CANADA’S ABSTENTIONS AT UN EMERGENCY SESSION SEEN AS AMBIGUOUS AND AMBIVALENT

December 21, 2001

For Immediate Release

Toronto, December 21, 2001 — B’nai Brith Canada sees yesterday’s emergency session of the UN General Assembly as a cynical attempt to divert the attention of the international community from the Palestinian Authority’s failure to dismantle the very terrorist infrastructure that it helped to nurture.

Rochelle Wilner, National President of B’nai Brith Canada, asked why our government feels constrained to abstain on resolutions it finds problematic instead of voting against them. “Canada’s abstentions on the two resolutions passed at this session contribute to ongoing process whereby the UN and its mechanisms are manipulated for the sole purpose of condemning Israel. It is time for Canada to stand up and register its opposition to a practice which is counterproductive to the process of negotiation and marginalizes Israel’s legitimate security concerns.”

Frank Dimant, Executive Vice President, commented: “By registering abstentions, Canada is demonstrating an ambiguous and ambivalent response to the dynamics of the region. Yesterday’s resolutions omitted any specific reference to Palestinian terrorist groups, nor did it touch on the responsibility of the Palestinian Authority which has harboured, nurtured and co-operated with these groups in an ongoing campaign of violence. When faced with such glaring omissions, we would have expected our government to have registered a far more forthright and explicit rejection of the text than a mere abstention.”

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For further comment call Rochelle Wilner at (416) 254 1010

B’nai Brith has been active in Canada since 1875 as the community’s senior human rights organization. Its Institute for International Affairs was established to monitor human rights issues worldwide.