The Middle East is now "open for business." said United States Commerce Secretary Ronald Brown at the end of the second Middle East/North African Economic Summit. But he was being overly optimistic. Successes were indeed chalked up at the October 29-31 meeting in Amman, including the goahead for a Middle East Development Bank. Tourism Board and Regional Business Council and agreement on 2,000 private sector business deals. In addition. Qatar pledged 250 million dollars to the Palestine National Authority while Jordan received pledges of 170 million dollars from Japan and 230 million dollars from the World Bank.

But serious political blunders placed in doubt Israel's role in building regional economic prosperity.

Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres antagonised the Palestinians and Arab neighbours when he told a televised news conference: "Jerusalem is an open city religiously: politically It is closed."

He meant the city was

"open" to adherents of the three monotheistic faiths -

Isl.im. Chirstianlty and Ju daism — but the issue of sovereignty was "closed" wlih Israel in sovereign possession.

This was a clear attempt to pre-empt negotiations between the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and Israel on the "final status" of the city, due to begin next May.

"What shocked us most was that this statement came from Peres," Abdullah Hassanat of The Jordan Times told Gemini News Service, "because Peres is regarded as the Israeli leader most prepared to compromise for peace."

Israel exacerbated Peres' blunder by announcing the construction on expropriated Palestinian land of 6,000 homes in a new Jewish neighbourhood in Arab East Jerusalem, and. It is assumed, by dispatching agents on the eve of the summit to assassinate the Islamic Jihad opposition

group leader. Dr Fathi

Shkaki. in Malta.

These actions compounded deep Arab suspicions of Israel's economic intentions and of Arab fears of domination by Israel, whose 70 billion dollar gross domestic product equals the combined total of its neighbours. When Arabs voiced their concern about such a possibility. Peres snapped bad-temperedly: “We don't need to trade with the Arabs,"

Peres also castigated Egypt, because after 16 years of political peace, there is "no economic peace." And Egypt sniped at Jordan which. Cairo claimed, was normalising relations with Israel too quickly.

Such squabbling bodes ill for the joint public projects put before the summit. Among these are a new airport serving Jordan's Aqaba and Israel's Eilat ports on the Red Sea, joint Jordan-Israel development of the Jordan Rift Valley. Integra-

tion of the Egyptian. Jordanian, Palestinian and Israeli electricity grids and the construction of hotels to expand regional tourism.

Israel and the West had hoped to prescribe development as a panacea to cure

an ailing peace process. But. as chief Palestinian negotiator Ahmad Qurei put it, Amman showed that the "political horse still draws the economic cart."

For example, the only major Arab-Israeli deal done

at the summit, hailed as the first one involving a Gulf state, is hedged in by conditions. This is the sale by Qatar of natural gas worth 2 billion dollars. The sale will be Indirect, through the US Enron Company, shipments will begin in the year 2000 and. according to Qatari Emir Hamad Bin Jassem al-Thani. will be Implemented only if "comprehensive peace is reached."

To political constraints must be added financial constraints. Few countries are prepared to contribute to the 40 billion dollar cost of funding the 1.000 public projects on the summit list. At the start of the summit, only three per cent of this sum had been pledged

Klaus Schwab, resident of the Geneva-based World Economic Forum which organised the summit, warned participants: "Official aid is out — private Investment is tn."

This makes it easier for investors and business

people to pick and choose partners in order to avoid the political complications which might flow, from putting Israelis and Arabs together In business enterprises. But this will not promote regional economic development and Integration. the avowed objective of the US and Russian spon- ’ sors of the annual summits.

A Western financial analyst told Gemini: "In Amman it was as if the peace process hadn't happened.

"On the one hand. Israeli businessmen were absent from most of the discus sions. On the other. Western businessmen attending will invest In the traditional ways they have always used in the Middle East.

"But in Amman they were able to make it clear to Arab governments and businessmen that in order to attract major foreign investtnent substantial changes have to be made — that they must establish stock markets and

financial transparency, accept the full repatriation of profits and demolish InterArab trade barriers.

"The more conservative Gulf officials and businessmen are reluctant to adopt Western business methods and will continue as before, while Egypt and the North African countries find It difficult to overcome the rigidity of economic structures or reform their bureaucracies.

■Jordan, he said, had; already Implemented many of the necessary reforms and could expect to benefit considerably from- the summit, particularly since Jordan is the first Arab country to receive an International credit worthiness rating, enabling it to lx>rrow cheaply.

Thus, as far as Jordan, and only Jordan. Is concerned. King Hussein can rightly any: "All our obje. tlves have been achieved."

Jordanians now hope that the summit will bring the economic dividends promised when they signed up for peace with Israel

Gemini News