Military

PNA to ask UN to reestablish 1967 border with Israel if Mideast talks fail - ambassador

RIA Novosti

16:28 26/08/2010

MOSCOW, August 26 (RIA Novosti) - The Palestinian National Authority will ask the UN Security Council to reestablish the 1967 border with Israel if direct Mideast talks fall through, the Palestinian ambassador to Russia said on Thursday.

Israeli and Palestinian authorities agreed to resume direct talks for the first time in 20 months, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said last week.

She said Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas had been invited to Washington on September 2 to start the talks. Russian, EU and U.S. officials will also attend the talks.

"We don't want to prophesize their failure. We will go to these talks with the hope that they will be successful," Fayed Mustafa said at a news conference in Moscow.

"We would like the international community to not just monitor this process but also to interfere when there is a threat of a failure," Mustafa said.

He said a failure in the talks may lead to a further escalation of tensions in the Middle East.

Abbas called on Israel to grab the historic opportunity to reach peace between Israel and the PNA.

But if the talks fail, he said, the PA will call on the UN Security Council to reestablish the borders that existed before the 1967 Middle East war, when Israel occupied Palestinian territories on the West Bank and East Jerusalem.