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    Bush Mideast Speech Draws Cool Response
    By Hannah Allam
    McClatchy Newspapers

    Sunday 13 January 2008

    Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates - President Bush on Sunday described Iran as the world's leading state sponsor of terrorism and called on Arab allies to help his administration curb the threat "before it's too late."

    In a speech at an opulent, palace-style resort here Sunday, Bush accused Iran's militant Shiite Muslim government of spending hundreds of millions of dollars to foment instability in Iraq, Lebanon, Afghanistan and the Palestinian territories, while ordinary Iranians face economic hardships and political repression.

    "Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywhere," Bush said. "So the United States is strengthening our longstanding security commitments with our friends in the Gulf, and rallying friends around the world to confront this danger before it's too late."

    But Bush appears unlikely, based on the regional reaction to his address, to find many Arabs to heed his alarms against Iran, a powerful neighbor and trading partner. Nor did many endorse his speech's other theme- a vision of "free and just society" featuring broad political participation and a voice for moderate Muslims in a region where money and family are common keys to leadership.

    Even political analysts here who share Bush's democratic vision said that his speech painted over the daily reality for most inhabitants of the Middle East, an oil-rich region where power is largely inherited and human rights violations abound.

    Whether chastising Iran or praising Palestinian elections, analysts said, Bush left out key facts that would have offered a messier- and more true-to-life- portrait of the modern Middle East.

    "Iran is a neighbor, we have to deal with that," said Ambassador Ibrahim Mohieldin, director of the Arab League's Americas department. "The U.S. is thousands of miles away from Iran - it's OUR national security that will be affected" if leaders agree to keep Tehran isolated at Washington's request.

    Bush heaped praise on his hosts, the rulers of the United Arab Emirates , for luring foreign investment and "building a prosperous society out of the desert." Left out, noted analyst Manar Shorbagy, an associate professor who teaches a course on U.S. politics at the American University in Cairo, was the ill-fitting fact that Iran is the country's No. 1 trade partner.

    Also unmentioned was the UAE's role as an important conduit for Iranian imports in spite of U.S.-backed economic sanctions. Moreover, a large and thriving Iranian expatriate community is central to commerce and society in Abu Dhabi and its more glamorous sister city, the commercial hub of Dubai.

    Bush, in elaborating on his theme of Middle Eastern democracy, also said he was encouraged by recent elections in Iraq, Lebanon, the Palestinian territories and other perennially troubled Arab lands. What he failed to mention, critics said: Iraqis elected an overwhelmingly Shiite Islamist government with close ties to Iran, the Lebanese still have no president because of a deepening political crisis and Palestinians voted the militant group Hamas into office. And Bush never once mentioned Syria, a close Iranian ally who plays a crucial role in regional politics.

    "You have all types of contradictions," Shorbagy said. "Talking about freedom when you're occupying two countries in the region: Afghanistan and Iraq. Talking about justice while you're against the (Palestinian) right of return. Talking about democracy while you're against elected groups you don't like ... Was he listening to himself?"

    Abdul Karim al Dekhayel, a political science professor at King Fahd University in the Saudi capital of Riyadh, said Bush displayed a double standard by urging Arab nations to ease ties with Iran while U.S. officials hold talks with Iranians to discuss the bloodshed in Iraq.

    "Instead of pushing Gulf countries to pressure Iran , they should rather encourage Iran to cooperate. We cannot always wave the stick- economic sanctions, severing of diplomatic ties," Dekhayel said. "Instead we could wave a prize- increased investment, trade relations."

    In his remarks on democracy, Bush reaffirmed but only mildly his belief that Arab nations must expand civil liberties and allow nonviolent political opposition. He emphasized roles for academics and civil society, and urged Gulf countries to consider their "human capital" as important as their oil. He acknowledged "setbacks" to democracy, such as the arrests of dissidents, but pointedly omitted mentioning U.S.-friendly countries by name.

    While Arab political commentators typically blame U.S. foreign policy for helping to prop up the region's monarchs and authoritarians, Bush said religious extremism exemplified by the Shiite theocracy in Tehran and the Sunni militants of al Qaida were to blame for the stagnation of democratic reforms.

