The Netherlands Foreign Minister Christoph van der Klaauw is expected to receive a cool reception when he visits Israel next month and will hear vehement protests from Premier Menachem Begin and Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir over his meeting with Palestine Liberation Organization chief Yasir Arafat in Beirut 10 days ago.
Van der Klaauw will be in Israel from May 12-14 in his capacity as chairman of the Council of Ministers of the European Economic Community (EEC). He had met with Arafat and top PLO lieutenants in the same capacity, though he was accompanied by officials of the Dutch Foreign Ministry. His visit here will be his second to the Middle East within the course of a month to report on the current situation and the prospects of the European peace initiative to which
Israel is adamantly opposed. The report van der Klaauw submits to the Council of Ministers is expected to determine the course of the European initiative in the months ahead. Israel objects to the EEC initiative on many grounds, particularly its advocacy of PLO “association” in the Mideast peace process. Begin and Shamir are expected to tell the Dutch diplomat that his meeting with Arafat disturbed the political process and reduced the prospects for peace in the region.
Vander Klaauw was in Egypt last weekend for talks with President Anwar Sadat and Foreign Minister Butros Ghali. According to reports from Cairo, he told them that the U.S. is showing more understanding of the European initiative and that the U.S. and Europe are drawing closer on the issue.
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