BEIJING: China welcomed Tuesday the new leadership of Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas's Fatah party, urging it to create conditions for renewed Middle East peace talks.

"We hope that this organisation ... will help strengthen internal solidarity and play a positive role particularly in uniting factions in Palestine and properly handling relations with Hamas," Middle East special envoy Wu Sike said.

"We do hope that Fatah will be able to play its due leadership role within Palestine and play a coordinating role so as to create favorable conditions for peace negotiations," he told journalists.

Abbas's party has overhauled its leadership, electing a raft of new members to its ruling body in its first party congress in 20 years, Fatah officials said Tuesday.

Palestinian activist Marwan Barghuthi, who is serving five life sentences in Israel, was elected to the governing body of Fatah, which dominates the Palestinian Authority.

The new leadership will have the difficult task of rebuilding a party that has been weakened by internal divisions and the rise of the Islamist movement Hamas.