President Saleh: Arafat was never an obstacle to peace

CAIRO, Nov. 12 (Saba)- President Ali Abdullah Saleh asserted that the late Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat was never an obstacle to peace but a sober advocate of the Palestinian cause and a proved man of peace. In a press conference in Cairo where he participated in the funeral of Palestinian leader Yassir Arafat, President Saleh cited the Palestinian leader’s signing of peace agreements with Israel albeit those agreements implied concessions from the Palestinian rights. He said that the death of Arafat, “a hero in his life and death”, was a misfortune. As for Israeli charges that Arafat was an obstacle to peace, Saleh said Israel accuses “whoever claims his rights” as an obstacle to peace. The Intifada, Saleh contends, enabled the Palestinian cause to gain a momentum by grabbing the spotlight of the Europeans and the Americans. That is it made them “know there is issue worth to be tackled”. The President called on the new leadership of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) to press ahead Arafat’s agenda as vociferously. He hoped that the current US Administration exercises pressure on Israel to comply with the Roadmap to peace plan. Saleh is critical of overstating the foothold of the Zionist lobby in the US Administration and reiterates that while the clout of the Zionist lobby is restricted to stock exchanges and media, the Arabs and Moslems are weak because they are not incorporating to take part in its decision-making and partly because of the September 11 events. Recalling terror attacks in Yemen, Saudi Arabia and Egypt, Saleh said terror cost them a lot in the form of tourism recession, and losses in economic and social spheres and in field of ties with other world countries. “We, in Yemen, have raised the motto of fighting terrorism becase terror has dealt a severe blow to the image and interests of our nation and its ties with the western world and the United States.” Saleh condemned the kidnapping of Iraqi Prime Minister Eyad Allawi’s relatives in and other kidnappings calling those terror acts that distort the image of resistance to occupation in the “legitimate” form. He insisted that terrorism can’t be an “Arabic or Islamic” for belongs to no certain creed or nationality. Saleh said that Israel wants to normalize relations with Arab states but that wasn’t possible without an Israeli compliance with the Roadmap to peace, the Israeli withdrawal of the 1967 territories. He accused Israel of being a terrorist person who kills children and bulldozes properties. AA/AA