AFTER US VETO, UNGA TO MEET ON JERUSALEM STATUS
The 193-member United Nations General Assembly will hold a rare
emergency special session on Thursday at the request of Arab and Muslim states
on US president Donald Trump's decision to recognise Jerusalem as Israel's
capital, sparking a warning from Washington that it will ‘take names.’
Palestinian UN envoy Riyad Mansour said the General Assembly would vote
on a draft resolution calling for Trump's declaration to be withdrawn, which
was vetoed by the United States in the 15-member UN Security Council on Monday.
The remaining 14 Security Council members voted in favor of the
Egyptian-drafted resolution, which did not specifically mention the United
States or Trump but which expressed ‘deep regret at recent decisions concerning
the status of Jerusalem.’
Mansour said on Monday he hoped there would be ‘overwhelming support’
in the General Assembly for the resolution. Such a vote is non-binding, but
carries political weight.
US ambassador Nikki Haley, in a letter to dozens of UN states on
Tuesday seen by Reuters, warned that the United States would remember those who
voted for the resolution criticizing the US decision.
‘The president will be watching this vote carefully and has requested I
report back on those countries who voted against us. We will take note of each
and every vote on this issue,’ Haley wrote.
She echoed that call in a Twitter post: The US will be taking names.’
Under a 1950 resolution, an emergency special session can be called for
the General Assembly to consider a matter ‘with a view to making appropriate
recommendations to members for collective measures’ if the Security Council
fails to act.
Only 10 such sessions have been convened, and the last time the General
Assembly met in such a session was in 2009 on occupied East Jerusalem and
Palestinian territories. Thursday's meeting will be a resumption of that
session.
Trump abruptly reversed decades of US policy this month when he
recognized Jerusalem as Israel's capital, generating outrage from Palestinians
and the Arab world and concern among Washington's Western allies.
Trump also plans to move the US embassy to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv. The
draft UN resolution calls on all countries to refrain from establishing
diplomatic missions in Jerusalem.
Haley said on Monday that the resolution was vetoed in the Security
Council in defense of US sovereignty and the US role in the Middle East peace
process. She criticized it as an insult to Washington and an embarrassment to
council members.
Israel considers Jerusalem its eternal and indivisible capital and
wants all embassies based there. Palestinians want the capital of an
independent Palestinian state to be in the city's eastern sector, which Israel
captured in a 1967 war and annexed in a move never recognized internationally.
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