Prime Minister Gamal Abdel Nasser announced today that Egypt has ordered its troops to withdraw at least 500 meters from the Israel-Egyptian demarcation line along the Gaza coastal strip, it was reported from Cairo. Col Nasser said the order was in response to a Security Council resolution on easing regional tension.
Egypt is also erecting a barbed wire barrier at certain vital positions inside Egyptian controlled territory, Col. Nasser added. Between the barrier emplacements Egyptian troops will exercise full authority to interdict any infiltration from Israel he said Col Nasser took the action after discussing the matter with Gen. E. L. M. Burns, chief of the United Nations Truce Supervision Organization.
The Times of London, in a dispatch from Cairo commenting on Col. Nasser’s attitude, says that the Egyptian view of the erection of a barbed wire barricade is that it would give an “unwarrantable air of permanency and legality to the present demarcation line.”
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