US, Israel to boycott the Durban conference

Thursday November 20, 2008 10:29 by Saed Bannoura - IMEMC & Agencies

Israeli Foreign Minister, Tzipi Livni, stated that Israel decided to boycott the second Durban conference for human rights which will be held in Geneva in April 2009. The United States and Canada also said they are boycotting the conference, the Arabs48 news website reported.

The Conference, “the World Conference Against Racism, Racial Discriminations, Xenophobia and related intolerance”, is a follow-up to the first conference held in Durban in 2001.

Livni claimed that “this conference, which should be meant to counter racism, will be used by Arab countries and Iran in uttering accusations and racist statements against Israel”.

She added that “this conference, like the one last year, will become a stage for anti-Semitism”.

The United States and Canada said that they will be boycotting the conference in solidarity with Israel.

Over the past several months, Israel sent numerous letters to senior officials at the United Nations demanding guarantees that “the conference would not be used as a stage for criticizing Israel” and demanded guarantees that this conference will not “turn out to be anti-Semite”.

 Last week, Livni met in New York with the UN Secretary-general, Ban-ki Moon, and presented the Israeli position regarding the conference. She claimed that Israel did not receive any guarantees that this conference will not be used against Israel, and therefore decided to boycott it.

The first anti-Semitism conference was held in Durban in September 2001. The idea of the conference was presented by South Africa; the Human Rights center of the United Nations, several Arab and international country joined South Africa.  

Israel believes that Arab countries and a number of Human Rights groups, tried to pass resolutions against it during the first conference.

Some of the Israeli objections are describing it as a racist state; describing Zionism as racism, describing settlements as ethnic cleansing against the Palestinians, accusing Israel of carrying offensives to annihilate the Palestinian people, and stating that the Holocaust is similar to other incidents that happened in the history of human kind.

Israel and the United States withdrew from the conference four days before it was concluded and claimed that it turned out to be racist and anti-Semite.

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