Saudi king's visit to Egypt historic

Arab League Secretary General Nabil el Araby described as historic Saudi King Salman ben Abdel Aziz's visit to Egypt Thursday, saying it will draw up strategic plans for future relations between the two countries.

In an interview with Saudi newspaper Al Waten out Wednesday, Araby said the timing of the visit is of importance, given the significant role played by the kingdom at the current critical stage.

Saudi Arabia's policy serves the common Arab action and Arab national security, he said, considering the Islamic military alliance formed lately by Saudi Arabia as an important step in light of repeated Iranian interference in the region.

Asked about reforming the pan-Arab body, Araby said the idea of reforming the Arab League was floated in September of 2011 and a committee comprising top politicians and intellectuals was formed at that time.

Committee members continued their meetings for almost one year and a half and all their reform recommendations were referred to the Arab summit that immediately endorsed them but till this date they have not been put in place, he said.

Reform always takes time, he said, noting that the idea of reforming the United Nations emerged in the early 70s and till now nothing changed.

About the Arab League's stance towards the Syrian crisis, Araby said "to talk about this issue we have to go back to the start of the Syrian revolution in 2011.

The problem in Syria is that its leader remained in office despite anti-regime protests and and did not chose to leave as in Egypt and Tunisia, he added.

"When protests escalated to violence confrontations, we made contacts at all levels and we talked with the Syrian leadership on the importance of halting violence, setting free political prisoners and conducting real reforms."

"We even send Arab observers to monitor the situation in 16 Syrian cities but they were unable to perform their task given repeated attacks on them," he said.

The Syrian opposition started at this time asking the Arab League to refer the issue to the UN and the Syrian file was sent on January 22 of 2012, he said.

For three years, the UN did nothing to settle the crisis except lately, he said.

The Charter of the Arab League includes no item on imposing sanctions on an Arab country. We can boycott the country but it is the UN that can slap sanctions.

He denied there was an initiative for an Arab intervention in Libya, saying these are groundless media reports.

"Now we have a national unity government in Libya and I think they will be able to extend their control over the Libyan territories and fight militias there," he added.

"I just want to make clear that the Arab League never asked the UN to carry out air raids over Libya. We only asked the UN to impose a no-fly zone over Libya in 2011 but somehow this request was replaced upon the desire of some countries and the UN asked the NATO to launch air raids," he added.

About Iraq, he said the Iraqi leadership never asked the pan-Arab body to intervene or help by anyway. They told us they have an agreement with the US and never asked us for any specific help.

He reiterated that the Palestinian issue will remain at the heart of the Arab world no matter what crises were. "It will remain the core issue in our region. Yes when we find some people being killed in other places in the Arab world, our attention may be drawn there but we cannot forget the Palestinian issue."

Any other crisis in the region can be settled by the internal sides away from foreign interference except the Palestinian issue. The Arab sides cannot settle the Palestinian issue away from the UN and the Security Council.

"And we all know that the international community will not move in anything related to Israel unless there is a US approval or a green light from the US," he added.

Source : MENA