EU FOREIGN ministers pressed Israel and the Palestinians to return to political talks, saying both sides should refrain from provocative actions as efforts intensify to restart the Middle East peace process.
European diplomats believe there is potential to coax parties back to the talks table by Christmas on the basis of a statement last month from the Middle East “Quartet”, which compromises the EU, the US, Russia and the United Nations.
Private signals from the two sides about their willingness to resume tentative talks are relatively positive, say diplomats. They caution, however, that questions still surround their ability to secure a deal to settle the decades-long conflict.
“We’ve suggested that there should be within the next few weeks – it says four weeks in the [Quartet] statement – the opportunity for discussions to start about the preparations,” EU foreign policy chief Cathy Ashton told reporters.
Mrs Ashton, who is in close contact with Israeli and Palestinian leaders, said the objective was to have proposals for talks ready within three months.
“What I’m keen to do is get the process moving and see at what point it would be the right moment for people to actually sit in the room together and start to work out the detail.” She was speaking after the regular meeting of EU foreign ministers at which they issued a statement deploring Israel’s expansion of the Jerusalem settlement of Gilo.
The ministers also called on both sides to avoid steps that run counter to the Quartet’s effort to restart the talks.
This was seen as an implicit message to the Palestinians not to seek any prosecutions against Israel in the International Criminal Court if they secure observer state status at the UN.
Although EU ministers are divided over the Palestinian bid for statehood at the UN, diplomats believe there is scope to proceed in parallel with the resumption of talks.
“Just as it is important for them to think about their own future, it’s important they think about how to use this moment of the spotlight to be able to help the process of getting into talks,” said Mrs Ashton of the Palestinians.
Minister of State for Europe Lucinda Creighton, who represented the Government, said the meeting was “cautiously upbeat” about the prospect of restarting talks.
“There’s a short, sharp timeframe for the talks, which I think will give an impetus to the process,” she said.
“The one thing that came through from all sides was the idea that nothing is going to happen from the US point of view because of elections and that became very clear at the UN general assembly, so Europe is in the driving seat.”
Ms Creighton expressed concern at the meeting about harsh sentences handed down in Bahrain to a group of 20 doctors and medical staff, some of them Irish-trained.
The EU ministers said Syrian president Bashar al-Assad “must step aside” and they intensified sanctions against Belarus.