Peace talks between Israel and Syria will resume this evening after being adjourned for religious observances. Both sides welcomed President Clinton’s intervention yesterday in the talks which are stalling over details of the return to Syria of the Golan Heights, seized by Israel in 1967.
Mr Clinton presented the negotiating teams with a working document aimed at removing obstacles to agreement on a new border between the two countries and new security arrangements. A State Department spokesman, James Rubin, said the document was intended to clarify the focus of the negotiations. However, White House officials close to the peace talks believe there is little chance of agreement in the next few days, the New York Times has reported.
Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak plans go home on Monday and leave the peace talks with Syria in the hands of less senior negotiators. Barak and Syrian Foreign Minister, Farouq al-Shara, had not been expected to stay in rural West Virginia, where the talks began last Monday, for more than a week. There was no immediate word when Shara would return to Damascus.
