GCC Summit names new military chief and UAE as 2019 host
The GCC announced the appointment of a new chief of its joint military command yesterday after a brief summit in the Saudi capital at which members pledged to work together to achieve regional stability and security.
The GCC also announced that the UAE would be the host of the next summit, next year.
GCC Secretary General Abdullatif Al Zayani said that Lt Gen Eid Awwad Al Shulaiwi will be appointed as the new military commander to the GCC Military Command in King Khalid Military City in Hafar Al Batan. He was the former commander of the Saudi Arabian Army, also known as the Saudi Royal Land Forces.
The joint military command was announced in 1984 as one of several areas of co-operation for the GCC. The GCC Military Command, in its current form, was established in 2013. But the proposal for a wider Middle East Security Alliance was not addressed at length during the summit, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al Jubeir said.
The alliance, Mr Al Jubeir said, was “under discussion between the GCC and still evolving”.
Mesa is a “security arrangement to counter Iranian aggression and the co-operation between the US and GCC, it’s a work in progress that both sides want to see succeed”.
For the second year running, the annual GCC summit was reduced to a single day, instead of the usual two to three days, as the bloc grapples with a diplomatic crisis arising from Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Bahrain cutting ties with Qatar over behaviour they view as reckless and meddling.
An indicator of the organisation’s struggles was the absence of Qatar’s emir, Sheikh Tamim at the meeting in Riyadh, while last year the leaders of Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and UAE were absent from the summit hosted by Kuwait.
Nevertheless, closed-door talks that lasted less than an hour resulted in a joint communique from the 39th GCC summit in which the six member states placed regional stability at the top of the agenda.
Besides strengthening joint security and defence, the
seven-point Riyadh Declaration called for a road map towards further economic integration, joint foreign policy to preserve the GCC’s interests and avoid regional and international conflict and a strengthening of partnerships and co-operation with international allies.
Saudi Arabia’s King Salman spoke of the need for co-operation on regional security and stability in his opening address.
“The region goes through challenges, terrorism and the Iranian threat that meddles in the affairs of our countries. I urge everyone to work co-operatively to create stability in the region and abroad,” King Salman said.
The Saudi king also called for a political solution to the civil war in Yemen, expressing his support for the peace talks taking place in Sweden.
He said members of the Arab Coalition have called on the internationally recognised Yemeni government to “save Yemen and its people from a group of people who have turned against the legitimacy of the state and have meddled with its security and stability”, referring to the Iran-backed Houthi rebels.
The king cited the Palestinian cause as another troubling concern, saying that the country “and its capital, Jerusalem” was still among the top priorities for the GCC.
In his remarks, the Emir of Kuwait, Sheikh Sabah Al Ahmad, addressed the GCC schism head-on.
“This session has convened on its scheduled date despite the conditions that we are passing through – [it] confirms our commitment to maintaining the GCC as an entity,” said Sheikh Sabah.
An “alarming escalation” in the problems of the region should push member states to reinforce the unity of the GCC and strengthen co-operation.
“The most dangerous obstacle we face is the struggle within the GCC,” said Sheikh Sabah, who has acted as mediator in the dispute.
He said it was a “threat to the unity of our position and the interests of our people”.
The emir called for media outlets to end offensive campaigns that have harmed “our values, our principles and have planted the seeds of sedition and disunity among our people”.
Prior to the opening session, officials from the states boycotting Qatar suggested a solution to the crisis might be found in Riyadh, heightening expectations that mutual concessions could be made. But such hopes were dashed by Qatar sending lower-ranking officials instead of its leaders.