 |
UN Human Security Network Meeting Endorses Peace Plan
A two-day ministerial meeting of the U.N. Human Security Network has endorsed a Jordanian-Egyptian peace initiative to end the seething Israeli-Palestinian conflicts, the semiofficial English daily Jordan Times reported on Sunday.
The Human Security Network, an informal organization under the United Nations, concluded its third annual ministerial meeting on Sunday at Jordan's ancient city of Petra, some 250 kilometers southwest of Amman.
Participants of the meeting endorsed the Jordanian-Egyptian peace plan, and called on Israel and the Palestinians to end their conflicts, restore confidence and resume peace negotiations in order to achieve a just, durable, and comprehensive peace in the region.
Foreign ministers of Jordan, Austria, Canada, Greece, Mali, Norway, Slovenia, Switzerland as well as senior officials from the U.N., the Netherlands, Thailand, Chile, Ireland and South Africa took part in the two-day conference.
The two-day meeting mainly focused on human security, development, international peace keeping efforts, protection of children's rights as well as prevention of AIDS.
The Middle East peace process also figured high in discussions during the meeting amid fresh reports of casualties in the Israeli- Palestinian violence, which has left over 500 people dead in the past seven months, mostly Palestinians.
Currently the Jordanian-Egyptian peace proposal is the only ready-made diplomatic agenda to end the conflicts, and it has won widespread support from the international community.
However, Israel is opposed to a key clause of the plan which stipulates a deadline for final status talks with the Palestinians, and it also refused to stop settlement activities in occupied territories, as demanded by the Palestinians and their supporters.
Jordan and Egypt, the only two Arab countries which have signed peace treaties with Israel, have been major peace brokers in the Arab-Israeli conflicts.
In This Section
|