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PNA warns of breaking down Qatar's construction projects in Gaza

Xinhua, March 4, 2016 Adjust font size:

Palestinian National Authority (PNA) Ministry of Housing and Public Works warned Friday of inactivating the Qatari construction projects due to differences with local contractors companies in the Gaza Strip.

The ministry said in an official statement that any notes or claims on working in the construction projects granted by Qatar in the Gaza Strip are only resolved through the official and legal means and usual channels.

"The recent remarks published in the media are unprecedented, irresponsible and may harm the highest interests of our people," said the ministry statement.

On Thursday, the Palestinian Union of Contractors in Gaza accused the Qatari construction committee of making unjust decisions that violate the contracts signed between the union and the Qatari committee.

"The decisions of the Qatari construction committee also violate usual measures applied between the employing institutions and the union of Palestinian contractors to resolve any feuds between them," said the contractors statement.

The PNA ministry published the statement after several contractors companies in the Gaza Strip went on a strike and refrained from finalizing the construction projects that Qatar finances in the Gaza Strip due to differences between them.

"Obstructing the work in the projects of the vital and essential Qatari grant which changed the feature of the Gaza Strip and caused harms to our companies and industries would deprive 20,000 families from their monthly wages," it said.

However, the contractors union said the Qatari committee "made arbitrary decisions against Gaza contractors which confiscate their rights and blackmail them by holding their dues and forcing them to pay delay fines."

The union's statement went on saying that "these decisions against contractors were made although the Qatari committee is the one responsible for shipping the construction raw materials in accordance to the signed contracts."

"These decisions turned the Qatari committee from being a donator to becoming lucrative," said the contractors' statement, which called to stop confiscation of contractors rights by annulling some chapters in contracts that guarantee a fair compensation to contractors.

The union warned that if the Qatari committee doesn't respond to their demands, "this would compel us to escalate measures and begins with a sit in, a boycott and end up work with all Qatari-funded projects."

Meanwhile, the Qatari construction committee expressed astonishment after the union of contractors in Gaza published the statement, adding "it keeps its legal right to respond to the accusations, which are libel and extrusion."

Since 2012, Qatar has been financing a series of projects in the fields of housing, health and infrastructure in the Gaza Strip with 407 million U.S. dollars.

In October 2014, Doha pledged one billion U.S. dollars as part of 5.4 billion in a meeting held in Cairo for two days for more than 50 foreign and Arab donors to construct the Gaza Strip at the end of the last Israeli offensive on Gaza. Endit