Excerpts: U.S.: preventing undermining Lebanon.Summit to defuse Lebanon
tensions.UN rejects Hizbullah outcry.Human rights complaints.Up to Abbas to
decide.Iraq pays Kuwait $650 million,still owes $22.3 billion July 30, 2010

+++SOURCE: Naharnet(Lebanon) 30 July '10:"Obama Renews Asset Freeze of
People
'Undermining' Lebanon"

SUBJECT: U.S. preventing 'undermining Lebanon'

FULL TEXT:President Barack Obama renewed an emergency measure Thursday(28
July) to freeze the assets of persons who work with Hizbullah and "infringe
upon" Lebanese stability.
"While there have been some recent positive developments in the
Syrian-Lebanese relationship, continuing arms transfers to Hizbullah that
include increasingly sophisticated weapons systems serve to undermine
Lebanese sovereignty," Obama said in a message to Congress.
Obama said the national emergency measures declared on August 1, 2007, must
"continue in effect beyond August 1, 2010."
The original executive order under President George Bush, continued by
Obama, found that threats against Lebanese stability and moves to restore
Syria's former dominant influence presented an "unusual and extraordinary
threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United
States."(AFP)

+++SOURCE: Naharnet (Lebanon) 30 July '10:"Historic Beirut Summit Brings
Together Abdullah, Assad, Suleiman to Defuse Tensions", Agence France Presse

SUBJECT: Summit to defuse Lebanon tensions

FULL TEXT:Lebanon on Friday(30 July) hosts a historic and fateful summit of
regional leaders aimed at defusing tensions over reports of an impending
indictment against Hizbullah members for the murder of ex-Premier Rafik
Hariri.
The meeting between President Michel Suleiman, Saudi King Abdullah and
Syrian President Bashar Assad was hastily organized amid fears of
Sunni-Shiite violence should the Special Tribunal for Lebanon implicate
"rogue" Hizbullah members.
Abdullah visits Beirut for the first time as Saudi king. He had attended the
Arab summit in Beirut in 2002 when he was still crown prince. He will be the
first Saudi monarch to visit the country since 1957.
As for Assad, he visits the Lebanese capital after an eight-year absence to
consolidate the resumption of normal ties between the two countries
following five years of tension that erupted after Hariri's assassination in
February 2005.
Abdullah and Assad are to arrive together from Damascus at around 1:00 pm
and meet with Suleiman at Baabda palace before attending a luncheon.
An Nahar daily said that the meeting will also be attended by Speaker Nabih
Berri, Premier Saad Hariri and members of the Saudi and Syrian delegations
and their Lebanese counterparts.
The newspaper said around 250 people have received invitations to attend the
luncheon with the exception of some members of the national dialogue, former
presidents, party leaders who are not lawmakers and religious officials.
Phalange leader Amin Gemayel and Lebanese Forces chief Samir Geagea are
among those who haven't been invited while former President Emile Lahoud
received an invitation.
According to An Nahar, Phalange MPs and ministers who have been invited to
the luncheon will boycott the gathering.(Naharnet-AFP)

+++SOURCE: Egyptian Gazette 30 July '10:UN rejects Hezbollah outcry",Reuters

SUBJECT: 'UN rejects Hizbullah outcry'

FULL TEXT:BEIRUT - A UN-backed tribunal set up to try suspects in the 2005
assassination of Lebanese statesman Rafik al-Hariri on Thursday(29 July)
rejected charges by Lebanon's Hezbollah armed group that its work is
politically motivated.

"Experience of other international tribunals has shown that the results
of the work of such institutions speak for themselves and contradict the
unsubstantiated allegations of hostile interference," Fatima Issawi,
spokeswoman for the tribunal, told Reuters in written answers to emailed
questions.
"We are convinced that this will also happen in the case of the Special
Tribunal for Lebanon (STL)."
Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad are due
to pay an unprecedented joint visit to Beirut on Frida(30 July) to try to
calm a political storm over the tribunal.
This month Hezbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah assailed the court,
which is based in The Hague, as an "Israeli project" after saying he had
received word that it planned to indict members of his group in connection
with Hariri's killing.
He denied that any Hezbollah members were involved. Early reports by UN
investigators implicated Syrian and Lebanese security agencies.
Syria says it had no hand in the February 14 seafront bombing in Beirut
that killed Hariri and 22 others.
The assassination provoked an international furor led by the United
States, France and Saudi Arabia that prompted Syria to end its 29-year
military presence in Lebanon in April 2005 and led to the establishment of
the special tribunal.
Asked about future indictments, Issawi said: "It would be quite unhelpful
to add to the existing speculations. The Office of the Prosecutor will issue
an indictment when it is ready."
The tribunal has indicted no one since it was set up by the UN Security
Council in May 2007.
Last year it ordered the release of four pro-Syrian Lebanese generals
jailed for four years without charge. Lebanese authorities had detained them
at the request of a former U.N. investigator in 2005.

