WEST BANK: Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas calls on Middle East power brokers to draft a new peace plan

Record ID: 349366

  • Title: WEST BANK: Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas calls on Middle East power brokers to draft a new peace plan
  • Date: 1st January 2011
  • Summary: BILIN, WEST BANK (DECEMBER 31, 2010) (REUTERS) PALESTINIAN, INTERNATIONAL ACTIVISTS PARADING DOWN ROAD DURING DEMONSTRATION AGAINST ISRAELI-BUILT BARRIER; MARKING FATAH'S 46TH ANNIVERSARY WOMEN MARCHING, CHANTING SLOGANS WHILE HOLDING PALESTINIAN FLAG
  • Embargoed: 16th January 2011 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: West bank, Palestinian Territory, Occupied
  • City:
  • Country: Palestinian Territories
  • Topics: International Relations
  • Reuters ID: LVA91CWOSNEWZM94YGMO3KPQARIM
  • Story Text: Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas has called on Middle East power brokers on Friday (December 31) to draft a new peace plan for the region that could help revive failed U.S.-backed negotiations with Israel.
    In a televised speech recorded recently and broadcast on Friday (December 31), Abbas said Palestinians would "demand" that the Quartet, comprising Washington, the European Union, Russia and the United Nations, "draft a peace plan" based on U.N. Security Council resolutions that call for establishing a Palestinian state on land Israel captured in a 1967 war.
    "The interest of the United States, the interest of the peoples of the region, including the people of Israel is to salvage the peace process. We demand that the international quartet committee and various international institutions, on top of which the security council, to draft a peace plan that is in harmony with the international legitimacy (U.N. Security Council resolutions), instead of continuing a process that in fact has focused on managing the conflict and not solving it," Abbas said.
    Abbas, speaking on the eve of the anniversary of the Palestinians' mainstream Fatah movement, reiterated a demand for Israel to halt settlement building, the issue over which negotiations launched anew in September foundered just several weeks later.
    Palestinians have rejected an offer made by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu this week to move toward an interim peace deal rather than a final settlement, in order to bypass such sticky conflict issues as the future of Jerusalem, settlements and Palestinian refugees.
    Abbas said he expected Washington to do more to confront Israeli settlement building in the occupied West Bank, part of land where Palestinians want to establish their state.
    He also said that the Palestinians are not responsible for the failure of the negotiations.
    "We are not to be blamed for the failure. It is unfortunate that some American officials are blaming the two sides," Abbas said.
    Abbas, now in Brazil to lay a cornerstone for a Palestinian embassy following that country's formal recognition of Palestinian statehood, has said he would seek further U.N. action if peace talks with Israel did not soon resume.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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