Rice meets Palestinian Authority's non-Hamas finance minister
U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice met Tuesday with Palestinian Finance Minister Salam Fayyad. The Washington meeting was the highest contact yet with a member of the new Palestinian unity government.
A U.S. State Department spokesman said Rice met Fayyad while he was holding talks in a private capacity with assistant secretary of state David Welch. The spokesman did not provide details of the discussions other than to say they dealt with matters Fayyad is currently undertaking.
The Bush administration has refused to lift an aid and diplomatic boycott of the Palestinian government because of the participation of Hamas ministers. But in a policy shift Washington has agreed to have dealings with non-Hamas members of the administration