+++SOURCE: ALMASRYALOUM via Egypt Daily News 30 July '10:"Rights conference
decries waning US, EU support",John Ehab
SUBJECT: Human rights complaint
Backgrounder:

FULL TEXT:At a two-day conference held this week in Cairo entitled
"Prospects for Political Reform in the Arab World," organized by the Cairo
Institute for Human Rights Studies (CIHRS), Arab and western rights
activists expressed concern about what they see as waning interest on the
part of the US and EU in promoting human rights reform in the region.
Conference sessions were devoted to a range of issues, including human
rights development in the Arab region, EU and US policies for promoting
democracy and human rights in the Arab world, and the role of the UN in
promoting human rights in the Middle East.
Speakers provided an overview of the regional human rights situation, from
longstanding national emergency laws to the frequent use of military
tribunals in countries such as Syria, Algeria, Sudan, Egypt and Yemen. The
conference also highlighted a perceived shift in the agenda of Arab civil
society over the last decade from a focus on general regional issues towards
more specific, localized problems, such as election monitoring, torture and
prison conditions within each respective country.
At the conference, many attendees complained that EU and US priorities in
the region had shifted over the last ten years--at the expense of human
rights and democracy promotion.
“Recent years have seen a European pull-back from active democracy support,"
said Kristina Kausch, research fellow at Madrid-based think tank FRIDE. This
trend, she said, had lead to "mounting disappointment with the lack of
coherence and commitment, which stands in contradiction to a plethora of the
EU’s declared foreign policy goals."
Conference participants tackled the issue of US democracy funding in
particular, which, they noted, has a significant impact on which initiatives
are pursued in the region and which aren't. According to CIHRS Director
Bahey Eddein Hassan, new US Agency for International Development (USAID)
policies, for example, restrict agency funding to organizations approved by
the Egyptian regime.
“Sadly, the American administration has agreed to provide support through
USAID only to those organizations officially registered [with the Egyptian
government],” said CIHRS Director Bahey Eddein Hassan. "This gives the
government the right to decide what constitutes an NGO, which has a negative
political effect rather than a positive developmental one."
Fortunately, he added, other sources of US funding--such as the Middle East
Partnership Initiative (MEPI), which sponsored the conference--are not bound
by the same restrictions.
“The current human rights situation in the world will continue to reflect
the absence of political will for the support of reform and democracy,” said
CIHRS research head Essam Edin Hassan. “This lack of commitment is not only
visible in the Arab world, but extends as far as the UN and the UN Human
Rights Council (UNHRC).”
Acording to conference participant Neil Hicks, international policy adviser
for US-based advocacy group Human Rights First, one of the reasons for the
UNHRC's current ineffectiveness is that Arab states work to “undermine the
independence and effectiveness of the UN’s human rights machinery.”
“A number of states, including several close allies of the US with poor
human rights records--such as Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan--have played
a leading role in promoting damaging proposals,” noted Hicks, which include,
“limiting the participation of independent NGOs at UNHRC meetings,
especially during the Universal Periodic Review Process, the council’s most
promising innovation.”
Conference participants also drew up a series of recommendations to be
presented at the Forum for the Future, a democracy and reform initiative
founded by the G8 and countries of the Middle East and North Africa.
Recommendations included calls for Arab countries to abide by international
human rights standards, civil-society monitored elections, guarantees for
freedom of expression and the abolition of emergency laws.
“We’re trying to send recommendations to make this forum more functional and
effective in helping human rights issues in the Arab world,” said Hassan.
Participants also called on Arab nations to release political activists and
prisoners of conscience, along with other detainees.
At the end of the conference, attendees voted to nominate a spokesperson to
represent them at the upcoming Forum for the Future, scheduled to take place
in Qatar in November under the auspices of the Qatari and Canadian
governments. Rola Badran, programs director for the Palestinian Organization
for Human Rights in Lebanon was selected for the task.

