Arafat agrees to give up authority over security forces

Imad Fallouji, a member of the Palestinian Legislative Council, said, "Arafat expressed his readiness to give (Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia) full authority to reshuffle his cabinet in the way that he sees fit and give the government full ... authority over the internal security services."

Palestinian sources told Israel Radio that Qureia is expected to replace his current interior minister.

UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan urged Arafat on Wednesday to empower his prime minister and interior minister to carry out essential reforms in the PA, especially in the security establishment.

Annan told a news conference that he hopes Arafat will use the current crisis to implement reforms and advance the peace process.

"I really hope that, as difficult and as complicated as the crisis is in Palestine, that they will exploit this crisis positively, and move ahead and really come up with some other reform structures which are required, particularly in the security area," he said.

The secretary-general said the best outcome would be to empower the prime minister and the interior minister to take charge of the security apparatus and pursue reforms.

"I hope chairman Arafat will see the need, in supporting this sort of reform at this stage, to be able to move the process forward," he said.

Aide: Arafat issued decree to unify security forces
Arafat issued a decree Wednesday to condense at least a dozen security branches into three agencies, a senior aide said.

The move has been a key demand of Palestinians putting Arafat under pressure for reforms, as well as of the United States, Egyptian mediators and the United Nations.

The aide, Jibril al-Rajoub, said Arafat - who had previously pledged to make the reforms - had now signed the decree to formalize the move.

The decree unifies Palestinian security forces into three agencies - national security, general or domestic security and intelligence, Rajoub said.

"All the parties concerned have been informed," including the Egyptians, he said.

Earlier Wednesday, Palestinian militants kidnapped and later released a senior official of the local government of the West Bank city of Nablus, an aide to the governor said. The abduction was the latest in a series of abductions amidst growing chaos in the Palestinian territories.

Fadel Alshouli, head of tribal affairs department at the Nablus government, was seized by militants and taken to the Balata Refugee Camp outside Nablus, said the aide, Anan Ateeri. He was released unharmed Wednesday evening.

The governor, Mahmoud Aloul, had been in contact with the kidnappers to try to secure Alshouli's release, Ateeri said.

The kidnapping comes a day after Palestinian lawmaker Nabil Amr was shot at close range while at home in Ramallah by unknown gunmen. Two bullets hit him in the leg.

Palestinian Authority officials pledged Wednesday to launch an investigation into the shooting, which came in the wake of a weekend of unrest and protests against the PA and Arafat.

Amr, a former Palestinian information minister who is a well-known critic of Arafat, was taken to a hospital in Amman, Jordan on Wednesday. After a three-hour operation to remove a blood clot in his knee, Amr was reported to be in stable condition.

Doctors will assess later whether Amr can walk "normally again," supervising doctor Ashraf al-Kurdi said.

The recent turmoil led to a reshuffling of the Palestinian security forces and the resignation of Palestinian Prime Minister Ahmed Qureia.

Arafat refused to accept Qureia's resignation, so the prime minister remained in office.

However, the Palestinian parliament passed a resolution Wednesday in support of Qureia, calling on Arafat to accept his resignation - which would result in the dispersion of the cabinet - and to appoint a government empowered to carry out reforms. The vote passed 43-4.

"If we can't restore public order and law ... this will bring the greatest damage to the Palestinian people and their cause," PA Minister Saeb Erekat said Wednesday. "It's the whole social fabric that is collapsing now."

Meanwhile, a Hamas leader telephoned senior Palestinian officials in the West Bank to urge calm in the midst of a security crisis, the group said in a statement Wednesday.

Hamas said Khaled Mashaal talked with Arafat and his former Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas about the internal Palestinian standoff.

"The continuation of this course is dangerous to the Palestinian people and their just cause," Mashaal warned, according to the statement.

Mashaal called for the need for "a wise leadership handling to get out of this turmoil and for resorting to dialogue as a means to solve differences between" Palestinians, the statement said.

"We ought not to give the Zionist entity a chance to get out of the political crisis it currently experiences, especially in these circumstances through which this entity's relations are subjected to international criticism," the statement quoted Mashaal as telling Arafat and Abbas.

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