Debating intervention

With or without foreign intervention Arab peoples seem determined to change the rules -- and may even be the rulers, writes Dina Ezzat

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The umbrella of the Second Arab Reform Conference in Alexandria looked very official for what is supposed to be primarily a non-governmental forum. The conference was inaugurated by President Hosni Mubarak, under whose auspices it is being held. It is hosted and promoted by the Bibliotheca Alexandrina, a semi-official international cultural centre that operates under the patronage of Mrs Suzanne Mubarak. And the idea behind the event itself -- even if propagated by the Bibliotheca Alexandrina Director Ismail Serageldin -- is in fact the brain-child of Gamal Mubarak, chair of the Policy Secretariat of the ruling National Democratic Party.

Nor is the list of 400 plus participants short on intellectuals and analysts, either sponsored or accepted by Arab regimes.

That said, the panels organised throughout this week's three-day event are certain to raise questions many Arab governments would rather were left alone, not least the impact foreign intervention in promoting reform and democracy in the Arab world.

Should Arab peoples, who complain often enough about the undemocratic -- if not outright despotic -- nature of their regimes, pursue the off the peg solutions currently on offer in Washington and other G8 capitals? And if Arab peoples do grasp the extended foreign hands, asked participants, will that really bring about change for the better or simply replace national tyrannies with foreign ones?

There are no easy answers to these difficult questions. But the panels debating political and economic reform, education, human rights, peace issues and the empowerment of women could hardly ignore the role of outside pressure. Many participants, and not just those with direct or indirect associations with Arab regimes -- towed the predictable line: democracy, reform and empowerment have to be strictly home-grown. Others, not so closely linked with governments, offered a different view.

Discussing developments in Syria, Lebanon, Sudan, Iraq and even Egypt, participants were often willing to speak up for foreign intervention with some accusing governments of preaching the home-grown approach to their peoples when, in fact, their rule is entirely supported by foreign powers. Yet throughout the discussions a clear line was drawn between using foreign intervention to serve the agendas of various Arab populations and being used by foreign intervention to serve the agenda of an aggressively hegemonic world power -- the US.

"This is a crucial point in US hegemony -- not just in the Middle East but across the world. We are no longer talking about globalisation as such -- it is hegemony that we are talking about now," argued journalist and writer Mahmoud Amin El-Aalem. The Middle East, and especially Egypt, lies, by virtue of geography, at the heart of US plans to ensure its dominance, said El-Aalem. "And it is not just about the simplistic interpretation that argues that the US wants to strengthen its presence in the Middle East to secure the region's oil and other natural resources. The Middle East is central to Washington's plans to control the world. The Americans want to be so well established here that they can spread comfortably in to Asia and Africa."

Conceding that foreign powers have recently been addressing issues of pressing interest to people suffering beneath undemocratic regimes, El-Aalem nevertheless warned that foreign intervention will not solve the problems of the region. Foreign intervention, he feared, could only bring temporary answers, and before long will impose its own agenda. And that, argued El-Aalem, is unlikely to be sensitive to the demands and aspirations of the Arab peoples.

The clearest pointer to the real goals behind foreign intervention in Arab affairs is provided, said El-Aalem, by the political activists they choose to back. Though he did not name sociologist Saadeddin Ibrahim, the director of Ibn Khaldun Centre, and Ayman Nour, the leader of Al-Ghad Party -- he referred to the "American national sociologist in Egypt" and the "US backed politician with a confused agenda" -- El-Aalem asked rhetorically whether "the Egyptian people would want them as a replacement to the current regime".

"We do not need to keep waiting for the Americans to tell us what to do or to propose candidates for us. We can find our way out," said El-Aalem, who argued that the best way to deny Washington the opportunity to meddle in Egypt's affairs would be for the "current regime to step down and be replaced by an interim government that could run the affairs of the country for a year during which all restrictions on freedoms could be removed to prepare for really and truly free elections".

Without such a move, El-Aalem warned, Egypt will fall into the same trap as those other countries in the region that seem to be heading towards the implementation of the Istanbul Declaration.

