions.”
Earlier in Damascus, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad told a meeting of Arab politicians that Syria would not “put forward conditions on making peace,” but warned it had “rights that we will not renounce,” the SANA news agency said.
Al-Assad is due in Paris today for talks with Sarkozy.
Israel captured the Golan Heights from Syria in the 1967 Middle East War and unilaterally annexed it in 1981. Damascus has repeatedly demanded the strategic plateau’s return as a non-negotiable condition for peace.
Telephone talks arranged by Turkish mediators between the arch foes were broken off last year during Israel’s offensive in Gaza, closing a promising diplomatic channel toward a broader Middle East settlement.
Last week, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said in Paris that he was ready to resume his role as mediator of three-way telephone conversations between Israeli and Syrian leaders at any time.
Speaking in Jerusalem, Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak on Wednesday said the meeting had helped pave the way for the possible restarting of Israeli-Palestinian talks.
“This meeting was good, important and constructive. It lifted a number of obstacles and created a decisive base for the resumption of negotiations that will allow us to reach an agreement with our neighbors, the Palestinians,” Barak said.
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