Arab door to open for Iraq’s leadership
<Even the Arab radicals realize that without Saddam henchman like Ezzat Ibrahim or Taha Yasin, the Arab league meetings would be a different kind of place.>
By Acil Tabbara
CAIRO: Arab states are increasingly willing to allow Iraq’s US-appointed leadership to be represented at their upcoming meeting on Tuesday, but without formally recognising its legitimacy, according to Egyptian and Arab League officials.
Of the 22 members of the Arab League, five have so far agreed to the Iraqi interim Governing Council’s request to represent Iraq at the meeting in Cairo on Tuesday and Wednesday, an Arab League official said. The five are Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, said the official, requesting anonymity.
Two Arab heavyweights — Egypt and Syria — have hinted they will also approve the request of the Governing Council to occupy Iraqaq’s seat at the League, vacant since the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime in April. “We cannot not deal with Iraq because there are attempts aimed at convincing it to abandon its Arab character and at isolating it from the Arab world,” Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Maher said Saturday.
Maher and Arab League chief Amr Mussa have welcomed the new Iraqi cabinet, appointed on Monday by the Governing Council. And Syrian Foreign Minister Faruq al-Shara has said Damascus is ready to deal with the Iraqi cabinet “in the interest of the Iraqi people”.
US Secretary of State Colin Powell said on August 7 that Washington would lobby Arab states to issue a declaration encouraging the Governing Council when their foreign ministers meet.
The Egyptian official news agency MENA said Thursday: “Most Arab states are willing to allow Iraq to attend the meeting” of foreign ministers. “There is no other alternative but for the Iraqi government to represent Iraq, nobody would benefit from cutting off communications with the new government or the Governing Council,” it added, quoting senior Arab diplomats.
The Governing Council issued a statement Thursday saying it would send the country’s newly-appointed acting foreign minister, Hoshyar Zebari, to the meeting despite not being invited. A Governing Council envoy, Safaa al-Bayati, was barred from a meeting of the league’s permanent representatives on Tuesday in the Egyptian capital, pending a joint decision to be taken at the ministerial gathering.
Mussa said Friday that a decision would be taken “on the modality of Iraq’s representation” at a consultative gathering of Arab ministers Monday, ahead of the formal sessions. Mussa’s spokesman, Hisham Yussef, told AFP: “Arab states could for example invite Iraq to make a speech at the meeting.”
Other Arab League officials said Arab states were likely to agree on Zebari expressing the Governing Council’s point of view on Iraq, but without formally giving this body Iraq’s seat at the Arab League.
They said the new government was not internationally-recognised, that the US-led coalition ruling Iraq has kept a right to veto its decisions, and that some Iraqis continue to reject its legitimacy. —AFP |
