By Xinhua
Cairo : An emergency meeting of Arab foreign ministers is likely to be held in the first week of January, 2008,on the situations of the Palestinian territories and Lebanon, Arab League (AL) Secretary General Amr Moussa said Saturday.
Moussa made the announcement at a press conference at the headquarters of the pan-Arab bloc in downtown Cairo on reviewing the AL policy in the year of 2007.
The Arab foreign ministerial meeting was initiated at the request of Egypt and Saudi Arabia, the current Arab summit chairman, said Moussa.
The meeting is to discuss the Israeli settlement policy which is threatening to undermine the Palestinian-Israeli talks reactivated following the Annapolis conference on Mideast peace held late November in the United States.
The Palestinians and Israel held two rounds of peace talks in December as a result of the Annapolis conference but have failed to yield any tangible progress.
The Palestinians are particularly upset over a tender by Israeli Ministry of Housing and Construction for the building project of 307 housing units in the southeast Jerusalem neighborhood of Har Homa.
The Palestinians insisted that Israel should stop settlement expansion, while Israel demanded an improved security mechanism from the Palestinian side.
On Thursday, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert promised not to build any new Jewish settlements during a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.
On the Lebanese track, Moussa said his office chief Hisham Youssef, who is also his envoy, will visit Lebanon in a bid to help resolve the current political crisis in the country.
Lebanon’s parliament announced Friday its 11th postponement to elect a new president scheduled on Saturday till Jan. 12, 2008.