General Assembly to Consider UN Probe Into Gaza
The General Assembly will meet on 4 November to consider
the report of the United Nations fact-finding mission on the
Gaza conflict, which found evidence that both Israel and the
Palestinians committed serious war crimes during the
hostilities earlier this year.
The President of the
Assembly, Ali Treki, has received a letter from the UN Human
Rights Council transmitting the report of the mission, which
was headed by Justice Richard Goldstone, a former prosecutor
at the UN war crimes tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and
Rwanda.
The four-member investigative team found
evidence that both Israeli forces and Palestinian militants
committed serious war crimes and breaches of humanitarian
law, which may amount to crimes against humanity, during the
conflict in December 2008 and January 2009.
The
Geneva-based Human Rights Council, when it took up the
report two weeks ago, had strongly condemned a host of
Israeli measures in the occupied Palestinian territory and
called on both sides to implement the mission’s
recommendations.
The Council had also recommended
that the Assembly consider the report during the main part
of its current session, requested Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon to submit a report on the implementation of its
recommendations to the Council in March, and condemned
Israel’s refusal to cooperate with the mission.
Next Wednesday’s meeting follows a request from the
Arab Group in New York, supported by the 118-member
Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), to consider the report in the
Assembly during the first week of November, according to a
(http://www.reliefweb.int/rw/rwb.nsf/db900sid/SNAA-7XB8VB?OpenDocument)
note issued by the spokesperson for the Assembly
President.
Mr. Ban has called on both Israel and the
Palestinians to carry out “full, independent and credible
investigations” in accordance with the recommendations of
the mission.
He said he was aware both were now going
to have their own investigations. “I have not received any
further details, but that is positive, I would say,” he
told a news conference at UN Headquarters on Wednesday. “I
have been repeatedly urging the Israeli Government to
institute a credible domestic investigation
process.”
ENDS