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CIA's Tenet present security reform plan to Palestinians

Special to World Tribune.com
MIDDLE EAST NEWSLINE
Sunday, August 11, 2002

The United States has presented to the Palestinian Authority a plan to reform its security infrastructure.

The plans was discussed by CIA director George Tenet during a meeting on Saturday with PA Interior Minister Abdul Razik Yehya. The U.S. program is based on a restructuring of Palestinian security agencies and training by Egypt, Jordan and the United States.

Officials said the plan, which was submitted to Tenet earlier this month, has not been formally completed. They said the Bush administration has presented an outline of the plan to Israel and the PA over the last few weeks.

A U.S. delegation would travel to the Palestinian areas once Israel and the PA approve the CIA plan, the officials said. A State Department delegation is expected to arrive in the area later this month.

Administration officials, including Tenet, were said to have told the PA that the CIA plan is the only way to ensure an Israeli withdrawal from West Bank cities. Under the plan, which will include a purge of PA officers who participated in attacks against Israeli civilians, Israel would hand over security authority to a reconstituted PA that can impose control over West Bank cities.

PA officials said they are studying the U.S. plan and have expressed reservation toward several unspecified clauses. For his part, Yehya expressed satisfaction over his meeting with Tenet.

Earlier, PA Chairman Yasser Arafat agreed that Egypt, Jordan and the United States will direct reforms to Palestinian security services. Arafat said this could begin soon, but would not specify.

"There is an agreement that Americans, Egyptians and Jordanians will come and administer the training of our security branches," Arafat told the Doha-based A-Jazeera satellite channel.

[Palestinian sources said Arafat has rejected an appeal by Fatah leaders to appoint a prime minister. The sources said the choice recommended to Arafat was PLO Executive Committee secretary Mahmoud Abbas.]

For his part, Yehya stressed that the PA does not plan to impose restrictions on Islamic insurgency groups. Instead, the minister said, the PA would employ dialogue with Hamas to limit attacks.

"If something happens, we ask them not to react," Yehya told the Washington-based Brookings Institute. "At the same time we are trying to convince the Hamas and Islamic Jihad not to respond to Israeli actions. But I cannot make any promises. There might be an attack."

On late Saturday, a Palestinian insurgent entered an Israeli community in the Jordan Valley and killed a woman and injured her husband. An Israeli military unit killed the insurgent. Arafat's ruling Fatah movement claimed responsibility for the attack.

In the Gaza City, a Palestinian gunman was killed in the Gaza Strip in an apparent infiltration attempt into nearby Israeli communities. The Islamic opposition Hamas movement was said to have been responsible for the attack.

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