Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa said on Sunday that any US strikes on any Arab country would destabilize the situation, and urged Western nations to guarantee the safety of Arab and Islamic communities against a recent upsurge in Islamophobia.
Moussa's remarks to the press came after his talks with Jordan’s King Abdullah and Foreign Minister Abdul Ilah Khatib, five days before the king, who is the current president of the Arab summit, is scheduled to hold talks in Washington with US President George W. Bush, reported the Jordan Times.
Khatib said the king's talks with Bush “will revolve around the situation in the Middle East and the need for a concerted international effort” to jump-start the peace process.
His political moves over the past two weeks, according to Khatib, were designed to “reach a unified and clear-cut Arab stand vis-à-vis” the attacks that hit the US on September 11 and the ensuing campaign against international terrorism.
“Our position as Arabs is that of condemnation,” Khatib told reporters. While he stressed that “Arab, Islamic nations and their causes should not bear the responsibility for the attacks” Khatib called for intensified international efforts that acknowledge the “Arab-Israeli conflict as the root cause of tension in this region.”
Moussa said the cancelled meeting between Palestinian President Yasser Arafat and Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres would not “yield results unless Israel changed its belligerent policies against the Palestinians.”
Hawkish Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called off the much-anticipated encounter, which had been slated for Sunday in a bid to contain the year-old spiraling “violence” in the Palestinian territories.
Moussa totally rejected possible US-led attacks on Iraq or any other Arab country, as a massive military build-up now underway in preparation for retaliation for the September 11 attacks on New York's World Trade Center and the Pentagon in Washington.
“Clearly, we would never accept a strike against an Arab country, no matter what the circumstances,” said Moussa in reply to a question on how Arabs would react if the US decided to strike Iraq.
“Striking any Arab country would cause turmoil,” he said. “It is not a matter of grasping the opportunity to hit any Arab country.”
For Moussa, “there are different ways of fighting against terrorism and it must be the subject of consultations” among Arab leaders. While he ruled out a “military” alliance on this issue, Moussa pointed to “a host of political, diplomatic, judicial, economic and financial” cooperation within the US-led campaign.
The Arab official said an emergency meeting of the council of Arab foreign ministers would convene soon in light of the looming dangers, the paper said.
Moussa said he had discussed with King Abdullah “the possibility of holding, very soon, a meeting of Arab foreign ministers” to find a common Arab position.
Moussa warned against continued “aggression targeting Arab and Muslim communities in Western countries,” saying that this attitude would have “crucial repercussions.” – Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
