After months of delay, Israel and the Palestinian Authority on Sunday set up teams of government experts to try to jumpstart U.S.-backed peace talks that critics say have yet to yield any progress.
"The teams will focus on a range of specific issues, from security to trade and water use, that would form part of any agreement on a Palestinian state," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Arye Mekel.
Israel's chief negotiator, Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, and her Palestinian counterpart, former prime minister Ahmed Quriea (Abu Ala), will continue to deal with the core issues of borders and the future of Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees.
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Mekel said the experts, numbering approximately 10 from each side and drawn from various government ministries, would meet separately
from Livni and Qureia.
The Israeli team comprises director-generals from the ministries of finance, foreign affairs, environment, and justice.
The Palestinian negotiating team includes five former PA ministers, including Sufian Abu Zeida, former Palestinian civil affairs minister Hisham Abdel Razik, and Saeb Erekat, former chief negotiator of the PLO.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat declined to comment specifically on the teams except to say that "we bring whatever experts are needed."
The negotiations, which U.S. President George W. Bush hopes will yield an agreement on Palestinian statehood before he leaves office next January, have been stalled by a series of disputes, including over Jewish settlement activity near Jerusalem.
The first final-status peace talks in seven years were launched by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas at a U.S.-sponsored conference in Annapolis, Maryland in November, but the sides remain divided on what any statehood agreement should entail.
Olmert has said the goal was an understanding on "basic principles" for a Palestinian state, with implementation only once Abbas reins in militants in the West Bank and the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip as called for under the long-stalled "road map" peace plan.
Abbas, whose authority has been limited to the West Bank since Hamas Islamists seized Gaza in June, wants a full-fledged agreement allowing him to declare statehood.
Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, France's foreign minister and top United Nations officials warned in recent weeks that the pace of negotiations was too slow to reach a statehood deal before the end of the year.
Addressing an economic conference in Saudi Arabia Sunday, Fayyad appealed for Arab support. He also put some blame onIsrael for the faiure of the Abbas regime to show a strong presence on the ground in the West Bank.
"Israel continues to raid our cities, undermining the credibility of our forces in the eyes of the population and demoralizing them," Fayyad's office quoted him as saying.
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