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Iraq Official Paper Blames Kuwait for Arab Summit "Failure"
An official Iraqi newspaper said Thursday that the Arab summit which concluded Wednesday in Amman, Jordan has failed and Kuwait should be responsible for the failure.
In an editorial Thursday, Ath-Thawra, organ of Iraq's ruling Arab Baath Socialist Party, said the resolutions of the summit offered only the "minimum" on the two main issues -- the Palestinian intifada (uprising) and the decade-old U.N. sanctions against Iraq.
The editorial blasted the summit for failing to adopt a decisive resolution to call for lifting the sanctions as well as cancelling the two no-fly zones set up by the U.S.-led Western allies in the wake of the 1991 Gulf War.
Iraq had demanded the summit unilaterally lift the sanctions imposed on Iraq for its invasion of Kuwait in 1990.
The editorial also criticized as "weak" the summit recommendation on paying the Palestinian National Authority 40 million U.S. dollars a month for six months, saying it did not reflect the will of the Arab people.
It accused Kuwaiti leaders as "henchmen of the U.S." who were trying to divert the attention of the summit and made it a failure.
Iraq has been resentful of Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, U.S. allies in the Gulf region, for allowing U.S. and British warplanes to use their bases to enforce the two no-fly zones with the claimed aim of protecting the Kurds in the north and Shiite Muslims in the south.
For its part, Kuwait vows no reconciliation until Iraq formally apologizes for its invasion, releases some 600 prisoners of war and returns "stolen property."
The two-day Arab summit failed to reach an agreement on how to resolve the conflict between Iraq and Kuwait. Its final communique made no reference to Iraq, but the Amman Declaration did call for lifting the sanctions.
The Arab summit was the first regular one in a decade. It was also the first time that the Iraq issue was put at the center of an Arab summit conference.
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