No talks till Hamas accepts government, says Fayyad

The new Palestinian prime minister insisted on Tuesday that the Hamas Islamists who have seized control in Gaza must accept his government's authority before it will consider calls for negotiations. 

Responding to urging from Egypt's president for the rival Palestinian factions to talk to each other, Salam Fayyad told Reuters in the West Bank city of Ramallah: "These are key principles that everyone has to accept for there to be any meaningful steps taken.

"First, Hamas has to relinquish any and all claims to legitimacy as a regime in Gaza. Second, there has to be acceptance of the constitutional measures taken by the president."

President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed the government led by Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas two weeks ago, after the Islamist group routed the forces of Abbas's Fatah faction in Gaza, leaving the coastal enclave politically split from the larger West Bank.

Abbas then named Fayyad, a technocrat who was until then finance minister, to lead an emergency government.

Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak, who hosted a meeting on Monday between Abbas and Israel's Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, said he was confident that Fatah and Hamas would return to dialogue.  Haniyeh, who still considers himself prime minister, has said he is ready for talks with Abbas at any time.

Committed to unity

Fayyad said the new government, which has received strong backing from the United States, Israel and the European Union, was committed to restoring unity between the two territories.

"We have not forgotten about Gaza," he said. "Everyone has to view the Palestinian National Authority as the home of all Palestinians living in Gaza and the West Bank."

Fayyad was inspecting the police headquarters for the West Bank and repeated that security forces in Gaza had orders from his government not to work under Hamas - although some police officers are working now on the streets of Gaza.

Other public employees in Gaza should provide services, he said, but only if they felt safe doing so and followed instructions only from the emergency government: "They are not to take instructions but from the one legitimate authority."

A key issue for police and other public servants is whether they will receive salaries, which have been withheld or sharply cut in the past year because of western sanctions on Hamas. The sanctions are now being eased for Fayyad's government.

Fayyad welcomed Israel's promise to pass on Palestinian tax revenues but said money had yet to arrive, and that he also wanted longer-term commitments. "So far it has been talk about money ... It's my firm expectation that money will be transferred."

But he added: "The payment of salaries is something that has to happen every month ... and that cannot happen unless Israel a) transfers the stock of withheld revenues and b) commits to transferring money regularly to us on a monthly basis."