JEDDAH, 29 May 2004 — Crown Prince Abdullah will not take part in the G-8 summit scheduled for June 8-12 in the US, Foreign Minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal has said.
“Saudi Arabia has no plan at all to take part in the summit,” Al-Hayat pan-Arab daily quoted the prince as saying.
US President George W. Bush had invited the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Yemen, Morocco and Bahrain to the conference in the state of Georgia.
President Bush will announce at the summit an amended version of his “Greater Middle East Initiative” to promote political and economic reforms in the region. Jordan’s King Abdallah and Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh have agreed to take part in the summit, but Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak has declined.
The foreign minister reiterated Saudi Arabia’s commitment to ongoing economic and political reforms. The Kingdom’s first-ever municipal elections are slated for February next year.
Saudi Arabia and Egypt have rejected outside imposition of reforms in the Arab world. In a joint statement last February, the two countries “affirmed that Arab states proceed on the path of development, modernization and reform in keeping with their peoples’ interests and values.”
Arab states “do not accept that a particular pattern of reform be imposed on Arab and Islamic countries from outside,” the statement added.
Modernization and reform must also fulfill the people’s needs and be compatible with “their Arab identity”, said the statement which came after US Secretary of State Colin Powell first announced plans to “institutionalize” the reform project.
