Abbas says talks for govt have reached deadlock

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said today that talks to achieve a national unity government aimed at ending an international aid boycott have reached a “dead end”.

US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, standing alongside Abbas at a joint press conference in the West Bank city of Jericho, said the US hoped to accelerate efforts to find a solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and to extend the scope of a recently declared cease-fire between the two sides.