Council president states concern about Israeli West Bank measures.

The Security Council President on 26 January issued a three-paragraph statement noting "concern" expressed over the extension by the Israeli Knesset of emergency regulations in territories occupied by Israel.

In the statement (document S/16293), the Council President urged that "no steps be taken which could lead to further aggravation of tension in the area", and recalled previous Council resolutions stressing the applicability of the Geneva Convention Relative to the Protection of Civilian Persons in Time of War, of 12 August 1949.

Javier Chamorro Mora (Nicaragua), council President for January, received four communications on the matter -- from the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) (document S/16249); from Egypt (document S/16255); from the Chairman of the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People (document S/16261 -- A/39/70); and from Israel (document S/16269).

The PLO said the Knesset had approved laws which had "the aim of replacing the Jordanian legislation 'theoretically in force in the occupied West Bank'". The laws would authorize the application of civil and criminal laws in "Judea, Samaria and Gaza'", and the imposition of taxes on the transfer of property and applicable "only to Israeli citizens purchasing such prperty, whether 'in Israel, Judea, Samaria or Gaza'".

The PLO described those measures as "one more step in the process of creeping annexation and discrimination against Palestinian people still living in their homes in the Palestinian territories". The united Nations and the Security Council should take immediate steps to declare such measures illegal and to bring to an end Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories, it stated.

Egypt said the Israeli legislation was a serious violation of Security Council resolution 242 (1967), as well as of the framework of peace in the Middle East signed in September 1978, and could have "serious repercussions on the situation in the Middle East, adversely affecting the momentum promoting a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East and the efforts exerted by Egypt for achieving a just settlement for the question of Palestine".

The Chairman of the Palestinian Rights Committee, Massamba Sarre (Senegal), expressed the Committee's "deep distress" at the Knesset action and said the measures were "a flagrant violation of the principles of international law and innumerable resolutions" of the council and the General Assembly.

Israel stressed that the "regulations in question do not in any manner affect the existing local legislation". They were "in conformity with the recognized principle of international law . . . that a State has the right to apply its laws to its nationals in respect of acts committed by them also beyond the limits of its territorial jurisdiction".

Israel said that since 1967, when "Judea, Samaria and the Gaza District came under Israel control and administration", certain questions "pertaining to the exercise of jurisdiction and legal assistance, mainly in criminal matters", had to be regulated, to ensure that Israel nationals should not escape legal responsibility for offences committed in those areas. Routine extensions of such legislation had been made, most recently on 2 January 1984.

Also, Israel noted that the regulations had been amended in order to close "existing loopholes in the field of taxation" which had enabled some Israel nationals to avoid paying some applicable Israel taxes.