Tuesday, 13 December 2011
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas (C, in row on R), UNESCO Director General Irina Bokova and officials attend the flag-raising ceremony for the Palestinian flag at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris. (Reuters)
Some 50 diplomatic guests watched as Abbas lifted the flag to the Palestinian national anthemas a morning of biting wind and rain gave way to a burst of sunshine.
“This admission is a first recognition of Palestine,” Abbas said at the ceremony. “It is moving to see our flag raised today at a U.N. agency. I hope that this will be a good omen for Palestine’s admission to other international organizations.”
“Our admission is a source of pride. Palestine, the land where civilizations met... is having a new rebirth,” Abbas said.
The UNESCO vote was a diplomatic victory for Abbas, who in the absence of peace talks with the Jewish state has pushed for recognition of a Palestinian state at the United Nations, a move opposed by Israel and the United States.
In a move that has split the U.N. Security Council, Abbas is pressing for statehood for Palestinians without waiting any longer for a breakthrough in negotiations with Israel on a peace treaty to end the 63-year-old Middle East conflict.
At the ceremony, UNESCO chief Irina Bokova welcomed Palestine to the agency and said she hoped its admission would be a step toward peace with Israel.
“A solution with two states living in peace and security has been long-awaited,” she said. “I want to believe that this admission to UNESCO is a chance to show that peace is also built through education and culture.”
Israel and its main ally the United States insist that only a peace treaty can establish a universally recognized Palestinian state. But the Palestinians say they have been patient through 20 years of futile talks.
Talks collapsed more than a year ago over continued Israeli settlement building in the occupied West Bank and in East Jerusalem, which was annexed by Israel after a 1967 war in a move not recognized internationally.
Abbas applied on Sept. 23 for a Palestinian state in the West Bank and Gaza Strip, with East Jerusalem as its capital, to have full membership of the United Nations, which currently considers Palestine an observer “entity” only.
Since the UNESCO vote in October, Israel has pressed ahead with new settlements. The Palestinians have refused repeated Israeli calls to renew peace talks unless Israel stops building settlements on land they want for a state.
Envoys of the so-called Quartet of the European Union, United States, Russia and the United Nations will travel to Jerusalem on Wednesday to try to break the deadlock.
Abbas, who still wants a U.N. Security Council vote on a resolution for a Palestinian state even though it is destined to fail because of a U.S. veto, was to meet President Nicolas Sarkozy later on Tuesday.
Sarkozy has called for Abbas to take an alternative route by asking the U.N. General Assembly to upgrade Palestine’s U.N. status to just short of full membership.
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