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The Western-backed Palestinian Authority has been disappointed that Obama did not pressure Israel to make greater efforts to make peace with the Palestinians, including a freeze on all settlement construction. In the absence of negotiations, senior Palestinian official Saeb Erekat urged the U.S. president to reverse course and support Palestinian efforts to seek U.N. General Assembly recognition of an independent state of Palestine. "We have decided to take our cause to the United Nations this month, and we hope that Obama will stand by us," Erekat told Wafa, the official Palestinian news agency. In China, Obama's re-election was good news for people concerned about Romney's vow to label China a currency manipulator if elected. Some feared that would ignite a trade war between the world's two biggest economies. "His re-election is in line with what the Chinese people want," said Hong Zihan, a graduate student who monitored the results at a U.S. Embassy event in Beijing. In Russia, Fyodor Lukyanov, editor-in-chief of Russia in Global Affairs, said Obama's second term should not bring any substantial change to Russian-American relations. He said he doesn't expect Washington to reverse a plan to roll out a missile defense system in Europe, which has irritated Moscow for years. "I don't expect any breakthroughs," he said. "That's just not possible." In Myanmar, which is pushing political reforms forward after five decades of military rule kept it isolated from much of the rest of the world, some said they were relieved Obama was re-elected because he chosen to engage rather than sanction their country. "It is good that President Obama is re-elected. President Obama is very flexible and international relations have improved during his term," said Thit Oo, a 42-year-old car mechanic. A spokesman for the main Syrian opposition bloc, the Syrian National Council, expressed hope that the election victory would prompt Obama to do more to support those trying to oust Syrian President Bashar Assad. "We hope this victory for President Obama will make him free more to make the right decision to help freedom and dignity in Syria and all over the world," SNC spokesman George Sabra said on the sidelines of an opposition conference on the Qatari capital of Doha. Sabra renewed the opposition's appeal to the international community to supply rebel fighters with weapons, but the Obama administration and its Western allies have been cool to opposition rebels' demands for weapons such as anti-aircraft missiles, out of concern that they could fall into the wrong hands.
[Associated
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