Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said on Thursday that Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman would not accompany Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on an upcoming visit to Egypt.
"Some say... that [Netanyahu] will bring his foreign minister with him," AFP quoted Mubarak as saying during a speech to mark the end of Israel's 15-year occupation of the Sinai peninsula in 1982.
"The Israeli prime minister is coming alone. His cabinet chief will come with him. He will not bring any other minister with him," Mubarak said, according to the news agency.
His statement came after Egyptian intelligence chief Omar Suleiman, the powerful official handling indirect Israel-Hamas contacts over a cease-fire and prisoner exchange, On Wednesday invited Lieberman to visit Cairo after meeting him in Jerusalem.
The 50-minute meeting and subsequent invitation signaled a possible softening in Cairo's stated refusal to deal with Lieberman over comments he has made that were perceived as anti-Egyptian.
On Thursday, Lieberman said in an interview with Israel Radio that Jerusalem and Egypt had overlapping interests and that there was room for cooperation between the two.
Lieberman: No point in foot-dragging on peace
The foreign minister also said he believed Israel should move forward with a peace process after he came under fire recently for ruling out initiatives aimed at ending the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
"Our interest is in taking the initiative into our own hands and moving forward. There is no point in wasting time and foot-dragging; we want to lead, not to be lead," Lieberman told Israel Radio.
A number of lawmakers on Wednesday accused the foreign minister of causing strategic damage to Israel by his positions on an Arab peace initiatives and western-backed peacemaking efforts.
In Thursday's interview, Lieberman added: "I have never suggested ruling over another people, but everyone needs to ask themselves why after lengthy negotiations and the transfer of large funds we are still at a dead end."
The firebrand rightist also spoke of the need for two-way work toward reaching peace with the Palestinians, demanding that both sides kept to past commitments.
"I haven't seen the Palestinians manage to dismantle a single terror organization... The logic behind Annapolis was in giving up all commitments and beginning negotiations for a peace accord, [which] is impossible to reach artificially; everything needs to be built logically, one thing after the other," he said.
Lieberman was referring to a United States-sponsored peace conference held in late 2007. He said earlier in the month that Israel was not bound by commitments it made at the summit.
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