MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazil reiterates it will defend recognition of a Palestinian state at the UN

Marco Aurelio Garcia, international affairs advisor to Dilma Rousseff and former president Lula da Silva

Brazil will ‘defend’ the recognition of a Palestinian state during the coming United Nations General Assembly discussions, said President Dilma Rousseff’s international affairs advisor Marco Aurelio García.

“The president is going to defend December’s position” when Brazil recognized the existence of the Palestinian State, Marco Aurelio told O’Globo during a Monday interview.

According to the O’Globo daily, “President Rousseff will talk about the issue during her speech that will open the round of UN debates next Wednesday.

“As we all know Brazil recognized the Palestinian State December 2010, in a letter addressed by former president Lula da Silva to the president of the Palestinian National Authority, (Mahmud Abbas), and there is no change anticipated in the Brazilian position”, the Planalto Palace (Executive) spokesperson Rodrigo Baena Soares publicly announced last week.

However Gabriela Shaley, former Israel ambassador before the UN expressed strong disagreement with Brazil’s position.

“For me it is frustrating, we have an optimum relation with Brazil when it comes to a vote in the UN, Brazil always votes against Israel, that makes me sad”, Shaley quoted by O’Globo.

The Palestinians are seeking international recognition of their state based on 1967 borders - the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip.

But Israel and the US say a Palestinian state can only be achieved through direct negotiations, however the Palestinian leadership says this approach has got them nowhere. The last round of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinians broke down a year ago.

Abbas anticipates “the Palestinian people and their leadership will pass through very difficult times after the Palestinian approach to the United Nations through the Security Council”.

The Palestinian leader says his first step will be to ask for full membership at the Security Council, rather than going to the UN General Assembly to seek a more modest upgrade in status.

The US says it will use its veto to block the bid in the Security Council.

Israeli deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon said the Palestinians were “shirking their responsibilities first and foremost with their people”.

“A unilateral declaration by the Palestinians of independence or any UN decision will actually be a vote for friction and conflict over co-operation and reconciliation and I think that would be deplorable for many years” Ayalon told the BBC World Service.

But he also said that the upcoming vote is “not a serious vote because it doesn't matter”. He added that “the important vote is in the Security Council. There the vote will not pass”.