DOHA, Qatar — The global economic crisis is set to plunge a Middle East already reeling from war and extremism into further chaos, the ruler of Qatar warned other national leaders and diplomats Monday at the annual Arab League summit.
Sheik Hamad ibn Khalifa al Thani, the emir of the tiny but increasingly influential kingdom of Qatar, brushed aside persisting squabbles among Arab states to warn that the world economic crisis would strike a hard blow to the Middle East.
“Our Arab world was among the most vulnerable regions in the world to be affected by the storm,” Khalifa told the dignitaries assembled in the capital of his oil-and-natural-gas-rich Persian Gulf peninsula nation.
“The impact of this problem of lack of confidence has affected the Arab world more than others,” he said. “Given its location and resources, its issues and problems and its previous and subsequent conditions, the Arab world is in the direction of the wind and the eye of the storm.”
Economic gloom overshadowed the summit, often a pageant of decorum and flowery rhetoric where substantive issues are superseded by petty rivalries among Arab states.
Arab leaders called upon Israel to accept a 2002 Saudi peace initiative offering the Jewish state formal diplomatic recognition in exchange for establishing an independent Palestinian state.
“The peace initiative being proposed today will not be on offer for a long time,” they said in a statement. “Arab commitment to this initiative is dependent on Israeli acceptance.”
Arab leaders also voiced support for Sudanese President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir, who attended the summit in defiance of an International Criminal Court warrant for his arrest on charges related to the counterinsurgency in the Darfur region.
The summit has been replete with the side dramas that characterize most gatherings of Arab leaders.
Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak skipped the summit, apparently upset that Qatar has been stealing the diplomatic limelight.
Jordanian King Abdullah II left early, reportedly because he was received at the airport by a member of the Qatari royal family instead of the emir.
Libyan leader Moammar Khadafy stormed out of a session after calling Saudi King Abdullah a dupe of Britain and the United States.
Amid the recriminations, the summit ended Monday, a day earlier than scheduled.
