By Xinhua
Ramallah : Yasser Abed Rabbo, a senior aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, reiterated on Thursday that the Palestinians can declare their statehood unilaterally if talks with Israel fail.
“We can declare the independence from one side if the current negotiations failed to achieve scores,” Abed Rabbo, a member ofthe Palestinian negotiating team, told Voice of Palestine radio.” This is a message to Israel and the international community that we have more than one option and choice,” said Abed Rabbo, also a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)’s executive committee.
He also accused Israel of marking time during the talks, saying that “The Israelis want to waste the time and to kill the chance which became available after Annapolis (peace conference).” But he underlined that there is no consensus on this proposal “which is put forward for the Palestinian institutions to study.
“It was not the first time for Abed Rabbo to urge for unilaterally declaring an independent Palestinian state. On Wednesday, he said, “if the peace negotiations are still notmoving ahead towards a permanent status agreement, the Palestinians will seek for declaring an independent Palestinian state unilaterally.”
Chief Palestinian negotiator Ahmed Qurei briefly denied the unilateral declaration, saying that “This option is excluded and has never been discussed among the Palestinian leaders.” As for the Israeli-Palestinian talks, Abed Rabbo expected that Israel will offer a Palestinian statehood with temporary borders and without Jerusalem as a capital by the end of the year. He also expected that Israel was going to exclude the issue of refugees and West Bank settlements from the peace talks.
The negotiations on final-status issues, which could pave the way for a Palestinian statehood if they were resolved, were renewed at a U.S.-hosted peace conference in Annapolis last November but they fail to make any notable progress so far.