ANAA, March 9 (Saba) - The UN Security Council last night held a closed session at the request of the State of Kuwait and Indonesia, on the deduction of the Israeli entity tax funds Palestinian.

Kuwait's UN ambassador Mansour al-Otaibi told reporters after the closed session that the Security Council discussed the decision of the Israeli entity to deduct part of the Palestinian tax revenues, and that the meeting did not result in anything because of the lack of consensus among the representatives of the 15-member council.

The issuance of presidential or press statements by the Council requires the approval of all 15 Member States.

In his remarks, the Kuwaiti ambassador explained that "the special coordinator of the Middle East peace process, Nikolai Miladinov, informed the members of the council that mediation should be used to resolve the issue," without elaborating.

He stressed that the majority of Member States considered that the Israeli entity can not deduct the Palestinian tax revenues, because these are Palestinian funds in the first place and because the Palestinians have the right to spend in the form they see.

On February 17, the Israeli entity decided to deduct some $ 139 million (annually) from tax revenues in a punitive measure to allocate part of the Palestinian Authority's revenues to pay salaries to detainees in Israeli jails and families of martyrs.

On the other hand, al-Otaibi revealed that during the closed-door consultations, the American peace plan to resolve the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, known as the "Deal of the Century," had been discussed, indicating that the talk was about the timing of putting the plan to be after the Israeli elections scheduled for April 9 .

The Kuwaiti Ambassador refused to provide further clarifications.


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