Right of the Palestinian people to self-determination – GA Third Cttee debate – Press release (excerpts)

Third Committee

36^th & 37^th Meetings (AM & PM)

INTERGOVERNMENTAL WORKING GROUP ESTABLISHED BY HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL TO ELABORATE

CONVENTION ON REGULATING PRIVATE SECURITY COMPANIES, THIRD COMMITTEE TOLD

Draft Text Prepared by Working Group on Mercenaries;

Also Hears from Two United Nations Experts on Racism, Racial Discrimination

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Background

As the Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) met today, it had before it the report of the Secretary-General on the status of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (document A/65/292), which notes that 173 States parties had ratified or acceded to the Convention as of 15 August, with six States having signed but not yet ratified it.  Fifty-four of the States parties also recognized the competence of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination to receive and consider communications from individuals or groups within their jurisdictions claiming to have been victims of violations of the Convention.

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Also before the Committee was the report of the Secretary-General on the right of peoples to self-determination (document A/65/286).  The report outlines the relevant jurisprudence of the Human Rights Committee and the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights on the treaty-based human rights norms relating to the realization of the right of peoples to self-determination.  It also contains a summary of the developments relating to the consideration by the Human Rights Council of the subject matter, including recognition of the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations and international human rights conventions. …

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Introduction of Reports

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The Committee heard first from MAGGIE NICHOLSON, Deputy Director of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights.  She introduced four reports from the Secretary-General on the elimination of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance, and the right of peoples to self-determination, entitled Status of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (document A/65/292), Financial situation of the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (document A/65/312), Global efforts for the total elimination of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance and the comprehensive implementation of and follow-up to the Durban Declaration and Programme of Action (document A/65/377) and Universal realization of the right of peoples to self-determination (document A/65/286).

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Statements

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SOHA GENDI ( Egypt) …

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Egypt had carefully considered the Secretary-General’s report on the matter and looked forward to inclusion next year of specific recommendations on how to enable the Human Rights Council to perform its role dealing with Israel’s human rights violations in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, he said.  The United Nations should play an invigorating role to ensure respect of rights of the Palestinian people, along with other Arab peoples suffering from occupation.  “We aspire for a larger UN engagement in a more serious manner, through its role in the Quartet and confidence building efforts, all the way through to the attainment of a just, comprehensive, and lasting peace,” he said.

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LINGXIAO LIU (China), associating herself with the Group of 77 developing countries and China, …

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… China supported Palestinians in their struggle for national self-determination and urged a greater role for the international community in solving that question, with a view to achieving peace in the Middle East at an early date.

MOHAMMAD A. AL NSOUR ( Jordan) said his country stood in unity with Turkey after the latest terrorist attack there.  It condemned all forms of terrorism. Every day, people in the Middle East, particularly those of the current generation, heard much talk about the right of self-determination and the aspirations of those who lived under a colonial yoke.  But, that right was a myth.

For more than 60 years, the Palestinians had aspired to self-determination and their own State, he said. The failure of the international movement to realize their right for self-determination only undermined other human rights for people in the Middle East.  How could one talk about freedom of expression and education when the right to life and freedom had been denied to all Palestinian people? Jordan, which has a peace treaty with Israel, renewed its call for Israel to resume negotiations and lift unilateral measures.  Doing so would enable millions of refugees to realize their expectations, return to their homes and determine the future for themselves and their children.

MONIA ALSALEH (Syria), aligning with the Group of 77 developing countries and China, …

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Racist practices in her region, she said, had been compounded by Israel’s racist decision, adopted a few weeks ago, regarding taxes on non-Jews.  Such laws were not compatible with what the world demanded to combat a growing tendency towards racism.  Moreover, Israel’s racist practices against Palestinian detainees, documented by video and audio, demanded international action.  Such practices revealed the racist truth behind Israel.  By overlooking such crimes, the global community only encouraged Israel to continue violating human rights. Syria had taken note of the Secretary-General’s report and regretted the arbitrary measures adopted by Israel documented by the fact-finding mission.  It was regrettable that the United Nations was still unable to use available resources to protect the rights of those living under the yoke of colonialism.

