Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat will run for re-election in January, a senior aide said yesterday despite a call by U.S. President George W. Bush for a new Palestinian leadership.

　　Asked if Arafat would run again, Palestinian Planning Minister Nabil Shaath said: "Yes, absolutely." He said Arafat had told him directly.

　　Presidential and parliamentary elections will be held in mid-January, senior Palestinian official Saeb Erekat announced yesterday along with plans to overhaul Palestinian financial and security institutions, reported The Associated Press.

　　The announcement came two days after Bush called on Palestinians to elect a leadership other than that of Yasser Arafat - one "not compromised by terror" and called for democratic and institutional reforms as well as elections as conditions for an eventual provisional Palestinian state.

　　Erekat also said municipal elections - the first ever - would be held in March 2003, and that the Palestinian Finance Ministry would be overhauled. He also said the judicial system would be reformed, and that the appointment of "competent judges" would take place by September 2002.

　　On Monday, Bush urged the Palestinians to overhaul the Palestinian Authority, to rid it of corruption, create a legislature with real powers and establish an independent judiciary.

　　Israel was maintaining its grip over West Bank towns yesterday, confining at least 700,000 Palestinians to their homes under curfew orders, in a drive Arafat called a "premeditated assault against the Palestinian people and its leadership."

　　With Israeli forces holding seven of the eight main Palestinian population centers, including Ramallah,swheresArafat's own headquarters compound was surrounded by Israeli tanks, Arafat charged that the Israelis were trying to overthrow his regime and retake the West Bank while "justifying their actions by falsely describing them as attacks against terror." He was quoted by the Palestinian Wafa news agency.

　　Israeli forces movedsintosthe southern West Bank city of Hebron early on Tuesday, surrounding the hilltop Palestinian government compound, killing four Palestinian policeman in exchanges of fire, imposing a curfew and making dozens of arrests.

　　The army said yesterday that five wanted Palestinians were arrested in Dura, a village near Hebron. Two other Palestinians were arrested in Hebron and Tubas, in the Jenin area.

　　Palestinians detonated explosive devices aimed at Israeli troops in Nablus and fired four mortar shells at a Jewish settlement in Gaza Strip, the army said. No injuries were reported.

　　In related news, a Belgian appeals court ruled yesterday that Belgium cannot investigate war crimes charges against Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon related to a 1982 massacre in two Palestinian refugee camps.

　　The three-judge panel said a case could not proceed against a person who is not in Belgium, despite a 1993 Belgian law granting Belgian courts "universal jurisdiction" over war crimes committed anywhere.