U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney arrived in Bahrain on Sunday following crucial late night talks with Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Abdullah on a Saudi peace proposal for the Middle East and the Iraqi issue.
Cheney flew aboard a U.S. military plane to the Bahraini capital Manama for talks with King Hamad bin Isa al-Khalifa. During his two hour stay, he was also due to visit the U.S. Fifth Fleet navy headquarters before heading to Qatar.
Cheney and Crown Prince Abdullah talked into the night about the Saudi peace initiative offering Arab normalization of relations with Israel in return for Israeli withdrawal from Arab lands occupied in the 1967 war.
Cheney also invited Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler to visit Washington, and the official Saudi Press Agency said Prince Abdullah had accepted the offer, nine months after he snubbed a similar invitation over perceived U.S. bias towards Israel.
Cheney's regional tour was initially aimed at maintaining momentum for the U.S. led war on terrorism, begun after the September 11 attacks on the United States. But the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, and U.S. efforts to end it, have forced themselves to the top of the agenda.
Cheney is also promoting Washington's campaign to stop Iraqi President Saddam Hussein acquiring weapons of mass destruction, but all the Arab leaders, including in Saudi Arabia, Cheney has met on his current tour said they would oppose any military action against Iraq.
It would be difficult for the United States to mount a successful military campaign against Iraq without the support — or at least acquiescence — of Saudi Arabia, military analysts suggest.
An open letter to Cheney in the Saudi Gazette, the major English language newspaper in the kingdom, asked how America can justify trying to eliminate Iraq's Saddam Hussein while doing nothing to rein in Israel’s prime minister Ariel Sharon. Both men are butchers, the Saudi paper wrote.
Cheney is set to arrive in Israel Monday afternoon. (Albawaba.com)
© 2002 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
