Obama Team Tells Jewish Leaders: UN Durban Text Crosses "Red Line"

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Source: Huffington Post


April 14, 2009 at 08:23 PM

In a private conference call with Jewish leaders on Tuesday, the Obama White House reaffirmed that it has not decided to formally reengage negotiations over the charter of the United Nations' World Conference on Racism, citing lingering disputes over the review document's language.

On the call, which the Huffington Post managed to listen in on, National Security Council aide Samantha Power stressed that while progress had been made on the text of the Durban II document, not enough had been done to get the United States to the table.

The current working text, she said, "met two of our four red lines frontally, in the sense that it went no further than reparations and it did drop all references to Israel and all anti-Semitic language. But it continued to reaffirm, in toto, Durban I. And while it did drop specific references to defamation, it continues to include very problematic language on incitement... that are out of line with core U.S. commitments to free speech. So that's where we have been for a couple weeks, with a text that is dramatically improved... also ratifies the U.S. decision to walk away in the sense that it did seem to spur the other delegations to go back to the drawing board... We have not reengaged in any kind of formal way with this process. Our red lines remain our red lines... In order for us to participate in the negotiations, to sit behind the placard, to be involved in a frontal way, much more would need to be done. And all four of our red lines will need to be met."

Power, who serves as director for multilateral affairs for the NSC, concluded: "We will make our decision up closer to the date of the conference, we want to show good faith to our allies and the people who are working hard to improve the text... But we are also not interested in being involved or associated with fool's errands."


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