Palestine president likely to visit India

New Delhi

23 March 2007

A school being built with Indian assistance at Abu Dees near

Jerusalem is expected to make progress in the next few months. The work of

constructing the embassy of Palestine in India was likely to begin in two or three

months, Ambassador of Palestine to India Osama Musa said.

"I hope our President will lay the foundation stone of the embassy ... President

Mahmoud Abbas's visit to India is still not fixed but it might happen in two or three

months or even later this year," Mr Musa told this newspaper. India has gifted land and

also extended financial assistance for the embassy.

Ambassador Musa said that India was a "very good friend" of the people of Palestine.

"We are finding that India stands firmly with us on the United Nations resolutions," he

said. President Mahmoud Abbas visited India in 2005 as part of an Asian tour that took

him to Japan, China and Pakistan.

The new foreign minister of the Palestinian Authority, Mr Ziyad Abu Amr, has said in

Jerusalem that President Abbas was planning to visit India. He welcomed India's support

to the Palestinian National Unity Government and said both sides need to enhance the

"very dear and historic" bilateral ties.

The minister has called upon India to play an active role in the West Asian peace

process. "India is an important country at the international stage. It can play a major role

... since it maintains good and friendly relations with all parties, not just in the region but

the entire world," he was quoted as saying.

He added that New Delhi should play an active role to help "end the siege which is

imposed on Palestine, since the new Unity Government has met with the conditions set

by the Quartet [comprising the United Nations, the United States, European Union and

Russia) and the international community."

India has extended assistance worth over Rs 60 crore to Palestine. About Rs eight crore

has been earmarked for the embassy and the rest will be spent on constructing schools

and hospitals in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. India has also dispatched medicines

worth Rs eight crore to Palestine.