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April 18, 2008

Carter to Meet Hamas Leader in Syria 
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http://enews.voanews.com/t?ctl=1BF03F9:A6F02AD83191E1608028A5FB5213230F30EB2FA2E66CBB22& 
Former US president arrived in Damascus Friday for talks with Khaled Meshaal, Syrian President Bashar Assad 






Jimmy Carter (file photo)Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter is expected to meet with the exiled leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas in Syria, the latest stop on his regional tour.

Mr. Carter arrived in Damascus Friday for talks with Khaled Meshaal and Syrian President Bashar Assad.

The Nobel Prize winner says he intends to try to get Meshaal to agree to a peaceful resolution of differences with Israel and the Palestinian faction Fatah, a rival of Hamas.

Israel and the United States have criticized Mr. Carter for agreeing to meet with Hamas, which both countries consider a terrorist group.

But Mr. Carter says peace in Israel is impossible without engaging Hamas, which won parliamentary elections in 2006.

In a separate development, an Israeli Cabinet minister, Eli Yishai, has told Mr. Carter he wants to meet with Hamas to facilitate a prisoner exchange.

On Thursday, Mr. Carter met in Cairo with top Hamas leadership from the Gaza Strip. He says his primary request was for Palestinians to stop launching rockets at Israel.

Mr. Carter is on a regional tour to promote the Middle East peace process.

In the past week, he has met with Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad, a leading Hamas figure in the West Bank, Nasser Shaer, and Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.

Mr. Carter mediated the 1978 Camp David Accords that paved the way for peace between Israel and Egypt. He has taken positions critical of Israel in recent years. In a 2006 book, he described Israeli policies in the Palestinian territories as a "system of apartheid."



Some information for this report was provided by AP and Reuters.



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