Sadat attacks Arab and Soviet critics of M.E. peace pact

Press, Volume CXV, Issue 33941, 6 September 1975, Page 15

Sadat attacks Arab and Soviet critics of M.E. peace pact

1 Zealand Press A&soctation-—Copyright > CAIRO. September 5. President Sadat of Egypt has accused the Soviet Union of seeking to dix ide the Arab countries by staying away from the signing of the Egyptian-Israeli disengagement agreement at Geneva.

Denouncing the Soviet Union for an attitude of ‘•flagrant incitement.” he also attacked Arab critics of the accord—) Syrian leaders and other! Arab ‘‘brothers’’—and deplored anti - Egyptian demonstrations staged in Damascus yesterday j morning. “I am in pain because of) what happened, particularly l in Syria,” President Sadat! said in a bitter and, at) times, emotional speech last night to the national assembly and the central committee of the Arab Socialist Union, Egypt's only political party. Egypt 4 for Arabs’ The speech was broadcast with a simultaneous English translation provided by the Cairo radio.

“If our aim was solely the> ■ recovery of Sinai, we would have achieved far more than) we did,” he declared. “Thei > new agreement does not red alise what I wanted. It is) •just another step on the path to peace and a breakthrough in the stalemate.” I !| Egypt, he said, stood up I for the Arab cause, contrary i to the accusations made I against him in some Arab ; capitals. Offer rejected j “We were offered the re- < ■turn of the whole of Sinai at; the price of ending the state! of war with Israel,” he as- . serted, “but we said ‘no’ because we were negotiating for the Syrian and Palestinian cause as well as ours.” The President added that for the same reasons, he had rejected a second offer for a ■ disengagement line running from El Arish, on the north- ] east Mediterranean coast, to the tip of the Sinai Penin- ; i sula. Such a line would have i

returned to Egypt much I more of her national territi i ory than was provided for in • the agreement signed in Geneva. U.S. ’now party* Underlining the difficulty of the negotiations. Sadat said the Arabs had emerged ( , stronger militarily and poii-! tically, and that Egypt! would not rest until all occupied territories were restored and the right of the! Palestinians to set up their own state was recognised. But, Sadat said, the inter-) ■national community would) not tolerate “any infringement on Israel’s right! to exist as a state.” “I have) told this to the Palestin-. ians,” he added. “It is not true that we have thrown ourselves into the American embrace,” Sadat said. But he repeated his view that the United States was now “a basic party to the Arab-Israeli conflict.”