US Cuts Funding For UNESCO After Palestinian Vote

Washington - The Obama administration is cutting off funding for the U.N. cultural agency because it approved a Palestinian bid for full membership.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland says Monday’s vote triggers a long-standing congressional restriction on funding to U.N. bodies that recognize Palestine as a state before an Israeli-Palestinian peace deal is reached.

Nuland says UNESCO’s decision was “regrettable, premature and undermines our shared goal to a comprehensive, just and lasting peace” between Israelis and Palestinians.

payment it planned to make in November.

She says the U.S. would refrain from making a $60 million

But Nuland said the U.S. would maintain membership in the body.

The Palestinians want full membership in the U.N., but Israel opposes the bid. The U.S. says it would veto a vote in the Security Council.

Delegates cheer after they approved the membership in a vote of 107-14 with 52 abstentions, during the session of UNESCO's 36th General Conference, in Paris, Monday Oct. 31, 2011. Palestine became a full member of the U.N. cultural and educational agency Monday, in a highly divisive move that the United States and other opponents say could harm renewed Mideast peace efforts.