Israeli PM To Visit Turkey, With Syria On Agenda

Olmert remains Israel`s caretaker premier until a new government is formed after a February election.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan will meet on Monday in Ankara to discuss Israel's indirect peace talks with Syria and other issues, officials said on Thursday.

Turkey has been mediating the indirect talks but they were suspended earlier this year after Olmert announced his resignation over a corruption scandal.

Olmert remains Israel's caretaker premier until a new government is formed after a February election.

"Prime Minister Olmert spoke yesterday to the Turkish prime minister and they agreed to meet on Monday in Ankara," said Mark Regev, Olmert's spokesman. "The meeting will deal with bilateral issues as well as regional issues, including the political processes in the region."

An Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said indirect peace talks with Syria will be high on the agenda during the Olmert-Erdogan meeting.

"It's possible that there will be another round but it has not been decided," the official said of the Israeli-Syrian track.

The two countries held almost 10 years of direct talks under U.S. supervision which collapsed in 2000 over the scope of a proposed Israeli withdrawal from the Golan Heights.

Israel captured the plateau in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it more than a decade later -- a move rejected by the United Nations.