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News, 09-16/04/03 (6) NERVOUS NEIGHBOURS * Turkey, in the end, joins the 'willing' coalition * Baghdad scenes uplift Israelis but dishearten Arab leaders * Divided Arabs contemplate their second catastrophe * Preliminary Postmortem: The Arab Press and the Fall of Saddam * Ankara's Miscalculation * Hizbullah denies claims that it sent fighters to Iraq * Arab world set to foot the war bill * Kingdom Calls Emergency Regional Meeting on Iraq * After the fall of Baghdad, who will dare challenge Washington? * U.S. Seeks to Stop Oil From Iraq to Syria NERVOUS NEIGHBOURS http://www.dailystar.com.lb/opinion/10_04_03_e.asp * TURKEY, IN THE END, JOINS THE 'WILLING' COALITION by Mohammad Noureddine Lebanon Daily Star, 10th April Finally, after weeks of procrastination, and 14 days into the war on Iraq, Turkey said "yes" to war. [.....] As a matter of fact, the new agreement signed by Gul and Powell on April 2 was ready for signature for some time. According to Mustafa Karaalioglu, Ankara correspondent for Yeni Safak, the agreement was concluded even before Powell arrived at Ankara. It was noticeable that Gul announced Turkey's acceptance of the new terms immediately after meeting with Powell, and did not go through the usual motions of consulting with the prime minister, the chief of staff and the president. Powell's visit turned the page on one of the tensest episodes in the Turkish-American relationship - an episode that both sides will remember for a long time to come. But what did Turkey get out of Powell's visit? 1. Turkey achieved a major concession that had long been a sticking point in negotiations between the two sides - namely, Powell's personal pledge that the Kurdish Peshmerga fighters would not enter Mosul and Kirkuk. The Peshmerga, Powell promised, would remain under American supervision. 2. US and Turkish forces will work in concert against PKK elements based in northern Iraq. 3. Turkey would be allowed to maintain a security zone inside Iraqi territory should that prove necessary. 4. A role for Turkey in the political and economic reconstruction of Iraq. In their joint press conference, Gul and Powell stressed the"Turkish model" for democracy and secularism in a Muslim state. Powell said "Turkey will have an important role to play in this reconstruction effort, not only helping with direct reconstruction help, but also by the example that Turkey will provide to Iraq of a democracy - a Muslim democracy - living in peace with its friends and neighbors." 5. Powell pledged Washington's support for Ankara on the Cyprus issue, especially since Turkey was coming under intense pressure in the European Union and the UN. Powell promised that "favorable developments are in the pipeline." 6. A $1 billion economic aid package. 7. The two countries agreed to set up a joint Turkish-American "coordination committee" to oversee developments on the ground. Turkey thus secured a role in shaping events in Iraq. For its part, the US made some important gains as well: First, it secured ground support for its forces already operating in northern Iraq. This support was granted under the guise of humanitarian aid and the provision of fuel and food, as well as permission for US aircraft to land in Turkey in order to evacuate casualties. Significantly, the Powell-Gul news conference had barely ended before US land forces started rolling into northern Iraq from Turkish territory. Second, Washington also secured a promise from the Turks that their forces would only enter northern Iraq in coordination with the Americans. The US thereby averted the possibility of clashes erupting between the Iraqi Kurds and the Turkish Army, and succeeded in ensuring the cohesion of the northern front. Most observers agree that Washington clinched - with the agreement between Powell and Gul - its first political victory since the Iraq war erupted. It also succeeded in checking Turkey's cooperation with Syria and Iran. In exchange, Turkey managed to maintain its strong ties with the US, achieved its aims vis-a-vis the Iraqi Kurds, and projected itself as an important country where US national interests are concerned. Nevertheless, Gul's assertion that Turkey was "part of the coalition" makes Ankara a full participant in the war - with all the risks and ramifications that this entails. http://www.dailystar.com.lb/opinion/11_04_03_g.asp * BAGHDAD SCENES UPLIFT ISRAELIS BUT DISHEARTEN ARAB LEADERS Lebanon Daily Star, 11th April The dramatic collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime in Iraq dominates the news pages of Israel's newspapers and both Tel Aviv mass-circulation tabloids, Yediot Ahronot and Maariv, have special double-spread editions, with huge one-word banner headlines over full-page pictures of Saddam's fallen statue in Baghdad's main square. "Liberation," thunders Maariv; "Victory," roars Yediot Ahronot. Maariv writes: "9.4.2003, 17:50 hours, a moment that will go down in history of Baghdad getting rid of the reign of terror; of Iraqis and Americans, together smashing Saddam's statue, as the watching crowd shouts for joy." In Yediot Ahronot's leader, Sever Plotzker says, "Baghdad did not fall. Baghdad rose up. Baghdad emerged from a long nightmare of cruel tyranny. Baghdad stepped out of Saddam's reign of terror that suffocated its citizens. Baghdad rose from the degradation, the suppression, and the horror. Baghdad shook off the medieval darkness and sprang to life." "American soldiers could not have reached the center of Baghdad in a 21-day gallop if the Iraqis had seen them as foreign invaders," Plotzker argues. "The Iraqi people would have blocked their way with their bodies and the Americans would not have been able to break popular Iraqi resistance - not militarily, not morally and not politically. But the Iraqi people saw the American soldiers as liberators." "True," Plotzker continues, "the Americans are bringing democracy to Baghdad on the barrels of their tanks, but Iraq will be a democracy in its own right. It will be the first Arab country to cast off the curse of generations, by which democracy and Arabism seemed to be mutually exclusive. In Iraq, the learned theory, according to which Arab culture rejects the values