"Congratulations President Trump, the charter is now in full force, and the board of peace is now an official international organisation," White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said at the signing ceremony.
The White House billed the ceremony as a sort of charter launch, but no charter draft has been publicly released. Nor is a complete membership list clear yet.
Trump initially billed his Board of Peace focused on Gaza. Then he said it could play alongside the U.N. as a global broker.
In his remarks at at the signing ceremony, Trump reaffirmed the Board of Peace will start with a focus on Gaza but then look globally.
“I think we can spread out to other things as we succeed with Gaza, we’re going to be very successful in Gaza,” he said, adding, “We can do numerous other things. Once this board is completely formed, we can do pretty much whatever we want to do.
“He promised again to work “in conjunction with the United Nations,” though he still criticized the U.N. for not doing enough historically.
“I think the combination of the Board of Peace with the kind of people we have here, coupled with the United Nations, can be something very, very unique for the world,” Trump said.
Trump inaugurated his newly created Board of Peace with a handful of founding members, but offered few details about its mandate and how the panel will work or might pursue efforts to end global conflicts.
A number of countries, many of them close U.S. allies, have expressed concerns that Trump might want the board to supplant or rival the U.N. and have either refused to sign on or remained noncommittal.
The U.S. secretary of state praised the Board of Peace as “a group of leaders that is about action” and credited Trump for bringing it together.
“He’s not limited by some of the things that have happened in the past, and he’s willing to talk to or engage with anyone in the interest of peace,” Rubio said.
Rubio stressed the body’s job “first and foremost” is “making sure that this peace deal in Gaza becomes enduring.” Then, Rubio said, it can look elsewhere.
With details of the board’s operations still unclear, Rubio described it as a work in progress.
“Many others who are going to join, you know, others either are not in town today or they have to go through some procedure internally in their own countries, in their own country, because of constitutional limitations, but others will join,” Rubio said.
Representatives from countries introduced as founding members were present at the ceremony, which took place at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. The foreign ministers of Turkey, Jordan, and Qatar were among the attendees, while no representatives from other global powers, Israel, or the Palestinian Authority were spotted at the ceremony."
Some 35 countries had agreed to sign on to the project, a senior administration official told reporters, and 60 nations had been invited to join. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity under ground rules set by the White House.
The European Union’s executive arm, Canada, Russia, Ukraine, and China also have not yet indicated their response to Trump’s invitations.
Some European nations, meanwhile, have declined their invitations. The UK, Norway, and Sweden have indicated that they won’t participate, after France also said no. French officials stressed that while they support the Gaza peace plan, they were concerned the board could seek to replace the U.N. as the main venue for resolving conflicts.
Parties key to the Gaza ceasefire — Israel and Egypt — said Wednesday they would join the board.
Trump said on Wednesday that some countries’ leaders have indicated that they plan to join but still require approval from their parliaments, and said his administration is also receiving queries about membership from countries that hadn’t been invited to join.
Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law who has been involved in Middle East negotiations, gave a slide deck presentation at the Board of Peace launch that included real estate development plans by zones.
“We do not have a plan B,” Kushner said, adding that people in the Middle East build cities in two or three years.
Trump, during his closing remarks, noted his own experiences in real estate.
He described Gaza as “this beautiful piece of property” and suggested his push for peace between Israel and Hamas “all began with the location.”
*This story was compiled by Ahram Online.
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