Eran-Erikat Meeting - May 14- 2000

(Communicated by the Prime Minister's Media Adviser)

The Interim Agreements Steering and Monitoring Committee led by Oded Eran and Saeb Erikat, with the Directors-General of the Justice and Public Security Ministries in attendance, met yesterday (Sunday), 14.5.2000, in Jerusalem to discuss - at the Palestinians' request - the prisoners issue. It should be noted that in the background to today's meeting were the recent confrontations between Palestinians and IDF forces in Judea, Samaria and Gaza.

Oded Eran emphasized that Israel had acceded to the Palestinians' request to devote yesterday's meeting to the prisoners issue even though Israel maintains its position that it has fulfilled all of its commitments on this issue according to the agreements. Moreover, Mr. Eran stressed that Israel cannot ignore the violent mood in the territories and added that even though it maintains that the Palestinian Authority is behind recent events, which conform to previously known PA modus operandi, the Palestinian police can, and must, take steps to prevent an escalation.

Dr. Erikat promised to relay Mr. Eran's message to PA Chairman Yasser Arafat and emphasized that the source of the violent outbreaks lies in the social distress felt by all layers of the Palestinian public over the prisoners issue both in regard to additional releases and the conditions of their imprisonment. According to Dr. Erikat, this unrest is putting the PA in a difficult situation; however, he added that the issue must be resolved at the negotiating table and not through violence.

At the end of the meeting, it was agreed that the joint Israeli-Palestinian teams would, in the coming days, consider the issue of the Palestinian prisoners' conditions of imprisonment and that a joint committee on the consideration of prisoner releases would transmit its recommendations to the steering committee in the near future.