PERES READY FOR FINAL STATUS TALKS

Last update - 08:32 19/01/2006

Peres: Israel ready to hold final status talks with PA after vote

By The Associated Press

WASHINGTON - Shimon Peres said Wednesday that Israel would be ready to open negotiations with the Palestinians on a permanent peace accord after it holds elections March 28.The aim, he said after meeting for 45 minutes with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, would be to end the conflict between the two sides and establish permanent borders between them.

Peres, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, quit the Labor party late last year to join the centrist Kadima party, founded by Ariel Sharon, who initiated Israel's historic withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the northern West Bank last September. Implying Israel was prepared to yield more territories, Peres told reporters, "We don't think of Gaza last but Gaza first.

"Peres said Sharon, who was incapacitated with a major stroke on January 4, "really wanted to make a real try to bring an end to the conflict."He also said that Acting Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who was named the interim chairman of Kadima, held similar positions to those of Sharon. He said reports that Sharon intended to hold on to most of the West Bank as well as all of Jerusalem were wrong.

"My impression is he was ready to go a long way," Peres said.Peres also raised Israel's request for U.S. financial aid to develop the peripheral areas of the Negev and the Galilee.Rice and other State Department officials made no statement after the meeting.