CAIRO, May 10 (Xinhua) -- Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit on Thursday reiterated the aims of the Arab Peace Initiative to achieve a comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace in return for normalization of ties with Israel.

    Abul Gheit made the remarks at a joint press conference with his Israeli and Jordanian counterparts Tzipi Livni and Abdel Illahal-Khatib respectively after their three-way meeting here earlier in the day, noting that the Arab side was represented by the Palestinians, Syrians and Lebanese to seek the comprehensive Arab-Israeli peace.

    The three-way meeting tackled the efforts by the Arab League (AL) to push forward the stalled Mideast peace process, several Arab concepts and the Israeli stand as regards the Arab Peace Initiative reactivated in late March by Arab leaders, Abul Gheit said.

    Meanwhile, Livni said that the Arab world could play a key role to help the Palestinians and Israelis realize peace, terming Thursday's preparatory meeting with the AL's representatives as "very good" with the next meeting of this kind to be held in Israel.

    For his part, al-Khatib noted that the three-way meeting was held in line with an assignment by the Riyadh Arab summit in late March on forming a committee to follow up the Arab Peace Initiative, which entrusted Egypt and Jordan, the two Arab countries having ties with Israel, and holding direct contacts with Israel to express the Arab stance on the Arab Peace Initiative.

    The meeting is the first direct contact with Israel by the Arab group tasked with following up the Arab Peace Initiative.

    The Arab Peace Initiative, first approved by the AL in its 2002 Beirut summit, calls for Israel's pullout from Arab land occupied in the 1967 Middle East War and the establishment of an independent Palestinian state in return for the normalization of ties with Arab states.

    However, Israel had rejected the initiative after it was first launched in 2002, but the Jewish state has recently said it could provide a basis for talks though there are amendments to the refugee issue.