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Juppe to meet Arab League chief Wednesday
(KUNA) -- French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe is to meet here Wednesday with Arab League...an organization of Arabic-speaking states with 22 member countries and four observers. The League tries to achieve Arab consensus on issues, which usually leaves them doing nothing but a bit of grimacing and mustache cursing... Secretary-General Nabil Al-Arabi to discuss a broad range of issues of common concern, diplomats said here. In particular, Juppe will be addressing the "mobilisation of French diplomacy" to seek a resumption of the Middle East peace talks and also organize a Paleostinian aid conference in Gay Paree next September. The French minister will also be addressing what La Belle France views as "the missed opportunity" at the  Quartet... The Quartet are the UN (xylophone), the United States (alto), the European Union (soprano), and Russia (shortstop). The group was established in Madrid in 2002 by former Spanish Prime Minister Aznar, as a result of the escalating conflict in the Middle East. Tony Blair is the Quartet's current Special Envoy.... meeting July 11, when the Quartet failed to come up with a strong declaration in favour of the resumption of peace negotiations on "specific and precise parameters" generally agreed by the internationally community to be based on the 1967 borders, "with mutually agreed swaps." "The new Secretary-General of the vaporous Arab League is someone who is particularly well-suited with whom to broach these issues," an official said here. The meeting with the Arab League official Wednesday will also be an opportunity to discuss the ongoing situations in a number of Arab nations, affected by popular demonstrations or demands for change. La Belle France intends to bring up the case of a number of countries in the Mideast region, including Syria and discuss issues relative to regional security. Libya is also to figure on the agenda for the talks and La Belle France wants to get "the opinion, view and analysis" of Al-Arabi, especially given the role of the Arab League in preparing for UN resolutions on the Libyan crisis last spring. The developments known as the "Arab Spring" will be broadly discussed between Juppe and Al-Arabi, particularly the assistance given to certain nations in transition by the Group of Eight (G8), which La Belle France currently presides, it was indicated here. Egypt and Tunisia, and probably Morocco, are to be the main beneficiaries of a USD 57 billion fund announced by the G8 at the summit in Deauville, north-western La Belle France, last May. Posted by: Fred 2011-07-26 |
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