Wednesday, June 1, 2011

Juppe visits Middle East to try to wrest concessions

The head of French diplomacy, Alain Juppe, begins on Wednesday 1 June, a trip devoted to the Middle East, where the bearer of an invitation to a peace conference in late June in Paris, he will try to pressure the Israelis and Palestinians to resume negotiations. "We can not remain in the status quo, it has to move, [even though] I do not give a 90% chance of succeeding, if only one chance, one must try," said he said Sunday at the TV station Canal +.

"We say 'do you put around the table and organize a conference in Paris in late June to restart the process." It's that message that I give. " The Minister will begin his meetings with a meeting in Rome on Wednesday with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's visit to Italy. It will be Thursday and Friday in Israel and Ramallah for meetings with prime ministers including Binyamin Netanyahu and Salam Fayyad and Palestinian youths.

No meeting with representatives of Hamas is its program, but France has distinguished récemmment United States to recognize that reconciliation with Fatah, the movement banned by the West was "good news" to seize Peace. "Let's try to change Hamas, which today remains a terrorist organization, to the renunciation of violence and terrorism and towards the recognition of the State of Israel is the direction that we must work" , argues Alain Juppe.

While Washington has described the reconciliation of "enormous obstacle to peace", Paris appears isolated in this approach. At the recent G8 summit in Deauville, the evocation of this reconciliation as a factor that can promote the release of Franco-Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, held by Hamas, was deleted from the final declaration.

During his trip, Mr. Juppe "will visit the parents of the hostage (...) to show its support for them," according to his ministry. The chief diplomat also attempt to influence the position of the Israelis on the need, according to the U.S. and Europe, a territorial negotiations on the basis of 1967 lines which existed before the Israeli occupation of the West Bank, Gaza and East Jerusalem.

On this question Alain Juppe faces a late inadmissibility of Israel can only be pleased that the G8, in its final declaration does not mention these lines in 1967 - apparently after he of Canada's opposition - and merely to support "design for peace" by Barack Obama.

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