Human rights watchdog wants to mediate talks

The leading European human rights watchdog has decided to invite Palestinian politicians from the Hamas group to Strasbourg in hopes of bringing them together with Israeli counterparts who were also asked to come.

It was the latest step in efforts by the international community to deal with the January election victory by Hamas, which the United States and the European Union consider a terrorist group.

Hamas’ imminent takeover of the Palestinian government has raised complex questions about how Europe can continue its massive aid to the Palestinian Authority.

The Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly said it would invite members of the Palestinian Legislative Council, including Hamas deputies, and members of the Israeli parliament to its April 10-13 session, but did not give any names.

“We are offering Strasbourg as a lab, as a testing ground for dialogue. If we invite Palestinians and Israelis and no members of Hamas come it will not be a real reflection of the Palestinian Legislative Council,” Mikhail Margelov said.

Margelov, who leads a committee on the Middle East at the assembly, an advisory body to the council, said it was important not to isolate a Palestinian government.

“We must look for new approaches. We’re faced with the fact that Hamas will be forming the government,” said Margelov, who is also chairman of the foreign affairs committee in the Russian Parliament’s upper house.

Russia has urged world powers to engage Hamas and held talks in Moscow with some of the group’s leaders earlier this month.

But Israel’s Foreign Ministry condemned the idea of inviting Hamas to the Council of Europe, calling Hamas a terrorist organisation.

“This is a slap in the face to the very principles upon which the Council of Europe was established, namely democracy, human rights and the rule of law,” Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said.

He said that the legitimacy given to the group “is counterproductive to all those who want to see peace in the Middle East.”

The Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly comprises several hundred national lawmakers from 46 European countries, including the 25 members of the European Union. It meets four times a year in Strasbourg.

The Council of Europe profiles itself as a peacemaker striving for dialogue and democracy. Last year, it organised a forum on Chechnya, but no representatives of the separatist rebels showed up for the talks, leaving only pro-Russian politicians to discuss the fate of the province.