Turkey welcomes UN vote on Palestine as 'another major defeat for US'

ANKARA

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu (Photo: Anadolu Agency)

Turkey said it welcomed the adoption of the resolution on the Protection of the Palestinian People in the United Nations General Assembly with a vast majority, in a development President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan described as another major defeat for the United States. 

“We welcome the adoption of the resolution on the Protection of the Palestinian People in the U.N. General Assembly with a vast majority. Responsible members of the international community have shown once again that Palestinian people will never be left alone in the face of grave violations of their fundamental rights, primarily their right to live, and will not keep silent against injustice,” the Foreign Ministry said in a written statement after the vote on late July 13.

The resolution was approved by 120 countries. Eight countries voted against the resolution while 45 abstained from voting. The move comes after the U.S. relocated its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem despite strong opposition from the world. Dozens of Palestinians were killed at the hand of Israeli security during the protests.

“We find it rather difficult to understand that some U.N. member states failed to uphold universal justice by refraining from supporting the resolution on such an issue, which has shaken the conscience of the international community and on which the just and the unjust are distinguished along clear lines,” it said.

Turkey said it expects the U.N. Secretary-General to act expeditiously to fulfill the requirements of the resolution and to formulate practicable recommendations within this framework as soon as possible “in order to ensure the accountability of the perpetrators of the massacre against the Palestinian civilians who participated in the peaceful protests and to establish deterrence with a view to preventing the recurrence of such incidents in the future.”

Turkey will continue to monitor the steps that will be taken on this matter and to stand by the Palestinian people in the upcoming period.

Erdoğan: Major defeat for US

In the meantime, Erdoğan described the results as another major defeat for the U.S. in a televised interview late June 13. He referred to another vote in the U.N. General Assembly late 2017, which had called the U.S. decision to move its embassy to Jerusalem illegal.