of liberal democracy because it has 'other values,' will finally be laid to rest." "What 'other values' are we talking about here?" Plotzker challenges. "Secret police on every street corner? Torture chambers? People disappearing in the middle of the night? People starving while leaders build themselves palaces? Developing chemical and biological weapons instead of medicines for hospitals? Concentration camps, mass graves, three abortive imperialistic wars?" "There is no human culture that has such values," Plotzker asserts. And to prove his point that democracy can flourish anywhere, he gives an example: "At the end of World War II, Far East experts insisted that Japan would never be a democracy. Western democracy, they said, was incompatible with Japan's tradition and values. Five years later, it was a full fledged democracy. So it has remained to this day, long after the last of the occupying soldiers left." "The establishment of democracy in Iraq, by Iraqis for Iraqis, will take time," he acknowledges. But, "it will set off an earthquake across the length and breadth of the Middle East. At last the truth will be revealed: It's not the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that is the Muslims' 'problem' - but the authoritarian, dictatorial, undemocratic governments that rule them. Removal of one may trigger a chain reaction toppling, one after the other the dictatorships in Syria, Iran, Sudan, Libya and Saudi Arabia." "Every dictator's day will come," Plotzker concludes. "On Wednesday, one of the last of them, Saddam Hussein, fell. He fell, but Baghdad did not. Baghdad rose up, standing tall." But Hebrew University Professor Amnon Sela, in a guest column in Yediot Ahronot, injects a large measure of skepticism about the efficacy of American attempts to change the world. "In the dying days of the 20th century, several attempts were made to impose justice in various parts of the world," Sela writes. "The Taleban regime was set up by an army funded to fight Communist aggression. The very same country that funded the Mujahideen who brought the Taleban to power toppled that regime. And still there is no democracy in Afghanistan and it is doubtful whether the new regime there wants it." He contends that the international community failed in the Balkans too, pointing out that since Slobodan Milosevic's trial in an international court, "another 24,000 people have been made refugees in Kosovo." "The real test in Iraq for the Americans and the British," Sela says, "is still ahead: the test of reconstruction." Complaining that "we don't even have valid criteria yet to measure success," he goes on to suggest some: "Will Iraq in 10 years time be substantially different from Saddam Hussein's Iraq? Will there be democracy there? Do the Iraqi people really want democracy? Will it be possible to bring peace to the Middle East as a whole and between Israel and the Palestinians?" Maariv's Arab affairs analyst, Amit Cohen, warns that the window of opportunity in Iraq will not be open for long. "The Iraqis have high expectations," he writes, "and they want results - fast. The US is still perceived as the power that destroyed Iraq, not just in war, but also primarily through years of sanctions. The Americans will have to invest vast sums to achieve the quick results that will satisfy the Iraqis. If other countries, especially the Europeans, don't join in, it's hard to see how America can do it alone." "These are the moments in which the Iraqi people will be tested," Cohen asserts. "Have the years under Saddam's heel made the Iraqis patient and even compliant? Or perhaps Saddam hardened them, led them to believe there can't be anything worse, and that anyone who survived his regime will easily get round America's policing efforts. If that's the case, euphoria could give way to anarchy." To prevent a collapse, Cohen suggests that, "The Americans will have to see to it that life in Baghdad is run as smoothly as possible. Soon Baghdad will cease to be a battlefield, and again become a city of five million people who want to work, eat and live. When they lift their heads to ask for help, Americans had better be there for them." In Yediot Ahronot, Guy Bichor writes that Iraq is now in limbo, and "time will tell where that proud and blighted country is going, and with it the rest of the Middle East. The pictures of Saddam's falling statue reverberated from North Africa to the Gulf. Arab dictatorships no longer have any legitimacy, and if they don't want their statues to fall too, they will have to start changing. No more haranguing leaders, closed societies and cold shoulders to the West, but regimes allowing openness and democratization." "There was such pluralism in Iraq and Egypt in the 1930s and 1940s, until the emergence of the military governments, and it is possible," Bichor opines. "This is also a message of great hope for Israel, because it will have a much better chance of being accepted in the changing Arab political culture, as it will be perceived as less foreign and threatening." But, in Bichor's view, "the pictures from the square in Baghdad, also give rise to concern. Those celebrating were Iraq's new masters, the Shiites and the Kurds. Iraqi history teaches that acts of vengeance against yesterday's rulers will follow. The Sunnis have locked themselves in, expecting the worst: just as Saddam's sculpted head was dragged through the center of Baghdad in a kind of symbolic lynching, the same thing could happen to them. "And in the Arab world, the worry is that the vacuum in Baghdad could become infectious, since in many Arab countries, a minority rules the majority: An Alawi minority in Syria, a Bedouin minority in Jordan, a Sunni minority in Bahrain, a Christian elite in Lebanon, and so on. What is happening in Iraq could prove a political precedent for them too." In Maariv, columnist Gad Shimron claims "the rules of the game in the Middle East have changed, and that "after decades of proud Arab nationalism, which, inter alia, nurtured the myth of Gamal Abdel-Nasser's expulsion of the British and the French, imperialist tanks raced through the streets of an Arab capital. And instead of running into barricades and volleys of fire, they were recruited by the locals, armed