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Diplomacy breaks out in Gulf as govts. back away from confrontation
mIddLe east
DIPLOMACy is breaking out in the Gulf as Arab nations back away from a Donald Trump-in- spired confrontation with Iran, according to a Bloomberg report which claims “the signs are everywhere”.
saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain are reportedly showing signs of ending their 30-month feud that saw them halt trade and ights over Qatar’s links with Iran and sup- port for Islamist groups. And says the report: “spooked by the prospect of a catastrophic war with Iran and its proxy militias across the region, Gulf monarchies are in the midst of a strategic rethink.
The UAE, whose economic model relies in large part on its international links, quickly realized it had most to lose from a military escalation. It had removed most of its troops from yemen by the end of a turbulent summer that saw oil tankers targeted and a U.s. drone downed in the Gulf without signi cant Amer- ican response.”
e strike on saudi oil installations which knocked out half the country’s crude produc- tion is said to have rammed home the risks and prove that Trump was not about to ride to his allies’ rescue.
“The attacks shattered any illusion of this magical U.s. security umbrella,” David Roberts, an assistant professor at King’s College London
who studies the Gulf was cited as saying. “It burst the bubble and showed that Iran had the willing- ness to both do something astonishing like the attack on Aramco facilities and the capability to carryitout.”
Iran has denied Us and saudi assertions it carried out the september 14 strike, pointing to houthi claims of responsibility. But experts have said it was almost certainly launched from southwestern Iran.
In a November 10 speech, UAE Minister of state for Foreign A airs Anwar Gargash said he saw “a path to a deal with Iran that all parties might soon” be ready to embark on if Tehran demonstrated commitment.
“Cold peace is possible but we are certainly far from a grand bargain,” Afshin Molavi, sen- ior fellow at the Foreign Policy Institute at Johns hopkins, was quoted as saying. “For that, both Riyadh and Abu Dhabi would have to accept a role for Iran in Arab countries such as Iraq, syria, Lebanon and yemen.”
For Iran’s President hassan Rouhani, the case for regional engagement is said to be obvi- ous. “Don’t you know that Iran is going to stay here and we will remain neighbors throughout history?” he has said, referring to Iran’s Arab neighbours. “Trump will only be around for a few years and will go back to whatever it was he was doing.”
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w w w . N E W S B A S E . c o m Week 48 05•December•2019
