Morocco, Tunisia renew backing for Palestinians' right to statehood
Morocco and Tunisia renewed their backing to the right of the Palestinian people to exercise their sovereignty on their territory and to establish their state with Al-Quds (Jerusalem) as its capital.
A joint statement, released in Rabat on Tuesday at the end of the two-day state visit President Ben Ali of Tunisia paid to Morocco, expressed the two countries' concern over the situation prevailing in the Middle East because of Israel's intransigence.
They also renewed support for the rights of the Syrian and Lebanese peoples to recover their occupied territories in line with United Nations resolutions and the basic principles of peace.
King Hassan II had said on Monday in Marrakesh during a dinner banquet in honor of President Ben Ali that the Israeli intransigence is jeopardizing security and stability in the Middle-East. The sovereign expressed conviction that "without a just, global and fair peace --recognizing the Palestinian people's rights-- the peoples of the region will not be able to focus efforts on global economic development."
On his part, President Ben Ali voiced, in a speech he delivered on Tuesday noon before the Moroccan parliament in Rabat, "deep worry" over the risks of a new explosion in the Middle East because of Israel's intransigence and persistence to impose a fait accompli. He also denounced Israel's failure to comply with international resolutions and with the very agreements it had signed.
The joint statement added that the two countries agree that all issues in the Arab world should be settled, and in the first instance the Iraqi crisis, through peaceful means and on the basis of U.N resolutions "to guarantee the lifting of the embargo decreed against the Iraqi brotherly people."
The two countries likewise called for settling all issues in the Mediterranean and in the African continent "to secure peace and stability" to the peoples of these regions and guarantee best conditions to achieve shared development and prosperity.