Palestinian Authority President Mahmuod Abbas says he is confident that the US-led peace conference this week in Bahrain will fail.
“We are certain that the workshop in Manama will not be successful,” Abbas, who is boycotting the US-led conference focussed on the Palestinian economy, tells foreign journalists in Ramallah.
Yesterday, the US government unveiled the economic part of its peace plan that it will present in Bahrain on Tuesday and Wednesday, with the aim of raising more than $50 billion for the Palestinians and creating one million jobs within a decade.
Abbas’s government had already rejected the proposal, saying the dispute with Israel is political and accusing the US of seeking to buy Palestinian support.
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas takes notes during a meeting with journalists in the West Bank town of Ramallah on June 23, 2019. (ABBAS MOMANI / AFP)
“We will not be slaves or servants for Greenblatt, Kushner and Friedman,” Abbas tells journalists at his presidential office in Ramallah, referring to US President Donald Trump’s negotiating team, including the president’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
“We need the economic (support), the money and the assistance, but before everything there is a political solution,” he says. “For America to turn the whole cause from a political issue into an economic one, we cannot accept this.”
— AFP
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From the Liveblog of
Sunday, June 23, 2019
