Palestinian PM nominee seeks US, EU guarantee

Photo taken on September 4 shows parliament speaker Ahmad Qorei (R) talking with Palestinian Prime Minister Mahmud Abbas during a meeting at the Palestinian Legislative Council in the West Bank town of Ramallah. Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat has asked Qorei to become prime minister to succeed Abbas, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) executive committee said Sunday. Photo: AFP

Arafat chose Korei Sunday to replace Mahmoud Abbas, who had resigned in frustration a day earlier, complaining that the Palestinian president and Israel had obstructed his peace efforts and the United States had not given him enough backing.

Korei's credentials as a highly regarded moderate and an architect of the 1993 interim Oslo peace accords with Israel could endear him to the United States and could raise hopes of salvaging a battered US-led peace plan.

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There was no immediate reaction from Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who was leaving on an official trip to India on Monday. But he has ruled out talks with a Palestinian leadership controlled by Arafat.

Israeli Health Minister Danny Naveh, of Sharon's rightist Likud party, said Korei's nomination would not bring a resumption of dialouge because "the man who is pulling the strings and controlling everything is one person, and it's Yasser Arafat."

Korei, a veteran politician but one who has little grass-roots support among Palestinians, appeared to recognize the difficulties he faces if he takes the job.

"I am not prime minister as yet...I want to see the Americans -- what kind of guarantee...they will (give)," he told Reuters.

"I want to see Europe, what kind of guarantees and support...they will (give). I'm not ready to go for a failure. I want to see whether peace is possible or not," he said in English in his office in the West Bank village of Abu Dis near Jerusalem.

Soon after Arafat's decision Sunday, Israel launched the latest in a series of missile strikes against Islamic militant groups. Helicopter gunships attacked the home of a member of Hamas's military wing, wounding 15 people, medical workers said.

The army said the building was used as a weapons arsenal and that ammunition and explosives blew up after the missiles hit.

Arafat's nomination of Korei, approved Sunday by the Palestine Liberation Organization's Executive Committee and the Fatah faction, came in the midst of a deep political crisis.

Israeli officials said Abbas's decision to quit was a blow to peace hopes and renewed calls for Arafat's expulsion. Arafat had appointed Abbas in April under intense international pressure for reform.

The nomination of Korei, 65, could ease weeks of political confusion in the Palestinian Authority, which has heightened concern that the US-led "road map" leading to peace and a Palestinian state by 2005 may now be beyond saving.