Mr Pritam Singh: To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs what are the reasons behind Singapore's decision to abstain from voting to grant Palestine full membership in the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Mr K Shanmugam:
Singapore has long supported the establishment of a Palestinian state as part of a negotiated two-state solution, which will see Israel and Palestine living side by side in peace and security. But in our judgement, the recent move to grant Palestine full membership in UNESCO would not contribute to such a solution.
Singapore was one of the 52 countries that had abstained on the vote to admit Palestine into UNESCO. We understand and sympathise with the desire of the Palestinians to become a member of UNESCO. But the application could not be considered apart from its broader political context. More importantly, it is also questionable whether it would help or hinder UNESCO's primary mission of promoting education, science and culture.
From the reactions to the application and the outcome of the vote, it is evident that UNESCO had been seriously divided and possibly weakened by this issue. The politically fraught atmosphere hinders UNESCO's primary Mission - Members would have read in the media that the US Congress has cut funding to UNESCO which was entirely predictable. That dimension has been ignored by those who sought Palestinian membership. It also adds a further complication to the already complicated negotiations over the Palestinian issue and has set back those negotiations.
Furthermore, the application was submitted just after Palestine had applied to the UN Security Council for full membership in the UN. That application is still under the Council's consideration in New York. Therefore, we could not ignore the fact that UNESCO's decision would have a political impact. It is not part of UNESCO's mandate to play such a political role. As such, we decided to abstain from voting on the UNESCO application.