Representatives of the "international quartet" that crafted the "roadmap" for Middle East peace will meet Friday in New York to try to revive the ailing peace plan, a spokesperson for visiting French President Jacques Chirac said late yesterday.

The quartet - the US, the European Union, the United Nations and Russia - will hold a ministerial-level meeting on the margins of the UN General Assembly, spokesperson Catherine Colonna said, after Chirac and UN Secretary General Kofi Annan held a working dinner here yesterday.

Chirac "hopes the quartet on Friday the 26th will arrive at concrete solutions, because the region needs political impetus and strong gestures favoring peace," Colonna said.

The roadmap calls for a cessation of violence, the disarming of Palestinian groups and a halt of Jewish settlement building ahead of the creation of a Palestinian state by the year 2005.

The internationally-backed plan has stalled since an upsurge in violence over the past few weeks.

Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat yesterday called on the quartet to take action without delay to get the roadmap back on track. – Sapa-AFP.