Vatican Will Not Partake in Palestinian Flag Initiative at UN

By Published on August 27, 2015

The Vatican does not want to be involved in the battle of the flags at the UN. In a note circulated to the New York headquarters in New York, the Vatican asked the Palestinian mission to the UN to remove any reference to the ‘Holy See’ from a draft resolution Ramallah intends to present to the General Assembly. The text requests that the flags of the two states recognised as permanent observer members (the Vatican and Palestine), may fly alongside those of the 193 member nations, in front of the entrance to the UN headquarters.

“The Holy See does not intend to co-sponsor a draft resolution that the State of Palestine may eventually present on the matter,” the note, reprinted by Reuters, said. “The Holy See asks the Permanent Observer Mission of the State of Palestine to the United Nations kindly to remove in its draft resolution any reference to the ‘Holy See’ and any generic reference ‘on behalf of the Observer States’,” it added.

It was not by chance that Ramallah chose to present its request now: the 70th United Nations General Assembly is due to open on 15 September and Pope Francis is expected to give a speech at the UN headquarters in New York on 25 September. Palestine probably gambled on the fact that refusing a request involving the Holy See shortly before the Pope is due to visit, would have caused embarrassment. But the move did not go down well with the Holy See which has asked to be removed from the draft resolution, thus dealing a significant blow to the initiative. In the note sent by the Vatican Observer mission to the UN, it explained that although it did not object to the Palestinians proposing a resolution to fly their own flag, the Holy See had no plans to join the initiative. After all, the question of Palestine’s status remains a thorny issue: in November 2012, the General Assembly voted to upgrade Palestine’s status to non-member Observer State status. However, the Security Council has always blocked Palestine’s application for admission as a member state (the last time this occurred was last December with a majority vote).

Read the article “Vatican Will Not Partake in Palestinian Flag Initiative at UN” on vaticaninsider.lastampa.it.

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