Omar Wafiq Tourbah, a Lebanese lawyer and member of the Al-Hariri Graduates Foundation, argued that it remains very hard for Arab peoples to accept the principle of "home-grown" change when they labour under "regimes that refuse to accede to the demands of their own people". No matter how much the people of this region are "genuinely opposed to foreign intervention", he said, they cannot ignore the simple fact that it is only when associated with foreign pressures that their demands start to be taken seriously by their governments.

"We in Lebanon have constitutional and democratic institutions. But with the killing of [former Lebanese prime minister Rafiq] Al-Hariri, the threat that we have feared for some time, especially since the imposed and unconstitutional extension of President Emil Lahoud's term, materialised: Lebanon's democratic institutions were being drained of democratic content. Lebanon was in danger of turning into yet another state where constitutional institutions are simply non- functional."

According to Tourbah, the Lebanese people had no option but to take action. "Despite our real solidarity with the Syrian people we had to speak against Syrian practices in Lebanon even if this appeared to support the position of foreign powers vis-ˆ-vis Syria's foreign policy."

According to Tourbah, the Lebanese were fully aware that there could be a confusion between their demands and growing international threats against Syria. "But we also knew that we could not take the risk of losing Lebanon to avoid being accused of facilitating foreign intervention in the region."

The choice, Tourbah said, was not about whether or not to accept foreign intervention but whether or not to defend democracy in Lebanon.

"Now the question is, had the Lebanese people decided to refrain from their call to end the Syrian presence in Lebanon -- in accordance with the Taif Accord -- would the US not have pursued Damascus on the matter? I believe, as many in Lebanon do, that the answer is no."

Tourbah argued that it was precisely this intersection between the demands of the Lebanese people and those of foreign powers -- irrespective of the motives of each -- that spared Syria a new US-French sponsored international resolution that could have insisted not only on Syrian withdrawal from Lebanon but also on the dismantling of Hizbullah.

Tourbah's views were echoed by many at the Sunday-to-Tuesday Alexandria Arab Reform Conference. Sessions debating women's empowerment and human rights were particularly animated over the question of how far Arab peoples should go in accepting foreign intervention.

Participants on both panels admitted that without "the impact" of foreign intervention it might be too difficult for non- governmental organisations to push governments to suspend, or even minimise, the exaggerated use of "cultural specificity" as a pretext to do nothing about discriminatory legal and health practices. They also conceded that in the absence of any foreign accountability -- no matter how partial -- the human rights records of many Arab countries would be much worse.

That said, the same panels also recognised the negative impact of foreign intervention on the agendas of many Arab countries, with some participants arguing that foreign interest -- whatever the motives -- has hijacked the rights movement in many parts of the Arab world, turning it into a springboard to access within international organisations and build international reputations. There is a price for everything, the panelists agreed, and using foreign pressure to pursue domestic goals is no exception.

"Take the example of the situation in southern Sudan or in Darfur," argued Sudanese activist Ibrahim Heidar, a member of the Sudan Studies Centre. Had it not been for foreign intervention, he said, the war in southern Sudan would not have ended and the gross human rights violations in Darfur would have been worse. "For good or bad reasons, foreign intervention brought an end to the war in the south [of Sudan] and allowed relief agencies to provide desperately needed assistance in Darfur."

Foreign intervention, Heidar and other participants, including El-Aalem, argued, might be an indication of Western hegemony but it is equally an indication of the failure of governments and non-governmental bodies to deal with their own crises.

Heidar argued that it is the peoples of the region who ultimately decide the gains foreign powers can secure in any intervention. "In the case of the war in the south [of Sudan] the foreign powers got their hands on [certain oil contracts] and imposed an agreement that might lead to the division of Sudan into two states... However, the peace deal between the Sudanese government and the Garang movement does not stipulate the division of Sudan. It only opens the option. And it is really up to the Sudanese people to close that option by making unity attractive to each and every Sudanese citizen."

But the ability of people to control the outcome of foreign intervention is something El-Aalem doubts. "It is a commonplace to say that the most challenging moments of history bring about the most impressive changes. But there are no guarantees that if we accept the challenge of foreign intervention it will lead to the results for which we hope."