Palestinian refugees – Third Cttee debate – Press release (excerpts)

SECURITY CONCERNS ARE MAJOR CHALLENGES TO HUMANITARIAN OPERATIONS, THIRD COMMITTEE

TOLD, AS IT CONCLUDES DISCUSSION OF REFUGEE ISSUES

Committee Also Hears Introduction of 17 Draft Resolutions on Human Rights

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Background

The Third Committee (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) met today to conclude its general discussion on refugees, returnees and displaced persons.  For additional background information, please see Press Release GA/SHC/3801 of 9 November.  In the afternoon, the Committee was expected to hear introductions of several draft resolutions submitted under its consideration of human rights.

Statements on Refugees, Returnees and Displaced Persons

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CLAUDIA PEREZ ALVAREZ (Cuba) …

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Cuba continued to support the Palestinian refugees, she said, who continued to be denied a State to which to return.  …

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S. SHAHID HUSAIN, of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, …

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The Conference remained ready to play a proactive role in assisting Governments to foster policies and programmes for resolving conflict, he stressed, and to establish an environment of durable peace in the world.  At the thirty-first session of the Islamic Conference of Foreign Ministers, and at the tenth session of the Islamic Summit Conference, Conference members had been called upon to make every effort to prevent conflicts, which could generate exoduses of refugees.  It had been decided to convene a Ministerial Conference on the issue of refugees, in coordination with the UNHCR.  Reiterating the plight of refugees from occupied Palestinian and Arab territories, as well as in the disputed territory of Jammu and Kashmir, he stressed the continued need for the international community to undertake efforts to de-escalate tensions in those regions and to secure the peoples’ inalienable national rights, including the right to return.

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