    "For decades, the people of this region saw their desire for liberty and justice denied at home and dismissed abroad in the name of stability," Bush said. "Today, your aspirations are threatened by violent extremists who murder the innocent in pursuit of power ... They hate your government because it does not share their dark vision. They hate the United States because they know we stand with you in opposition to their brutal ambitions."

    The president already has called on Israeli and Palestinian leaders and made pit stops in Bahrain, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates. The remaining destinations on the eight-day tour are Saudi Arabia and Egypt, where Bush will visit in the first instance a king who inherited his throne and in the second a president who took power in 1981 and is widely regarded as grooming his son for succession.

    --------

    Special Correspondent Miret el Naggar contributed from Cairo.

    Go to Original

    Bush Urges Unity Against Iran
    By Steven Lee Myers
    The New York Times

    Monday 14 January 2008

    Aby Dhabi, United Arab Emirates - President Bush on Sunday urged wary Persian Gulf allies to rally against Iran "before it is too late," even as the International Atomic Energy Agency announced that the country had agreed, yet again, to answer outstanding questions about its nuclear programs within four weeks.

    In an address to government and business leaders in an opulent hotel here, Mr. Bush focused not only on what the United States believes are Iran's nuclear ambitions but also its suspected support for Islamic militants in Afghanistan, Iraq, Lebanon and the Palestinian territories. He called Iran's government "the world's leading sponsor of terrorism" and accused it of imposing repression and economic hardship at home.

    "Iran's actions threaten the security of nations everywhere," he said. "So the United States is strengthening our longstanding security commitments with our friends in the gulf and rallying friends around the world to confront this danger before it is too late."

    The announcement about Iran's pledge of cooperation on its nuclear program, however, could undercut efforts to build international support against Tehran. It came after a visit to Iran this weekend by Mohamed ElBaradei, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations' nuclear monitoring agency, who met with Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

    Iran agreed to carry out its pledges, made last year, to resolve suspicions about its nuclear programs, though the state news agency said it expected the United Nations Security Council to drop its sanctions in return. The announcement essentially delayed for another month what had been an end-of-the-year deadline to disclose all of its nuclear work, including any covert or undeclared military research.

    Over the past year and a half the Iranians have repeatedly made declarations that they would answer outstanding questions within a week, but each of those deadlines has passed with only partial answers offered.

    With Mr. Bush in the middle of a trip to the region intended to build a united Arab front against Iran, the White House acknowledged that the announcement represented progress, but expressed skepticism about Iran's willingness to provide complete information. It also said Iran was still obliged to suspend its enrichment of uranium, as required by the Security Council.

    "Answering questions about their past nuclear activities is a step," said Gordon D. Johndroe, a White House spokesman. "But they still need to suspend their enrichment and reprocessing activity. Another declaration is no substitute for complying with the U.N. sanctions."

    Administration officials say many Arab states are wary of Iran's growing power and influence in the region, especially among Shiite minorities in predominately Sunni nations like Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.

    In recent months, however, the gulf states have shown signs of reaching out diplomatically to Iran. Saudi Arabia gave permission to Iran's president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, to make a pilgrimage to Mecca, and the Gulf Cooperation Council also extended him an invitation to a summit meeting last month.

    Mr. Bush began his Middle East trip in Israel, focused on brokering an Israeli-Palestinian peace, but Iran has loomed large in his travels, particularly after a confrontation in the Strait of Hormuz a week ago between three American warships and five Iranian speedboats.

    The Pentagon has appeared to back away from part of its initial account of that encounter. In Bahrain, where Mr. Bush began his day on Sunday, the commanders of the two American ships involved said that a threatening radio message may not have come from the Iranian boats.

    The commanders said they took the radio warning seriously nevertheless, because it was broadcast as the Iranian speedboats were maneuvering in what they viewed as a provocative manner around the American ships. Because the warning, that the American ships would explode, was broadcast over an open maritime radio channel, it could have come from another ship in the area or from somewhere on shore.

    In a news conference at the headquarters of the Fifth Fleet, the officers also said they had determined that boxes dropped into the water by the Iranians were not dangerous, as feared at the time, and were probably a ruse to study the reaction of the Navy warships. "Whether it was coincidental or not, it occurred at exactly the same time that these boats were around us," Cmdr. Jeffery James of the Hopper, a destroyer, said of the radioed threat, "and they were placing objects in the water so the threat appeared to be building."

