It appears that the Palestinians’ request to become a full-fledged member of the United Nations by applying to the Security Council this fall has hit major stumbling blocks. As reported by Evelyn Leopold in a Huffington Post blog, the Palestinians are not expected to get the nine votes in the 15-member Security Council that they need for nationhood status at the United Nations, a quest they began talking about early this year.
A special Security Council committee assigned to the Palestinians’ membership application has been debating the request in the last two months, but it seems that Bosnia-Herzegovina, Britain, Colombia, France, Germany and Portugal will abstain in a Security Council vote and that the US will stick with its pledge of a no vote or possibly abstain, too. The committee is expected to report on Nov. 11 on whether Palestine meets the requirements of nationhood at the United Nations.
To read Leopold’s full post, go to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/evelyn-leopold/palestine-un-statehood_b_1086336.html
Dulcie Leimbach is a co-founder, with Barbara Crossette, of PassBlue. For PassBlue and other publications, Leimbach has reported from New York and overseas from West Africa (Burkina Faso and Mali) and from Europe (Scotland, Sicily, Vienna, Budapest, Kyiv, Armenia, Iceland and The Hague). She has provided commentary on the UN for BBC World Radio, ARD German TV and Radio, NHK’s English channel, Background Briefing with Ian Masters/KPFK Radio in Los Angeles and the Foreign Press Association.
Previously, she was an editor for the Coalition for the UN Convention Against Corruption; from 2008 to 2011, she was the publications director of the United Nations Association of the USA. Before UNA, Leimbach was an editor at The New York Times for more than 20 years, editing and writing for most sections of the paper, including the Magazine, Book Review and Op-Ed. She began her reporting career in small-town papers in San Diego, Calif., and Boulder, Colo., graduating to the Rocky Mountain News in Denver and then working at The Times. Leimbach has been a fellow at the CUNY Graduate Center’s Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies as well as at Yaddo, the artists’ colony in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.; taught news reporting at Hofstra University; and guest-lectured at the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism and the CUNY Journalism School. She graduated from the University of Colorado and has an M.F.A. in writing from Warren Wilson College in North Carolina. She lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.
