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Palestine wants EU to deal with all its ministers
Palestine's national coalition has urged the European Union to deal with all its ministers as it has a united agenda and united leadership. Palestinian Minister of Planning Samir Abu Eisha said Saturday his government had urged the European Union and the International Community to forge direct contacts with the all the Palestinian coalition members. His remarks were made in response to EU foreign ministers who agreed earlier Saturday to limit contacts to non-Hamas ministers in the Palestinian unity government. "The EU stance to deal with any members of the government was a positive development but insufficient," Abu Eisha said, adding that "in any coalition government, all members should be dealt with in the same way." Mahmud al-Zahar, former Palestinian Foreign Minister and a senior leader of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), has cautioned that the platforms of the Palestinian national unity government and those of the Hamas movement not be confused. "You should know well that there are differences between the political platforms of the new unity government and the Hamas movement," Al-Zahar said. Al-Zahar rejected the recognition of Israel, saying, "We would never ever recognize the right of Israel to exist on one inch of the land of Palestine ...If we give up our resistance, this mean we will give up ourselves." The unity coalition, comprising Hamas and Fatah members, was sworn in earlier this month. The international community, including the U.S. and the EU, boycotted the former Hamas-led government for refusing to recognize Israel. Posted by: Fred 2007-04-02 |
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