Italy will soon upgrade the Palestine Liberation Organization’s diplomatic status, the PLO representative here said in an interview published Sunday.
“The question has been under discussion and now we are in the phase of defining the new terminology,” Nemer Hammad told the newspaper La Repubblica.
” A number of formulations have been examined, among them ‘general delegation of the Palestine’ or ‘permanent delegation of the Palestinian state,’ “he said.
But Hammad, who said he will meet this week with Italian Foreign Minister Giulio Andreotti, said he does not believe Italy will actually recognize a Palestinian state in the near future.
“I think that the status of the PLO representation in Italy will be raised, in a way that will be a step forward with respect to the current situation, without, however, going all the way to full recognition,” he said.
Hammad’s interview was published a week after a delegation from the Italian Parliament went to Tunisia to meet with PLO leader Yasir Arafat.
“Undoubtedly that represented a manifestation on the part of the Italian people, represented by their Parliament, of a recognition of the Palestinian people and their right to self-determination and a state,” he said.
In Athens, meanwhile, the Greek Foreign Ministry is coming under pressure from Arab diplomats to recognize Israel and a Palestinian state simultaneously.
The Arabs are said to want such a move to take place before the June 18 elections in Greece. The fear the incumbent Socialist Party of scandal-ridden Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou will lose to the opposition Liberal Party, which favors normalizing relations with Israel and opposes recognizing the proclaimed Palestinian state.
Kostas Mitsotakis, the Liberal Party leader, reiterated last week that, if elected, his party would recognize Israel immediately upon taking office and would follow the European Community’s lead with regard to the proclaimed Palestinian state.
(JTA correspondent Jean Cohen in Athens contributed to this report.)
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