Abbas refuses to travel until Arafat ban is lifted

The new Palestinian Prime Minister, Mahmoud Abbas, insisted yesterday that he would refuse to take diplomatic trips abroad – including to the White House – until Israel lifted its travel ban on Yasser Arafat. The Palestinian President has been blockaded amid the rubble of his Ramallah headquarters for more than a year.

Mr Abbas, known by his nickname, Abu Mazen, said: "I will not leave the country and I will not visit anywhere before the siege imposed on President Arafat has been lifted and before he enjoys full freedom to move within the West Bank and Gaza and outside, without any obstacles to his return."

Ra'anan Gissin, a spokesman for Ariel Sharon, the Israeli Prime Minister, denied that Mr Arafat was under siege. "Arafat is free to go," he said. "The question is whether he's free to come back." The inference, for now at least, seemed to be that he was not.

"It's not a question of Arafat's itinerary," Mr Gissin said, "but where the Palestinians want to go. Are they willing to steer a different course and stop terrorist attacks on Israelis?" Mr Sharon slightly softened his boycott of Mr Arafat, saying he would not automatically refuse to meet any foreign minister who visited the Palestinian President. The Prime Minister's welcome mat would be rolled out on a "case-by-case" basis, but all visiting statesmen would be received by Silvan Shalom, the Foreign Minister.

Mr Sharon declined to meet Yoriko Kawaguchi, the Japan-ese Foreign Minister, who is seeing Mr Arafat, but she will have talks this week with Mr Shalom. President George Bush said he would invite Mr Abbas to the White House. The Americans, who have refused to send even junior officials to meet Mr Arafat, are trying to build up Mr Abbas as an alternative, more pragmatic, focus of power.

The risk, of which the Palestinian Prime Minister is well aware, is that this will make him look an instrument in the US drive to reshape the Middle East. After the humiliation of Saddam Hussein, a hero on the Palestinian street, he cannot afford to be either America's man or Israel's. Mr Abbas is still fighting to persuade the Palestinian Legislative Council, which meets in Ramallah tomorrow, to ratify his new cabinet.