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Boris Johnson meets PA Foreign Minister

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Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson met Palestinian Authority (PA) Foreign Minister Riyad al Malki at the Foreign Office yesterday to discuss UK-Palestinian relations.

In a statement after the meeting, Johnson said: “The UK-Palestinian relationship is strong and long-standing and it was a pleasure to meet Foreign Minister Riyad al-Malki to discuss our shared desire to strengthen it further.” He also pointed to the UK’s “commitment to supporting the Palestinian people and the two-state solution” and “the urgent need for renewed peace negotiations”.

The Foreign Secretary reaffirmed the UK’s “longstanding position on the status of Jerusalem,” following US President Donald Trump’s recent Jerusalem announcement.  Johnson said the city’s status “should be determined in a negotiated settlement between the Israelis and the Palestinians, and Jerusalem should ultimately be the shared capital of the Israeli and Palestinian states”.

Malki later met with International Development Secretary Penny Mordaunt to discuss the UK aid programme in the Palestinian Territories. Britain is a major contributor of aid to the Palestinians, and allocated £507m in assistance for the Palestinians between 2012 and 2016.

Malki sparked controversy in July when he asked the Arab League for support to file a lawsuit in an international court against the UK government for publishing the Balfour declaration. Malki said at the time that the declaration was a promise with a bad omen, that “hundreds of thousands of Jews arrived from Europe and other places in Palestine at the expense of our people” and that Britain was responsible for “Israeli crimes committed against our people since the end of the British Mandate”.