Canada announced Thursday it was lifting its restriction on contacts between government ministers and the Palestine Liberation Organization.
The move was announced by External Affairs Minister Joe Clark as Canada held its first formal meeting with a PLO representative at United Nations headquarters in New York.
Yves Portier, the Canadian delegate to the United Nations, met with Nasser al-Kidwa, alternate representative for the Palestine observer mission, 40 minutes after Clark’s announcement.
The discussion was “very general,” lasting 10 to 15 minutes, according to a spokesman at the Canadian mission to the United Nations.
In Ottawa, Clark announced that the government had decided to “lift existing restrictions in contacting the PLO at the ministerial level.”
He expressed the hope that his government “can play a constructive role in bringing together the parties to the conflict.”
But he pointed out that the Foreign Ministry continues to maintain its policy of not recognizing the Palestinian state declared by the Palestine National Council in Algiers last November.
Clark had been lobbying for the shift in policy for some time, finally persuading Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, who had opposed high-level talks with the PLO.
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