WAM said King Abdullah of Jordan and Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khalifa ibn Zayed Al-Nahyan met here to review the threat against Iraq. Calling on Iraq to fully comply with UN resolutions, the two leaders said military strikes against Iraq were unwarranted. Military action would not only have grave consequences on the Iraqi people but would also threaten security and stability in the regio, they said in a joint statement.

In Muscat, Yussef ibn Alawi , Oman’s minister of state for foreign affairs yesterday called for a peaceful settlement in Iraq, which faces the threat of a US military strike aimed at toppling President Saddam Hussein, whom Washington accuses of developing weapons of mass destruction."It would be preferable to continue the dialogue between Iraq and the United Nations," he said. A July 4-5 round of talks between UN chief Kofi Annan and Iraqi Foreign Minister Naji Sabri in Vienna failed to produce agreement on the return of UN arms inspectors to Iraq.

Alawi’s remarks followed a two-day visit to Muscat by King Abdallah before his two-day UAE visit which began yesterday.

Alawi also said Oman backed the sending of a CIA-led team of intelligence experts to the Palestinian territories to help Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Authority overhaul its security apparatus. "We will support any effort aimed at resolving the crisis, normalizing the situation and helping the Authority reform Palestinian (institutions)," Alawi said, quoted by the official ONA news agency.

He was responding to a question about a proposal by the international diplomatic "quartet" on the Middle East which, according to quartet officials, plans to send a CIA-led team of intelligence experts from the region to assist with the reform of the Palestinian security apparatus.

Top officials from the quartet, comprising the United States, UN, European Union and Russia, met in New York on Tuesday and urged nations to support Palestinian democratic reforms leading up to the creation of a Palestinian state.