TEL AVIV, Jan 12: In a rare visit to the Jewish state on Monday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Amr Mussa slammed the Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for bringing the Middle East peace process `to a standstill.'But after talks with Mussa - his first since taking office in October last year - Israeli Foreign Minister Ariel Sharon insisted there was still scope for progress in the peace process.``I came to reaffirm a message of peace from President (Hosni) Mubarak for the last year of the millennium,'' Mussa told around 150 international dignitaries gathered for a peace conference organized by the Peres Centre for Peace.But Netanyahu's policies over his two-and-a-half years in power have Left the peace process `in a crisis', Mussa said. ``We spent this time trying to get previous agreements implemented, and this is a period of failure,'' he saidThe Palestinians and their Arab supporters regularly complain that the two agreements Netanyahu signed with the Palestinians in January1997 and October last year dealt with issues already covered by previous accords.``Let me be clear - the current situation is untenable, this is a disastrous road,'' Mussa said. ``This policy of procrastination - adding conditions to agreements - is distorting the relationship of peace and security and demonstrating disrespect to other countries.''Netanyahu last month froze implementation of October's Wye River peace agreement until the Palestinians meet a series of Israeli demands. His decision prompted anger from the Palestinians and criticism from the United States as some of the demands go beyond the requirements of the Wye agreement.Mussa set out five principles which he said Israel needed to respect for there to be real peace in the region - implementation of the Wye agreement, resumption of so-called final-status talks on a permanent settlement with the Palestinians, resumption of talks with Lebanon and Syria and multilateral cooperation with all its Arab neighbours.