with five-kilo hammers, to help them smash the statue of the man, who, until then, had been God's deputy on earth. "What will be the next target? The statues of Assad, father and son, in the squares of Damascus? The portraits of Mohammad Qadhafi in Tripoli and Benghazi?" "The scenes from Baghdad evoked shocked reactions not only in the bureaus of the dictators, defined as leaders of the 'axis of evil,'" Shimron continues. "Pro-American Arab leaders, like Egypt's Hosni Mubarak and the leaders of Saudi Arabia and the Emirates, also broke out in a cold sweat opposite their TV sets. The scenes from Baghdad proved that for, George W. Bush, the director who is reordering the world, his word is his bond. He promised to destroy Saddam and he did." "Now," writes Shimron, "they are worried in Cairo, Riyadh and Kuwait City, and they wonder where Bush is going next, and whether he will try to keep the second half of his promise about setting up a democratic regime in Baghdad. For Mubarak and his friends, members of the club of presidents elected with 99 percent majorities, democracy and free elections are not just empty words - but the high-grade raw material from which nightmares are made." http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,934337,00.html * DIVIDED ARABS CONTEMPLATE THEIR SECOND CATASTROPHE by David Hirst in Beirut The Guardian, 11th April "His image put up more resistance than he did," said a commentator in the leftwing Beirut newspaper al-Safir, referring to those symbolic moments in Firdaus Square, Baghdad, when an American tank recovery vehicle came to the assistance of the jubilant Iraqis trying to topple the giant statue of Saddam Hussein. What many Arabs see as the craven, ignominious, completely selfish manner of his going has only added contempt to the other emotions they feel - anger, despair, exasperation, and a profound sense of impotence - at the larger meaning of the cataclysm. And it appears that for almost all of them, except of course the Iraqis themselves, the meaning is bleak indeed. "April 9 2003: The Second Catastrophe," ran the front-page headline of the Beirut daily al Kifah al-Arabi, the first "catastrophe" being the creation of the state of Israel in 1948. Al-Anwar went further back, to the collapse of the Ottoman empire when, reneging on its promise to give the Arabs their freedom, Britain conquered and occupied Iraq. "It is as if at the beginning of the 21st century," it said, "our fate is to fight again for the independence that we first gained in the course of the 20th." Others set Saddam Hussein's downfall against the backdrop of all the high endeavours of modern times: the pursuit of national dignity after centuries of foreign domination; social justice and material progress; the unification of an Arab world which the colonialists had divided. One-time "revolutionary" movements such as Saddam Hussein's Ba'ath party were the standard-bearers of this "national liberation project". Its supreme task, the proof of its success, was to have been the "liberation" of Palestine from the Zionists. But now, with this new "catastrophe", what is left of Palestine is expected to suffer yet further reverses, or so everyone fears. For the hawks of the Bush administration hardly disguise their ambition to make "liberated" Iraq into the fulcrum of a new Israel-friendly regional order. The Arabs note that the Israelis are rejoicing that the regional balance of power has shifted dramatically in their favour, that after Baghdad others, starting perhaps with Damascus, will become targets for regime change, or at least a very serious, US-enforced change of attitude. The Iraqi defeat was seen as all but inevitable from the outset. But it was at least expected that Saddam, the man who cast himself as a latter-day Saladin and vowed to make Baghdad the graveyard of the "aggressors" in a second "mother of battles", would go down fighting. In the earlier stages of the war Arabs found some solace in such resistance as there was to the invaders; some crumbs of comfort in the fact that the "uprising" on which the "liberators" were counting had signally failed to materialise; some pride in the Arab volunteers who went to the defence of this threatened province of the greater Arab homeland. But glorious last stand there was not to be. Even the Iraq opposition, contemptuous though it was of Saddam Hussein, had expected better than this. As Ali Allawi, one of its leaders, put it: "We thought he was drawing the coalition forces into a closed ring of defence in Baghdad. But there was no strategy. It was the bluster of a cheap dictator who has been terrorising people for years." As if his shabby exit were not bad enough, there was also the spectacle that accompanied it: the Iraqi people finally erupting with joy and hosannas of gratitude for George Bush and Tony Blair. This was perhaps the unkindest cut of all. While the rest of the Arab world was decrying the Anglo-American "aggression", here were the Iraqis, supposedly its victims, rejoicing in it, or at least in the one thing - the downfall of the tyrant - that they wanted of it. "Baghdad did not fall a martyr while resisting," the Amman daily al-Arab al-Yaum lamented, "and its women ululated like Palestinian mothers when their sons are martyred by Israeli gunfire." Some Arab viewers turned off their television sets in disgust at the spectacle. The gulf that may now widen between Iraqis and other Arabs is a product of a moral and political confusion apparent long before the war. In opposing military intervention the Arabs had been opposing the wishes of those, the Iraqis themselves, most directly concerned and with greatest right to the decisive voice in their own future. And the Iraqis had always wanted to be rid of Saddam Hussein, and did not much care about the means: the joy in Firdaus Square was perhaps the best proof of it. The Arabs now fear the worst; their newspapers are full of gloomy predictions that a puppet regime will be established in Baghdad and it will soon be fulfilling the pro-Israeli wishes of its American puppet-masters. What, they ask, is to be expected of such an avowed admirer of Ariel Sharon as the new military governor of Iraq? Whether the predictions prove true or false, the lack