Syria: Bush, violating int'l conventions

 
Syrian Arab Republic  expressed on Tuesday its astonishment over U.S. President George W. Bush's recent statements that was said to cancel the Palestinian right of return, the official SANA news agency reported.

"According to the international law, the American president doesn't have a right to annul an international resolution that guarantees and preserves the right of return of the Palestinian refugees," SANA quoted a Foreign Ministry official as saying.

The Palestinian right of return was stipulated in UN Resolution194, which was adopted in 1948 and calls for the return of the Palestinian refugees.

During his meeting with PA Chief Mahmoud Abbas in the West Bank city Ramallah on Jan. 10, Bush proposed an 'international' mechanism of compensation payments for Palestinian refugees, without mentioning the long-anticipated return right.