PLO Says Arabs to Call for UN Trial of Israeli 'Criminals'

Published October 20th, 2000 - 02:00 GMT
Al Bawaba
Al Bawaba

Arab leaders are to study a call for the UN Security Council to put on trial Israeli "criminals" for the killings of around 100 Palestinians in the last three weeks of violence, the PLO said Friday. 

Arab foreign ministers are to make the recommendation for the summit on Saturday and Sunday in the Egyptian capital, the Palestine Liberation Organization's political department chief, Faruq Qaddumi, told reporters. 

The ministers who met in Cairo Thursday called for the formation of "tribunals to judge those who have committed crimes against the Palestinian people, and for the Security Council to implement this process," he said. 

Qaddumi said the proposal would be part of a package of "political, economic and material support" measures to be submitted to Arab leaders at their emergency summit convened to debate the Israeli-Palestinian clashes. 

Some Israeli states will threaten a break in ties "if the aggressions continue", he said, without naming them. 

Several Arab diplomats, who asked not to be named, told AFP the summit will also demand the creation of an international commission of inquiry into the clashes in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. 

Libyan leader Moammer Kadhafi on Wednesday revealed the contents of the draft resolution for the summit, the first gathering of Arab heads of state since 1996. 

It proposes "denouncing" and "condemning" the Jewish state for the violence in the Palestinian territories, but Kadhafi charged that the draft was too soft on Israel in terms of concrete measures. 

One good point in the draft, Kadhafi said, was a proposal to seek international legal action against "certain Israeli leaders," notably Ariel Sharon, the hawkish leader of Israel's right-wing Likud opposition. 

It was a highly publicized September 28 visit by Sharon to a disputed holy site in Arab east Jerusalem sacred to both Jews and Muslims that sparked the clashes - CAIRO (AFP)  

 

 

 

© 2000 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)

Subscribe

Sign up to our newsletter for exclusive updates and enhanced content