of sympathy which the Arab regimes displayed towards the Iraqis during their long night of despotism is one reason why Iraqis may willingly distance themselves from Arabs and Arab causes. But most Arabs clearly do acknowledge that it was the sheer awfulness of Saddam Hussein's regime, combined with the neo-imperial ambitions of the Americans, that brought this Arab catastrophe about. Some say it was unique in its depravity, that its fate is not a precedent for others in the region. "We can't compare it,' the Saudi columnist Jamal Kashoggi said, "with Iran or Egypt or Saudi Arabia. His was a regime outside history." Others contend that it was just the worst of a very bad lot. "All the Arab rulers are now more than ever hated by the people," said Leila Qadi, a Lebanese researcher, "and when their turn comes their people will celebrate it just like the Iraqis did Saddam's. And I think some of them are now trembling on their seats." NO URL (received through email subscription) * PRELIMINARY POSTMORTEM: THE ARAB PRESS AND THE FALL OF SADDAM by Daniel Kimmage RFE/RL IRAQ REPORT Vol. 6, No. 17, 10 April 2003 The abrupt evaporation of Saddam Hussein's regime, from ministers to military to the policeman on the corner, in its own capital on 9 April left much of the Arab press wondering at narratives of the war it had woven and now suddenly found frayed. Images admit only so much interpretation. The dominant narratives in the Arab press did not allow for pictures of Iraqis welcoming U.S. soldiers who had been presented as occupiers or venting pent-up hatred on representations of a dictator who had been presented as the embodiment of steadfast resistance. Some chose to avert their eyes, others found ready explanations, others still took rueful comfort in seeing their criticisms vindicated. A few found cause for joy, and many more looked with apprehension to the future. Confronted with a stark event and a limited array of images, those responsible for headlines and front pages had perhaps the easiest task. The two best-known pan-Arab dailies -- both London-based and Saudi-owned -- stuck to the understated style that is their common hallmark. "...And Saddam's Regime Falls" read the headline in "Al-Sharq al-Awsat" above an enormous photograph of the Iraqi leader's statue, a chain around its neck and two grotesque metal pipes still connecting severed legs to the pedestal where it had stood only a moment before. The headline in "Al-Hayat" was "Baghdad...and a Statue of Saddam Fall on 9 April," above a photograph of Saddam pulled forward to the breaking point, but not yet broken, against the looming backdrop of a domed mosque. "Al-Quds al-Arabi," also based in London, but affiliated with Palestinian expatriates and bitterly antiwar, headlined its edition "Chaos Engulfs Baghdad After the 'Disappearance' of the Regime...and Saddam," over a photograph of a U.S. Marine clinging to a still upright Saddam, a U.S. flag covering the Iraqi leader's face. The American flag that was briefly draped over the face of Saddam Hussein's statue served as a lightning rod for fears of an impending, open-ended U.S. occupation of Iraq. Other front pages focused on the suddenness of the regime's collapse. A few examples: Algeria's "El Khabar": "Marines Occupy Baghdad" (picture of American flag over Saddam) Lebanon's "Al-Nahar": "'Disappearance' of Saddam's Regime...And The Search For Him in Tikrit" (picture of U.S. soldier watching falling statue) Jerusalem's "Al-Quds": "Al-Rashid's Capital Under American Occupation" (distant shot of U.S. tanks on Firdaws Square) [The reference is to the Caliph Al-Rashid, who ruled Baghdad from 786-809 A.D.] Egypt's "Al-Akhbar": "Sudden Collapse of Saddam's Regime" (picture of a child with the caption "Tears of an Orphan") Editorial pages indicated that even at this early stage the discussion in the Arab world consists of more than mere shock and dismay. Algeria's "El Khabar": Al-Arbi Zawaq expressed surprise, closing with a hopeful conjecture that resistance might still be in the offing: "Despite all the expectations that analysts based on steadfast Iraqi resistance in Umm Qasr, Al-Faw, Al-Basrah, Karbala, and Al-Najaf, the capital of Al-Rashid fell without any resistance to speak of. This poses a thousand and one questions about what happened.... "...We can only say that all of our statements here merely form questions. We would not be surprised if Baghdad's occupiers tonight encountered violent attacks from all directions." Lebanon's "Al-Nahar": Jubran Tawini struck an optimistic chord:"Baghdad has not fallen. The regime of Saddam Hussein has fallen. "The people of Iraq and the people of Baghdad have not been defeated. Saddam Hussein and his cohorts have been defeated! "This is the situation 21 days after the beginning of the war on Iraq. The images we saw yesterday reminded us of the fall of [Romanian dictator Nicolae] Ceausescu, the fall of [former Yugoslav President Slobodan] Milosevic, the fall of the Berlin Wall. A huge prison has opened its gates to release millions of prisoners to freedom. The reaction of people in the streets is the best proof of the years of oppression, tyranny, fear, poverty, and hunger that Saddam Hussein's regime imposed on the people of Iraq." Egypt's semi-official "Al-Ahram": The editors made a pointed decision to ignore specific events in Baghdad, focusing instead on the need to deliver medicines to Iraq to avoid a humanitarian catastrophe. Similar logic was evident in Jordan, where the editors of "Al Dustour" lauded a royal initiative to extend "urgent humanitarian aid to the fraternal Iraqi people." The editors of Syria's official "Tishreen" waxed abstract about the United Nations, international law, and weapons of mass destruction, yet left aside concrete developments in Iraq. Saudi Arabia's "Al-Jazeera": The editors noted carefully that the "rapid collapse in Baghdad reflected a dissolution of political authority and the true nature of the connection between the regime and the Iraqi people." They went on to chide Iraqis for unruliness: "The pressing tasks in Iraq now are to restore security and order. Iraqis themselves must do their part by putting a stop to the unfortunate looting and chaos that were so much in evidence yesterday. They