Bethlehem – Ma’an/Agencies – President Mahmoud Abbas arrived in Argentina for talks on the now comatose Middle East peace process on Sunday, on a visit overshadowed by Iranian leader Mahmoud Ahadinejad’s visit to neighboring Brazil.

Abbas was to meet with his argentine counterpart Cristina Fernandez on Monday. Last week Fernandez told visiting Israeli President Peres her government favors the creation of a Palestinian state.

Palestinian-Israeli peace talks were broken off in December 2008 when Israel launched a three-week war on the Gaza Strip that ultimately left more than 1,400 Palestinians dead. Abbas recently rejected an Israeli offer to resume talks on the grounds that Israel must halt the expansion of settlements on land taken from Palestinians.

During his meeting with Fernandez, Abbas praised Argentina for voting in support of a UN-mandated investigation into the war. “We thank Argentina for their continuous support and for voting for the Goldstone report,” he said.

He also urged Argentina to pressure Israel to halt the construction of West Bank settlements: “We need everyone who can to say to the Israeli authority that they are mistaken, that they are doing wrong to Palestinians and that they should revise their policy and stop settlement activity.”

"They [Israel] should implement the international decisions, especially the Road Map, and then we can continue final status negotiations, because there is no peace with occupation and settlements."

"To achieve peace we need to end the occupation that happened in the 1967, and the establishment of the Palestinian State and Jerusalem its capital," he added.

Iranian connection

While in Brazil last week, Abbas asked President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva to persuade Iran to cease support for his main Palestinian rival, the Hamas movement, which won parliamentary elections in 2006.

"Iran supports Hamas with money. Hamas' decisions are in the hands of Tehran," Abbas said on Friday in an interview with the Brazilian daily Folha de Sao Paulo.

"I hope [Lula] can tell [Ahmadinejad] a few things about everything that is happening in the Middle East. I think the president will," Abbas was quoted as saying.

Israel’s archenemy, Iran is thought to be a key backer of Hamas. As a key Middle East state, Ahmadinejad is in Brazil seeking support amid growing isolation resulting from the country’s standoff with the west over its atomic energy program.

While Abbas continued his overseas tour to salvage, Iran’s ally Hamas was reportedly poised to conclude a prisoner exchange with Israel that would involve the release of more than 1,000 Palestinians from Israeli prisons. If an exchange takes place it would amount to a massive strategic victory for Hamas.

’Argentina backs Palestine’

Argentina’s foreign ministry said Abbas visit “will offer the opportunity of exchanging the countries point of views on regards the Middle East regional situation, as well the negotiations carried out so far by both Palestinians and Israelis, and the possibility of Argentina’s cooperation for the region."

In the same communiqué, Foreign Minister Jorge Taiana said, "Argentina has always supported the peace-making processes intended to resolve the Middle East conflict, and to guarantee the inalienable right of the people of Palestine to constitute an independent state," according to the Buenos Aires Herald.

On Tuesday, Abbas is expected to meet with Argentina's top lawmakers at the Congress, visit the Islamic Center and give a speech at the Argentine Council of International Relations.

Abbas is accompanied on his two-day visit to Argentina by foreign minister Riad Al-Maliki and Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat.