Ambassador Gunnar Jarring had a 90-minute meeting today with Foreign Minister Abba Eban after earlier visits to Cairo and Amman. Authoritative diplomatic sources said after the talk that the UN special peace envoy regards his mission as continuing and that he did not yet plan to prepare his final report to Secretary General U Thant.
Dr. Jarring was expected to make another round of Arab capitals and may come to Jerusalem again next week. The same sources said that Egypt had rejected Jarring’s proposal for peace talks under his auspices on Cyprus but that Jordan’s rejection was “not so positive.”
The speech by Egyptian President Nasser in Cairo yesterday was described by these sources as representing a “grave hardening” of attitude. In offering aid to the Arab terrorists, Nasser spelled out for the first time what he meant by the word “struggle,” which he uses frequently in his speeches. He said struggle meant war. It was also the first time that he did not even mention the possibility of a political settlement with Israel.
The sources stressed that no one, including Dr. Jarring, had asked Israel to state its territorial aims until direct talks were started with the Arabs. The Israel position remains one of determination to maintain the present cease-fire lines until peace settlements are reached, with no discussion with third parties of any aspect of the substance of such settlements. They noted that the United States stands for the five-point program outlined by President Johnson last June which refers to the need for a peace agreement with secure, agreed-upon borders.
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