950828

Israel hands

Palestinian offices

closure orders

JERUSALEM: Israeli police on Monday began handing closure orders to three Palestinian offices in Arab East Jerusalem which it said were linked to the Palestinian self-rule Authority.

Radwan Abu Ayyash, head of the Palestinian Broadcasting Corporation (PBC), said Israeli police handed him an order to close down his private press office within four days. Israel said he was using the premises for PBC business.

On Sunday Israel police spokesman Eric Bar-Chen said the PBC, the Central Bureau of Statistics and the Palestinian Council of Health would be handed warning letters on Monday.

Under the 1993 Israel-PLO peace deal, the authority must restrict its activities to areas under Palestinian self-rule -- currently the Gaza Strip and West Bank enclave of Jericho.

PLO Chairman Yasser Arafat on Monday slammed Israel's closure orders as a violation of the 1993 PLO-Israel interim peace accord.

"It's completely against the agreement. Especially that those three centres are very old centres, (from) even before our Palestinian Authority and our arrival here in Gaza," Arafat told reporters in Gaza City.-Reuter