Settlement expansion 'endangers' Mideast talks: Ashton

(CAIRO) - EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton said on Monday that Israel's decision to build new settler homes in east Jerusalem "endangers" indirect talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

"Recent Israeli decisions to build new housing units in east Jerusalem have endangered and undermined the tentative agreement to begin proximity talks," she said in Cairo where she addressed members of the Arab League.

"The EU position on settlements is clear. Settlements are illegal, constitute an obstacle to peace and threaten to make a two state-solution impossible," Ashton said.

Israel's interior ministry announced on Tuesday that 1,600 new homes for Jewish settlers would be built in predominantly Arab east Jerusalem, triggering fury among Arab and Palestinian leaders.

But Ashton said peace was nonetheless achievable.

"Peace is necessary, it is urgent and it is achievable. I am here to add the full weight of the European Union to reaching this goal," she said.

Israel's March 9 green light for the new construction in east Jerusalem's Ramat Shlomo raised doubts over the outlook for indirect peace talks the Palestinians had reluctantly agreed to hold with Israel just days earlier.

The announcement also came during a visit to Israel by US Vice President Joe Biden, dealing a heavy blow to months of US-led efforts to relaunch talks between Israel and the Palestinians.

Direct negotiations collapsed after Israel launched a devastating 22-day military offensive against the Islamist Hamas-run Gaza Strip aimed at halting Palestinian rocket fire.

Ashton is on a visit to Egypt as she begins a tour which will also take her to Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories and Syria before attending a meeting of the Middle East Quartet in Moscow.