JERUSALEM - Russia denied Thursday it was planning a full-scale Middle East peace conference in the autumn after the idea was cold-shouldered by Israel and the United States.
Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who is accompanying President Vladimir Putin on an historic trip to Israel, said the Russian's leader's proposal had been misunderstood and "twisted" by the media.
"There was a misunderstanding of course," Lavrov told reporters.
"It was said that President Putin suggested holding a summit in Moscow on the Middle East. But this was not proposed.
"What he offered was to think of holding in Moscow, in the context of the continuing Palestinian-Israeli resolution process, a meeting of high-level experts in Moscow. There is nothing unusual in this."
Putin said on a visit to Cairo on Wednesday that Russia planned to organize an international conference on the Middle East later this year.
"We propose the convening of an international conference in Moscow next autumn with the participation of all concerned parties and the quartet," Putin said at a joint news conference with Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak.
The so-called diplomatic quartet, grouping Russia, the United States, the European Union and the United Nations, drafted a Middle East peace plan known as the roadmap which calls for a Palestinian state alongside a secure Israel.
While the concept of an international peace conference involving the quartet is included in the roadmap, a source in Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's office said it was far too premature to consider such a meeting.
"Holding an international conference is only scheduled in the second phase of the roadmap. We are not even at the first stage which requires the Palestinians to dismantle terrorist organisations," he told AFP.
There were similar doubts in Washington, which is Israel's main ally.
"We believe there will be an appropriate time for an international conference, but we are not at that stage now, and I don't expect that we will be there by the fall (autumn)," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.
But the Palestinians were enthusiastic. Such a conference would help "rapid implementation of the roadmap," deputy prime minister Nabil Shaath told AFP.
Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit on Thursday also welcomed the proposal. "Egypt believes it is a good idea and may help in its preparations," he told reporters.
"This is a reasonable proposal which must be discussed so that the concerned parties do not refuse it outright," Abul Gheit said.
04/28/2005 17:46 GMT