Palestinian Request for UN Membership Starts Long Process

Just a week after Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas presented his bid for full membership in the United Nations, a committee of the Security Council met Friday to consider the request.

The committee on the admission of Palestine, made up of all 15 members of the Security Council, agreed to meet again next week at the expert level to discuss the technical details of the application. It is expected to report back to the Council on its work in two weeks.

Palestine’s envoy to the UN Riyad Mansour told reporters afterwards the Council had established the legal arguments for Palestine’s membership and that he now expected the process to move forwards without delay.

“We hope that the experts will deal with the application in a short period of time so that the next President of the Security Council, Nigeria next month, will be able to report to the Security Council about the work of the committee of experts.”