Russia President Meets Palestinian Leaders


Associated Press
Date: 04-29-05

By MOHAMMED DARAGHMEH, Associated Press Writer

RAMALLAH, West Bank - Russian President Vladimir Putin laid a wreath on the late-Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat's tomb Friday and held talks with Arafat's successor, Mahmoud Abbas, but Palestinians held out little hope for concrete results.

Putin was greeted at the Palestinian headquarters, known as the muqaata, by an honor guard of Palestinian security forces. A military band played a halting version of Russia's national anthem and the Palestinian anthem as Putin and Abbas stood side by side.

Security officers then placed a wreath, with a banner reading "from the president of the Russian Federation," before Arafat's tomb. Putin approached, bowed his head, stood silently at attention for a few seconds, bowed again and walked away.

Dozens of Russian women married to Palestinian men stood outside the compound, greeting the Russian leader's arrival with exultant chants of "Putin."

Putin, the first Kremlin leader to visit the region, arrived with a plan to sell 50 armored personnel carriers and two helicopters to the Palestinians to replace vehicles destroyed during more than 4 1/2 years of Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But Israel was trying to scuttle the deal, fearing the armored vehicles could fall into the hands of militants.

"I think I can say the choppers are a done deal, but about the vehicles, we still don't have a clear-cut answer from the Israelis," Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said.

The helicopters would be used to transport Abbas. Israel destroyed the Palestinian Authority's presidential helicopters as part of its campaign to limit the movement of the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, who is accompanying Putin, said Thursday that the two sides would discuss how Russia could assist the Palestinians with their security. But when asked if Israel wouldn't be upset by the sale of armored personnel carriers, he replied, "This is an offer not so much for Israel, but for the Palestinians."

Putin, who visited Ramallah on the last day of his three-day visit to the area, arrived in the region promoting a fall Mideast peace conference in Moscow, and Palestinians responded enthusiastically ? but the idea dropped off the table during Wednesday's talks in Jerusalem after Israel and the U.S. expressed reservations.

Lavrov said Thursday that Putin did not suggest a summit but a "meeting of experts at the high level. There is nothing unusual about this. Such meetings are held periodically."

One of Putin's goals is to strengthen the Russian role as a player in Middle East diplomacy. Russia is one of the four co-sponsors of the "road map" peace plan, along with the U.S., U.N. and the European Union, but the Americans have taken the lead.

President Bush formally presented the plan in June 2003, but it stalled after neither side carried out its initial requirements.

Putin's talks in Israel on Thursday concentrated on other issues ? Iran, Syria and anti-Semitism.

Putin demanded that Iran submit its nuclear program to international monitoring, defended Russia's sale of anti-aircraft missiles to Syria on the grounds that they are purely defensive weapons, and visited the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial.

Source

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