EU's Solana welcomes Mideast envoy Mitchell
(BRUSSELS) - EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana warmly welcomed Thursday the naming of former senator George Mitchell as the new US special envoy to the Middle East.
"The HR (Solana - the EU high representative for foreign affairs) looks forward to working very closely with the US Special Envoy Mitchell," said a statement issued in Brussels.
US President Barack Obama had earlier told a press conference in Washington he would send Mitchell to the region "as soon as possible" to ensure a "durable" and "sustainable" ceasefire in Gaza.
Mitchell, 75, is renowned for negotiating the 1998 Good Friday agreement that helped bring peace to Northern Ireland.
His peace efforts in the Middle East were less successful. In 2000 he was charged with presiding over the committee bearing his name and finding ways of ending violence between Israelis and Palestinians.
In his report submitted in 2001 he called on both sides to take immediate measures to unconditionally end the violence but his calls went unheeded.
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