The European Union has called for establishing a sustainable cease-fire in Gaza to make room for political negotiations for an eventual durable settlement of the conflict.
EU member states and Middle Eastern and North African countries are meeting in Barcelona for the 8th Union for the Mediterranean (UfM) Regional Forum “to discuss the critical situation in Israel and Gaza-Palestine as well as the consequences in the region,” as the UfM’s official site informed.
“The pause should be extended to make it sustainable and long-lasting while working for a political solution,” said the EU’s top foreign policy official, Josep Borrell, on Monday in Barcelona, at the start of the UfM’s meeting.
Furthermore, he called for a “political solution that should allow us to break the cycle of violence once and for all.” “Nothing can justify the indiscriminate brutality Hamas unleashed against civilians on the seventh of October,” he said. “But one horror cannot justify another horror.”
Josep Borrell called for an extension of the truce in the Gaza Strip, which is due to end on Tuesday.
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The four-day pause has seen tearful reunions of families and hostages, released in exchange for dozens of Palestinian prisoners, in the first relief in the seven-week war.
However, Israel did not attend the meeting in Barcelona.
Miroslava Salazar, with AFP
