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UN urges Israel to prolong moratorium on settlements

19 February 2010 00:19 (UTC +04:00)

Baku â€“ APA. The United Nations on Thursday called on Israel to prolong its 10-month moratorium on settlement construction on occupied Palestinian territory and to completely freeze its settlement activities, APA reports citing Ria Novosti.

Undersecretary General for Political Affairs Lynn Pascoe said continued settlement activity violated Israel’s Roadmap obligations.

Pascoe said that the Israeli government’s partial restraint on settlement construction in the West Bank, excluding East Jerusalem, remains in effect, and has led to a slowdown of construction activity.

He said, however, that settler violence remained a concern, adding that there have been eight recent reported attacks by settlers on Palestinians, including on February 9 when settlers shot and injured a Palestinian teenager.

Under the internationally agreed roadmap for Middle East peace, Israel is obliged to freeze construction and remove unauthorized outposts built since 2001 from the Palestinian territories.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced in late November 2009 that construction would be limited in the West Bank, but not East Jerusalem, which is also under Israeli occupation and which the Palestinians claim as the capital of a future independent Palestinian state.

The issue of settlement construction in the West Bank, occupied by Israel since the 1967 Arab-Israeli War, has been the main obstacle to reviving peace talks with the Palestinians. Some half a million Jewish settlers live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.

The Palestinian National Authority has refused to return to the negotiating table until the construction is completely halted.