Unmapped rights
AMNESTY International (AI) issued a statement on 3 June calling on the participants in the roadmap peace plan summit in Jordan to acknowledge that respect for human rights and international law is a fundamental obligation -- not a bargaining chip to be used in negotiations, or a concession."Disregarding human rights, or subordinating these rights to political considerations, can only undermine the prospect of achieving durable peace and security," warned the organisation.
AI charged that the roadmap peace plan, which as yet contains no specific mechanism to ensure compliance with obligations under international human rights and humanitarian law, refers to such obligations as though they could be made conditional on political developments.
Both sides, according to the AI, are bound by the principles of international human rights and humanitarian law which prohibit the killing of civilians.
According to the organisation, in the past two and a half years the Israeli army has killed more than 2,000 Palestinians and Palestinian armed groups have killed more than 700 Israelis. Most of those killed were civilians and included some 350 Palestinian children and more than 90 Israeli children.
It added that the Israeli army has destroyed more than 3,000 Palestinian homes, vast areas of cultivated land, and hundreds of commercial and public property.
Suspects identified
FOR THE first time, the Saudi interior minister linked last month's Riyadh bombings to Al-Qa'eda in an interview that was published on Saturday, and his ministry announced that it has identified 12 of the attackers."I think it is Al-Qa'eda [who executed the attacks] and there might be other [terror] organisations who helped or worked closely in the attacks," Prince Nayef told the Arabic-language Okaz daily.
The minister said 25 people so far are in custody in connection with the 12 May bombings at three Western housing compounds in Riyadh. Thirty-five people were killed in the attacks, including nine suicide bombers.
A statement from the ministry on Saturday identified 12 people who were involved in the attacks, saying that it had discovered their identities "through intensive investigation and blood and DNA tests".
The list did not include Ali Abdel- Rahman Al-Ghamdi, believed to be the mastermind of the bombings.
Protesting exclusion
SYRIAN President Bashar Al-Assad has criticised the United States for not inviting Syria to a Middle East summit last week, saying Washington was delaying any peace talks between his country and Israel."The summit was concerned with the Palestinian track and the roadmap. I think the Syrian track for them [the United States] has been delayed. We don't know why, but for now it's not on the table," Al- Assad said in comments aired by Dubai- based Arabic television channel Al- Arabeya on Monday.
"I don't think they needed Syria to be there, whether because Syria is not connected to this [roadmap] issue or because of Syria's non-conformity and non- agreement with these ideas in the first place. We have a different view."
France says it wants another roadmap to be drawn up for Israel and its neighbours, a call echoed by Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini whose country takes over the rotating European Union presidency next month.
"There should be a roadmap for Syria and Lebanon. The mechanism of forging the map would be the core of a study between European nations, Syria and Lebanon... Of course we will also talk to the United States," Frattini told a news conference in Damascus after meeting Al-Assad.
Squeezing Tehran
SECRETARY of State Colin Powell on Sunday called on Iranians to press their political and religious leaders to abandon support for terrorism and their drive to develop nuclear weapons."Iran is a problem. It continues to support terrorism. It continues to develop, we believe, the capability to produce nuclear weapons, and this is troublesome," Powell said on Fox News on Sunday.
But he stressed that young Iranians were realising that their political and religious leaders were not steering them "in the right direction toward a better future".
On Monday, Iran's Foreign Ministry appealed to Washington to stop using the "language of force", warning that US posturing would only undermine the cause of dialogue and strengthen the hand of hard- liners in the Islamic republic.
"You have to help Iran, because pressure will lead nowhere and will only make radical thoughts flourish, and this is not in the favour of us, the region or anybody," said a statement from the Foreign Ministry.
Hashemite visits Iraq SHARIF Ali Bin Hussein, a scion of Arabia's Hashemite dynasty, returned to Iraq on Tuesday, 45 years after the revolution that toppled the British-backed monarchy and killed his cousin, King Faisal II.
He says he wants to help shape Iraq's political future in the aftermath of the US- led war that ousted Saddam Hussein, though it is not clear how many Iraqis would welcome any move to restore a monarchy that had little popular support in its day.
Only 2,000 tribesmen and intellectuals turned out to welcome him at the royal mausoleum in Baghdad after his arrival from London in a privately chartered jet.
"We are very happy. This is the moment we were waiting for all our lives," Sharif Ali, flanked by a dozen bodyguards, told the cheering crowd in the mausoleum garden, after praying for the souls of the Hashemite royalty buried there.
Al-Ahram Weekly Online : 12 - 18 June 2003 (Issue No. 642)
Located at: http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2003/642/re14.htm