Israeli Vice Premier Shimon Peres met a top aide to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, and the prime minister of Poland, during his official visit to West Germany last weekend, in addition to holding apparently successful economic talks here in his capacity as finance minister.
Valentin Falin, a policy adviser to Gorbachev, assured Peres at a meeting Sunday that Moscow has no hostile intentions whatever toward Israel.
But he maintained that the Israeli government failed to read the political map of the Middle East properly, including the role of his country in the region.
He stressed that the Soviet Union is eager to work for a settlement that would satisfy the needs of all parties for independence and security.
Falin did not rule out the idea of direct flights between Moscow and Tel Aviv to carry Jewish immigrants to Israel. “This is not impossible,” he told Peres.
Peres was told by Prime Minister Mieczyslaw Rakowski of Poland that Warsaw wants to upgrade economic ties with Israel and expand tourism between the two countries.
He told Peres he wanted his minister of agriculture to visit Israel soon.
Peres also spoke with President Francois Mitterrand of France, who assured him his country has no intention of recognizing the independent Palestinian state proclaimed by the Palestine Liberation Organization.
At the same time, France cannot disregard the PLO’s recent shift in positions, Mitterrand said.
West German Foreign Minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher denied reports that he intends to meet soon with PLO chief Yasir Arafat or invite him to Bonn.
DEBTS AND REPARATIONS
Peres’ lengthy talks with Bonn Finance Minister Gerhard Stoltenberg last Friday focused on two major concerns: the retirement of Israel’s considerable debt to the Federal Republic and payments to Holocaust survivors who were unable to file reparations claims before the deadline years ago.
In that connection, Peres stressed that West Germany has already fulfilled all of its obligations in compliance with the reparations agreements concluded in the early 1950s.
Nevertheless, he said, Bonn, though under no legal obligation, has promised to consider an Israeli request to make available some $39 million a year for the survivors who currently are paid a pension by the Israeli government.
West Germany is the only country apart from the United States that makes available yearly development loans to Israel.
This has been going on for 20 years and Israel now owes about $134 million to Bonn.
During Peres’ talks with Stoltenberg, Chancellor Helmut Kohl and Minister for Economic Cooperation Hans Klein, the Germans appeared to agree to Jerusalem’s request that yearly debts of nearly $56 million be invested in Israel rather than paid back to West Germany.
Last week, Bonn lowered the interest rate on Israel’s loans from 4.3 percent to 2.5 percent.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
