Rice to push Israel to lift more West Bank barriers
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice will on Sunday urge Israel to remove more West Bank roadblocks as she meets Israeli and Palestinian officials to try to accelerate their peace talks.
Speaking at the beginning of a two-day visit to the region on Saturday night, Rice said she would review Israel's steps on the ground to see if they had improved the daily lives of Palestinians, including promised removal of barriers.
"The first thing we are going to do is to review the ones that were supposedly moved," Rice said, adding she wanted to discuss with Israeli officials how significant those barriers were to allowing greater movement for the Palestinians.
"Not all roadblocks are created equal," Rice said.
Rice met Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert after her arrival in Jerusalem on Saturday and will meet Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday.
Abbas and Olmert, who are due to meet on Monday following Rice's departure, agreed in November to resume peace talks with the aim of reaching an agreement by the end of this year. The peace negotiations have yet to show tangible progress.
After Rice's last trip in late March, Israel said it planned to remove 61 barriers in the occupied West Bank. But a U.N. survey subsequently found that only 44 obstacles had been scrapped and that most were of little or no significance.
Western pressure is mounting on Olmert to do more to ease travel restrictions and take other steps to shore up Abbas, whose authority has been limited to the West Bank since Hamas Islamists took over the Gaza Strip in June.
On Saturday, Abbas's security forces deployed to the northern West Bank city of Jenin for a law-and-order campaign meant to show the government is laying the ground for statehood.
Israel has so far balked at removing many barriers, arguing they are necessary to prevent suicide bombers. The Palestinians call them collective punishment.
Rice also plans to hold trilateral meetings with the top peace negotiators, Israeli Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni and Ahmed Qurei of the Palestinians, and with Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and Israeli Defence Minister Ehud Barak.
Rice said the most important part of her talks would be to review "where we are in terms of the situation on the ground and the improvement of life for the Palestinian people."
U.S. officials are sensitive to the lack of demonstrable progress in the talks and they hope to use a visit by U.S. President George W Bush, who will travel to the region this month to celebrate the 60th anniversary of Israel's founding, to nudge them along.
(Writing by Ori Lewis; Editing by Richard Balmforth)
