Israeli PM agrees to new police questioning

JERUSALEM, July 24 (Xinhua) -- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has agreed to take another session of police questioning next week, local daily Yedioth Ahronoth reported Thursday.

Olmert's legal team has notified the police of their consent to hold the session next Friday, the fourth since the ongoing "money envelopes" case went public in early May, said the report, adding that the police have yet to confirm the date.

The prime minister, currently embroiled in the fifth investigation against him over suspicions that he took illicit money, much of it in envelopes, from a U.S. businessman before becoming premier, was last questioned two weeks ago at his official residence in Jerusalem.

The latest arrangement was made public hours after Israeli Attorney General Menachem Mazuz criticized Olmert, who denies any wrongdoing in the investigation, for deliberately impeding an ongoing probe against him.

"The police have been presented with real difficulties in arranging times to question the prime minister and arranging the length of the interrogation sessions. These are difficulties the police have not come across when investigating other public servants, including former prime ministers," local daily The Jerusalem Post quoted Mazuz as saying.