Interview: AL chief opposes Israel's unilateral policy

Arab League (AL) Secretary-General Amr Moussa said Saturday that the AL is opposed to the ongoing unilateral policy adopted by Israel and called on the Palestinians and Israel to return to negotiation table.

Moussa made the remarks in the Arabic-Chinese Friendship Hall at the Cairo-based AL Headquarters in an interview with Xinhua on the eve of the two-day Second Ministerial Meeting of China-Arab Cooperation Forum, slated for May 31 in Beijing.

Only if an independent sovereign Palestinian state was set up with east Jerusalem as its capital, the half-century-old Palestinian-Israeli conflicts could be solved, said Moussa.

According to the Arab peace initiative, Israel must withdraw from all the Arab territories that it grabbed since 1967, he said.

The initiative, adopted at an Arab summit in Beirut in March 2002, says that Arab countries will normalize relations with Israel if the Jewish state withdraws from Arab territories taken in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war and an independent Palestinian state is established with east Jerusalem as its capital.

Israel has rejected the plan.

Moussa said that Arab nations were opposed to Israel's unilateralism since the only solution to Palestinians-Israeli conflicts to realize eternal peace should be bilateral negotiation.

However, Israel will neither return to negotiation table nor withdraw from the occupied territories, if the political support from western countries persists, according to Moussa.

He said that the AL is hoping for the resumption of negotiation, Israel's renouncement of one-side policy and the implementation of the two-state solution as soon as possible.

As for the Palestinian side, Moussa said that he has urged the ruling Palestinian Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) to abide by the Arab peace initiative during his Wednesday's meeting with Palestinian Foreign Minister Mahmoud al-Zahar in Cairo.

Zahar responded positively, saying that the Hamas-led government was flexible enough to reach a clear stance on the Arab peace initiative, according to Moussa.

The veteran diplomat also said that both the West and Israel should accept the democratic outcome of the Palestinian legislative elections on Jan. 25.

The Hamas-led government, which came to power on March 29, is facing severe financial and diplomatic crises due to the West's cutoff of aid and Washington-led political isolation.

It is unacceptable that western powers and Israel punished the Palestinian people for their democratic choices, stressed Moussa.

Source: Xinhua