...megjegyzés nélkül:
Alarmed by Mideast Crisis, EU Presents United Front
Sat September 6, 2003 10:36 AM ET
By John Chalmers
RIVA DEL GARDA, Italy (Reuters) - Stunned into action by the unraveling Middle East peace process, the European Union on Saturday denounced the political wing of Hamas as a terrorist organization, a move long sought by Washington.
Foreign ministers of the 15-nation bloc also called for swift diplomatic action to try to halt the incessant violence and warned that Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas's decision to resign would further destabilize the region.
The move against Hamas, prompted by a truce-shattering suicide attack in Jerusalem last month, opened the way for the EU to freeze the Palestinian militant group's assets and place its leaders on a terrorist blacklist.
Meeting on the shores of Lake Garda for a second day, the EU ministers remained divided on Washington's efforts to broaden U.N. involvement in Iraq, with France and Germany arguing that it did not go far enough and Britain lining up behind its ally.
But there was none of the acrimony over Iraq that has marred EU meetings for the past year. The ministers agreed that steps should be taken quickly at the United Nations to prevent instability in Iraq spilling across the region and beyond.
"I don't think there's any argument about the need to hand over sovereignty as quickly as possible to the Iraqis, nor about the strengthening of the political process and the enhancing of the U.N. role," said British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw.
EU CLOSES RANKS ON "ROAD MAP"
Around 5,000 demonstrators marched around the mountain-ringed resort town of Riva del Garda to protest against EU trade and foreign policy ahead of the launch next week of world trade talks in Cancun, Mexico.
Accompanied by a steel band, protesters chanted slogans against the World Trade Organization and the EU. Police watched from a distance and there was no serious trouble.
Organizers had hoped to attract 20,000 protesters but they admitted earlier this week that it might be hard to draw a big crowd because Riva del Garda was difficult to reach by public transport and because many people were still in holiday mode.
Inside the conference center the foreign ministers closed ranks on the need to press on with the U.S.-backed "road map" for peace in the Middle East as news emerged that Abbas had submitted his resignation as Palestinian prime minister.
The exit of the moderate Abbas after a power struggle with Palestinian President Yasser Arafat could spell the end of the peace plan and plunge the region into a new spasm of violence.
"We knew very well that the road would be very bumpy, but it (the road map) is the only document...that exists at this moment to which everyone in principle agreed to develop," EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana told reporters.
Solana was due to fly to Egypt on Saturday for talks on the crisis. And the EU, one of four parties behind the road map with the United States, Russia and the United Nations, has called for a meeting of the "quartet" in New York on September 22.
Swedish Foreign Minister Anna Lindh said the United States and Israel bore some responsibility for the crisis in the Palestinian Authority, arguing that by seeking to ostracize Arafat they had given Abbas a "kiss of death."
Abbas has struggled to impose his authority over militant groups, including Hamas, which claimed responsibility for an August 19 suicide bombing that killed 22 Israelis.
The EU last year put Hamas's military wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, on its blacklist of banned terrorist groups.
France had until now blocked outlawing the political wing, arguing it had a potential role to play in peace efforts and provided much-needed social services to the Palestinian people. (Additional reporting by Marie-Louise Moller, Crispian Balmer, Sebastian Alison and Giada Zampano)
[http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=ED4J0X3TM05N2CRBAELCFFA?type=worldNews&storyID=3398666]
