UK urges Syria to pull forces and condemns Israel?

Following a phone call with Arab League Secretary General, Nabil el-Arabi on the Syria situation, December 29, FCO Minister Alistair Burt, Minister of the Middle East and North Africa, issued a press release saying “the UK has consistently supported the Arab League’s efforts to encourage the Assad regime to end the cycle of violence in Syria. The Secretary General and I discussed the recent deployment of the Arab League monitoring mission to report on Syria’s compliance with the Arab League’s plan for resolving the current crisis. He stressed “I welcomed the Arab League’s plans to increase the size of the mission over the coming days, which will bolster its capacity to report independently on the situation in Syria. I look forward to the mission’s interim report in due course.” “Reports show that the violence has continued in Syria over the past few days,” Burt noted, urging the Syrian government to commit to its obligations to the Arab League “including immediately ending the repression and withdrawing security forces from cities.” “The Syrian government must allow the Arab League mission independent and unrestricted access to all areas of Syria and to the Syrian people.” FCO Minister emphasized. In a different context, Burt commented on the recent Israeli actions of building illegal settlements saying “I condemn the decision by the Jerusalem Local Planning and Building Committee to build additional structures in the Palestinian neighborhood of Silwan, and housing in the settlement of Gilo. This is another provocative and deeply counter-productive step, the latest in a series by the Israeli authorities.” He added “Continued systematic settlement construction makes it ever harder to achieve the common goal of international efforts: a contiguous Palestinian state living side-by-side with a secure Israel, with Jerusalem as a shared capital.”