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Prominent Palestinian moderate Mahmoud Abbas on Wednesday accepted his appointment by Yasser Arafat as the Palestinians' first prime minister to implement key reforms, a close aide to Arafat said.
The United States signaled on Tuesday that new Palestinian legislation creating the premier's post met its terms for unveiling a "roadmap" to peace between Palestinians and Israel.
But Washington, convinced Arafat has fomented bloodshed against Israel which he denies, voiced reservations about his retention of ultimate power over Palestinian diplomacy and security organs.
"Brother Abu Mazen has officially accepted Arafat's appointment to become prime minister," Arafat's adviser Nabil Abu Rdainah told Reuters in the West Bank city of Ramallah, using Abbas's nom de guerre.
Abbas will start consultations on Thursday to form a cabinet and will have three weeks -- with a possible two-week extension -- to submit his team to parliament for approval, said Saeb Erekat, a senior minister.
Abbas could not be reached immediately for comment. He had held off agreeing to take up the position until he was convinced he would wield credible powers.
In a 69-1 vote ratifying the legislation, the parliament cut into Arafat's decades-long domination of Palestinian politics by stripping him of authority to approve cabinet members.
But the bill, which Arafat later signed into law, preserved his over-arching power over Palestinian security services and peace policy, as well as his right to dismiss the premier.
Abbas will run the Palestinian Authority day by day with a mandate to purge corruption, overhaul a patronage-ridden bureaucracy, help curb militants with an interior minister of his choice, and foster a return to peacemaking.
Cautious US Approval
A State Department official welcomed Abu Mazen's acceptance of the post. "We look forward to the confirmation of his nomination in the near future," said the official.
Despite reservations voiced in Washington over the division of authority, it appeared the step toward reform demanded by a US-led "Quartet" of international peace brokers met President Bush's condition for unveiling their peace "roadmap."
"(Now that Abbas has accepted), we urge the Quartet and especially President Bush to immediately implement the roadmap. The ball is in now in the Israeli court," Abu Rdainah said.
The government of right-wing Israeli Prime Minister has demanded a slew of revisions to the roadmap en route to a Palestinian state, an outcome opposed by many in his Likud Party. Palestinians want the plan implemented as is.
State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said on Wednesday the United States would consult both sides about how to carry out the long-awaited plan, which might ease Palestinian fears that Israel might try to renegotiate the substance.
"The document will be released as the roadmap. That is the roadmap and that will be the roadmap," Boucher said.
Abbas, highly respected in Israel, is an architect of 1993 interim peace deals that have been eclipsed by militant violence that erupted in September 2000 after negotiations on a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza broke down.
He has bemoaned the militants' campaign of suicide bombings, ambush shootings and rocket attacks as counterproductive to the longtime Palestinian quest for independence.
The United States and Israel believe Arafat has stymied reforms to murky security services they say have failed to stop violence and even abetted it. He has denied wrongdoing.
"(Abbas' appointment) is a step in the right direction. We hope Abu Mazen will have the authority to fulfill his commitments first and foremost in fighting terror and hopefully becoming a reliable partner with whom we can sit and begin discussing progress toward an eventual agreement," Israeli Foreign Minister spokesman Jonathan Peled said.
Arafat had outmaneuvered rivals in the past. But dissent in his Fatah faction, kindled by diplomatic isolation and Israel's reoccupation of West Bank cities last June after Palestinian suicide bombings, shattered his immunity to reform pressures.
Israel wants Arafat sidelined before talks can resume.
(China Daily March 20, 2003)
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