Moscow called Friday on Israel and the Palestinian Authority to come to complicated compromises to reach a settlement of Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
U.S., Israeli, and Palestinian representatives held trilateral discussions in the U.S. State Department on Thursday, followed by a smaller meeting of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and U.S. Special Envoy for Middle East Peace Process George Mitchell.
Russian Foreign Ministry official representative Andrei Nesterenko said Russia considers the resumption of the talks as an important result of joint efforts made by the Middle East Quartet of international mediators - Russia, the United States, the European Union and the United Nations.
"We call for both sides to exercise a maximum of responsibility and a constructive approach, a willingness for difficult compromises to achieve a settlement on an universally recognized international legal basis and to eventually yield the establishment of an independent, viable and territorially contiguous Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, living side by side with Israel in peace and security," Nesterenko said.
U.S. President Barack Obama said he had "confidence" the Palestinian-Israeli talks would succeed.
Israeli-Palestinian direct peace talks came to a halt in December 2008, when Israel launched an attack on the Gaza Strip in a bid to put an end to the firing of homemade rockets at southern Israel by Palestinian militants based in the enclave. The conflict left 1,300 Palestinians and 13 Israelis dead.
The Palestinians have cited ongoing Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, both occupied by Israel since the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, as the main obstacle to the peace process.
The Palestinian National Authority will ask the UN Security Council to reestablish the 1967 border with Israel if direct Mideast talks fall through, the Palestinian ambassador to Russia said on Thursday.
MOSCOW, September 3 (RIA Novosti)
