Ending Middle East trip, Annan urges parties to seize fleeting chance for peace
18 June – Following meetings with top Israeli and Palestinian officials, Secretary-General Kofi Annan has issued a broad
appeal to all those involved in the Middle East conflict to seize the current - and fleeting - opportunity for peace.
"I appeal to everyone to work actively for peace, for the sake of the people, for the sake of the region and for the
sake of the two parties involved," Mr. Annan told a press conference in Ramallah following his meeting on Saturday with
Palestinian Authority President Yasser Arafat.
"I think we have an opportunity, but a brief one, a fleeting opportunity to resolve this issue, and we should seize the
moment," Mr. Annan observed. "If we don't seize it may move away from us."
For his part, President Arafat told reporters, "We are disciplined and we are committed to fulfilling all the agreements
related to the ceasefire, and we hope the other side will make the same commitment."
The Secretary-General said he was gratified that both the Palestinians and the Israelis had accepted the ceasefire "so
that we can move on to the other essential and important aspects of the Mitchell report." That report, named for former
United States Senator George Mitchell who chaired the committee that produced it, contains recommendations geared
towards halting the violence and bringing the parties back to the negotiating table.
Asked whether the Mitchell committee report had replaced United Nations resolutions on the issue, Mr. Annan replied,
"The UN resolutions stand, and are relevant." He noted that the report contained constructive suggestions to break the
current cycle of violence and move on to confidence-building measures. "So, if you wish, the Mitchell Report provides a
road map to the negotiating table, and at the negotiating table the discussions that will take place will be in the
framework of land-for-peace, which is the essence of the UN resolutions."
Following the press conference, the Secretary-General meet with top-level officials from the Palestinian Authority and
from the United States. He also visited UN-run projects in the Occupied Territories that educate children and help the
injured.
Mr. Annan then departed for Jerusalem, where he had a private dinner at the residence of Israeli Prime Minister Ariel
Sharon on Saturday evening.
On Sunday, the Secretary-General met with a number of Israeli leaders from different points on the political spectrum,
starting with an impromptu visit by former Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. Among other officials, he met with Deputy
Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Shimon Peres.
During a press conference which followed their meeting, the Foreign Minister welcomed the Secretary-General warmly,
underscoring the importance of his present mission to the Middle East and adding that Mr. Annan could carry a message of
"hope and promise."
The Secretary-General said his purpose in coming to the region was "to seize the opportunity offered by the present
ceasefire and to use it to help restore the movement towards a lasting peace, negotiated within the framework of United
Nations resolutions."
He added that he was encouraged that both President Arafat and Prime Minister Ariel Sharon had repeated to him their
commitment to fully implement the recommendations of the Mitchell committee. He said he had been pressing both parties
to agree on timelines, "and to accept the help of third parties in whom they both have confidence."
The Secretary-General later visited a high school outside Tel Aviv that had lost seven of its students in a recent
suicide bombing.
Mr. Annan then departed for London, where he met privately today with his Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace
Process, Terje Roed-Larsen.
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UN convenes media encounter to discuss search for Middle East peace
18 June – Prominent journalists and Middle East experts, including senior officials and lawmakers from Israel and the
Palestinian Authority, gathered today at the Paris headquarters of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization (UNESCO) to discuss the search for peace in the troubled region.
In a message to the two-day seminar, Secretary-General Kofi Annan said that during his just-concluded week-long tour of
the Middle East he had met not only with senior officials but also with victims of the conflict, including Palestinian
children mutilated by gunfire and Israel school-friends of teenagers killed by a recent bombing in Tel Aviv. "Their
suffering is terrible in itself, but all the worse in that each act of violence sows the seeds of the next, and further
erodes each side's belief that peace with the other will ever be possible," he said.
Mr. Annan pointed out, however, that the two parties shared a mutual desire to see an end to the bloodshed. "On both
sides there is also a deep yearning to escape from this hell and find the way to a normal and peaceful life," he said.
The Secretary-General sounded a theme he has repeated throughout his trip, namely the need for both parties to seize the
current opportunity for peace by adhering to the ceasefire, implementing the recommendations of an international
committee of fact-finding (the "Mitchell committee"), and returning to the negotiating table to settle their differences
based on UN resolutions. "The end of the process must be a comprehensive peace settlement, negotiated by the parties on
the basis of Security Council resolutions 242 and 338, and the principle of land for peace, and the road that leads back
to such negotiations has been clearly traced by the Mitchell Committee," he said.
The Secretary-General's message was delivered by Shashi Tharoor, the Interim Head of the UN Department of Public
Information, which organized the event.
In his address to participants, UNESCO Director-General Koichiro Matsuura joined Mr. Annan's call for peace and noted
that education, combined with objective information, constituted a powerful tool to change attitudes.
Ambassador Ibra Deguène, the Chairman of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian
People, said the situation in the field was getting worse and that it was time for the international community to act.
He also noted the crucial role of the media in raising awareness in an objective and non-biased way.
Also taking part in the morning's session, which was moderated by Mr. Tharoor, were Loic Hennekinne, Secretary-General
of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of France, Nasser Al-Kidwa, the Permanent Observer of Palestine to the UN, Yuli
Tamir, a former Cabinet Minister in Prime Minister Barak's Government (Israel), Ambassador Clovis Maksoud (Lebanon),
Director of American University's Centre for the Global South, and Stephen Cohen, President of the Institute for Middle
East Peace and Development. Two Palestinian journalists who had been scheduled to attend were unable to do so due to
travel restrictions imposed by Israel.
ENDS