It is not known whether Qaddafi will take part personally in the summit

CAIRO, December 27 (IslamOnline & News Agencies) - Libya will attend the Arab summit slated for March 2003 in Bahrain, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher said Thursday, December 26, after a visit to Tripoli.

"The Libyan Jamahiriya will attend the summit in Bahrain," Maher told reporters, without specifying if Libyan leader Moamer Qaddafi, whom he met Wednesday, December 25, will take part personally, Agence France-Presse (AFP) said.

Earlier Thursday, Arab league spokesman Hisham Yussef said Libya's request to withdraw from the 22-member Arab League remained frozen.

"There is nothing new about the Libyan request and that means it is still frozen," Yussef said after Arab League Secretary General Amr Mussa visited Libya Monday, December 23.

During talks in Tripoli, Mussa had broached the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the U.S.-led showdown with Iraq as well as plans for an Arab summit in Bahrain in March, without discussing Libya's pullout request, Yussef said.

The remarks appeared to contradict those from Libya's minister for African Unity, Ali Abdel Salam Triki.

The Libyan official told AFP Wednesday he had informed Mussa that Tripoli would pull out "due to the continuing situation of deterioration in the Arab world."

However, Triki gave no date for such a withdrawal.

For his part, Qaddafi insisted Wednesday that he still planned to pull his nation out of the League, according to the official Jana news agency.

Libya will stick by its decision "as long as the League charter is not re-activated and respected in a way that guarantees effective Arab action against the dangers facing the Arab world," he was quoted as saying.

Libya announced October 24 it wanted to quit the organization for failing to do much to stop Israel's aggressions against the Palestinians and U.S. threats of war against Iraq.

At the time, Mussa was only able to secure a freeze from Qaddafi on his decision to quit the League.