Envoys of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas have been holding secret meetings with the top leader of the militant Hamas group exiled in Syria to end deadly Palestinian infighting and prepare new coalition talks, senior officials said on Saturday.
Abbas will come to Damascus early next week to meet exiled Hamas chief Khaled Mashaal and Syrian officials, said Moussa Abu Marzouk, the deputy head of Hamas' political bureau in Syria.
"I hope his [Abbas'] meetings in Damascus will be constructive and lead to solving all outstanding problems that have broken the dialogue in the past," said Abu Marzouk in an interview.
PHOTO: EPA
An Abbas aide confirmed that the Palestinian president planned to meet with Mashaal today.
Officials from both Palestinian sides said significant progress has been made in the secret talks over the past two weeks between Mashaal and two Abbas envoys, independent legislator Ziad Abu Amr and Mohammed Rashid -- a former adviser to Abbas' predecessor, the late Yasser Arafat.
The envoys were heading to Damascus for another round of talks on Saturday following a stop in Qatar, which has been mediating between Palestinian factions, officials said on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to the media.
Abu Marzouk said mediations were geared at resuming negotiations between the Hamas-led government and Abbas' more moderate Fatah party to form a national unity Cabinet. He predicted that dialogue would resume in the next few days.
The bitter Hamas and Fatah rivals have repeatedly failed in recent months to form a coalition because of disagreements over a political program and control over key Cabinet posts. Hamas has also balked at international demands that any Palestinian government recognize Israel, renounce violence and accept existing peace deals.
In Gaza, Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh called on Saturday for his Hamas movement and for Fatah to halt their increasingly violent power struggle, which has claimed 35 lives in recent weeks.
"All forms of internal fighting must stop," he said in a televised speech.
In a challenge to Hamas, Abbas last month threatened to call early parliament and presidential elections, saying the Islamic militants have failed to provide basic services to the Palestinian people.
But in his interview, Abu Marzouk stressed that Abbas only has the authority to call for early presidential elections, not legislative ones.
"The failure of the presidency to make tangible achievements makes it a duty for him [Abbas] to call for early [presidential] elections," Abu Marzouk said.
"But he has no constitutional or legal right to conduct early legislative elections, and many Palestinian factions do not believe that early elections would be a solution to the current crisis," he said.
In Jordan, Abbas held a surprise meeting with King Abdullah to discuss the mediation efforts. Abbas told reporters that talks were "continuing to form a Palestinian unity government with an agenda that would help end the blockade" imposed on Palestinians since Hamas took control of the government following its landslide election victory last year.
The Palestinian leader said his talks with King Abdullah were "fruitful" and focused on coordinating an Arab position to discuss with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who has arrived for a weeklong tour of the region.
On her first stop on Saturday in Israel, Rice said she had no new sweeping initiatives in hand for resolving the long-standing Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"I'm not coming with a proposal, I'm not coming with a plan," she said, ahead of her meetings with Israeli and Palestinian leaders.
In his interview, Abu Marzouk stressed that both Syria and Egypt "play a key role" in reviving negotiations between the Palestinians on a unity government.
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