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Silence, secrecy and perseverance as peace talks move into fourthday

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Secretary of State Madeleine Albright meets with Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak at Camp David, Md. Thursday, July 13, 2000 during the Mideast summit. With a self-imposed deadline exactly two months away, President Clinton urged Barak and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat to set aside their differences and reconcile for the good of their people. (AP Photo/Ralph Alswang, The White House)

July 15, 2000 

THURMONT, Maryland (AP) - Entering a fourth day of Mideast negotiations at secluded Camp David, American mediators expressed dogged determination to move the talks forward - and an equally fervent desire to maintain a veil of secrecy over the proceedings.

"The goal here ... is to try to make these talks successful," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said after Secretary of State Madeleine Albright - sitting in Thursday for President Bill Clinton - met with senior negotiators from both sides and Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak.

Having extracted pledges of silence from summit participants, U.S. officials repeated with what has become their Camp David mantra: The less said about how things are going, the better.

"We are not trying to characterize optimism or pessimism at any given moment," Boucher said.

But on the sidelines of the talks, non-negotiators spoke freely, with the Palestinians' unofficial spokeswoman expressing pessimism as to whether any headway could be made.

"These are not easy issues," said Hanan Ashrawi, referring to the so-called core disputes - the status of Jerusalem, which both sides claim as their capital; the fate of more than 2 million Palestinian refugees displaced by the creation of the state of Israel; and the boundaries of any future Palestinian state.

"In terms of addressing Jerusalem and refugees and the boundaries, they still have not been resolved," Ashrawi said. "I doubt they will be successful in this time period."

Participants were working against a Sept. 13 deadline for signing an accord. The Palestinians have said they would declare statehood that day, treaty or no treaty.

The White House has said it does not want to impose any "artificial deadline" on the length of the summit, but Clinton is scheduled to leave Wednesday for a meeting in Japan of industrialized nations.

Diplomatic sources indicated the talks so far had been intensive and serious, but had not produced a breakthrough on any of the core issues.

U.S. spokesmen have said nothing about the substance of negotiations, alluding only to the fact that the two sides were "grappling" and "struggling" to resolve extremely difficult disputes.

Clinton was away from Camp David for about eight hours Thursday, handing off the role of lead mediator to Albright. Asked why the secretary met with Barak but not Arafat, Boucher said only that U.S. mediators were doing what they thought best to move the talks forward.

During his break from the talks, Clinton attended a White House signing ceremony for a U.S. trade agreement with Vietnam, where he expressed hopes that old enmities could be put aside in the Middle East as well.

"Former adversaries can come together to find common ground in a way that benefits all their people, to let go of the past and embrace the future, to forgive and to reconcile," he said before flying back to the presidential retreat for a group dinner and to spend the night.

Over the weekend, the pace of talks may be affected by the Jewish Sabbath, which begins at sundown Friday and ends at sundown Saturday, and the Muslim holy day, Friday.

"We are aware of the religious obligations of the parties as they make them known to us, and we will make sure that the plan of activities takes those into account," Boucher said, without elaborating.

It was unclear whether Palestinians would be able to go ahead with plans for a "leadership meeting," which would include three senior PLO officials - all sometime critics of Arafat - who traveled to the United States and are staying in the Washington area.

"I am not aware that there's been a request to bring in political leaders," said Boucher.

Arafat, seeking to build a broad base of support for any accord reached, brought a large entourage in addition to the negotiators in residence at Camp David, the Navy-run presidential retreat tucked away in the Catoctin Mountains 90 miles (140 kilometers) north of Washington.

Israel has added a delegate to its negotiating team, Boucher confirmed Thursday. Israeli officials identified him as Dan Meridor, the chairman of the committee in Israel's parliament that deals with military and foreign affairs.