Quartet peace mediators delay meeting

United Nations & Washington: Plans for a meeting of the quartet of major-power Middle East mediators later this month have been indefinitely postponed due to a scheduling conflict, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said on Thursday.

The quartet of the United States, Russia, the United Nations and the European Union, seeking to resuscitate the near-dead Middle East peace process, had tentatively been set to meet on January 25 in Paris on the sidelines of an international conference on the reconstruction of Lebanon.

"But we found there was a scheduling conflict, and we are now pushing to have that quartet meeting convene as soon as possible," Ban told a news conference at UN headquarters.

"It is very important to re-energise the process at this time, to help facilitate the peace process in the Middle East," Ban said.

He was consulting with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and EU officials on a new date and meeting plans, but he could not yet say when or where the quartet meeting would be rescheduled, he said.

Russian UN Ambassador Vitaly Churkin called the delay "regrettable" and said Moscow was not to blame for the scheduling conflict.

The Russian foreign minister "was very eager to have this meeting of the quartet. It is our position that the quartet must be more active and meet more regularly and meet with the important actors in this conflict," Churkin told reporters.

A UN source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Quartet meeting was rescheduled for early February, probably in another city.

Since 2003, the Quartet has been backing a "roadmap" for peace which calls for the creation of an independent Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, but the plan has been stalled.

Maenwhile, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice leaves for the Middle East on Friday hoping to increase pressure on Iran, which Washington accuses of destabilising Iraq.

Rice departs on Friday evening for talks on Saturday and Sunday in Israel and the Palestinian territories, before travelling to Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait.

Her visit to Kuwait will include a meeting with foreign ministers from the Gulf states of Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Qatar and Bahrain, as well as Egypt and Jordan. Rice, seeking to counter Iran's role in the region, has met with the same Arab governments three times since September, in New York, Cairo and Jordan.

She will wrap up her tour in Berlin and London before returning to Washington on January 19.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said Rice's trip would be "more about laying the foundations for potential future actions than actually coming to closure on any particular agreements."

The focus on Iran could overshadow efforts to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, not the first time the issue has received a lower priority during President George W. Bush's tenure.

The top US diplomat had promised last month to redouble efforts to revive the Mideast peace process and Bush conveyed the same message last week to German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

But on the eve of her departure, Rice said the main goal of her trip was to counter Iranian influence and promote the Bush administration's new strategy in Iraq, which includes the deployment of an extra 21,500 US troops, bolstering reconstruction aid and sending Patriot missile defense systems to the region to protect moderate Arab allies.

"What we are ... looking at is the need to solidify the consensus, the interest of these states that all fear Iran's moves in the region, fear the regional aggression of Iran," Rice said.

"I don't want to speculate on what kinds of operations the United States may be engaged in, but I think you will see that the United States is not going to simply stand idly by and let these activities continue," she said.

Rice's warning coincided with a US operation in the northern Iraqi city of Arbil, where the American military detained six Iranians. Tehran denounced the action as an attack on one of its consulates.

With tension between the United States and Iran mounting, Washington also announced Thursday it had stepped up the US military presence in the region, with two aircraft carrier battle groups due to stay in the Gulf for several months.

It was the first time Washington had moved two carriers to the region since 2003, when the United States invaded Iraq, a US military official said.