Palestinians to call for emergency meeting of U.N. General Assembly

Permanent Observer for the State of Palestine to the U.N. Riyad Mansour addresses the U.N. Security Council meeting on the situation in the Middle East, including Palestine, at the United Nations Headquarters in New York, U.S., December 8, 2017. REUTERS/Brendan McDermid

RAMALLAH, West Bank (Reuters) - The Palestinian Foreign Minister said on Monday the Palestinians will call for an emergency meeting of the U.N. General Assembly after the U.S. vetoed a Security Council resolution calling for the withdrawal of its declaration that Jerusalem is Israel's capital.

President Donald Trump reversed decades of U.S. policy on Dec. 6 and recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, imperilling Middle East peace efforts and upsetting the Arab world and Western allies alike.

"We are moving within 48 hours ... to call for an emergency meeting of the General Assembly," Palestinian Foreign Minister Riyad al-Maliki told reporters in Ramallah. He said the international community would "consider the decision by president Trump as null and void."

(Writing by Ori Lewis; Editing by Matthew Mpoke Bigg)