Al-Umma [Archives:2004/717/Press Review]

26 Feb.2004.
Main headlines
– Extremists attack Abdulmalik Ahmed al-Mutawakil in Thamar
– HAMAS: The wall would not protect the Zionist entity, the world has to force it stop it
– America escalates accusations against the Islah leaders

The political editor of the newspaper writes an article saying whenever the Yemeni relations with Saudi Arabia or one of its regional neighbours gets tense a tedious question would pop up by Gulf and Arab mass media instruments about Yemen's accession to the GCC. The question and arousing it every time is as a reminder to Yemen that it is something and the Gulf States are something else. Perhaps the geography, history and religious and social blending do not qualify the political state of Yemen to join the GCC. The question, more important than that, should be: what is the significance of the GCC and what has it achieved, what are the privileges and gains the Gulf States have realized politically, economically or in security?
In addition to all that and other questions, is Yemen actually in need of entering the GCC which void of any content, by the testimony of its very members and division of their stands and the known differences of the GCC states internal and external as well as he variance in the standard of growth inside it? Added to that is the weakness of trade exchange among its member states if compared to other countries. The ludicrous thing is that unifying the Gulf currency would not be accomplished before the year 2010, which is another evidence of the GCC chronic failure. Thus the mere Yemeni official ambition for accessing the council would not go far beyond an attempt to escape from official internal failures as a result of h deterioration of the political, economic, social and security situation and continuous search for unstudied alternatives to alleviate the acuteness of those problems.
Yemen is not in need for joining the GCC and is not honored to beg for this accession to a loose framework that has not achieved to those within it any mentionable thing and is still governed by an external will and faded media sparkle more than what is actually on the ground. Conceding the impossibility of Yemen's exclusion from being influenced and influential, it is hopeful that its Gulf relations must be based on respect, fraternity and equal joint interests.
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