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Jerusalem, December 01, 1999
Unbelievable decision by the
Palestinian Legislative Council
In a closed session
today, the Palestinian Legislative Council decided to form a
special committee that will monitor the actions and opinions
of the PLC members, so that criticism of the PA will not
occur again.
Find the English
translation of the PLC decision below.
The Palestinian Human
Rights Monitoring Group (PHRMG) strongly condemns this type
of decision. It is clearly in conflict with Palestinian law
and the Oslo agreement. The members of the PLC are elected
legislators, whom according to the Oslo agreement, are
supposed to enjoy full democratic rights in their
parliamentary work, the freedom of opinion and speech.
We call upon elected
legislators worldwide to strongly protest against this
decision.
The PLC further condemns
the 9 PLC members who signed the petition criticizing the PA
on Friday 27th November 1999, arguing that Arafat should be
immune to all criticism because he represents a symbol for
the Palestinian people.
5 of the original PLC
signatories of the “Petition20”-statement from Friday
published today a new statement, confirming their earlier
accusations of corruption in the PA, which weakens democracy
and civil society. “How long will our people bear this?”,
the statement said. “Our petition provoked a corrupt
minority at a time when Israeli aggressively destroyed
Palestinian homes. This, together with the extension of
Israeli settlements, did not provoke this minority in the
same way”.
In Nablus, the police
detained As’ad Issa and Jaber Jabbour for the crime of being
the brothers of two wanted by the police for distributing a
communiqué that condemns the recent PNA arrests of the
Palestinian academics and intellectuals.
The communiqué stated that
by arresting the public figures signing the “Petition20”,
the PA have discarded all the principles and morals that the
Palestinians have believed in during the struggle for
freedom. The communiqué was signed by the Student Council,
The Islamic Block (Hamas), The Islamic Group (Islamic
Jihad), PFLP, DFLP and People’s Party, at Al-Najah National
University in Nablus.
The developments over the
last days prove the fact that Arafat’s regime highly
resembles a dictatorship. The PA is building its power on a
physical power apparatus spending most of its time on
destroying the Palestinian civil society from within.
The criticism that emerged
in the “Petition20”-document was highly legitimate, and any
efforts of the PA to label this attempt of starting a
democratic debate as “incitement” will only put the PA in a
very embarrassing situation worldwide and locally.
PHRMG condemn in the
strongest terms the arrests by the Palestinian Authority of
Palestinian signatories of the “Petition20”-statement. These
detainees were expressing their alarm about corruption in
the Palestinian Authority, and the failure of the Oslo
Accords in securing basic rights for Palestinians, in a
legal way.
We demand the immediate release of
Abdul Sattar Qassim, Ahmad Qatamesh, Yasser Abu Safieh, Afif
Suleiman Al Judah, Adnan Odeh, Ahmad Dodeen, Adel Samara and
Abdul Rahim Kittana.
The Universal Declaration of Human
Rights states that the freedom of expression includes the
“freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek,
receive and impart information and ideas through any media
and regardless of frontiers”.
Further, PHRMG urges the
Palestinian authorities to ensure the physical and
psychological integrity of all detainees as well as order a
full and impartial enquiry into all events.
For more information, contact the
PHRMG office: Tel: 972 2 6262463, Fax: 972 2 6262378,
E-mail:
admin@phrmg.org
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