must realize that they need to preserve what they have, especially in the presence of foreign military forces that might find such behavior a temptation to do whatever they want to a state whose people does not hesitate to attack its property." Britain's "Al-Quds al-Arabi": Editor Abd al-Bari Atwan has been a harsh critic of the United States and a staunch proponent of resistance to "invasion and occupation" since the war began. Faced with the "sudden and inexplicable collapse" of Baghdad's defenders, Atwan sounded a grim warning of possible regime change in Egypt, Syria, and Saudi Arabia: "Finally, we wonder about the feelings of the Arab leaders who abandoned Iraq and connived with the invasion. How do they feel when they see statues of their colleague Saddam Hussein falling one after the other in Al-Basrah, Baghdad, and Al-Nasiriyah. Have they thought hard and taken heed? We believe that the statue of Saddam Hussein will not be the only one to fall. It will be followed shortly by other statues in more than one Arab capital. The army and security forces, no matter how repressive they are, cannot defend a dictatorial regime, especially if its masters and protectors want to change it. Our information indicates that the British and American administrations have begun to look for alternatives and sift through names in preparation for regime change in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Iran." Britain's "Al-Sharq al-Awsat": Editor in Chief Abd al-Rahman al-Rashid has been a passionate critic of the pro-Saddam Arab media. Images of ecstatic Iraqis in Baghdad inspired him to broaden his criticism to encompass the dire status quo that a mendacious media establishment serves to maintain: "The images from yesterday morning shocked the Arabs from the east in Manama on the Gulf to the west in Casablanca on the Atlantic Ocean. Between them are cities where people hardly slept, marching continuously in the belief that they were defending the Iraqi people when they were defending Saddam." "Yesterday morning, television stations, including Al-Jazeera, that took part in the campaign to defend Saddam and his regime in the war, were unable to conceal the pictures of popular joy in the capital. They were unable to explain them. Yesterday's images...unmade the greatest lie in the modern history of the Arabs -- the Arab television and print media that have insisted for 20 years on trying to convince the people of the region that they are seeing the people's army, the people's government, and the people's ruler." "The Arabs have split into two groups in this war. One group rules; it claims that this is a war of existence, a war of honor, and a war of conspiracy. And there is a silent group, most of whose members come from Iraq and lack the means to express themselves because they are exiles abroad or oppressed at home. They knew that this is a war of liberation, or they at least were indifferent to its purpose because it is a war to remove a murderous and corrupt regime. The regime must leave just as it came. It is a historic, unprecedented event for the region. All the wars of the past were wars with Israel or wars of regimes. This is the first war of its kind -- a war against the terrible Arab plight." http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=25141 * ANKARA'S MISCALCULATION Arab News (Saudi Arabia), 13th April Ever since Enver Pasha threw in the lot of the Ottoman Empire with the Central Powers in 1914, Turkey has a record of acting against its own best interests in foreign affairs. Now it seems that Turkey's miscalculated policy on the Iraq invasion, may have brought about the very thing that the Turks had been seeking to avoid ‹ the de facto creation of a Kurdish state. Turkey's refusal to support the American and British invasion of Iraq was motivated by venal rather than moral grounds. Though the man in the street saw Washington's imminent attack to be useless bloodletting and an extension of US imperial power, Ankara clearly identified a chance to make a very lucrative diplomatic deal. The Americans had offered money, lots of it, which was sufficient to kick-start the process of economic reform. But Ankara wanted that and more. It wanted a green light for its armed forces to advance into northern Iraq, under the pretence of coping with a humanitarian flood from Kurdish controlled areas and protecting the interests of the much smaller ethnic Turkish community in the region. The calculation must have been that in the postwar confusion, Ankara could attain for itself some temporary, but long-term, protectorate status over the oil-rich northern area of Iraq. Turkey would thus have acquired physical control of the northern oilfields while stopping the Kurds from acquiring a strong power base on its borders. The key drivers of this policy were clearly the Turkish military, not the moderate Justice and Development (AK) Party government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Nowhere in the world is the military mind notable for its subtlety and Turkey is no exception. Ankara set a high and nonnegotiable price ‹ with the result that the Americans gave up and walked away. Turkey thus loses on every count. No one will praise its government for making a moral stand against the invasion, because it is crystal clear that if its demands had been met, it would have supported the invasion enthusiastically. Washington is not going to forget the massive disruption to its military plans caused by Turkey's generals, the guys Americans always thought were their NATO buddies, who walked the same walk, talked the same talk and fired the same bullets. Military and civilian aid packages just aren't going to happen now. Washington will surely whisper in the ears of the World Bank and the IMF to ensure that they give Turkey an altogether harder time from now on. But perhaps the most major loss has been the opportunity for handling the perceived threat from Kurds in northern Iraq which was done in such a knuckle-headed way. Consider this: The AK Party government has recognized, in part at least, the rights and culture of Turkey's ethnic Kurds. Ankara could have capitalized upon that good will in the most extraordinary and internationally impressive way. If, instead