REPUBLIKA.CO.ID, JAKARTA -- During the upcoming extraordinary summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), Indonesia will push for initiatives in efforts to return Palestinian refugees to their region, a foreign ministry official said here on Thursday.

"Indonesia in the OIC Summit will later also push for the return of Palestinian refugees to Palestine," the Director General of Multilateral Cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Hasan Kleib, said.

He said illegal resettlement activities by Israel that have reached East Jerusalem would affect the demographic composition of the region and later make the Palestinian people lose their rights in the area.

"The danger of resettlements is that they will change the demographic composition of Palestine. East Jerusalem used to have many Palestinian residents, but day by day their number is becoming smaller due to the presence of Jewish settlers," he added.

"So, if a referendum is held someday, Palestine may lose because East Jerusalem is full of Jewish settlers as five million Palestinians live outside it," he said.

In view of this, Hasan said Indonesia would call for efforts to return Palestinians to their region.

President Joko Widodo during the U.S.-ASEAN Summit in California, United States, also reminded the audience about the need to make efforts to settle the Palestinian problem.

The president said Indonesia has consistently supported Palestinian independence.

One of the concrete contributions of Indonesia would be the country's willingness to become the host of the OIC Summit on March 6 and 7 to discuss the Palestine and "Al Quds Al Sharif" (holy city of Jerusalem) issues.

The extraordinary conference will be attended by OIC member countries and also observer countries, such as Thailand, Bosnia Herzegovina, Russia and the Republic of Central Africa.

Ikuti Whatsapp Channel Republika