BRUSSELS (AFP) — Palestinian leaders will not negotiate with the kind of "anti-peace" Israeli government which prime minister-designate Benjamin Netanyahu seems determined to form, an official said Sunday.
"It is very clear that these days he is talking to far right political parties" which are "totally against the establishment of a Palestinian state", Palestinian Authority foreign minister Riyad al-Malki told reporters in Brussels.
"They don't envisage a two-state solution, they don't see the need to negotiate with the Palestinians as a way to achieve peace," he told a press conference after talks with European Union, Egyptian and Jordanian officials on the Middle East situation.
"They do believe in the use of force as a means to achieve political gains. Such a government is, of course... should be described as an anti-peace government."
Just two weeks ahead of an Arab summit in Doha on March 29-30 in which the Israeli-Palestinian conflict will be a key issue, the Palestinian official set out a clear and uncompromising line.
"We, as the Palestinian authority, are not interested in really entering into negotiations with such a government."
Sitting with him at the joint press conference, EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana also indicated that it could not be business as usual with such a government.
"Let me say very clearly that the way the EU will relate to a government that is not committed to a two-state solution would be very different. They know it and we have to keep on saying that," he said.
Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg, whose country holds the rotating EU presidency, said he expected the rival Palestinian factions, Hamas and Fatah, to reach a "national accord" and rally round Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas ahead of the Doha talks.
That should produce an administration that "will live up to the peace commitments".
Last month EU foreign ministers called on the incoming Israeli government to relaunch the Middle East peace process with the Palestinians, though some voiced fears over having right-winger Netanyahu at the helm.
Netanyahu is holding secret talks with centrist Tzipi Livni in a last-ditch effort to form a broad government instead of a narrow right-wing coalition, reports in Israel said Sunday.
Livni, the outgoing foreign minister and leader of the centrist Kadima party, had rejected joining a cabinet with Netanyahu late last month.
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