Bush seeks peace talks

US PRESIDENT George W Bush yesterday announced an international conference this autumn to include Israel, the Palestinian authority and some of their Arab neighbours to help restart Middle East peace talks.

He said that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice would preside over the session. Mr Bush said the conference would include representatives from Israel, the Palestinians “and their neighbours in the region” and said participants would include just those governments that support the creation of a Palestinian state.

Mr Bush also pledged increased US aid to the Palestinian government of President Mahmoud Abbas and called for the convening of a meeting of “donor” nations to consider more international aid, including the Arab states of Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan.

Mr Bush said the past few years had see “some hopeful, some dispiriting” changes in the Middle East. And he called the present time “a moment of clarity for all Palestinians. And now comes a moment of choice”.

Meanwhile, Israel will free 250 Palestinian prisonerslater this week — nearly allof them from the Fatah faction of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, a spokesman for the Israeli prime minister said yesterday.

The release, intended to bolster Mr Abbas in his struggle against the Islamic militant Hamas, would take place on Friday, said Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s spokesman. He said 85% of the prisoners would come from Mr Abbas’s Fatah faction, with the rest from smaller Palestinian parties. None would come from Hamas, he said.