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TITLE: Arabs Want UN To Guard Palestinians |
AUTHOR: Salah Nasrawi |
PUB: AP |
DATE: March 12, 2001 |
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Arab foreign ministers said Monday that Israel's tightened blockade of Palestinian territories will worsen security conditions and called for the deployment of international troops to protect the Palestinians. Israeli soldiers dug trenches and deployed tanks around several Palestinian towns Sunday, cutting off access to the towns and isolating dozens of smaller villages with tens of thousands of residents. Farouk Kaddoumi, head of the political department of the PLO, told the ministers meeting at Arab League headquarters in Cairo that the Israeli move ``has virtually cut the West bank into 40 pieces and Gaza into five pieces.'' ``This step will add to the continuous Israeli measures to isolate the Palestinian people from the outside world and destroy its economy,'' the foreign ministers said in a statement. ``It also rings the alarm for further deterioration in the security conditions and increases the already heightening tension.'' The ministers said Arab governments will ask the U.N. Security Council to review the situation and establish an international force to protect the Palestinians. Warning that lives are at stake, the Palestinians echoed that request at the U.N. headquarters in New York. ``The council has a responsibility,'' the Palestinian U.N. envoy, Nasser Al-Kidwa, said Monday. ``We are requesting an immediate meeting with the aim of adopting, hopefully, the draft resolution which would establish the U.N. observer force.'' Al-Kidwa said the situation on the ground has gotten worse since the council defeated a resolution to authorize a U.N. observer force in December. The United States campaigned intensely against it. ``Since that vote, there were at least 70 to 75 more Palestinians killed in addition to thousands injured,'' he said. ``Some of those lives could have been saved.'' In Israel Monday, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon convened his Cabinet for its first meeting amid sharp disagreement among his ministers over the intensified siege. Ministers from the center-left Labor Party warned that the new policy could backfire and trigger more violence. Sharon denied that the restrictions were part of a tougher policy toward the Palestinians, saying the army had imposed the tight closure in response to specific warnings about a terror attack. Sharon aides said they believed the closure would be eased in the coming days. The ministers endorsed a plan Sunday to speed up delivery of $1 billion that Arab nations pledged last fall for the Palestinian Authority, whose economy has been devastated by the Israeli measures. The plan includes about $40 million a month for urgent needs. On Monday, the ministers also tried to hammer out an agenda for an Arab summit in Jordan later this month amid disagreements over what should be the top priority ? the stalled Middle East peace process or the conflict between Iraq and the United Nations over sanctions and weapons of mass destruction. Arab League Secretary General Esmat Abdul Meguid said Arabs are divided by disagreements over the Iraq issue and warned that solidarity will not be restored unless they are resolved. Algerian Foreign Minister Abdel Aziz Belkhadem said sanctions imposed on Iraq after its 1990 invasion of Kuwait should be immediately lifted. Qatari Minister of Foreign Affairs Sheik Hamad bin Jassem bin Jabor Al Thani said the problem requires ``a political solution ... based on dialogue and openness.'' END |