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On Gaza, UN PGA d'Escoto Fires Back from Nicaragua
as Council Begins Speeches
Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of
Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis
UNITED NATIONS,
December 27, 10:17 pm -- With over 230 killed
by air strikes in Gaza, and a belated Security
Council meeting getting under
way, from Nicaragua the president of the UN General Assembly, who
has recently
said he's faced death threats on these issues, put out a statement
which his
spokesman e-mailed to Inner City Press:
Subj: PGA
statement on Gaza
airstrikes
From: PGA Spokesman
To: Inner City Press
Sent:
12/27/2008 9:50:53 P.M.
Eastern Standard Time
Statement by the President of the General Assembly, Miguel
D´Escoto Saturday 27
December
The behavior by Israel in bombarding Gaza is simply the commission of
wanton
aggression by a very powerful state against a territory that [it?]
illegally
occupies. Time has come to take firm action if the United Nations does
not want
to be rightly accused of complicity by omission.
The Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip represent severe and massive
violations
of international humanitarian law as defined in the Geneva Conventions,
both in
regard to the obligations of an Occupying Power and in the requirements
of the
laws of war.
UN PGA d'Escoto confers about Culture of Peace
Those
violations include:
Collective punishment - the entire 1.5 million people who live in the
crowded
Gaza Strip are being punished for the actions of a few militants.
Targeting civilians - the airstrikes were aimed at civilian areas in
one of the
most crowded stretches of land in the world, certainly the most densely
populated
area of the Middle East.
Disproportionate military response - the airstrikes have not only
destroyed every
police and security office of Gaza's elected government, but have
killed and
injured hundreds of civilians; at least one strike reportedly hit
groups of
students attempting to find transportation home from the university.
I remind all member states of the United Nations that the UN continues
to be
bound to an independent obligation to protect any civilian population
facing
massive violations of international humanitarian law - regardless of
what
country may be responsible for those violations. I call on
all Member
States, as well as officials and every relevant organ of the United
Nations
system, to move expeditiously not only to condemn Israel's serious
violations,
but to develop new approaches to providing real protection for the
Palestinian people.
The Security
Council "organ of the UN" is highly unlikely to issue the requested
condemnation. Outside the Chamber, US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad was
heard to
say into his cell phone, it will be a 45 minute meeting, we will try to
just
focus on the humanitarian issues (and not any cease fire).
We'll see.
At 10:17 p.m., the Council's
consultations began.
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Press Nov. 7 debate on the war in Congo
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Security Council and Obama and the UN.
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