China’s top diplomat has said Beijing supports “full” United Nations membership of a Palestinian state, AFP reports.

“We support Palestine becoming a formal member of the United Nations,” foreign minister Wang Yi told journalists at a press conference.

“The catastrophe in Gaza once again reminded the world that the fact that the Palestinian territories have been occupied for a long time can no longer be ignored,” Wang said.

“The long-cherished wish of the Palestinian people to establish an independent country can no longer be evaded, and the historical injustice suffered by the Palestinian people cannot continue for generations without being corrected,” he added.

China has historically been sympathetic to the Palestinian cause and supportive of a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. And President Xi Jinping has called for an “international peace conference” to resolve the fighting.