By Matthew Russell Lee, Exclusive
UNITED NATIONS, September 30 -- For Palestine on Friday in the UN Security Council's Committee on Admission of New Members there were only six of the fifteen members who wanted to push forward on Palestine's application for full UN membership.
With this surprisingly low vote count, the majority decided that the Committee will meet at a lower level, and merely "update" the Security Council in about two weeks.
There is, sources told Inner City Press, no assurance even of a formal or listed meeting about the update; it could be quietly done under "Other Matters."
A source in the meeting told Inner City Press that it was not only power, but numbers. Of the nine Council members which have recognized Palestine, three have been viewed as shaky: Nigeria, Gabon and Bosnia, due to the Republika Srpska portion of its government.
For the pro-Palestinian membership vote count to be only six at Friday's meeting, it means that all three broke the other way. Some insisted that they support Palestine "in principle" -- but as one of the stronger six supporters put it, it comes down to supporting a piece of paper, and for that there were only six.
Palestinian Observer Riyad Mansour came to the stakeout and made a statement in English, then as journalists tried to ask questions Mansour himself asked, "Arabic? Doesn't anyone read Arabic?" He then repeated the statement in Arabic and left without taking any questions.
While Gabon has not filed a "reservation" to the Group of 77's statement in support of Palestine, it may be a question of when, not if.
Non-Council member Barbados on Friday at noon confirmed Inner City Press' earlier exclusive story that Barbados is among the countries that has formally filed reservations to Paragraph 108 of the G-77 Statement, and named Antigua (and Barbuda) as another that has expressed reservations. We'll have more on this.
Abbas at GA on filing day, SC vote count of only six not shown
Some of those in the Council bringing about this special "legal" delay -- a review of the Charter by experts that one of the six strong supporters of Palestine called entirely unnecessary -- say the delay is for the Middle East Quartet process. On Friday before Mansour spoke but did not take questions, Inner City Press asked UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's spokesman Martin Nesirky who reviews Quartet envoy Tony Blair's conflicts of interest, working for JP Morgan Chase and the Quartet. "Not the UN," Nesirky said, urging Inner City Press to ask Tony Blair or the other Quartet participants. Watch this site.
