Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has slammed the decision by the International Criminal Court to launch a preliminary investigation into possible war crimes in the Palestinian territories, saying it is absurd. Speaking in West Jerusalem yesterday, Netanyahu said it is absurd of the ICC to ignore international law and agreements under which the Palestinians do not have a state and can only get one through direct negotiations with Israel.
The rules of the ICC are clear, No state, no standing, no case. Netanyahu said Israel upholds high standards of international law and that the country's actions are subjected to careful and constant review of an independent legal system. Palestine applied to join the ICC in December and has since signed the Rome treaty, the charter that led to the formation of the ICC in 2002. It is due to join the court in April but its membership will be backdated to June 2014, meaning that the court will have jurisdiction to look into last summer's offensive between Israel and the Palestinian group Hamas. The conflict, which left the Gaza Strip run by Hamas devastated, killed more than 2,300 Palestinians, mostly women and children. Israel says it lost 73 people, most of them soldiers. |
Rouhani wins Iran's Presidential election Moderate cleric Hassan Rouhani won Iran's presidential election on Saturday, the interior ministry said, scoring a surprising landslide victory over conservative hardliners without the need of a second round run-off.Interior minister Mostafa Mohammad-Najjar announced on state television that Rouhani secured just over 50 percent of the ballot based on a 72 percent turnout of 50 million eligible voters. Mr Hassan Rouhani ... got the absolute majority of votes and was elected as president," Najjar said. Tehran Mayor Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, a hard-line conservative, lagged behind with about 16 percent of the votes. Iran's top nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili, he too a hard-line conservative, earned 11 percent. The voter turnout was 72.7 percent. President-elect Hassan Rohani, sixty four years old, is known as a moderate conservative. He has been stressing the need to improve ties with Western nations, and is back...
Comments
Post a Comment