Erekat sends letter to Ashton Protesting Czech Ambassador's Visit to Ariel University

Dr. Saeb Erekat, PLO Executive Committee member, sent a letter on Monday to EU High Representative Catherine Ashton in which he voiced his deep concern over the visit of the Czech Republic’s Ambassador in Israel to Ariel settlement University last week.

In the letter, Erekat warned that Ambassador Pojar's visit undermines the EU's efforts to support the political process and the two-state solution by legitimizing the Israeli occupation.

“His visit occurred one day before Israel defied the EU and the international community by announcing 1,400 new settlement housing units, including 40 new units in Ariel. It came one month after the 28 foreign ministers of the Union’s member states unanimously deplored Israel’s continuous settlement expansion”, he wrote.

Erekat asked the EU to “publicly disavow Ambassador Pojar’s visit to Ariel University, and take appropriate action to ensure that representatives of the EU and its member states do not undermine the Union’s considerable and deeply-appreciated efforts to support the two-state solution.”

Ariel sits on nearly 15,000 dunums of stolen Palestinian land deep in the occupied West Bank, 20 kilometers east of the 1967 border.