U.S. Envoy Meets Hussein, Peres in New Peace Effort

JERUSALEM —  U.S. Middle East special envoy Richard W. Murphy returned to Israel on Tuesday night after meeting with King Hussein in Jordan amid reports that he is on a mission to draft an Israeli-Egyptian-Jordanian peace declaration.

Murphy met Tuesday night with Prime Minister Shimon Peres and discussed his talks with Hussein. The U.S. official planned talks this morning with Foreign Minister Yitzhak Shamir before heading for Cairo for a meeting with Egyptian officials, Israeli Foreign Ministry officials said.

Murphy had been scheduled to fly to Egypt after the Hussein meeting. His latest diplomatic mission began Monday when the assistant secretary of state met in Jerusalem with Peres.

In Amman, the official news agency Petra said Hussein told Murphy that only an international conference--including the five permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, the United States, Soviet Union, China, Britain and France--could bring peace.

Diplomatic sources said Murphy’s trip followed renewed Soviet interest in settling the Arab-Israeli conflict. Soviet Deputy Foreign Minister Yuri M. Vorontsov, who visited Syria and Jordan last week, hinted at a “significant change” in the Kremlin’s Middle East policy but did not elaborate.