Top Arab talks ahead

Press, 14 June 1983, Page 8

Top Arab talks ahead

NZPA-Reuter Bahrair The Palestine Liberatior Organisation leader, Yassei Arafat, says that an Arat summit meeting will be held to discuss Middle East problems, although the date and venue have yet to be decided. He said that the meeting was the result of efforts by the P.L.0., Saudi Arabia and Algeria. Arab envoys have been criss-crossing the region for several weeks seeking a consensus on Lebanon and other main problems. The P.L.O. chief said that his talks with Arab leaders, during a tour which has so far taken him to ten countries, covered the situation in Lebanon, where Syrian and Palestinian forces face Israeli troops in the Bekaa Valley. He was'expected to have more talks in the United Arab Emirates (U.A.E.), said sources close to him. Mr Arafat, faced by a continuing mutiny in his Fatah guerrilla group, has again accused the Libyan leader, Colonel Muammar Gadaffi and other Arabs of interferring in P.L.O. affairs. Refering to the mutiny, he said: ‘lt is not the first or the last time ... it is because of Arab intervention and interference.” But as he spoke in Bahrain, rebels against his policy line said in Damascus that they estimated 70 per cent of Fatah guerrillas supported them. A dissident spokesman, Jihad Saleh, said that there was no personal feud against Mr Arafat, but that the P.L.O. chief had deviated from the group’s policy line by edging towards American-sponsored Middle East peace proposals. “The deviations of the P.L.O. are the result of Saudi influence. The Saudis do all in their power to fulfil American desires in the Middle East,” he said. Mr Arafat had earlier been quoted as saying that the mutiny in Fatah for a stronger line and armed struggle against Israel was 100 per cent under control. His latest criticism of Colonel Gadaffi, whom he said was one of the channels of intervention in the P.L.0., came after an announcement on Friday that Libya and the P.L.O. had agreed to stop verbal attacks on each other. At the week-end Mr Arafat was quoted by a Kuwaiti newspaper as urging the Arabs to wage an “all-out war” against Israel to “rectify” political scales in the Middle East.