OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (Agencies)
Israel's new Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accepted Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak's invitation late Monday to visit Egypt for talks, the prime minister's office said.
Mubarak in a telephone call "invited the prime minister to a meeting in the near future in (Egypt's Red Sea resort of) Sharm al-Sheikh," Netanyahu's office said in a statement.
"The prime minister welcomed the invitation and the meeting will apparently take place before long," it said, without giving a date.
Netanyahu stressed to Mubarak "that the peace between the two countries is of great importance and the two countries have a common interest in deepening and expanding the peace so as to rebuff threats against it," according to the statement.
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Time of tension " The prime minister welcomed the invitation and the meeting will apparently take place before long " Office of Israel Prime Minister The invitation comes at a time of tensions between the two countries which signed a peace treaty in1979.
Israeli Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman stirred controversy last year when he said Mubarak could "go to hell" if the Egyptian leader did not want to visit Israel. He once suggested Egypt's Aswan Dam might be bombed.
On his first day at the foreign ministry last week, Lieberman said the U.S.-sponsored Annapolis declaration of 2007 on peace with the Palestinians was no longer valid.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit said he would not shake hands with his Israeli counterpart Avigdor Lieberman if he encountered him at a meeting, Egypt's state news agency MENA reported last week.
Netanyahu has said he would negotiate with the Palestinians but would shift the focus of the talks from thorny territorial issues to shoring up the Palestinian economy and improving security. Palestinian leaders have demanded Netanyahu commit to Palestinian statehood as the goal of any peace negotiations.
A right-leaning government headed by Netanyahu's Likud party took office last week. International concern was raised by Netanyahu's appointment of ultra-nationalist Lieberman as foreign minister. |
