Washington, December 21, SPA -- U.S. President George W. Bush has met Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and said that Middle East peace talks are a difficult but “irreversible” process. “No question this is a hard challenge, but nevertheless, people must recognize that we have made a good deal of progress, " Bush said at the White House a month before he leaves office without the peace deal he had hoped to broker when he revived Israeli-Palestinian negotiations in Annapolis, Maryland in November 2007. “I was pleased to note that the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution which confirms that the bilateral negotiation process is irreversible and it’s a path to a Palestinian state and a path to peace in the Middle East,” Bush told reporters yesterday.--MORE www.spa.gov.sa/618039