The Hindu : Greater Middle East Initiative

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Friday, Mar 12, 2004

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Greater Middle East Initiative

By Chinmaya R. Gharekhan

While the GME initiative has generated an internal debate in the Arab world on the need for change, it can become counterproductive if the Americans attempt to impose 'dangerous' concepts.

A NEW initiative planned by the United States for what it calls the Greater Middle East region has been the subject of intense debate and controversy in West Asia during recent weeks. The U.S. is reported to have shared the paper with its partners in G-8 and aims to get it endorsed and launched at the G-8 summit in Sea Island, Georgia, U.S., in June this year.

The region of Greater Middle East is defined as comprising countries of the Arab world, plus Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Turkey and Israel. The provocation for the initiative is the threat the region poses to the national interests of the U.S. and other G-8 members. "So long as the region's pool of politically and economically disenfranchised individuals grows, we will witness an increase in extremism, terrorism, international crime, and illegal migration," says the document.

Drawing upon data contained in the 2003 and 2004 United Nations Arab Human Development Reports (AHDR), the plan states that the dismal statistics reflect a region that stands at a crossroads. "The GME could continue on the same path, adding every year to its population of underemployed, undereducated, and politically disenfranchised youth" which will pose a direct threat to the stability of the region, or follow the alternative of political, economic and social reform.

It is obvious that the initiative is an extension of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. "The liberation of Afghanistan and Iraq from oppressive regimes ... presents the G-8 with a historic opportunity." The initiative, which some Arab observers have compared to the 35-member Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe in 1975, proposes coordinated action by the industrialised countries under three broad baskets:

- Promoting democracy and good governance;

- Building a knowledge society, and;

- Expanding economic opportunities.

According to the 2003 AHDR, Arabs topped the worldwide list of those supporting the statement that `democracy is better than any other form of government.' It is suggested that the G-8 should support democratic reform by helping with technical assistance in various ways, parliamentary exchanges, anti-corruption efforts, civil society, human rights, etc. The initiative gives credit to a few countries such as Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Iran, Lebanon, Morocco, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and Yemen for having announced their intention to hold some form of elections during the next two years.

As for building a knowledge society, the initiative proposes assistance to the region's education challenges and help to students to acquire the skills to succeed in today's global market place. Some of the areas identified for help are basic education, literacy, especially for girls, `discovery schools' initiative such as the one in Jordan and bridging the digital gap. On the economic side, there are a number of concrete ideas, for example a GME finance corporation, a GME development bank, technical help for WTO accession negotiations, etc. Not surprisingly, the key to the region's economic prosperity is said to lie in unleashing its private sector potential through market forces, building regulatory structures, and reducing state dominance of financial services. G-8 would be encouraged to establish a Middle East Economic Opportunity Forum, to be based loosely on the APEC model to cover regional issues. G-8 would fund many of the proposals under all the three baskets.

The initiative, which has not yet been shared with any of the countries in the extended region, has generated a storm of protests in nearly all of them. The most criticised aspect is the one on which the document is silent, the Arab-Israeli peace process. It is pointed out that this deliberate omission of any reference to the peace process shows up the initiative for what it is — a gimmick timed for the U.S. presidential elections. It has been argued that there can be no objection to the quest for reform but reforms cannot be realised if they are only a cover-up for the war on terror. President Hosini Mubarak of Egypt noted, in an interview with the Italian newspaper, La Republica, that in case the GME plan was imposed on the Arabs, it would create a "storm of violence and chaos" like the one Algeria experienced. The Prime Minister of Kuwait, Sheikh Sabah, is reported to have said to the media: "Kuwait has not received anything and does not want to receive anything." Even Saudi Arabia, the closest American ally in the region, has rejected the initiative.

The Americans would surely be closely monitoring the reaction in the Arab world to their initiative. They would have expected unfavourable comments and statements from the media and government leaders. The U.S. and allies would surely revise the document at least in one crucial respect; namely, introduce a reference to the imperative need for a peaceful solution to the Palestinian-Israeli problem. Naturally, they would do so in a `balanced' manner, from their and the Israeli perspective. It is perfectly possible that a `biased' mention of the problem would further alienate the Arabs.

There is not much the Americans can do about the charge that the initiative is driven by electoral considerations since it is largely true, but they could introduce language to emphasise the voluntary nature of the exercise and to assuage the sentiments of the region to meet the complaint of the West wanting to impose its standards on others. The U.S. will have to devise mechanisms to ensure that the control over the institutions remains with the local authorities; it is however unlikely that the U.S. would be prepared to lose control over money.

Whatever the eventual shape and fate of the initiative, it has succeeded in generating an internal debate in the Arab world on the need for change. Words such as `reform', `modernisation', and `democracy' have entered the political discourse. It would be wrong to conclude that these concepts were not being discussed in the region until now, but the GME initiative would stimulate further thinking and perhaps provide political, not to mention financial, encouragement to those in the civil society engaged in these quests. To that extent, the Americans would have achieved their objective. But if they go much further and attempt to impose `dangerous' concepts, the initiative would turn out to be counterproductive.

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