Abbas: Palestinian bid for UN non-member on Sept 27

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas said on Saturday he will make a bid on September 27 to obtain non-member status at the United Nations. "We will go to the UN General Assembly for consultations with our friends on the draft resolution calling for the upgrade of Palestine (to non-member status)" in the United Nations, Abbas said in a televised address. "We are going to the UN to say that we are a state which applies the fourth Geneva convention (on the protection of civilians in time of war). There are 133 countries that recognise us as a state with east Jerusalem as its capital and where we have embassies hoisting the Palestinian flag." Palestinians now have an observer entity status. Palestinian foreign minister Riyad al-Malki said last month that Abbas would make the upgrade request on September 27 during the UN General Assembly. Palestinians are assured that the resolution would be passed with a wide majority. Such a resolution needs support of more than half of the 194 member states of the United Nations. In September 2011, Abbas made a high-profile effort to obtain full-member status at the UN, but the request was never put to a vote in the Security Council, where the United States had pledged to veto it. Several weeks ago, a senior official from the Palestine Liberation Organisation said Washington was pressuring the Palestinian leadership to delay its upgrade plans until after the US elections in November.