Belgium's top diplomat on Friday pronounced the new Palestinian government more moderate than its Hamas-led predecessor, and urged it to secure the release of captured Israel Defense Forces soldier Gilad Shalit, halt all violence and bring its chaotic security forces under a single authority.

Belgian Foreign Minister Karel De Gucht is the latest of a string of Western officials to resume ties with the Palestinian cabinet, reconfigured last week to add moderate Fatah and independent ministers to what had been an exclusively Islamic militant Hamas lineup.

After Hamas took power a year ago, the international community and Israel imposed bruising sanctions on the Palestinian Authority to try to force it to disarm, recognize Israel and accept existing peace accords between Israel and the Palestinians.

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Hamas has killed more than 250 Israelis in suicide bombings, and the EU, U.S. and Israel classify it as a terrorist organization.

The new government - formed on Saturday in an effort to curb deadly infighting and lift the sanctions - did not explicitly accept those demands. Israel immediately announced it would shun it and suspend any peacemaking plans.

But European Union and U.S. officials have indicated they detect shifts in the attitude of the new government, which has agreed to respect past peace accords. And they have begun meeting with non-Hamas members of Cabinet while they size up the new government's actions.

"It cannot be denied. There are hints in the government program toward meeting the [international] criteria," De Gucht said, after meeting with Palestinian Foreign Minister Ziad Abu Amr, an independent, and before meeting with Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas of Fatah.

The EU's relations to the new alliance will be determined in part by how the coalition responds to demands to free Shalit, stop violence and integrate its security forces, he said.

De Gucht also said he expects a resistant Israel to be prepared to enter into talks on a final peace deal with Abbas, the government's point man on negotiations, and called for a halt to Jewish settlement in the West Bank. De Gucht met Wednesday with Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in Jerusalem.

Abu Amr said the substance of the government's program met the international conditions.

"In the coming weeks, we will be working hard with the international community and the Europeans to make sure every contradiction [in the program] is removed, he said.

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