Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak met on Tuesday with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas ahead of a tripartite meeting about the Middle East peace process.

The Mubarak-Abbas meeting discussed latest developments in the running Israeli-Palestinian direct negotiations, which kicked off on Sept. 2 in Washington and ended a 20-month deadlock.

Prior to the meeting with Abbas, Mubarak had held talks with U. S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The second round of direct talks here on Tuesday is the first to take place in the region after the restart in nearly two years.