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'UAE initiative only way to avoid war'

The President, His Highness Shaikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan, made the proposal in a letter to a summit of the 22-member Arab League held on Saturday in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.

Shaikh Abdullah circulated Shaikh Zayed's proposal among Arab leaders and reporters in Egypt. The other leaders did not take it up during their formal discussions and in their final communique.

But Shaikh Abdullah said Arab leaders had talked in private about getting Saddam to step down.

'We had backing and support publicly from some countries like Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, while others are convinced that this is the way out but say this only in private,' Shaikh Abdullah said.

'Shaikh Zayed had the guts and courage to say what others could not say publicly,' Shaikh Abdullah said.

He rejected suggestions that US pressure was behind the proposal, saying that Shaikh Zayed was motivated by his concern for the welfare of the Iraqi people.

'I am sad to say that the value of the idea put forward will be realised only after we see Iraqi children dying in a war,' Shaikh Abdullah said.

OIC meeting

UAE Foreign Minister Rashid Abdullah said yesterday that his government would raise the proposal at a meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Conference (OIC) that Qatar is hosting on Wednesday.

'We will propose this initiative at the Islamic summit,' he told AFP in Doha on the sidelines of a meeting of foreign ministers of the six-state Arab Gulf Cooperation Council (AGCC).

Mr Abdullah said the issue had been put on the agenda of the AGCC foreign ministers' meeting at the request of Kuwait.
'We will continue to defend our initiative at all international meetings,' Mr Abdullah added.

He denied it amounted to interference in Iraq's domestic affairs. 'It is an initiative designed to prevent catastrophe and avoid destruction in the region'.

Mr Abdullah played down the Iraqis' response to the demand, saying they 'weren't reading this initiative correctly and (they) have a habit of tossing out accusations of treachery on all sides'.

(It may be mentioned that some Iraqi officials and newspapers have criticised the UAE initiative calling it 'treachery').
A Press conference scheduled for the end of the AGCC meeting was postponed until today.

Denying that the proposal amounted to an interference in Iraqi internal affairs, the UAE foreign minister said that it was an initiative designed to prevent catastrophe.

'The real catastrophe will occur if Iraq is attacked and destroyed,' he added.

He said that the Iraqi leaders should work on finding a solution in consultation with the Iraqi people and with the Arab support, noting that the proposal did not exclude the role of the Iraqi leadership which Mr Abdullah described as important equally as that of the iraqi people.

He said that the proposal would remain on the table for whosoever wanted to discuss it.

Diplomatic sources close to the AGCC said ministers from Qatar, Bahrain and Oman had asked for time to consult their governments before approving the text of a final communique.

In Riyadh, a Saudi official yesterday hailed as 'courageous' a call by the UAE for Saddam to quit to avoid a US-led war.
'It is a courageous proposal,' the official said under cover of anonymity, adding that Shaikh Zayed 'was taking the interests of the Iraqi people into account'.

The Kuwaiti council of ministers hailed the proposal, according to the official Kuna news agency yesterday.

'The council believes that these ideas are aimed at protecting the unity of Iraq, protecting its brother people from destruction, ruin and loss of life, and avoiding a destabilisation of security in the region,' it said.

The Kuna quoted Kuwaiti Foreign Minister Shaikh Sabah Al Ahmed Al Sabah as saying Shaikh Zayed's proposal could offer 'the way out' of the Iraq crisis.

Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al Faisal told reporters on the sidelines of the summit on SAturday that 'we are sure that the UAE under the leadership of Shaikh Zayed would not present anything that is against Arab interests'.

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