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| May 3, 2002 | Friday | Safar 19, 1423 |
Annan disbands mission to Jenin
UNITED NATIONS, May 2: The UN Security Council was divided and devastated following Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, decision on Thursday to end the fact finding mission to Jenin refugee camp as mandated by the Council resolution.
Mr Annan announced that he would disband the 20-member team, waiting in Geneva, because of mounting Israeli conditions for the mission that Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s cabinet believes is biased against the Jewish State.
In a three-page letter to the UN Security Council on Wednesday, Mr Annan said he regretted aborting the mission because “the long shadow cast by recent events in the Jenin refugee camp will remain.”
“With the situation in the Jenin refugee camp changing by the day, it will become more and more difficult to establish with any confidence or accuracy the recent events that took place there,” Mr Annan said in the letter.
“For these reasons, it is my intention to disband the fact-finding team tomorrow,” he wrote.
The team was to be headed by former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari and included Cornelio Sommaruga, former president of the International Committee of the Red Cross, and Sadako Ogata, former UN High Commissioner for Refugees.
Initially the Arab nations tabled a draft resolution in the Security Council asking the Secretary-General not to abort the mission and to go ahead despite Israel’s objections.
But the resolution was later withdrawn by Syria and Tunis believing that it would be vetoed by the United States which had supported the idea of the mission in the first place.
After nine hours of on and off negotiations, council members went home for a brief sleep before returning for more scheduled talks, on Thursday, Ambassador Kishore Mahbubani of Singapore, this month’s council president told the reporters.
Palestinians accused the Israeli army of a massacre during eight days of fierce house-to-house fighting. Israel denies the allegation and says it was rooting out a “terrorist network.”
Israel’s cabinet on Tuesday again failed to give approval to the UN team, after agreeing two weeks ago to the mission. It insisted on an overhaul of the team’s procedures and said the mission’s final report should omit conclusions.
United States that had been instrumental in getting Israel to accept the mission in the first place and hoped until the last minute it would go ahead. The White House expressed regrets.
Palestinian Observer Nasser Al-Kidwa, said Israel was trying to hide its crimes in Jenin “and beyond.”
“They fired missiles from helicopter gunships at densely populated areas ... bulldozed structures while people were inside and prevented humanitarian and rescue workers from g