Cairo  - Leaders of rival Palestinian groups Fatah and Hamas are to conduct separate meetings with Egyptian officials in Cairo on Saturday, to discuss reconciliation between their factions.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas is scheduled to meet with Egyptian President Hosny Mubarak, to discuss Cairo-mediated Hamas- Fatah reconciliation talks, as well as the Arab-Israeli peace process and Abbas' recent tour of European capitals.

Abbas, who arrived in Cairo on Saturday after his Paris visit where he met with French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, is scheduled to head to Saudi Arabia after his 2-day visit in Egypt.

Meanwhile, Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal heads a high-ranking delegation of the Palestinian Islamic movement to meet senior Egyptian officials, including intelligence chief Omar Suleiman.

Meshaal will discuss inter-Palestinian talks as well as the moves towards a prisoner swap deal between Hamas and Israel which including Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who was captured in 2006. Hamas is demanding the release of hundreds of Palestinians from Israeli prisons in exchange for the 23-year-old soldier.

Feuds between Hamas and its secular Palestinian rival Fatah mounted after Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip in June 2007, and ousted Abbas security forces.

Egyptian intelligence officials have been trying to broker an agreement between Hamas and Fatah, which controls Palestinian- administered areas of the West Bank, since March. (dpa)