Pakistan calls for an immediate end to the blockade on Gaza to allow humanitarian relief to reach Palestinians in the coastal enclave as the death toll in the besieged territory rises to more than 740.
The appeal comes a day after Pakistan voted, along with other UN Human Rights Council members, to launch a probe into Israel’s offensive in the territory, with rights chief Navi Pillay saying its military actions could amount to war crimes.
“The blockade of Gaza must be ended in order to allow access of any humanitarian assistance,” Pakistan’s most senior foreign office bureaucrat, Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry, tells a press briefing.
“And that is why even in the UN Security Council and later in UN Human Rights Council we called for humanitarian pauses,” Chaudhry explains.
“It is important that the blockade of Gaza is ended, its borders opened and the Palestinian prisoners released,” Chaudhry says.
— AFP
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