DAMASCUS, Syria, Jan. 21 (UPI) -- A Syrian minister said Wednesday her country will not restart peace negotiations with Israel from scratch.
Bouthaina Shaaban, minister of Immigrants Affairs, told the Dubai-based al-Arabiya satellite television Syria could not restart negotiations from point zero as Israel is requesting, especially since agreement on 80 percent of controversial issues was reached in the talks that ended in 2000.
Only the border between Syria and Israel after israel's withdrawal from the Syrian Golan Heights was missing from the agreement, she said.
She said late Syrian President Hafez Assad spent hundreds of hours studying the data in the U.S. peace initiative based on trading land for peace and future negotiations could only be directed by peace guidelines included in that initiative.
"The problem lies with the Israeli side as (Israeli Premier) Ariel Sharon insists on keeping up his policy of violence, escalation, occupation and displacement of Palestinians," she said, blaming Israel's policies for obstructing the resumption of peace negotiations.
