WASHINGTON: France’s planned recognition of a Palestinian state will not include the opening of an embassy until Hamas frees the hostages it is holding in Gaza, President Emmanuel Macron said in an interview that aired Sunday.
“It will be, for us, a requirement very clearly before opening, for instance, an embassy in Palestine,” Macron told CBS News in an interview taped Thursday.
The interview was aired as Britain, Australia and Canada on Sunday recognized a Palestinian state in a coordinated, seismic shift from decades of Western foreign policy.
The move triggered swift anger from Israel, which finds itself under huge international pressure over its war against Hamas in Gaza and the dire humanitarian situation in the besieged territory.
Portugal was also set to recognize Palestinian statehood later Sunday, while France says it will do so along with other countries Monday at the United Nations.
Macron also spoke out strongly against any plans to displace Palestinians from Gaza — which they want to be part of a future sovereign state — when rebuilding the territory.
“But if the precondition of such a plan is to push them out, this is just a craziness,” Macron said on “Face the Nation.”
“We should not be — for the credibility of the United States, for the credibility of France — we cannot be implicitly or explicitly complacent with such a project.”
France’s Macron says no embassy in Palestine until Gaza hostages freed
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France’s Macron says no embassy in Palestine until Gaza hostages freed
- Portugal is set to recognize Palestinian statehood later Sunday, while France says it will do so along with other countries Monday at the UN
UN chief visits Iraq to mark end of assistance mission set up after 2003 invasion
- Sudani said his country “highly values” the mission’s work in a region “that has suffered for decades from dictatorship, wars, and terrorism”
- Guterres praised “the courage, fortitude and determination of the Iraqi people”
BAGHDAD: United National Secretary-General Antonio Guterres was in Baghdad on Saturday to mark the end of the political mission set up in 2003 following the US-led invasion of Iraq that toppled Saddam Hussein.
The UN Security Council, at Iraq’s request, voted last year to wind down the mandate of the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI), by the end of 2025. The mission was set up to coordinate post-conflict humanitarian and reconstruction efforts and help restore a representative government in the country.
Iraqi caretaker Prime Minister Mohammed Shia Al-Sudani said his country “highly values” the mission’s work in a region “that has suffered for decades from dictatorship, wars, and terrorism.” He said its conclusion showed Iraq had reached a stage of “full self-reliance.”
“Iraq emerged victorious thanks to the sacrifices and courage of its people,” he said in a joint statement with Guterres.
The ending of UNAMI’s mandate “does not signify the end of the partnership between Iraq and the UN,” Sudani said, adding that it represents the beginning of a new chapter of cooperation focused on development and inclusive economic growth.
The prime minister said a street in Baghdad would be named “United Nations Street” in honor of the UN’s work and in recognition of 22 UN staff who were killed in an Aug. 19, 2003, truck bomb attack on the Canal Hotel in Baghdad, which housed the UN headquarters.
Guterres praised “the courage, fortitude and determination of the Iraqi people” and the country’s efforts to restore security and order after years of sectarian violence and the rise of extremist groups, including the Daesh group, in the years after the 2003 invasion.
“Iraqis have worked to overcome decades of violence, oppression, war, terrorism, sectarianism and foreign interference,” the secretary-general said. “And today’s Iraq is unrecognizable from those times.”
Iraq “is now a normal country, and relations between the UN and Iraq will become normal relations with the end of UNAMI,” Guterres added. He also expressed appreciation for Iraq’s commitment to returning its citizens from the Al-Hol camp, a sprawling tent camp in northeastern Syria housing thousands of people — mostly women and children — with alleged ties to the IS.
Guterres recently recommended former Iraqi President Barham Salih to become the next head of the UN refugee agency, the first nomination from the Middle East in half a century.
Salih’s presidential term, from 2018 to 2022, came in the immediate aftermath of the Daesh group’s rampage across Iraq and the battle to take back the territory seized by the extremist group, including the key northern city of Mosul.
At least 2.2 million Iraqis were displaced as they fled the IS offensive. Many, particularly members of the Yazidi minority from the northern Sinjar district, remain in displacement camps today.
