Arab report sees little reform, faults US action

CAIRO - In a long-awaited report contested by the United States and Egypt, Arab intellectuals and reformers said they saw no significant advances toward democracy in the Arab world in the year after October 2003.

The third Arab Human Development Report (AHDR), released on Tuesday under UN auspices, says most reforms were "embryonic and fragmentary" and did not amount to a serious effort to end repression in the region, which has some of the world's most authoritarian governments.

The United States, which says its policy is to promote democracy in the region, contributed to an international context which hampered progress, through its policy toward Israel, its actions in Iraq and security measures affecting Arabs, it said.

"Overall, there has been no significant easing of the human development crisis in the Arab region," it said.

The report was written before elections in Iraq in January and the recent street protests in Lebanon - events which the Bush administration has cited as evidence of change.

The US and Egyptian governments had criticized parts of an early draft of the UN report, leading to a dispute which held up its release for at least three months.

But the UN Development Programme (UNDP) eventually decided to put it out under its logo, with a disclaimer in the preface.

"The very process of writing this AHDR has been a source of significant public and, unfortunately, highly politicized and often inaccurate speculation," wrote Mark Malloch Brown, UNDP Administrator at the time it was written.

"Some of the views expressed by the authors are not shared by UNDP or the UN... (But) This report clearly reflects a very real anger and concern felt across the region," he added.

The most controversial parts of the report, subtitled Towards Freedom in the Arab World, describe the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory and the occupation of Iraq by the United States and its allies as violations of freedom and obstacles to human development there and in the region.

It says that the occupations gave Arab governments an excuse to postpone democratization, forced Arab reformers to divert some of their energies away from reform and strengthened extremist groups which advocate violence.

The United States also undermined the international system by repeatedly using or threatening to use its UN Security Council veto, enabling Israel to build new Jewish settlements and continue with its barrier in the West Bank, it adds.

INCREASED SUFFERING IN IRAQ

"This has pushed many people in the region to lose hope of obtaining justice from global governance and could exacerbate a tendency toward extremism," the report said.

In Iraq, the occupation has increased human suffering and, because the United States has failed to meet its obligations to protect citizens, the country has seen "an unprecedented loss of internal security," it said.

"After dismantling the old state, the US-led authorities made little progress in building a new one. Despite the optimistic reports published by the Occupation forces and the US Administration their performance continued to be deficient," it added. In its analysis of the roots of authoritarianism in the Middle East, the intellectuals cited the discovery of oil, the creation of Israel, the phenomenon of client states during the Cold War and the fragile and unnatural nature of most of the Arab states created during the decolonization period.

The US response to the September 2001 attacks on the United States added to the ambiguity in the Western attitude to human rights in the Middle East, it said.

"The 'war on terror' has cut into many Arab freedoms... An unfortunate by-product in some countries has been that Arabs are increasingly the victims of stereotyping, disproportionately harassed or detained without cause," it said.

"The fact that some Western countries ... have taken steps widely perceived to be discriminatory and repressive, has weakened the position of those reformers calling for Arab governments ... to change their course," it added.

The report notes an increase in activity by civil society groups pressing for changes inside Arab countries, some reform initiatives by Arab governments, some improvements in education and some empowerment of women in the Arab world.

But it added: "There is a near-complete consensus that there is a serious failing in the Arab world, and that this is located specifically in the political sphere."

It says that if the current repressive situation continues, more intense social conflict is likely to follow.

"Disaster can be averted. The alternative is to pursue an historic, peaceful and deep process of negotiated political alternation ... The desired outcome is a redistribution of power within Arab societies, restoring sovereignty to its rightful owners, the vast majority of people in the Arab world."

- REUTERS