UNSC failure to provide int’l protection for Palestinians disheartening: Kuwait
Arab League values Kuwait’s efforts to protect Palestinians
KUWAIT: The UN Security Council’s failure to adopt the Kuwaiti-sponsored draft resolution, aimed at providing international protection for Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip and West Bank, is disheartening, said a Kuwait senior diplomat late Friday.
The vote on the draft resolution saw 10 countries, including Kuwait, China, and France, voting in favor of the draft while four nations abstained and the US using veto. A voting session on a similar US-backed resolution on the matter was held, garnering three opposing votes from Kuwait, Russia and Bolivia while 11 nations-including France, China, and the UK-abstained. The sole vote in favor of the resolution came from the US.
Delivering his speech to the Council’s voting session on the Kuwaiti-backed draft, Kuwait’s permanent representative to the UN headquarters in New York, Ambassador Mansour Al-Otaibi said that the failure to adopt the resolution would encourage Israel to continue its decades-long aggression against the Palestinian, which escalated in the past few months.
Through the rejection of the draft resolution, the Council was sending a message that Israel was beyond the boundaries of international law and that the people of Palestine were unworthy of basic human rights and protection, noted Ambassador Otaibi. The Kuwaiti diplomat said that despite knowing the true aggressors, the Security Council had failed to hold Israel accountable for its actions, a matter that will have grave consequences on the Palestinian people. Ambassador Otaibi thanked all those who voted in favor of the draft resolutions; however, he urged the international community to ‘wake up’ and address the plight of the Palestinian people in a just and impartial manner to help protect their dignity and humanity.
Intensive efforts
Meanwhile, Arab League Secretary General Ahmed Abul-Gheit has valued Kuwait’s recent intensive efforts at the UNSC to provide an international protection for Palestinian civilians in the Gaza Strip and West Bank. Kuwait submitted a draft resolution to the UNSC on May 18, in which it condemned Israel’s use of force against the Palestinian people and called for a protection of civilians in the occupied Palestinian territories from the Israeli atrocities. The UNSC delayed a vote on the Kuwaiti-proposed draft resolution on June 1, and eventually failed to adopt it after the US vetoed the resolution. Abul-Gheit, in a statement yesterday, lauded the Arab Group’s efforts at the UNSC in backing the Kuwaiti-sponsored resolution, and, strongly, denounced Washington’s use of veto to block it.
He also expressed disappointment at the UK’s abstaining, along with Netherlands, Poland, and Ethiopia, from voting on the draft resolution. He also voiced his sorrow over UNSC’s inability to bear its responsibilities to impose measures aimed to end Israeli escalated violations against the Palestinian people. In recent months, Israeli occupying forces killed and wounded hundreds of unarmed Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, Abul-Gheit noted, adding such crimes have been widely condemned by the international community.
Washington’s current approach in undermining any resolution aimed at stopping the bloodshed of innocent Palestinians would only lead to encouraging the Israelis to continue their hostile and oppressive actions that clearly violate international legitimacy and law, he said.
It would also diminish the chances of making the appropriate atmosphere to resume peace negotiations between the Palestinians and Israelis, and achieve a just and comprehensive settlement for the Palestinian cause, he added.
Furthermore, Abul-Gheit affirmed the League’s keenness to continue its ‘firm’ and ‘solid’ commitment to work in favor of supporting the Palestinian cause and protecting the legitimate rights of the Palestinian people, of which most notably establishing an independent Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital. —KUNA
Council failed to hold Israel accountable: Otaibi