THE UN CALLS ON ISRAEL AND EGYPT TO END THE SIEGE ON GAZA

New York, 23 Rajab 1435/23 May 2014 (MINA) – Assistant UN Secretary-General for Political Affairs Oscar Fernández-Taranco called on Israel and Egypt to take immediate measures to improve livelihood situation for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and to guarantee complete opening for the border crossings.

Speaking at the UNSC regular meeting on the Middle East situation, Fernández-Taranco said: “The international organisation calls on Egyptian and Israeli authorities to necessarily take immediate measures to help improve circumstance in the Gaza Strip.”

He added: “They have to guarantee the full opening of crossings of the Gaza Strip, including the Rafah Crossing, and permit the legal movement of trade and people,” Middle East Monitor (MEMO) reported as quoted by Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA).

Fernández-Taranco commented on the humanitarian situation in Gaza saying: “Palestinians are still in an urgent need for supplies to guarantee sustainability of basic services and improvement of vital infrastructures such as networks of running water and sewage.”

Israel has been imposing a strict siege on the Gaza Strip since mid-2006, when the Islamist Hamas movement won the majority of the Palestinian parliament.

Egypt has been helping Israel tightening the siege as it closes the Rafah Crossing; the main crossing for people into and out of the Gaza Strip.

After the ousting of former president Mohamed Morsi in July 2013, Egyptian regime carried out a massive campaign on tunnels used to smuggling basic livelihoods and medicines from Egypt to Gaza. (T/P012/E01)

Mi’raj Islamic News Agency (MINA)