Sirte, SPA:
Prince Saud Al-Faisal, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Chairman of the delegation of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to Sirte extraordinary Arab summit conveyed the greetings and wishes of the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz Al Saud to the participants in the summit, stressing the importance of examining ways necessary to develop the joint Arab action' system.
This came in a speech made by Prince Saud Al-Faisal before the extraordinary Arab summit, which opened in the Libyan city of Sirte earlier yesterday.
In his speech, Prince Saud Al-Faisal greeted President Muammar Qaddafi, Leader of September Revolution and the President of the Conference of the extraordinary Arab summit; Secretary General of the Arab League; President of the African Union Commission and all other participants.
He stressed the need to examine ways necessary to develop the system of the joint Arab action, including the institution of the Arab League, and to look into the suggestion put forward by the Secretary General of the Arab League during the regular Arab Summit held in March on the establishment of a league for Arab neighborhood on the grounds that this matter involves a joint Arab and regional interest.
On the vision of the Arab League Secretary General on the policy of Arab neighbourhood which reflects an abstract of Amr Moussa's read of the Arab situations in the Middle East in general, Prince Saud Al-Faisal explained that this vision returns to a sense of the erosion of the regional role of the Arab system in its environment and centre compared to an ascending of the role of some other countries, let alone the continued Israeli defiance.
According to the assumptions underlying the proposal of the Secretary General, the Arab reality pushes us to launch a new era in the history of the Arab system's relationship with its geographical surroundings with the aim to provide innovative means and mechanisms to make the Arab system more able to face current and future challenges and contain the coming threats, Prince Saud Al-Faisal, Minister of Foreign Affairs added.
He went on in his speech by saying that just feeling the need to hold an extraordinary summit to discuss ways of enhancing the joint Arab action and the initiative of Arab neighborhood's policy reflects the importance of this matter since it is associated with the present and the future of the Arab nation.
Prince Saud Al-Faisal pointed out that the issue of joint Arab action has cast its shadow over the Arab meetings at their various levels and it was a topic of ongoing talk and controversy resulted in series of projects and plans, but did not lead to tangible results so far.
Though, he stressed that such an initiative is very important and worthy due its doubtless noble goals.
In his speech before Sirte Arab summit, Prince Saud Al-Faisal also said that 'Of course, we look forward to develop our relations with neighboring countries to its extreme extent that we wish at least but I think that you share my opinion that the proposal of the neighborhood policy will not achieve its desired goal only after we provide for this type of special relationship the terms of success.
'Accordingly, the Kingdom sees that it's better to gradually focus on ways of promoting and advancing the Arab action to be already an active and influential joint action at the Arab and international levels. It is true that the absence of an effective and influential Arab role has created a strategic vacuum that is exploited by many neighboring countries, but I see that the reform of this system requires us to primarily activate the Arab cooperation through the strengthening of the institution of the Arab League and this matter does not require any significant changes in the Arab League's Charter but just a serious and practical commitment, Prince Saud Al-Faisal explained in his speech.
On the Sudanese cause, Prince Saud Al-Faisal pointed out to what is happening in Sudan, though it is an Arab country and Arab League member, it is threatened by secession.
He added that it is not justified that the Arab League sits on the fence about what happens in Sudan, especially as 'we are going to have an imminent Arab/African meeting, which requires to address this situation within the framework of Arab-African solidarity.
'The threat of secession may not be in the interest to Sudan and in our view that the interests of the two parties should help Sudan to overcome this risk and that the referendum must be fair and should hold without any pressure may lead to ominous results, therefore, we hope for a joint Arab-African stance represents the beginning of a new era of Arab-African solidarity', Prince Saud Al-Faisal, Minister of Foreign Affairs concluded his speech.