Swiss and Chinese recognise Palestine

[faceless]

Palestinians claim Swiss, Chinese 'recognition'
Compiled by Daily Star staff
Tuesday, April 17, 2007

China and Switzerland have informed Palestinian officials they will deal with the new unity government, the Palestinian information minister said on Monday. Both nations said their policy had not changed, and both have dealt with Hamas in the past, but the development appeared to reinforce a Palestinian effort to win recognition for the new government. But a spokesperson for the Dutch Foreign Ministry said on Monday that Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniyya would not be granted a visa - should he formally request one - because the EU considers his Hamas party a terrorist group. Dutch media reported that Haniyya had been invited to be the main speaker at a conference organized by the Dutch-based Palestine Platform for Human Rights and Solidarity to be held in Rotterdam on May 5.

Envoys from Switzerland and China met recently with Palestinian Foreign Minister Ziad Abu Amr, an independent, and informed him of their position, said Information Minister Mustafa Barghouti. Barghouti said Switzerland and China told the Palestinians that "they are going to deal with our government, without any discrimination between its members."

The Hamas-Fatah coalition was formed last month. In response, the European Union and the US said they would meet only meet with non-Hamas members of the Cabinet. Swiss Foreign Ministry spokesman Jean-Philippe Jeannerat noted that Switzerland never did impose an outright boycott on the Hamas government - unlike the US, the EU and Israel. But he did not say specifically that his nation's envoys would meet with Hamas ministers now.

Barghouti's announcement came as China's Middle East envoy, Sun Bigan, was in the region for talks with Israeli and Palestinian officials. Jing Lu, a spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in Tel Aviv, said he was unaware of any new statement of Chinese policy and noted that Sun was not scheduled to meet with Hamas members during his trio. China, however, was among the countries which hosted members of the previous Hamas government.

Meanwhile, several thousand people gathered outside the Red Cross office in Gaza City on Monday to call for the release of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli jails. Monday's rally came ahead of the annual Prisoners Day on Tuesday, held in identification with Palestinians imprisoned by Israel. This year's rally came as negotiations continued for a prisoner swap in return for an Israeli soldier captured by Hamas-linked militants last June. Haniyya assured the crowd that the list of prisoners Hamas is demanding from Israel in return for Shalit includes "all our people from all the factions."

Haniyya said the list includes the best-known Palestinian prisoner - Marwan Barghouti, a popular militant leader from the rival Fatah movement. Israel has said it will not free Barghouti, who is serving five consecutive life terms. In a statement sent to reporters on Monday, Hamas said: "We believe that capturing soldiers and exchanging them for prisoners is the best solution for releasing our heroes, after the failure of all the diplomatic channels."

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Monday that he was open to a "reasonable exchange" of Palestinian prisoners in return for a captured soldier, but he said the Palestinians' demands are too high. In an interview with Canadian Broadcasting Corp. TV, Olmert declined to say how many Palestinians Israel would be willing to exchange. But "it definitely will not be 1,400," the reported size of the list provided by the Palestinians, Olmert told CBC.

Israeli currently holds at least 9,221 Palestinian prisoners in its jails, including hundreds of women and minors. Many have never been charged with any crime.

http://www.dailystar.com.lb

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I always knew the Swiss were bound to come in useful at some point! This is good news though and will serve to show how stupid it is of those other officials to not talk to Hamas leaders.

[major.tom]