of having the generals lining up their divisions on the Iraqi border, supposing Ankara had thrown open the border and said to the Iraqis on the other side, "What do you need? How can we help?" If Turkey had become a conduit of humanitarian assistance into much of Iraq, its fears of a postwar independent Kurdish state could have been treated with widespread sympathy. It might even have made the Kurds themselves think twice about their once implacable foe. But that did not happen. http://www.dailystar.com.lb/14_04_03/art5.asp * HIZBULLAH DENIES CLAIMS THAT IT SENT FIGHTERS TO IRAQ by Maha Al-Azar Lebanon Daily Star, 14th April Hizbullah's media office denied reports that US forces had arrested six of its fighters along the Syrian-Iraqi border. Saudi-owned Al-Hayat newspaper had published a report on the front page of its Saturday issue that said that a "military source" had told the newspaper that US forces had arrested six members of Hizbullah Friday, "who were planning to conduct operations against coalition forces." But a Hizbullah statement Saturday denied "any knowledge of the existence of a Hizbullah group" at the Syrian-Iraqi border. "Moreover, Hizbullah has not sent any of its members there," the statement said. In an earlier interview with The Daily Star, the political adviser to Hizbullah secretary general Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah said that the party had no intentions of sending any of its members to fight in Iraq. "They don't need our help or expertise," he said, adding that "we have enough work here resisting Israel," said Hajj Hussein Khalil. [.....] http://english.aljazeera.net/topics/article.asp?cu_no=1&item_no=2620&version =1&template_id=263&parent_id=258 * ARAB WORLD SET TO FOOT THE WAR BILL aljazeera.net, 14th April The US-led war on Iraq could cost as much as $1,000 billion in lost production in Arab countries, a UN economic seminar in Beirut warned on Monday. "A dark cloud is covering the whole world and the Arab region in particular," said Mervat Tallawi, Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for West Asia (ESCWA). She estimated the cost of the war at a trillion dollars in lost gross domestic product, on top of the $600 billion lost due to the 1991 Gulf War, at the start of a four-day session. Tallawi added that between four and five million jobs had been lost following the previous Gulf War and the figure was expected to rise between six and seven million as a result of the current conflict. "In the past 10 years, average per capita income in the Arab region has been the lowest in the world, largely because of the fall in the price of oil," said Tallawi. Over the years war and civil strife have conspired to divert the resources and energies of many ESCWA members from their development objectives, she added. Tallawi said the region's woes included, "a fall in interest rates, an increase in military spending, which reached double the international average, a fall in tourist and transport income, particularly among airlines, a rise in the cost of insurance and reinsurance as well as a decrease in trade between Arab countries." She also cited, "the degradation of the environment following military attacks and the use of arms of mass destruction, cluster bombsŠas well as human, civil and military losses." ESCWA would concentrate its efforts on a "limited number of priorities," such as water, globalisation, social policy and technology and the reconstruction and rehabilitation of Iraq, said Tallawi. ESCWA member states are Bahrain, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Palestinian Authority, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Syria, United Arab Emirates and Yemen. http://www.arabnews.com/Article.asp?ID=25221 * KINGDOM CALLS EMERGENCY REGIONAL MEETING ON IRAQ Arab News (Saudi Arabia), 15th April RIYADH, 15 April 2003 ‹ The foreign ministers of countries neighboring Iraq will meet in Riyadh on Friday to review the fallout of the war, Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal said yesterday. The "Emergency Regional Conference" was called by Saudi Arabia on instructions from Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd and Crown Prince Abdullah, deputy premier and commander of the National Guard, Prince Saud said in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency. "The conference comes in response to the current circumstances and developments in Iraq, which affect the Iraqi people in particular, and the repercussions on the countries of the region in general," he said. Prince Saud, who made the announcement after a surprise visit to Damascus yesterday, did not name the countries which would take part in the meeting. Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Turkey, Syria, Iran, all of which border Iraq, and Egypt held a regional conference on Jan. 23 in Istanbul in a bid to prevent the US-led war on Iraq. Kuwait, which provided a launchpad for US troops heading to Baghdad, also borders Iraq. Following the fall of Baghdad, Saudi Arabia has been active diplomatically as a new situation emerges in the Gulf. French Foreign Minister Dominique de Villepin held talks here on Sunday with Prince Saud and both agreed that the return of Iraq to Iraqi control must remain a priority. De Villepin held similar talks in Cairo, Damascus and Beirut where he called for the return of UN arms inspectors to Iraq and the lifting of sanctions against Baghdad. British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw is scheduled to hold talks in Riyadh today. Sudanese President Omar Hassan Al-Bashir was also due to arrive here for talks on Iraq with King Fahd and Crown Prince Abdullah. Riyadh will host today an extraordinary meeting of the foreign ministers of the Gulf Cooperation Council states to discuss the aftermath of the war. Prince Saud last week urged the United States to allow the Iraqi people to choose their own government and their own future and to end the occupation quickly. During an impromptu visit to Damascus earlier yesterday, Prince Saud discussed Iraqi security and sovereignty with Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, Syria's official SANA news agency said. Their talks focused on "efforts by Iraq's neighbors to restore