Mubarak: The Arab summit will be held in any place in May
Egypt-Regional, Politics, 4/5/2004

The Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said the Arab summit might be held in any Arab state, including Tunisia, but not in April, but in May because of the preoccupation of certain member states in the Arab League.

This was expressed in a press conference following talks Mubarak had held with his Syrian counterpart Bashar al-Assad in Cairo, and called on Tunisia in its being as the President of the current summit to make contacts to convene it.

Mubarak said he does not oppose the convening the summit in any Arab states, and simultaneously expressed readiness to convene the summit in Cairo.

He said " I will welcome if the summit will be held in Tunisia and if it is held in any country.. I am not against convening it in any Arab country absolutely." The Egyptian President added, flirting with journalists I agree to convene the summit " even it is convened on the moon."

Mubarak indicated that his country issued the invitation statement for the summit in order to rescue the situation and to prevent demonstrations in all the Arab states against not convening the summit." News reports in Cairo said that President Mubarak tried to alleviate the tension with Tunisia in his statements which he had made after his meeting with the Syrian President, noting the statement by President Mubarak as saying that his initiative to host the summit was at the request of Arab states. He cited an example that he had received a telephone call from the Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh asking him to rescue the summit and convene it in Cairo.

In the context of advisory talks held to convene the summit, Mubarak also met yesterday with the Sudanese President Omar Hassan al-Bashir. Mubarak met last week in Sharm esh Sheikh with each of the King of Bahrain Hamad Bin Issa al-Khalifa and the Jordanian King Abdullah and the Saudi crown prince Abdullah Ibn Abdul Aziz.

This, however, coincides with efforts made by the secretary general of the Arab league Amr Moussa to agree on the place and time of convening the summit.

Moussa was due to have left for Morocco yesterday to complete talks he was holding with the Arab Maghreb states in this context.

On Friday, Moussa met with the Tunisian President Zine al-Abidin Ben Ali and headed on Saturday for Tripoli to hold talks with the Libyan leader Muammar al-Qathafi who, by his turn, is making efforts to rescue the summit. Moussa postponed his visit to Algeria which announced its apology for receiving him because of its preoccupation in the elections.

Previous Stories:
  Continued meetings in Egypt, in preparations for the Arab summit   (4/1/2004)
  Egypt: Arab Council for Water to be established in Cairo   (3/29/2004)
  Nile basin states rule out amending 1929 treaty   (3/18/2004)

Please add a link on your webiste pointing to ArabicNews.com and bookmark ArabicNews.com & subscribe to our daily email news bulletin.

Search