Jordan Times
Wednesday, July 15, 2009
Jordan calls for increased
international peace efforts
SHARM EL SHEIKH (Agencies) - Jordan on Monday urged the international community
to intensify its efforts to find a just solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict
and bring peace and stability to the region.
In a speech yesterday at a preparatory meeting for the Non-Aligned Movement
(NAM) summit, Minister of Foreign Affairs Nasser Judeh said failure to achieve a
comprehensive peace and realise the two-state solution would lead to major
negative consequences for the region and the entire world.
Judeh underlined the need to activate the role of the NAM to ensure that it
plays an effective role in spurring action by the various international entities
and stakeholders, especially the UN.
The top diplomat stressed that Jordan welcomes the international consensus on
the need to achieve peace.
In this context, he highlighted US President Barack Obama’s commitment to
achieving Mideast peace and stressed the significant part the US can play in
this regard.
The minister said Jordan is looking forward to working with influential world
powers to realise the two-state solution within a specific timeframe,
emphasising the need to seize the opportunity at hand to achieve peace.
Creating the required atmosphere for launching peace negotiations, he added,
necessitates that Israeli settlement activities be frozen and unilateral Israeli
measures in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem brought to an end.
He also called for an Israeli withdrawal from all occupied Syrian and Lebanese
territories.
Judeh said realising just, comprehensive and lasting solution to the
Arab-Israeli conflict that ensures the legitimate rights of the Palestinians,
mainly the creation of their state on the Palestinian soil, is a basic priority
for Jordan.
Later Tuesday, Prime Minister Nader Dahabi arrived in Sharm El Sheikh. During
the summit, which is scheduled to commence today, the premier will deliver His
Majesty King Abdullah’s address to the summit, highlighting the King’s vision on
ways to confront the present regional and global challenges.
The two-day summit, held under the banner "International Solidarity for Peace
and Development", aims for a "new international order... in which nations [are
not judged] by their size or military and economic capabilities", Agence France-Presse
quoted Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit as saying at yesterday’s
meeting.
This year, Egypt will replace Cuba at the helm of the movement.
The summit is expected to be overshadowed by a meeting on the sidelines between
prime ministers Yusuf Reza Gilani of Pakistan and Manmohan Singh of India, amid
hopes of a resumption of peace talks between the two arch-foes, according to AFP.
Other heads of state expected at the summit include Sudanese President Omar
Bashir, whom Reuters news agency reported is attending despite an International
Criminal Court indictment calling for his arrest, and Afghan President Hamid
Karzai, who will deliver a speech “about development in Afghanistan, the need
for an international struggle against terrorism… and the role of NAM member
nations cooperating with Afghanistan”, AFP said.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon is expected to deliver an address to the summit
to “encourage the Non-Aligned Movement to build on its leadership role to
address today’s challenges”, including disarmament, the economic crisis, climate
change and implementation of the poverty-reduction Millennium Development Goals,
AFP said.
The NAM, which counts 118 member states that represent around 56 per cent of the
world’s population, is the largest grouping of countries outside the UN, and
aims to give a voice to the developing world.
Founded in 1955, the movement originally sought to distance itself from both the
Western and Soviet blocs during the Cold War, but its raison d’etre today is
questioned after the collapse of the Soviet Union and the ensuing shift in power
politics, according to AFP.
NAM groups 53 states from Africa, 38 from Asia, 26 from Latin America and the
Caribbean, and just one from Europe: the former Soviet republic of Belarus. The
movement has 16 observer countries and nine observer organisations.
| FACT BOX Non-Aligned Movement summit in Egypt The Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) summit in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm El Sheikh on Wednesday and Thursday is the 15th held by NAM, a grouping that has struggled to stay relevant after it was founded during the Cold War by countries which did not want to be aligned either with the Soviet Union or the United States. Following is some background about the Sharm El Sheikh meeting and NAM: THE SHARM EL SHEIKH SUMMIT: A meeting between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Pakistani Premier Yusuf Reza Gilani on the summit sidelines could set the stage for a dialogue between the rivals that was stalled after last November's attack in Mumbai. Sudanese President Omar Bashir is attending the summit despite an International Criminal Court (ICC) indictment calling for his arrest on charges he masterminded human rights abuses in Sudan's western Darfur region. At a ministerial meeting in Iran last year before the warrant was issued, NAM expressed "deep concern" about the ICC's effort to try Bashir. Also at that Iran meeting, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad called on NAM to unite against what he said was bias in the UN Security Council, which Tehran has accused of siding with the West in a dispute over Iran's nuclear ambitions. Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit said the meeting would include almost 55 presidents, as well as other top officials from member states. ORIGIN OF NAM: The Bandung Asian-African Conference in April 1955 was instrumental in founding the Non-Aligned Movement. That meeting gathered delegates from 29 countries, many newly independent from their colonial rulers. FOUNDING NAM SUMMIT: The NAM was formally set up in 1961 in Belgrade by developing countries that chose not to align with the United States or Soviet Union to avoid becoming caught up in Cold War politics. Twenty-five countries were represented. The founding fathers were President Josip Broz Tito of Yugoslavia, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru of India, President Gamal Abdul Nasser of Egypt, President Sukarno of Indonesia and President Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana. Nasser, a champion of Arab nationalism, was a hero to Arabs for defying the United States and colonial powers Britain and France in the 1950s and 1960s. "We don't want to become a part of any sphere of influence for any power. That is what the United States has tried to do with us," he said. NAM TODAY: The movement now has 118 member states, with 15 observer states, representing two-thirds of the members of the United Nations and half of the world's population. It has struggled to find a role since the 1989 fall of the Berlin Wall and the Soviet Union's collapse. The 118 are composed of 53 states in Africa, 38 in Asia, 1 in Europe and 26 in Latin America and the Caribbean. NAM's chair country rotates between geographic regions. Egypt is taking over the chair from Cuba, which chaired the summit from September 2006. Source - Reuters |