A senior Palestinian official has warned that any delay in Israel's next withdrawal from the West Bank could damage attempts to build trust between the two sides.

Israel said it had to postpone the pullout of troops from a further 6% of the occupied land because of a dispute over the areas to be handed over.

The third phase of the withdrawal programme was due to begin on 20 January under the terms of the interim peace agreement signed last September.

"We believe that the Israeli Government's decision is a blow to any attempt to revive the trust level between the two sides," Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said.

"Trust cannot be built by reaching an agreement where both sides decide on something and then one side decides on when and how to implement it alone," he said.

The Palestinians only heard about the delay through the media, despite the "long hours" spent by Palestinians officials at the negotiating table with their Israeli counterparts, Mr Erekat said.

The hand-over would place about 40% of the West Bank under Palestinian control.

Syrian delay

Reports from Israel say the latest stumbling block might not be resolved for several weeks as Prime Minister Ehud Barak is due to travel to the US for the next round of talks with Syria.

Syrian-Israeli negotiations are due to resume on Wednesday - although Syria on Sunday cast doubt on the schedule.

A Syrian Government spokesman in Damascus said the parties concerned were discussing the outlook for the peace process based on the assessment of the previous talks before taking a decision on a date for the next round.

However, a senior American official said the United States still expected the talks to begin on Wednesday as planned.

The Syrian-Israeli talks resumed last month, nearly four years after they were broken off.

Correspondents say there is concern in the Palestinian camp that their position would be further weakened by progress on the comparatively uncomplicated Syrian-Israeli track.

Mr Barak is also due to meet the Palestinian leader, Yasser Arafat, in Washington.

Parallel talks

The previous West Bank redeployment was also delayed, mired in disagreement almost until the moment that it happened.

Israel says it alone can decide which areas it should pull out from, while the Palestinians insist there should be discussion.

At the same time, parallel talks are going on between the Palestinians and the Israelis on a final status agreement to achieve a lasting peace by settling the most contentious issues.

The first deadline for a draft agreement on that comes up in a month. BBC correspondent Jeremy Bowen says the two sets of negotiations are supposed to be separate, but inevitably they overlap.