TOKYO, February 15, 2016 (WAFA) – President Mahmoud Abbas Monday renewed his call for an international conference and collective mechanism to be held and set up to bring the Israeli occupation to an end within a scheduled timeline.

Speaking during a joint press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Tokyo, Abbas praised the role of France in peacemaking in the Middle East and called for an international support group – composed of the UN Security Council permanent members, a number of Arab and European countries, Japan, and other countries and world powers – to be formed to support the Palestinian cause of ending the Israeli occupation.

“We are working with the ad-hoc Arab Ministerial Committee to seek a UN Security Council resolution on [Israeli] settlements, given their jeopardizing of security and stability in our region, as well their obstruction of the two-state solution,” he stated.

Abbas added Palestinians were not “seeking negotiations for the sake of negotiations” with the Israeli side. He stressed his leadership will not accept partial or interim solutions to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.

He pledged that his leadership would continue to accede to international treaties and conventions in order to safeguard Palestinian people’s rights and consolidating the bases of future democratic Palestinian state.

Abbas also praised Japan for its role in pushing for a solution to the conflict, urging it to play a greater role in reaching a political solution based on ending the Israeli occupation and establishing an independent Palestinian state on the basis of the 1967 borders and within a scheduled timeline.

Earlier the day, Abbas met with the Emperor of Japan, Akihito, in the Imperial Palace in the Japanese capital, Tokyo.

Abbas arrived in Tokyo on Sunday in an official four day-visit to Japan. Prior to this, he made a stopover on Dhaka international airport, during which he met with Bangladeshi Foreign Minister Abul Hassan Mahmud Ali.

M.N/K.F/M.H