Palestinians renew demand for prisoner releases

Palestinian Security Minister Mohammad Dahlan urged Israel yesterday to release thousands of Palestinian prisoners and withdraw from more occupied areas, saying this was "vital" to bolster a shaky truce with militants.

Dahlan said he would raise the issue in a meeting yesterday with Israeli Defence Minister Shaul Mofaz.

The main Palestinian militant group Hamas has warned the three-month truce declared under intense international pressure to further a US-backed "road map" to peace would unravel if Israel did not loosen criteria under which prisoners could go free.

Dahlan said Israel's failure to free prisoners had led Prime Minister Mahmoud Abbas to cancel a meeting with his Israeli counterpart Ariel Sharon on Wednesday.

"We are calling for the release of all Palestinian prisoners and especially those prisoners who spent long years in prisons, including the ill and the elderly," Dahlan, minister of state for security affairs, told reporters after a meeting with Egyptian mediators in Gaza.

Up to 8,000 Palestinians, including minors, have been arrested since an uprising for independence began in September 2000. The prisoner issue is one of the most emotional, affecting the lives of almost every Palestinian.

Dahlan noted the cases of 460 prisoners in jail for many years, and said: "There's no justification anymore for those staying in jail."

The Palestinian minister met with two Egyptian envoys sent by President Hosni Mubarak to bolster a temporary ceasefire declared June 29 by Palestinian militant groups.

The mediators won the agreement of four militant factions to stick to the truce shaken by Israel's refusal to release prisoners and end violence in the past week.