‘KSA, Bahrain merger plan undemocratic’

Reports say Saudi Arabia is seeking to merge with Bahrain in line with plans to unify the six Arab member states of the [Persian] Gulf Cooperation Council [P]GCC. Members of the council, including Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Oman, are expected to meet and discuss closer union among the six countries on May 14. This comes as some members of the [P]GCC have expressed concern about Saudi Arabia’s possible dominance over the other five countries if the council becomes unified. Press TV has conducted an interview with Hayan Haydar, political analyst from Beirut, to further discuss the issue. The following is a rough transcription of the interview. Press TV: Speaking about the proposal that is being made by Riyadh about, in its words, “a close union, a merger with Bahrain”. What is this merging about? Is Riyadh planning to give Bahrain internal political autonomy but staying in charge of the military affairs? -We know, of course, it’s sent military forces to help with the crackdown. What kind of agreement with Bahrain is Saudi Arabia looking for here? Haydar: I think it’s a bit early to really define what the details are. I’m sure they themselves did not fix what details were there. It’s obvious, it can be seen that the Bahrainis went into trouble a year and few months ago, and the regime called on the [Persian] Gulf States and especially Saudi Arabia -- and they entered, militarily. It seems that now the regime cannot control it anymore. They can see that there are a lot of international organizations condemning the violence and the non-democratic procedures of this regime. Now, this is a step forward. As our colleagues on the air were stating, the basic thing would have been to have a referendum asked [to] the people, whether they want this type of union, federation or whatever it is. We’ve seen last year, also, an invitation to Jordan and Morocco to join the [P]GCC club, as we can call it. We know very well that Iraq and Yemen have been longing for years, two decades, some of them, to enter into this [P]GCC and they were refused. So it looks more like it’s becoming more and more the club of kingdoms and emirates. Press TV: Even if we say that Bahrain is going to go ahead with this plan, what about the other Arab states? Of course, we’ve been suggesting throughout this show that they’re not going to be for it. Will the other Arab states of the Persian Gulf region agree to join this confederation, and do you think this club would undermine their sovereignty and independence? For instance, the Bahraini information minister would describe it as an [EU-type of union];however, we saw the Qatari government saying in one report that Qatar sees this as Saudi’s way of undermining the Persian Gulf states’ bilateral relations and forcing its own agenda. Haydar: I would like to note, first of all, that the US has got its largest base in Bahrain, to start with. Second, just today it was announced that the US will resume providing Bahrain with the arms and weaponry which they had bought last year and which were stopped because of complaints from the international organizations on democracy, etc. The US really knows what’s going on over there. I would like just to ask, what is this democracy when the ministry of information tells them that the Bahrainis would back such a plan, the merger plan? They don’t have a government, they don’t have a parliament, they don’t have a referendum, and they don’t ask the people whether they want it or not. Coming back to your question, you know that the Arabian Peninsula is made mainly of tribes coming from “Ha…em’, that is Oman and Yemen, and the Hejaz, that is coming from the Western-Saudi side, and the rest are coming from the eastern and northern part of the peninsula, that is like Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, etc. Of course, these people are not just going to jump on the bandwagon and join this merger just like that. You know that Bahrain used to rely on pearls and agriculture. Yet it doesn’t rely on this anymore in this economy. 70 percent of its oil is Saudi oil so it cannot say no to the Saudis. But this is not the case of Abu Dhabi or Qatar or Oman, so it will be much different. The negotiations will have a much different way there. We have seen these conflicting positions in the [P]GCC when they talked about the same currency, to have a common currency for them. Going back to the proposal which the [P]GCC made to Jordan and Morocco last year to join them, we can see that the first 20 articles within the proposal, out of the first 20 articles, 15 of them were military or security articles, then comes the foreign policy, etc.