Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal today announced that Deputy Prime Minister and Commander of the National Guard Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdulaziz had presented an eight-point list of proposed agreements for peace in the Middle East to U.S. President George W. Bush during their lengthy meeting yesterday at the President's ranch in Crawford, Texas.
The proposal, the Foreign Minister said, is intended as a comprehensive outline of how to move towards a long-term resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian crisis, by starting discussions on the basis of a peace that all sides agree to. A Saudi official referred to the Saudi-U.S. talks as warm, friendly, and excellent in every way. Aides on both sides spoke of a determination to work together, and the President was reported to consider the Saudi proposal helpful and constructive. Prince Saud declared in an interview today: "We both came with a similar vision for peace. The intention of the meeting was to see whether we could achieve a common agreement on how to get peace."
The eight points of the proposal are:
- complete Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank areas that have recently been occupied.
- an end to Israel's military siege of Ramallah, where Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has for four weeks been trapped in his headquarters.
- insertion into the region of a multinational force.
- reconstruction of destroyed Palestinian areas.
- renunciation of violence.
- immediate initiation of political talks.
- an end to Israeli settlements.
- implementation of UN Resolution 242 calling for Israeli withdrawal from territories occupied during the 1967 war, including the West Bank and the Golan Heights.
