Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas on Wednesday denied media reports that he and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert have been drafting an accord of principles ahead of a US-sponsored peace conference.
"No we did not talk about this issue. We just talked about forming a joint committee to deal with all important issues that we need to agree on at this stage," Abbas told reporters after talks with French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner in Amman.
According to an alleged copy of the Hebrew-language document, published on the Palestinian Maan news agency's website, a "demilitarised" Palestinian state would be created within 1967 borders, with Jerusalem as capital.
It says the Jewish neighbourhoods of the Holy City would remain under Israeli control and Arab district under Palestinian, and the issue of Palestinian refugees resolved in a just and agreed manner.
Israel "will put an end to its occupation of the West Bank according to an agreed-upon timetable" and evacuate "the (Jewish) settlements in stages," according to the text. But Miri Eisin, an Israeli government spokeswoman, told AFP on Tuesday that "such a document does not exist." Maan has said Olmert and Abbas were in the process of finalising it before the conference, expected in November.
Israeli public radio, citing an unnamed Palestinian source, has said that a document was worked out "but not yet signed" by the two leaders, who have met three times over the past five weeks as they try to hammer out some sort of agreement ahead of the conference.
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