JEDDAH, 16 September 2003 — Saudi Arabia yesterday said that Israel was responsible for the collapse of a cease-fire accord in the occupied Palestinian territories and that renewed violence had not only worsened the situation in Palestine but also hampered international efforts to implement the road map.
The Council of Ministers, which met here under the chairmanship of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd, said Palestinian factions were maintaining the truce. The Cabinet reiterated the Kingdom’s condemnation of Israel’s plan to exile Palestine President Yasser Arafat. The weekly Cabinet meeting urged peace-loving countries to exert all possible efforts to end the Israeli occupation and establish an independent Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, the Saudi Press Agency said.
Culture and Information Minister Dr. Fouad Al-Farsy said the Cabinet also called for protecting the unity, sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of Iraq.
The Cabinet hoped that the joint efforts of the United Nations, the Arab League and the interim government would help bring Iraq back to normalcy by setting up a constitutional government, the agency said. However, the Cabinet said the new broad-based government should treat all Iraqis equally, irrespective of their ethnic, religious and national inclinations.
Al-Farsy said the meeting approved a new law on the exchange of insurance benefits for Saudis being transferred from the General Organization for Social Insurance to the Pensions Fund and vice versa. The law was that an employee should be a subscriber of either system for at least a year and his age should not be more than 59 when applying for the transfer. A committee will be set up with three members each, from both GOSI and the Pensions Fund, to implement the law and propose its executive regulations. The law will come into effect 60 days after its publication in the official gazette.
Al-Farsy said the Kingdom would soon sign an agreement with Indonesia for the promotion and protection of mutual investment. The Cabinet endorsed an agreement with the US on a global environmental program.