security and stability and to preserve the (country's) territorial integrity," SANA said. Syrian Foreign Minister Faruq Al-Shara took part in the discussions, it added. Prince Saud's unexpected visit came after the United States stepped up criticism of Syria, accusing Damascus of possessing weapons of mass destruction and allowing senior Iraqi leaders to escape through its territory. Arab League Secretary General Amr Mussa dismissed the allegations of Syrian support for Saddam Hussein's regime as groundless, the official Syrian daily Tishrin said yesterday. "Mussa judged yesterday (Sunday) as groundless the accusations of certain American leaders against Syria," the newspaper said. "The United States and major powers should use their military force on behalf of the Palestinian cause and end the Israeli occupation of Arab land," the newspaper quoted Mussa as saying. [.....] http://www.dailystar.com.lb/opinion/15_04_03_i.asp * AFTER THE FALL OF BAGHDAD, WHO WILL DARE CHALLENGE WASHINGTON? Lebanon Daily Star, 15th April The majority of the Arab press called Baghdad's fall a catastrophe and an omen for worse things to come. Editors and analysts said Baghdad will not be the last, because the Anglo American victory will whet the appetite of the United States and its allies to devour more Arab capitals. The one country that appears to be on top of the list is Syria. They say this victory is the first stage in Washington's declared to redraw the map of the Middle East according to the political, cultural, and social values of Washington. Rabat al-Alam (Morocco) America has come to Iraq to liberate it. This is a new style of liberation, a liberation that consists of thousands of airplanes bombing Iraq and destroying all cities, all villages, all schools, all hospitals, all museums, and historical sites with a 5,000-year history. All these sites have become rubble as a result of the US bombers liberating Iraq Š It may become a tradition for America and Britain to liberate other Arab and Islamic countries so that Israel will remain the master in our Arab and Islamic Middle East. Let's learn a lesson from the liberation of Iraq, a lesson well-taught by the United States and the United Kingdom. An-Nahar (Lebanon) Former Prime Minster Salim al-Hoss said that the Americans invaded Iraq under the pretense to disarm the country of weapons of mass destruction and for "regime change." "They entered Iraq, destroyed its cities and killed thousands of civilians," he said. "At the end they did not find any weapons of mass destruction and they replaced the old regime with chaos and devastation. "And with all this they (America) claim to have achieved victory," he said. "This sort of victory should be a source of indignity for them." Al-Gumhuriyeh (Egypt) The dust of war has almost settled, with British and US forces occupying most of Iraq and with the Iraqi forces having all but vanished. While a military victory has been easy to win, restoring the peace is likely to be a most difficult task. Iraq is fast dropping into the abyss of anarchy, now that the regime has collapsed. The coalition now faces a cumbersome responsibility, namely that of restoring peace and establishing civil rule. The Iraqis will never make peace with a killer whose hands are dripping with their blood. Nor will they ever accept an agent government clad in a national garb but loyal to America. This may stir sedition and unrest. Political reform must be of a truly national nature. If however it becomes cross-bred with alien seeds it will be doomed to failure. Al-Mustaqbal (Lebanon) The Beirut daily said Washington has pledged to tackle Hizbullah, in the next phase of its "war on terror," according to media sources in London. The sources were quoted as saying Washington has pledged to take "all effective action" to cut off Syria's support for Hizbullah, including a military strike if necessary. Israeli media said two of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon's senior aides are scheduled to hold talks with senior officials in Washington this week, to press the Americans to act against Iran and Syria. Since the Iraqi conflict began, Syria has emerged as the most likely target of any extension of the war. US President George W. Bush and other US officials have threatened Damascus for its continued support for Hizbullah and for allegedly harboring some of Iraq's leadership. This is not just a threat to one country; rather, it is a threat to the entire region, the paper said. Al-Akhbar (Egypt) This is not the Iraq we have known throughout history, the grand nation of heroism, the seat of the Abassid Dynasty, which saw the golden age of Islam. This, however, may be the Iraq which the US wants us to see, a country which allows its people to steal from the distinguished Mosul University in the north as they have looted residential areas in Basra in the south. Such shameful scenes are those which the US allows to be shot by the so-called embedded media personnel; the only ones allowed access to first-hand information from the battlefield. The US has also shown its ugly face when Secretary of State Colin Powell, in statements given at a NATO meeting in Brussels recently, made it clear that by its war on Iraq the US seeks to protect Israel. This is the real America; a country whose soldiers sit back in their armored tanks and watch as thieves steal Iraqi heritage. ISRAELI PRESS The Jerusalem Post "The 'road map' seems to follow the (US President George W.) Bush speech because it has most of the same ingredients: ending terrorism, democratization, statehood and, for Israel, a settlement freeze. But the road map makes a subtle change that makes all the difference. Like Oslo and all the failed peace plans before it, the road map is built upon a moral equivalency between Israel and the Palestinians, whereby demands to 'both sides' are carefully matched Š The truth is that the road map is so obsessed with placing equal blame and making equal demands of both sides that it is hard to see how it can be satisfactorily amended. "There is also little point in amending it, since that would mean going back for another lowest-common-denominator document from the UN and the Europeans which would not turn out much better. What should be