Hope for democracy lingers in the Middle East despite the late-March collapse of an Arab summit on the subject.
Tunisia canceled the Arab League conference scheduled to begin Mar. 29 in Tunis, citing dissension among members.
The summit was to have covered proposals for democratic reform and renewal of an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan.
Discussion of the peace plan was destined to be difficult after Israel's Mar. 22 assassination of Ahmed Yassin, founder of the militant group Hamas.
But reform proposals were controversial, too. A leaked US plan for Middle Eastern democracy elicited protests from Arab League members saying change shouldn't come from abroad.
A Tunisian official told BBC News that participants planned to avoid the word "democracy" in the ill-fated conference's final communiqué.
Not all Arab leaders are that squeamish about democracy.
Qatari Emir Shaikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani on Apr.5 called on Arab countries to consider the US plan.
According to a Reuters report transmitted by the Arab news network Aljazeera, he also told a conference in Doha that Arabs shouldn't use the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and concerns about security as reasons to oppose change.
"Honesty obliges us to stress that the wrath in our region does not spring only from the Palestinian cause but goes deeper and is due to problems of our own creation that have nothing to do with the outside world—problems that we allowed to grow unremedied and unchecked," the emir said.
Before the scheduled Tunis meeting, Qatar's foreign minister twice defended the US plan.
"The Arab world is not ready to launch its own initiative due to diverging interests," said Hamid bin Jasim bin Jabr Al Thani at a cultural festival in Doha, according to an Agence France-Presse report carried by Aljazeera.
AFP said he earlier supported the US plan at a meeting of Arab foreign ministers in Cairo. Qatar, where citizens approved a constitution last year, plans parliamentary elections this year.
The Al Thanis' defense of democratic reform won't draw praise in many Arab capitals—yet. But it's important and deserves notice wherever leaders don't shun the word "democracy."
(Online Apr. 8, 2004; author's e-mail: [email protected])
