Chief Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said on Saturday that a series of meetings would be held this week between Israeli and Palestinian officials to prepare for the summit between Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon on June 21.

Erekat told Palestinian Radio Voice of Palestine that Palestinian officials will discuss with their Israeli counterparts the implementation of the agreements reached at the last summit between Abbas and Sharon on Feb. 8 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, as well as cooperation in the planned Israeli pullout of settlements from Gaza and part of the West Bank.

He also urged Israel to reopen Gaza Airport that remained closed for five years, set up passage linking Gaza Strip with the West Bank and remove checkpoint in Rafah on the border between Gaza and Egypt after the withdrawal from the Gaza Strip.

If such demands, in addition to support for the Palestinian economy, were not met, the withdrawal would only turn Gaza into a big prison for the Palestinians.

Meanwhile, Palestinian Deputy Prime Minister and information minister Nabil Shaath denied that the Palestinian National Authority (PNA) was committed to disarm militants at the Sharm el-Sheikh summit.

Shaath, who is on an official visit to Egypt, told Radio Voice of Palestine that the PNA would not carry out such a commitment under the roadmap peace plan until Israel dismantles settlements and stop constructing the separation wall in the occupied West Bank.

Source: Xinhua