PLO leader shot dead in Lebanon

SIDON (Agencies) - Gunmen shot and killed the top official in Lebanon of Fatah, the faction led by Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organisation, security sources said. Mouin Shabaytah died in hospital after being hit by seven bullets when his car was riddled by sub-machine-gun fire in the port city of Sidon, 40km (25 miles) south of Beirut. The unidentified assailants fled and there was no immediate claim of responsibility.

Shabaytah, 58, was the second senior Fatah official to be shot in south Lebanon in less than a week. It is not clear whether the killers were rejectionist opponents of Mr Arafat's peace accord with Israel.

On the Israeli-occupied West Bank, a Jewish settler shot and killed a Palestinian who had attacked him with an axe. The assault took place in Hebron, a town which is held as holy by both Muslims and Jews as the burial place of Abraham. Military officials said the settler was returning from prayers at the Tomb of the Patriarchs when he was set upon by two Palestinians carrying axes. Despite a serious head wound he managed to open fire with a pistol, killing one of his attackers.

The second Palestinian then struck the settler several more times with his axe, forcing him to drop the pistol, which his assailant seized and fled, the military sources said.

In Tunis, Fatah said yesterday that the future Palestinian state would be based on pluralist democracy and a free-market economy. Fatah's 107-strong Revolutionary Council endorsed the principles at a weekend meeting chaired by Mr Arafat, the PLO news agency Wafa said.

Approving the accord between the PLO and Israel, the Council adopted a declaration highlighting the aims of the Palestinian National Authority, due to take control of Jericho in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip from Israel over a four-month period starting on 13 December.

Fatah is the driving force behind the Palestine Liberation Organisation's peace deal with Israel. Its line, adopted with Mr Arafat's blessing, generally prevails within the PLO - even more since Marxist radical factions opposing any deal have been boycotting PLO institutions for months.

Extracts of the agreed principles include a society of 'freedom, egality, sovereignty of law . . . democracy and pluralism. The guarantee of freedoms including the freedom of opinion, of expression, of the press.' There is to be 'a free-market economy assuring social justice and favouring individual initiative' and a modern social security system for all.