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SUAD AMBAR ( Libya) said racism and discrimination were universal problems that needed to be tackled in a universal manner.  Racism varied in form from one place to another, and one culture to another, but in most cases it was directed against the vulnerable, the marginalized and minority groups.  What the Palestinian people had been facing under Israeli occupation was the worst form of racial discrimination in contemporary times.  …

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NADYA RASHEED, the Permanent Observer Mission for Palestine, speaking about the Right of Peoples to Self-Determination, said that the United Nations work was incomplete as long as the Palestinian people remained under Israeli occupation, with their right to self-determination relentlessly violated by their occupation.  For more than four decades, the machinery of Israel’s occupation had produced systematic violations against the Palestinian people in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem.  They were subject to displacement, killing, imprisonment, destruction and other affronts to their dignity and security.  The situation in the Gaza Strip was especially deplorable, as more than 1.5 million Palestinians were deprived of their basic rights.  At the same time, Israel’s military occupation had continued over decades and its colonial nature had become undeniable, as was evident in Israel’s unlawful and fervent construction and expansion of more than 120 illegal settlements.  Additionally, the human rights of the Palestinian people continued to be violated by the nearly 500,000 illegal settlers, many armed and fanatical, who had been illegally transferred to the Occupied Palestinian Territory.

The occupying Power continued with its colonization of Palestinian Territory through its illegal construction of the separation wall, which was linked to the settlements and intended to entrench them and to advance its land grab, she said.  It was important to recall that, in its Advisory Opinion, the International Court of Justice concluded that the construction of the wall, along with measures taken previously by the occupying Power, severely impeded the exercise by the Palestinian people of its right to self-determination and, therefore, was a breach of Israel’s obligation to respect that right.  Israel’s construction of illegal settlements and the wall were making the internationally agreed goal of the two-State solution and the Palestinian people’s right to self-determination nearly impossible to achieve.   Palestine reiterated its appeal to the international community to take real efforts to bring an end to these violations.  She also said that the resolution entitled “the Right of the Palestinian people to self-determination” would be presented for adoption and that Palestine hoped for solidarity by adopting the resolution by consensus.

YOUSEF N. ZEIDAN, the Permanent Observer Mission for Palestine, speaking on the elimination of racism, said the collective and individual rights of the Palestinian people had been desecrated “simply because they are not Jewish”.  Discrimination had been institutionalized by Israel, the occupying power.  Since 1948, Israel had been engaged in a racist campaign to bring Jews, and only Jews, to historical Palestine and the illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem.  Racist laws had turned Palestinians into citizens of Israel, who made up one fifth of the Israeli population, into second- and third-class citizens. The so-called “loyalty oath” had legalized racism by obliging non-Jews who apply for citizenship to swear loyalty to the Jewish character of the State; its purpose was to annul the right of return of Palestinian refugees and the rights of Palestinian citizens of Israel. Israel was clearly “seeking a democracy for Jews and fascism for non-Jews”.

The “anti-Nakba bill” was another discriminatory law, he said.  It had been proposed by the political party led by Israel’s foreign minister, a settler living illegally in the Occupied Palestinian Territory who had called for the expulsion of Palestinian citizens of Israel.  Last week, in the Knesset, a racist law was introduced that would enable a community to reject tenants deemed “unfit within the community’s social fabric”; it was intended to set a legal basis for exclusively Jewish villages from which Arabs would be excluded.   Israel has been the single biggest violator of international humanitarian law and United Nations resolutions, and its persistent violation of the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination and the International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid was ample proof of its apartheid politics.  The time had come for the international community to take steps to end all Israeli violations and to pursue accountability and justice for Israel’s crimes against the Palestinian civilian population.

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MOURAD BENMEHIDI (Algeria), aligning with the Group of 77 developing countries and China, …

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….   Algeria also attached importance to all those principles at the international level.  It was the exercise of the right to self-determination, however, which was vital for the full enjoyment of all other civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights. Attempts to introduce simplified interpretations of that right could not take away the right of those living under oppression to freely choose their destiny. Algeria, which had supported all those struggling for their dignity in Africa, Asia and elsewhere, would support the exercise of that right through a free and impartial referendum.  The United Nations, which had made precious efforts to apply that right, must persevere in order to achieve its universality.  It was a concern that the right to self-determination remained inaccessible to Palestinians and Saharawi people, whose fate rested in the hands of the international community.

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For information media • not an official record