+++SOURCE: Jordan Times 30 July '10:"Arabs agree to direct talks, Abbas
‘must
decide’ ",Agencies

QUOTE: "Arab officials ... left it up to Abbas to decide"
BACKGROUNDER:
FULL TEXT:Arab officials agreed in principle on Thursday(29 July) to the
holding of direct Middle East peace negotiations and left it up to
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to decide when to start talks with
Israel, Agence France-Presse reported.
Abbas and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu have been under pressure
from Washington to move forward, and the announcement prompted Netanyahu to
express openness to starting talks "in the next few days".
Qatari Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Hamad Ben Jassem Ben Jabr Al
Thani made the announcement after chairing a meeting of foreign ministers
and representatives in Cairo.
He spoke in response to a question about whether they had given Abbas a
"green light" to start talks.
"I'll be clear. There is an agreement but with the understanding of what
will be discussed and how the direct negotiations will be conducted. And we
will leave the assessment of the position to the Palestinian president as to
when the conditions allow the beginning of such negotiations," he said.
Foreign Minister Nasser Judeh, who took part in the meeting, said: “We
appreciate President Mahmoud Abbas’ keenness on consulting with Arab
countries and keeping them in the picture of the developments regarding the
indirect negotiations,” the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported.
Judeh also stressed the Jordanian position, expressed by His Majesty King
Abdullah, on the need to support the Palestinians in setting up an
independent and sovereign state on their national soil with East Jerusalem
as its capital, based on the 1967 borders.
The minister underlined the efforts being exerted by King Abdullah, other
world leaders and influential stakeholders in urging the international
community to take steps to achieve regional peace and stability, noting the
King’s latest contacts in this regard.
He also stressed the need to take advantage of the United States’ positive
position and US President Barack Obama’s commitment to the two-state
solution within the framework of a comprehensive peace.
The meeting drafted a letter to Obama which laid out the “general
principles” of peace talks, an official who took part in the meeting told
AFP.
They included “the presence of a clear reference for the direct negotiations
and a halt to [certain] Israeli actions in the Palestinian territories,
especially a halt to settlement activity in the West Bank and Jerusalem”,
said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Arab League chief Amr Musa said “written guarantees” were required for
direct talks.
There “must be written guarantees... and the negotiations should be serious
and final status talks”, he said.
Hisham Yusef, who heads Musa’s office, said the meeting gave a “yellow light
that needs some work before it turns green”.
In Jerusalem, a statement from Netanyahu’s office said: “In response to the
Arab League decision, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that he is
ready to start, already in the next few days, direct and frank talks with
the Palestinian Authority.”
Abbas has conditioned the talks on an Israeli guarantee for a Palestinian
state based on pre-1967 war borders between Israel and East Jerusalem and
the West Bank.
He also wants an end to settlement construction in East Jerusalem and the
West Bank. Israel acceded to US pressure to limit settlement building in the
West Bank until September, when a moratorium ends.
The Palestinian leader repeated his conditions on the eve of the meeting in
an interview with Egyptian newspaper editors, the official Egyptian MENA
news agency reported on Thursday.
Abbas said he would tell the meeting that if there was “no serious vision
relating to the 1967 borders and an end to settlements then I cannot enter
direct negotiations”, adding he would immediately enter negotiations if his
demands were guaranteed.
He complained about “pressures I have never faced before in my life” from
Washington and the European Union.
Abbas suspended direct negotiations with Israel after its offensive on the
Gaza Strip in December 2008.

+++SOURCE: Jordan Times 30 July '10:"Kuwait gets $650m in Iraqi
reparation",Agence France Presse

SUBJECT: Iraq pays Kuwait $650 million, still owes $22.3 billion

FULL TEXT:GENEVA (AFP) - The United Nations released $650 million in Iraqi
compensation to Kuwait on Thursday, the latest payment of a war reparation
scheme that began in 1994. The payment brings the total sum of compensation
paid to Kuwait to $30.15 billion. A further $22.3 billion is due to Kuwait.
Most of the latest round went to state and private companies, governments
and international organisation, the UN Compensation Commission said in a
statement. Following the 1991 invasion of Kuwait by Saddam Hussein's reg?me,
Iraq is required to put 5 per cent of its oil and gas revenues into the UN
reparations fund. As it has struggled with insecurity and a raft of economic
problems since 2003, Iraq has been appealing for its payments to be reduced.
In May, Iraqi Oil Minister Hussein Al Shahristani renewed the call for
Kuwait to "forget the past", saying his country could not sustain the
obligation.
=======
Sue Lerner - Associate, IMRA