Abbas says he agrees to meet Israeli PM in Moscow

By Anees Bargouthi

WARSAW, Poland (AA) - Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday said he agreed to meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Russian capital Moscow as part of efforts aimed to revive the stalled peace talks between the two sides.

“Russian President Russian Putin proposed a meeting on September 9 in Moscow and I agreed to it,” Abbas told a joint conference with his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda in Warsaw.

He, however, said that Netanyahu had asked to postpone the meeting. “So there will be no meeting for now,” Abbas said.

The Palestinian leader went on to assert that he is ready to meet Netanyahu anywhere.

“I only care about the establishment of an independent Palestinian state within pre-1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital,” he said.

On Monday, Netanyahu met with Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov in Jerusalem to discuss a Russian proposal to host a meeting between him and Abbas in Moscow.

In a statement following the meeting, Netanyahu’s office said the Israeli premier is always ready to meet with Abbas directly and without preconditions.

U.S.-sponsored peace talks between the Palestinians and Israel collapsed in 2014 when the latter objected to the formation of a Palestinian unity government between the umbrella Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Hamas, who controls the blockaded Gaza Strip.