By KUNA
Washington : US President George W. Bush dropped by late Monday to join a scheduled meeting between Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad and White House National Security Advisor.
Fayyad is on a three-day visit to Washington where he held talks yesterday with Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and will deliver a speech in the Aspen Institute today, and meet with the Appropriations and Foreign Relations Committee in Congress before leaving town on Thursday.
The White House declined to comment on this partial meeting between Bush and Fayyad.
In a speech in the American Task Force on Palestine (ATFP) yesterday, Fayyad said that political differences between the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) and Hamas could be “sorted out” once both sides reach this consensus and agree on a security doctrine and the legitimacy of the Palestinian Authority.
Fayyad noted that expressing desire to establish a Palestinian state is not enough anymore, and the focus should be on “the nature and criteria of this state”.
A Palestinian state requires a parallel progress on issues of governance, security, economy, and politics, he added.
Last time Fayyad visited Washington was April 2007 in his capacity as Finance Minister on the sidelines of the World Bank-International Monetary Fund (IMF) meetings.