Israeli prisoner release not enough - Palestinian official

The Palestinian Authority has welcomed Israel's announcement that it will release 23 prisoners as a goodwill gesture to mark the holy month of Ramadan, but called for the release of thousands more prisoners it says are eligible for release under agreements already reached.

"Such a development would be a cause for jubilation and happiness for all Palestinians," Hisham Abd al-Rizaq, the official in charge of the prisoners issue, said in comments broadcast by Palestinian radio.

He said the authority wanted "Israel to comply with the Palestinian-Israeli accord, which provides for freeing Palestinian prisoners and completing this process during the final-status negotiations" .

"There are parameters that Israel must have upheld during the first and second phases of redeployment.

However, Israel has failed to honour most of the provisions of the Palestinian-Israeli accord in full," Abd al-Rizaq said.

"Consequently, thousands of Palestinian prisoners who are eligible for release under the agreement are still languishing in jail.

Given all of the above, I urge the Israeli government to comply with the Palestinian-Israeli agreement provisions concerning the release of prisoners and detainees."

BBC Monitoring (http://www.monitor.bbc.co.uk), based in Caversham in southern England, selects and translates information from radio, television, press, news agencies and the Internet from 150 countries in more than 70 languages.