Heard about the latest new world order move?
No Mediterranean Union shortcut around Arab-Israeli conflict
Hasan Abu Nimah, The Electronic Intifada, 16 July 2008
French President Nicolas Sarkozy wants to establish a Union for the Mediterranean. The idea of cooperation between countries north and south of the Mediterranean is by no means new. Decades ago the European Community had envisaged closer ties of partnership with the Maghreb countries. Those countries had been a secure source of cheap labour for Western European industry in past times. Through trade, 19th and 20th century European colonial policies and cultural and economic interaction, Arab communities had grown in various European countries, mainly those on the Mediterranean northern rim. It became natural as a result for both sides to harvest the historic process in a manner that served mutual interests.
Later in time, those foreign communities turned burdensome. The tendency of people from the poor south to migrate by any available means, sometimes illegal, to the prosperous north in pursuit of jobs and better living conditions, had eventually led to the formation of ghetto-like foreign quarters in some European capitals. With conditions for integration often difficult, the presence of those foreign communities had sharpened the contrast between different cultures rather than acting as the desired catalyst for cultural and social interaction.
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The summit, which convened in Paris on 13 July is supposed to officially launch the Union, and to establish its permanent offices. All the would-be members were represented at the summit except the Libyan leader who harshly criticized the project as a neo-colonial European plan to divide the Arabs, and to impose normalization with Israel upon them. He predicted the plan's failure.
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Hasan Abu Nimah, The Electronic Intifada, 16 July 2008
French President Nicolas Sarkozy wants to establish a Union for the Mediterranean. The idea of cooperation between countries north and south of the Mediterranean is by no means new. Decades ago the European Community had envisaged closer ties of partnership with the Maghreb countries. Those countries had been a secure source of cheap labour for Western European industry in past times. Through trade, 19th and 20th century European colonial policies and cultural and economic interaction, Arab communities had grown in various European countries, mainly those on the Mediterranean northern rim. It became natural as a result for both sides to harvest the historic process in a manner that served mutual interests.
Later in time, those foreign communities turned burdensome. The tendency of people from the poor south to migrate by any available means, sometimes illegal, to the prosperous north in pursuit of jobs and better living conditions, had eventually led to the formation of ghetto-like foreign quarters in some European capitals. With conditions for integration often difficult, the presence of those foreign communities had sharpened the contrast between different cultures rather than acting as the desired catalyst for cultural and social interaction.
***
The summit, which convened in Paris on 13 July is supposed to officially launch the Union, and to establish its permanent offices. All the would-be members were represented at the summit except the Libyan leader who harshly criticized the project as a neo-colonial European plan to divide the Arabs, and to impose normalization with Israel upon them. He predicted the plan's failure.
--MORE--