Visiting British Minister of State of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office Kim Howells said Tuesday that his country considered the two-state solution as the best means to achieve peace in the Middle East.
Howells made the remarks during his talks with Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit one day before Abul Gheit's visit to Israel aimed to push forward the stalled Middle East peace process, Egypt's Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Howells, who arrived here earlier in the day, also hailed the appointment of former British Prime Minister Tony Blair as a Middle East peace envoy of the international Quartet (the UN, the EU, the U.S. and Russia) as a positive step to revive peace efforts and restructure the Palestinian economy.
On U.S. President George W. Bush's proposal to reactivate the stalled Mideast peace process along with arrangements for an international conference, Howells expressed welcome to any meeting that would enable the parties concerned to openly discuss the challenges and potential solutions to the problems.
For his part, Abul Gheit stressed the importance of pushing forward the Middle East peace process to realize the hopes of the Palestinian people for establishing a Palestinian state, according to Egyptian Foreign Ministry spokesman Alaa el-Hadidi.
Abul Gheit told Howells that achieving Mideast peace would not be an easy mission due to tremendous challenges on the ground.
The two officials also discussed conditions in the western Sudanese region of Darfur and Afghanistan, as well as bilateral relations, said the spokesman.
Howells is on a two-day visit to Egypt as part of a regional tour which has taken him to Jordan and will also take him to Libya.
Source: Xinhua
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