Iraq hijacks WEF
Debate over Iraq has consumed the World Economic Forum, reports Dina Ezzat
President of the World Economic Forum (WEF) Claus Schwab may disagree that the Iraq issue has hijacked Davos. He would, however, agree that "Iraq figured very high this year on the agenda of talks in the Davos meeting... it is only natural [that] people are feeling concerned about Iraq. I personally [am] concerned."
But it is not just "people" that are concerned. International markets have also been very unsteady over the past few weeks in anticipation of a decision on Iraq. Meanwhile, international organisations, particularly the humanitarian organisations, have been busy preparing for the worst. Thus, Davos saw intense debate over the chances for war and peace in Iraq, the international and economic consequences of this war, and the future of Iraq and the entire Middle East.
This year the world's top CEOs were not showing as much interest in the discussions dedicated to information technology issues as they were to panels dedicated to the Iraq crisis. One meeting that received a huge audience was a panel organised by BBC television and attended by the Turkish Prime Minister Abdullah Gul, Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa, President of the European Union Parliament Pat Cox, US Under-Secretary of State Richard Hass and Amnesty International Secretary- General Irene Khan, among others. The meeting revealed that the world is not convinced of the reasons that the Americans are offering to justify their military action against Iraq: if action is due to human rights violations, asked Khan, then why now when Iraq's record has been concerning for a very long time. If it about democracy, asked Cox, then how will a war achieve this objective. If it is about international legitimacy, asked Moussa, with a supporting applaud from a good section of the audience, then how could this be served when multilateralism and the will of the UN Security Council was being undermined.
Hass responded to these questions with Washington's traditional argument: that Iraq is a serious threat to international peace and security. However, Hass, who was criticised by none other than former US officials, had no evidence of the declared Iraqi threat to show the world.
Former US President Bill Clinton, criticised the US administration for focusing too much on Iraq while ignoring the more pressing threat of North Korea. "North Korea has greater capacity to produce atomic weapons than Iraq does and has less capacity to feed itself than Iraq," but the US administration is too busy with Iraq.
The debate was getting particularly intense when representatives of the anti-war camp were put in the same panel discussion with representatives of the pro-war camp. However, by the time US Secretary of State Colin Powell arrived in Davos on Saturday, talk about Iraq was all but over.
In Davos, Powell made some of his harshest ever statements on Iraq since the beginning of this crisis, when US President George W Bush declared Iraq to be a member of the "axis of evil".
He said that the US was ready to go to war alone against Iraq. While it may consider giving inspectors some more time, time was running out for the Iraqis to comply. "We will not shrink from war. That is the only way to rid Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction. We continue to reserve our sovereign right to take military action against Iraq alone or in a coalition of the willing," Powell added, to the dismay of many diplomats and politicians, who were hoping that Washington would heed the globe's increasingly anti-war sentiment.
"These were really very gloomy statements. Things do look very bleak," commented an Arab diplomatic source at the meeting. According to this source, Powell's uncompromising statements left the vast majority of Davos's participants convinced that war was more inevitable now than it was at any time during the past four months. On 16 September Iraq declared its intention to allow the unconditional return of arms inspectors.
Equally dismaying was the lukewarm reaction of Powell to a Swiss proposal to host a last ditch meeting between Americans and Iraqis to avert war.
Indeed, King Abdullah of Jordan, who attended the Davos meeting this year, made no secret of his conviction that it is only a matter of time before the Americans launch their offensive against Iraq. "Unfortunately, I believe that we are now [doing] a bit too little too late to see a way out, [and] a diplomatic solution between Iraq and the international community," Abdullah said. He added, "today, I think the mechanisms are in place. I think it would be very difficult, it would take a miracle to find a dialogue and a peaceful solution out of this crisis".
However, those who believe that there has to be, or simply that there will be, war against Iraq were forced to listen to strong voices of opposition from those who believe that war is not at all inevitable.
One prominent anti-war participant in Davos this year was prime minister of Malaysia, Mahathir Mohamed. Speaking on the first day of the forum, Mahathir criticised the US for its plans on Iraq. "Just as, in the stone age, the man with the biggest club ruled, in our modern and sophisticated global village the country with the [greatest] power rules."
Spelling out the views of much of Western Europe, Swiss President Pascal Couchepin all but sided with the arguments voiced from the Arab and Muslim world when he said that war against Iraq was not inevitable and would have dangerous, destabilising consequences for the Middle East, notably the Israeli- Palestinian conflict. "Force must not be used before the matter has been brought before the UN Security Council," Couchepin said. He added, "I am naïve enough to believe that war is avoidable."
In addition to the public debates over Iraq, several meetings were held on the sidelines of Davos to discuss Iraq. Participating in a series of Iraq-related meetings were Powell, Gul, Moussa, Qatari Foreign Minister Hamad Bin Jassim, several European foreign ministers and heads of international humanitarian organisations, including the International Committee for the Red Cross and the UN High Commission for Refugees.
When the Davos summit came to a close this week, the world had more questions than answers over the future of Iraq. "On the one hand war seems to be inevitable, but on the other there are still some key politicians and economists who argue that it is avoidable," commented one participant.