done instead is to supplant the road map, just like the road map supplanted Bush's June 24 speech. Turnover is fair play. Bush, not the 'Quartet,' is the ultimate interpreter of his own speech. And the essence of that speech was to place the primary burden of statehood and peace on the Palestinians, where it belongs." Haaretz The road map which Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon claims to accept demands that Israel "immediately" dismantle the outposts" established since March 2001." Older settlements, according to the plan, should be "frozen, including for natural growth." All that, however, is supposed to happen at the beginning of the first of the plan's three stages - the same stage at which the Palestinians are supposed to implement far-reaching governmental reforms and enforce a total cease-fire - and not at a final stage, as Sharon claimed. There is a gnawing concern in reading Sharon's words, given the way his government has been dealing with the Palestinians, that the prime minister is raising "the issue of stages," as he called it, as a means of undermining the road map by entangling it in endless and barren arguments dooming it to oblivion. Yediot Ahronot Israel's largest Hebrew-language daily refers to the widespread looting in many Iraqi cities and asserts: "Nobody can quickly 'restore' law and order to Baghdad. There was no law and order during 30 years of repression, only lunatic dictatorship, the price for which the nation is paying." TURKISH PRESS Milliyett Fikret Bila wrote in the Istanbul daily that thousands of Iraqis have already died. It is uncertain how many more will perish. The reason for the war is about to be forgotten, but the results of the war have started to emerge before it is over. Evidently, the United States has already determined its contractors for the reconstruction of Iraq. It had made a proposal to the former head of Shell to manage Iraq's petroleum. According to the calculations made, a minimum of $100 billion is needed for the reconstruction of Iraq. This is not a problem when the value of the Iraq's petroleum resources is taken into consideration. The United States and Britain will have their own companies construct Iraq with the revenues from the Iraqi petroleum. It is just the time to ask: "Whose property are you giving to whom?" But who will ask? The United Nations? NATO? The poor Iraqi people? Š The United States, which did not listen to the United Nations when it started the war, will also not listen to it when it finishes the war, unless it wants the UN to act as a mannequin in the streets of the Iraqi capital in order to save appearances. Turkish Daily News "The establishment of a Turkish-Peshmerga joint force may create an excellent opening for future cooperation between Turkey and Iraqi Kurds. Yes, Turks and Kurds have had their ups and downs, not only in Turkey but also in northern Iraq, but we feel the current situation in Iraq where law and order has collapsed has created a window of opportunity for the Turks and Kurds to display that they can rise to the occasion. "This would display that Turkey and the Iraqi leaders are capable of cooperating, while in Ankara it would also ease many of the Turkish concerns and end talk among various circles, including the military ranks, that Turkey should intervene in northern Iraq. This is causing frustration among various conservative circles in Turkey and in return is creating domestic complications which we feel may even threaten the democratic structure of our country." IRANIAN PRESS Tehran Times Rahman Asadi in Tehran said officials at the US State Department and the Pentagon have not hesitated to devise their own definitions of terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and American national interests. To them it doesn't matter in what part of the world their self defined interests lie or how much misery protecting those interests will bring to the local people. What matters to them is protecting their so-called interests and achieving their objectives by any means. The US internalized and began implementing "the end justifies the means" principle long ago. It seems that the hawks in the White House are following the expansionist path tread by the former Soviet Union during its heyday. But they should bear in mind the fact that if they follow "the might is right" doctrine, then they should be prepared for its inevitable backfire, which will be caused by US expansionism, unilateralism and the desire to establish a new world order. The legitimization of the indiscriminate use of force is a very dangerous development, both for the people in the region and the US itself. It will result in the spread of terrorism around the world and in particular in America - the very pretext which the US used to start the campaigns against Afghanistan and Iraq. http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/w-me/2003/apr/15/041501525.html * U.S. SEEKS TO STOP OIL FROM IRAQ TO SYRIA by Matt Kelley Las Vegas Sun, 15th April WASHINGTON (AP): U.S. military engineers have reported that they shut down a pipeline used for illegal oil shipments from Iraq to Syria, Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld said Tuesday. But Rumsfeld said he could not guarantee that the pipeline was completely shut off or that oil was not being clandestinely shipped from Iraq to Syria. "We do not have perfect knowledge," Rumsfeld said at a Pentagon news conference. "We do know that they were instructed to shut it down and they have told us that they have." Rumsfeld and Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said coalition forces had not destroyed any pipelines. "They would not destroy the pipeline or any of the other infrastructure," Myers said. The pipeline opened in 2000 and was believed to have handled about $1.2 billion worth of oil a year shipped in violation of the United Nations sanctions against Iraq. [.....] _______________________________________________ Sent via the discussion list of the Campaign Against Sanctions on Iraq. To unsubscribe, visit http://lists.casi.org.uk/mailman/listinfo/casi-discuss To contact the list manager, email casi-discuss-admin@lists.casi.org.uk All postings are archived on CASI's website: http://www.casi.org.uk