Shani Cooper is Israeli Ambassador to Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone
The Embassy of Israel in Ghana and 102 countries around the world have reopened after a shut down Wednesday.
Embassy announced a temporal shutdown via a press release, following a misunderstanding with the Finance Ministry of Israel.
A statement from the embassy copied to Starr News said: “Due to the decision of the Israeli Ministry of Finance to breach understandings that were agreed upon and signed by the Director General of the Ministry of Finance on July 21, 2019, and to apply a one-sided procedure that alters a protocol that has been in place for several decades, we are forced to close the diplomatic mission. No consular services will be provided and no one will be allowed to enter the Embassy”.
However, Shani Cooper, Ambassador to Ghana, Liberia and Sierra Leone told Starr News’ Atiewin Mbilla-Lawson that a third party had written to o the court to intervene in the issue, hence the call-of.
She said the court interfered and asked the ministry of finance to freeze all the demands to deduct salaries of diplomats.
“Now the court ruled 25 days for negotiations between the sides in which no side can do a step against the other and there is a discussion in court in the beginning of December. So in the beginning of December we will probably know if we have again an understanding or if we will have to go back to the conflict,” she explained.
She noted that between now and December, there would be negotiations between the ministry of finance of Israel and the union of the employees of the ministry of foreign affairs.
She announced that “since we resumed our work and the embassy is opened again. We are now sending individual messages to each person who was in the process of issuing visa or having a consular request.”
“Each and every one of the people will receive a message with new dates and new instructions on finishing the process,” she said.
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