Palestinians stand firm on bid at UN

The Palestinians will push on with a bid to achieve non-member status at the UN despite pressure for them to back down, top negotiator Saeb Erakat said yesterday. “No matter what pressure we are facing... we will not go back on our decision,” Erakat said in Amman after talks in the Jordanian capital between Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Arab League chief Nabil al-Arabi. “We tell the countries that are trying to undermine our action that we are not seeking a confrontation with America or to isolate Israel, but to isolate Israeli occupation and settlements, and to affirm the principle of the two states,” he told reporters. Abbas and Arabi discussed the Palestinian UN bid and agreed on a number of legal and diplomatic measures related to the move, Erakat said. Arabi, meanwhile, said Arab League ministers would meet at their Cairo headquarters on November 12 to discuss the bid and would be joined the next day by representatives of the 27-member European Union for more talks. “It is time for Palestine to obtain such recognition at the UN,” said Arabi. The Palestinians have sought to upgrade their status at the UN from an observer entity to that of a non-member state, as they aim to push for their long-promised independent state. Abbas has said he will table the resolution later this month, on either November 15 or 29, officials say. But Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned on Sunday the Palestinian bid would not bring about peace but instability, and urged Abbas to resume direct peace talks that have been on hold for more than two years. “I am taking this opportunity to call again on President Abbas to return immediately to negotiations without preconditions because we can only advance peace around the negotiating table and not through unilateral decisions at the UN which will only distance peace and bring instability,” he said. Abbas spokesman Nabil Abu Rudeina said any direct talks must await the UN vote. “When we return from the UN General Assembly and are a non-member state based on 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as the capital, the way to direct negotiations will be open to achieve security and stability on this basis,” Abu Rudeina said.