[A-List] Robert Fisk on Iraq, Arab League

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Impotent Arab League puts on brave face
By Robert Fisk in Beirut
The Independent, 11 November 2002

That most tired of horses, the Arab League, would have us believe yesterday
that Iraq had accepted UN Security Council Resolution 1441.

Naji Sabri, the Iraqi Foreign Minister, insisted the resolution had diluted
Washington's desire for war. The Iraqi parliament, no less - only slightly
less democratic than the Roman Senate during the reign of the Emperor Nero -
was being summoned to vote on the UN resolution.

And if the people of Iraq decide UN inspectors should be allowed into their
country, who would expect Saddam Hussein to reject their wish?

In reality, of course, the Arab League - the most powerless and impotent of
all the animals in the Arab stable - has simply gone along with what looks
best.

"I think we can expect a positive position by the Iraqis," Egypt's Foreign
Minister, Ahmed Maher, announced. "They haven't yet taken the formal
decision on their attitude towards the resolution."

The Pentagon's announcement, "leaked" through the The New York Times , that
it would have 250,000 troops ready for an invasion is clearly timed to
persuade President Saddam that abiding by the resolution is a good idea. But
the Arab League's belief that the resolution really restrains the United
States from invading shows just how far from reality the League is.

Until Syria's vote for the resolution on Friday, every Arab was supposed to
believe that the UN vote would provide a trigger for a US invasion. The
moment Syria voted for the resolution, every Arab was supposed to believe it
deprived the US of the trigger.

Farouk al-Sharaa, the Syrian Foreign Minister, insisted yesterday that the
US Secretary of State, Colin Powell, had sent him a letter "in which he
stressed there is nothing in the resolution to allow it to be used as a
pretext to launch a war on Iraq and that if the US administration had any
intention of resorting to military action, this resolution wouldn't have
taken seven weeks."

Syria, needless to say, will try to persuade the UN to appoint some Arab
inspectors on the team to Iraq. It will be interesting to see if this
mournful appeal is successful. According to Mr Maher, Iraqi acceptance of
the resolution would depend on the inspection team's "neutrality" and their
respect for "Iraqi sovereignty".

In the past, this has meant a refusal to allow UN inspectors to enter
presidential palaces in Iraq. Baghdad's concern, in the past, was that UN
inspectors were being used by the CIA to spy on Iraq - a claim The New York
Times previously confirmed to be true but now refers to as an "allegation".