Human rights situation in the OT – LAS letter

QUESTION OF THE VIOLATION OF HUMAN RIGHTS IN THE

OCCUPIED ARAB TERRITORIES, INCLUDING PALESTINE

Letter dated 8 March 1993 from the Permanent Mission of the

League of Arab States to the United Nations Office at Geneva

addressed to the Assistant Secretary-General for Human Rights

The Permanent Mission of the League of Arab States to the United Nations Office at Geneva presents its compliments to the Centre for Human Rights and has the honour to transmit herewith the statement issued by the secretariat of the League of Arab States on 2 March 1993 concerning Israel's closure of the occupied Gaza Strip.

The Permanent Mission of the League of Arab States requests the Centre for Human Rights to have this statement circulated among the members of the Commission on Human Rights as an official document of its forty-ninth session.

LEAGUE OF ARAB STATES

Office of the secretary-General

Date:  2 March 1993

Statement by the secretariat of the League of Arab States

concerning Israel's closure of the Gaza Strip

The secretariat of the League of Arab States is monitoring with grave concern the escalating incidents of violence and counter-violence in the occupied Palestinian territories, the most recent of which consisted in yesterday's closure and blockade of the Gaza Strip by the Israeli occupation authorities. This is having adverse economic consequences on the life of Palestinians in t:he occupied territories, in addition to the fact that the repeated and semi-permanent closure and blockade of the Strip are increasing the daily sufferings of the Palestinian people and causing a further deterioration in their living conditions.

The collective punishment operations in which Israel is persistently engaging in the occupied territories, and particularly in the Gaza Strip, are incompatible with United Nations resolutions, human rights, the Fourth Geneva Convention and other international covenants and instruments.

The League of Arab States, while condemning Israel for its arbitrary practices against Palestinian citizens aimed at reducing them to starvation, calls upon the international community to promptly take urgent measures to protect the Palestinians living under Israeli occupation and to dispatch fact-finding missions.

The international community is called upon to play an effective role in maintaining the momentum towards peace and in establishing a mechanism that will create appropriate conditions to enable the Palestinian people to enjoy the right to self-determination so that they can live in peace like other peoples of the world.