Desperately Seeking Sea Island

Protesters are stopped by police in riot gear in Brunswick, Georgia which is closest mainland city to the exclusive Sea Island resort where the G8 Summit is taking place.

How do you express your reservations about a seemingly worthy initiative meant to promote democracy, human rights and free markets in the Arab world? You do so cautiously and, well, politely.

The G-8 Summit, held this week in Sea Island, Georgia, is discussing a wide range of economic, political and security issues, paramount among them the Greater Middle East Initiative, the American proposal to promote reform in Middle Eastern countries.

On the face of it, the initiative has great appeal - free participation by Arab citizens in the public debate, via a free media, and transparent elections; harnessing economic growth to accommodate roughly 5 million youngsters entering the job market each year; enhancing the role of women in the social and political spheres; and providing educational opportunities for all young Arabs who seek them. 

The emphasis now is on a new draft, closer to the European version, that seeks to "support" reform movements within the various Middle Eastern countries. Allan Larson, undersecretary for Economic, Business and Agricultural Affairs, quick to assure legislators on the Hill, and through them the Arab public, that the US has no sinister designs on the region, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on June 2 that "the impetus" for reform must come from the region and that "we have no interest in forcing a set of proposals on the people of the Middle East, nor could we do so if we wished."

Reassuring, I'm sure.

But Sea Island, a name in the US that conjures images of wealth and privilege in southern Georgia, a plush place for celebrities to retreat to, is a long way from, say, Fallujah and Rafah. Do we trust the US in Iraq and Palestine, not to mention the broader Middle East anymore?

In Iraq, UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi spoke last Thursday of the "terrible pressure" he faced in forming the country's interim government. He suggested that the occupation authority, particularly US administrator Paul L. Bremer, wielded significant influence over the process. "I sometimes say - I'm sure he doesn't mind me saying that - that Bremer is the dictator of Iraq," he said. And the American media was abuzz with reports last week about how Bremer and White House envoy Robert D. Blackwill backed Iyad Allawi for prime minister over other candidates because Allawi was regarded as sympathetic to the Bush administration's views on "rebuilding" Iraq.

And in Palestine, well, look, the less said about that the better - except for one thing, where the devil is America's respect for human rights in that sad land, the very human rights it now wants to introduce to the region? Moreover, the US has long sought to avoid a central question: In its quest to build a partnership for social reform in the Arab world, who will be its partners? And will its partners, in the quest for economic reform, be the market-dominant elite in Arab countries that it has traditionally befriended and empowered, at the cost of alienating the impoverished majority?

The folks meeting at Sea Island, originally known the G-7, have historically worked well together as a forum in which the wealthiest nations coordinated their policies till, after the demise of the Soviet Union, the United States gave Russia a seat at the table and changed the name to the G-8, another international body, like the IMF, NATO, the Security Council, and the like, in which it has a commanding position.

The US is missing the problem because it is the problem. President Bush will close the Sea Island summit today by calling for democracy, human rights and social justice in the Middle East (practices that, believe me, all of us will give an arm and a leg to see promoted in, introduced to, even imposed on our part of the world), yet he will continue to support Israeli policies that are inimical to those very values.

So one wonders: Would you buy a used car from this man? 

Fawaz Turki can be reached at [email protected]

Source: Arab News