May 30, 2002	Thursday	Rabi-ul-Awwal 17,1423

RAMALLAH, May 29: Yasser Arafat is to announce a major reform of his unwieldy and rival security services within 72 hours at the most, senior Palestinian security officials said on Wednesday.

The Palestinian leader is set to unveil a new security struture and redefine the mission of its branches, but still has not decided on who will be running them, the sources said.

“These security reforms come eight years after the establishment of the Palestinian Authority,” General Abdel Razaq al-Majaida, head of national security for the Gaza Strip, said in an interview in the West Bank town of Ramallah.

“We have gone through many experiences, and now it is necessary to reevaluate things in this new phase and organize the Palestinian security forces to face the future,” he said.

The sprawling structures, slammed by Israel and the United States for not only failing to prevent anti-Israeli attacks but sometimes abetting them, are expected to be cut down to four branches from around a dozen now.

Officials have said each branch, instead of having a West Bank and Gaza structure, will be unified under one command, placed under a sole supreme commander, with all the chiefs united in a national security council, for improved transparency and accountability.

Majaida said reforms were needed so security departments would have a firm legal grounding to carry out their work amid the chaos of the 20 months of fighting between Israel and the Palestinians, which has left them confused and in disarray.

But he said Arafat had yet to decide on who would be taking the top jobs.—AFP