These are are excerpts from editorials in newspapers from around the world that may be of interest to Royal Gazette readers:

Haaretz, Tel Aviv, Israel, on a Saudi peace initiative:

Belatedly, the country's leaders have woken up to the potential importance of the recent proposal by the Saudi crown prince that in exchange for an Israeli withdrawal from the territories and the establishment of a Palestinian state, Arab states would sign peace treaties with Israel and conduct normal diplomatic and commercial ties with the Jewish state. The first to find this rare Saudi initiative both interesting and positive was Foreign Minister Shimon Peres. Justice Minister Meir Sheetrit suggested inviting Crown Prince Abdullah to Israel. President Moshe Katsav proposed he go to Saudi Arabia. Prime Minister Ariel Sharon said he would try to find channels of communication with the Saudis to learn more details about the plan "and to make clear to them Israel's position." ...

By definition, since the crown prince has had no direct communication with Israel, these positions should be regarded as opening positions in a dialogue that might yet take place. ...

The prime minister, who promised to bring peace and security, must undertake a sincere and serious examination of the significance of the Saudi initiative and its ramifications. Sharon regards a leader's determination and cool-headedness in the face of a violent enemy as the test of leadership. But as Menachem Begin and Yitzhak Rabin each demonstrated, a creative and unexpected diplomatic initiative can also be the test of destiny for a leader.

The Times, London, on the French presidential election:

Presidential elections in France are won on the centre ground. The first round will eliminate the other 17 challengers, including Jean-Pierre Chevenement and Alain Madelin who alone may be able to awaken interest in the torpid contest. But all know that the second round will be a rerun of the 1995 election. Only this time Jospin has less freedom of manoeuvre than his incumbent rival. He must run still as the Socialist challenger, whereas Chirac is almost free of party constraint. The Right has imploded, and the "Union in Movement", as the embryonic pro-Chirac grouping is known, has almost no political programme apart from Jospin's defeat. To capture the centre, Jospin would like to play down "socialism" and emphasise "modernism". The difficulty is that his party will not let him do so; and his professorial manner hardly makes such a conversion convincing. He must therefore strike out at his rival's record, underlining Chirac's passivity as President and the allegations of corruption and sleaze. Infuriatingly, opinion polls show that most voters are little troubled by either. What they care most about is law and order, an issue where the right is seen to have a natural advantage. The contest is so close that it will probably be decided by the campaign itself. The difficulty is getting anyone to take an interest.

The Independent, London, on the Zimbabwe presidential election:

Less than two weeks before the voters of Zimbabwe go to the polls, it appears to be dawning on President Robert Mugabe that brutal intimidation, censorship of the media and rabid "anti-imperialist" bombast may not be sufficient to guarantee him re-election. This is one inference — perhaps the most hopeful one — that can be drawn from the arrest yesterday of the country's main opposition leader, Morgan Tsvangirai. ... The evidence on which the charges are based seems equally spurious. It is contained in a mysterious video broadcast on Australian television, which purports to show Mr. Tsvangirai in talks to arrange the "elimination" of Mr. Mugabe. The video, which bore all the hallmarks of having been heavily edited, if not doctored, has been extensively replayed and reported in the state-controlled Zimbabwe media.

Again, the aim appears to be not to prevent Mr Tsvangirai from competing for the presidency, but to discredit him with the voters; to do everything to render the opposition unelectable, while still going through the motions of an election. ... The glimmer of hope in Zimbabwe's pervasive political gloom is that the voters may be courageous enough to scorn the coercion. The more desperate the actions of Mr. Mugabe, the more brightly that hope shines through.