If there is a vote in the United Nations on the Palestico request for recognition of their state, Montenegro will abstain, said the head of the permanent mission of Montenegro to the UN, Milorad Šćepanović.
Commenting on the issue that occupies the most attention at this year's UN General Assembly, Šćepanović said that, although he recognizes Palestine's right to a state, "which is at the level of principle and legitimacy, for Montenegro, on the other hand, "important elements of pragmatism are expected in this case".
Pointing out that Montenegro has excellent diplomatic relations with both the Palestinian Authority and Israel, Šćepanović said that until the appearance of the draft text of the resolution, it is not possible to definitively know how Montenegro will express itself.
"Our experience teaches us that despite the belief in one's right, one should exhaust all the possibilities of negotiations," Šćepanović told Montenegrin journalists.
"If it comes to that, Montenegro will abstain from voting, because for principled and historically legitimate reasons we cannot be against the right of a country to achieve its goal, but due to pragmatic reasons, Montenegro cannot turn a deaf ear to a very serious argument with Israeli side. "The EU does not have a unified position," he said.
Metzger in Podgorica, Abbas in Sarajevo
The US insists on the continuation of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, and most of the EU members follow them
Palestinian Authority President Mahmut Abbas visited Bosnia and Herzegovina in August and lobbied ahead of the important vote. In June, Israeli Foreign Minister Lieberman visited Albania, Croatia and Austria, as reported by the media - with the same goal.
It is interesting that last Sunday he was with Prime Minister Igor Lukšić in Podgorica discussed by Jona Metzger, the Chief Rabbi of Israel and the leading religious authority in the Jewish world.
Metzger decided to visit Podgorica, even though the Jewish community in Montenegro has about 60 members. There was not even a word about Palestine in the official agenda of the talks and the statements after the meeting.
Obama knows how high the stakes are
Otherwise, the USA insists on the continuation of negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, and most of the EU members follow them.
"When there is a unique position of the EU on an issue, then Montenegro has that as a reference point because we align with the EU's foreign policy considering that we have the status of a candidate. Since we carefully look at the relationship of forces within the EU when they do not have a unified position, it seems to us that our declaration is in correspondence with the politics and mood in the EU".
As the clock ticks down to the expected submission of the Palestinians' formal application for UN membership, all parties involved - Palestinians, Israelis and EU negotiators, as well as US President Barack Obama - know how high the stakes of this confrontation have become.
Palestine is not giving up
Palestinian leaders said it was too late to give up their plan, but these days negotiations continued at five to twelve to find a solution that would prevent the spectacle of a failed request for membership in the Security Council.
The president of the Palestinian Authority was not swayed by "enormous pressure" to drop his bid for full membership, including a new call from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for renewed direct negotiations.
Abbas said that 20 years of negotiations are more than enough that the world "should intervene and end the Israeli occupation when the US cannot."
One of the possible scenarios is that Abbas gives in to the pressure and turns his resolution, which will be sent to the UN Secretary General tomorrow (Friday), into a proposal for peace
Abbas said that 20 years of negotiations are more than enough that the world "should intervene and end the Israeli occupation when the US cannot."
The second, most expected scenario is that the 15-member UN Security Council rejects Abbas's request, forcing him to turn to the much broader General Assembly for a vote on upgrading from observer to non-member status, like the Vatican.
The third option is a gradual approach
Although it would be symbolic, it would give the Palestinians some satisfaction, but tensions in the region would increase dramatically, and the prospects for statehood would undoubtedly decrease.
A third option is a slow, gradual approach, where nothing would happen this week. World leaders would go home and the powder keg of Palestinian statehood would not be on the front pages.
This will happen if EU and US negotiators succeed in "removing" some votes in the SB. For the SB to propose the establishment of statehood, Abbas needs to collect nine votes in favor from the Council, without a single veto from the five permanent members.
If that fails, not only will Obama not have to veto the resolution, but it won't even be put to a vote.
It would only need a simple majority in the General Assembly (as opposed to a two-thirds vote on statehood), but that would take weeks if not months, leaving room for negotiators to try to restart dialogue.
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