MUI rejects possible Israeli presence at APU meeting

Jakarta, NU Online
The Indonesian Council of Ulema (MUI) rejects the possible presence of an Israeli delegation at an Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) conference to take place in Bali late this month and asks the government not to issue any visa to the Israeli representatives, the council’s chief said.

"Our rejection is based on our view that Israel is a colonial power to Palestina and South Lebanon. And we know colonialism is against the preamble of Indonesia’s 1945 Constitution," KH Cholil Ridwan, chairman of the MUI’s executive board, said here on Wednesday.<>

Israel had also committed various kinds of gross human rights violations such as killing Palestinian civilians, including women and children, causing poverty and destruction, and had jailed several Palestinian ministers and parliamentary members, he said.

Israel was also a country that did not respect international laws by ignoring various UN Security Council resolutions, especially on withdrawal of its military forces from Palestinian land it had been occupying since the Arab-Israeli war, according to Ridwan.

As reported by the state news agency, the MUI had conveyed its rejection to the possible arrival of an Israeli delegation to the IPU conference to the IPU secretary general and had also asked the Indonesian government not to give visas to the delegation, he said.

"If the government supports the arrival of the Israeli delegation, it means the Indonesian government recognizes the sovereignty of Israel and this will be against Indonesia’s foreign policy," he said. (dar)