ISRAEL:Doctors gave Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon a battery of neurological tests yesterday to judge whether he was coming out of a coma, but media reports said concern was rising at his failure to regain consciousness.
Neurologists at Jerusalem's Hadassah hospital were testing Mr Sharon's responses to pain, sound and other stimuli to see if he was emerging from a coma after suffering a massive stroke on January 4th that left him fighting for his life.
A week into a health crisis that has cast a shadow over Middle East peacemaking, doctors on Thursday reduced sedatives that have kept Mr Sharon (77) unconscious and removed a brain catheter after a scan showed no need to drain fluids.
But Israeli media reported that doctors were starting to worry about Mr Sharon's failure to open his eyes. He responded to pain stimuli on both sides of his body earlier in the week, but apparently has not made any notable progress since then.
"The doctors have said that the pace of the prime minister's responses are very slow and have expressed concern that he has not yet opened his eyes," the NRG news website reported.
A Hadassah spokeswoman declined comment on the reports.
Yesterday's hospital bulletin later said: "There is no change in the prime minister's condition." He had been listed as critical, but stable.
Even if Mr Sharon regains consciousness, it could be days before doctors can assess the impairment to his faculties. With his hospital stay expected to last months, Mr Sharon is given little chance of returning to public life.
Meanwhile, Israel plunged back into politics as parties began holding primary elections to select candidates for a March 28th general election.
Opinion polls continued to predict victory for Mr Sharon's centrist Kadima party.
A Maariv newspaper poll showed Kadima winning 43 seats in the 120-member parliament under Ehud Olmert, the interim prime minister. Labor would win 17 seats and the right-wing Likud party, which won 40 in the last election, would fall to 16.
Meanwhile, Silvan Shalom handed in his resignation as foreign minister yesterday, opening the way for a reshuffle in Israel's caretaker government.
"The resignation will go into effect on Monday," a spokesman for Mr Shalom said.
Justice minister Tzipi Livni, a former operative in the Mossad intelligence agency, is expected to be appointed foreign minister until the election, media reports said. She is considered likely to stay in the role if her Kadima party wins.
Signalling Washington's desire to keep Middle East diplomacy out of limbo, US envoys Elliot Abrams and David Welch met Mr Olmert to discuss a Palestinian parliamentary ballot on January 25th.
Israel's cabinet is expected to vote tomorrow on whether Palestinian residents of east Jerusalem can cast votes in the election at post offices in the city's eastern sector, captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war.