    For the second time in two months, Mr. Bush found himself making a case about Iran's threat in the face of developments that seemed to undercut it. In December, an American intelligence report concluded that Iran had suspended a nuclear weapons program in 2003, a finding that has delayed a new round of United Nations sanctions.

    In his meetings, in Kuwait, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates, Mr. Bush and his aides have tried to press leaders to do more to help the United States to isolate Iran's leaders. Privately, Mr. Bush has urged Persian Gulf leaders to restrict Iran's access to banks and other financial institutions, one administration official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not allowed to discuss internal deliberations.

    In addition to sanctions already imposed by the United Nations Security Council over Iran's failure to comply with demands involving its nuclear programs, the administration has lobbied for countries to enforce American sanctions against four state-owned banks in Iran and the Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guards. Ayatollah Khamenei appeared to be referring to the administration's efforts on Sunday when he declared, "Americans mistakenly think they can bring the Iranian nation to its knees with pressure," according to the news agency ISNA.

    Mr. Bush used his speech here on Sunday to call for greater political freedom in the region.

    "You cannot build trust when you hold an election where opposition candidates find themselves harassed or in prison," he said at the Emirates Palace, a large hotel on the Persian Gulf, built at a cost of $3 billion.

    "You cannot expect people to believe in the promise of a better future when they are jailed for peacefully petitioning their government," he continued. "And you cannot stand up a modern and confident nation when you do not allow people to voice their legitimate criticisms."

    Except for Iran, though, Mr. Bush did not single out any country, including his host, the United Arab Emirates, whose record on human rights "remained problematic," according to the State Department's most recent human rights report.

    --------

    Thom Shanker contributed reporting from Washington, and Nazila Fathi from Tehran.

    Go to Original

    Bush Gets a Taste of the Sheik's Life
    By Michael Abramowitz
    The New York Times

    Monday 14 January 2008

    Aby Dhabi, United Arab Emirates - When President Bush showed up Sunday to meet United Arab Emirates President Sheik Khalifa bin Zayed al Nahyan, he was presented with the biggest bling Secret Service agents said they had ever seen: a giant necklace set with hundreds of rubies, emeralds and other precious stones, holding a medallion that included a hand-painted enamel American flag.

    It was just one example of the kind of lavish wealth on display as Bush makes his way through Persian Gulf countries bursting with oil money.

    The president and his party stayed here Sunday night at the Emirates Palace, a giant Taj Mahal-like hotel that cost more than $3 billion to build. The hotel has a nearly mile-long private beach with sand imported from Algeria. The interior hallways are lined with gold and marble.

    But before he went to bed, Bush helicoptered to the desert encampment of the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheik Khalifa's younger brother. There he dined under tents on lamb, veal and chicken, and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed showed Bush the falcons with which he hunts on his property, according to White House press secretary Dana Perino. She likened the atmosphere to the kind of relaxed feeling at a neighborhood barbecue back home.

    Perino said the president had "a really nice time."

    Bush is not done with Middle Eastern royal hospitality: On Monday, he will fly to Riyadh for two days of bonding time with Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah, who famously distrusts telephones and prefers to practice his diplomacy in person. Bush will have dinner Monday with the king at his palace in Riyadh, where the main reception area includes a giant plexiglass fish tank that is 30 by 12 by 15 feet , according to the White House.

    On Tuesday, Bush will travel to the Al Janadriyah Farm, the country retreat where the king maintains a stable of some 150 thoroughbred stallions. The dining room has a giant U-shaped table with capacity to seat up to 300 guests.

    Perhaps the biggest question facing the two leaders is not how they will cope with Iran or the Middle East peace process but how the two will manage to stay alert when they meet: Bush is an early bird, while Abdullah is a night owl known to greet visiting dignitaries at very late hours.

    At a background briefing yesterday, an unnamed senior official broke into laughter when told that reporters seemed to have a wager about how long the meetings might last.

    "You know, this is a matter of great sensitivity, and I don't really want to be wading in," he replied. "But if someone wants to offer me 10 percent on the side, I could see what I could do."