President Mahmoud Abbas signed letters of accession to 15 international conventions and treaties after the Israeli government refused to release the fourth group of Palestinian prisoners.
In a meeting of the Palestinian Liberation Organization’s action committee, Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas announced that he had signed 12 documents that the PA would use to petition the UN.
Before signing the documents, Abbas asked the members of the PLO leadership present at the address to vote yea or nay – and the vote was unanimously in favor. Abbas then signed the papers, under which the PA will be joining 15 international organizations.
Abbas said the leadership made its decision after Israel neglected to announce a fourth round of prisoner releases.
The full list of treaties and conventions to which Abbas sent letters of accession:
1. The Four Geneva Conventions of 12 August 1949 and the First Additional Protocol
2. The Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations
3. The Vienna Convention on Consular Relations
4. The Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in armed conflict
5. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
6. The Hague Convention (IV) respecting the Laws and Customs of War on Land and its annex: Regulations Concerning the Laws and Customs of War on Land
7. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
8. The Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties
9. The International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination
10. The Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment
11. The United Nations Convention against Corruption
12. The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide
13. The International Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid
14. The International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights
15. The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights