The four-member panel appointed to investigate the Israeli raid on a Gaza-bound aid flotilla in May was to hold its first meeting with UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon on Tuesday, dpa reported.
Ban said Monday he would meet with the panel at UN headquarters to discuss its mandate, which he said includes examining investigations already carried out on the Israeli military interception of the Turkish-led flotilla, which killed nine people.
The panel will find and review the facts and circumstances that led to the violence onboard one of the ships, and then decide what else is needed to fully investigate the incident, Ban said.
"The panel has a robust mandate to examine and identify the facts, circumstances and contexts of the incident as well as to recommend measures to avoid future incident," Ban told a news conference.
The panel is to present its first progress report by mid- September.
It is headed by former New Zealand prime minister Geoffrey Palmer and outgoing President Alvaro Uribe of Colombia, who will co-chair the investigation. The other members are Ozdem Sanberk of Turkey and Joseph Ciechanover of Israel.
Sanberk has served as ambassador to Spain, France, Britain and Germany, and Ciechanover is an expert on financial and security policy.
The incident nearly severed decades-old diplomatic ties between Turkey and Israel, two allies in the difficult Middle East region. The nine people killed when Israeli forces stormed the flotilla included eight Turkish nationals and one Turkish American.
In addition to the UN inquiry panel, which was called for by the UN Security Council, the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva has also appointed a three-member "independent international fact-finding mission" to examine whether the raid violated international law.
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