With still nearly another four months remaining to the next ministerial meeting of the World Trade Organization scheduled to be held in Doha Qatar, the rift between the Arab countries regarding participation in the conference has intensified and widened.

The ministerial conference is due to be held in Doha next November and the Zionist regime has also been invited to attend.

The government authorities in Qatar have announced that because the meeting is organized under the auspices of the World Trade Organization, it has no power to stop the participation of Israel.

The economics and commerce ministers of the Arab countries recently had a meeting in Cairo , during which the Israeli participation in the Doha conference was totally ignored and they declared that they would participate in the meeting in order to assure its complete success.

Yousef Petros Ghali, the Egyptian trade minister , on behalf of the Arab ministerial meeting in Cairo has evidently contacted Mike Moore the director general of WTO and has assured him of full participation of the Arab countries in the forthcoming Doha conference.

But the Arab ministers have decided to hold a consultative meeting prior to the November gathering in Doha in order to evaluate any further developments and consequently make their final decision.

Amongst the Arab countries which participated in the Cairo meeting, Egypt, Jordan, Tunisia, Qatar, Kuwait, Mauritania, Bahrain and Oman are already members of the World Trade Organization, with Saudi Arabia, Algeria, Sudan, Libya and Yemen taking part in all meetings as official observers.

Saudi Arabia as one of the largest and most influential Arab countries especially as a leader in the Persian Gulf Cooperation Council, has strongly opposed participation of any Arab country in the Doha meeting if the Israeli regime is allowed to participate. Saudi Arabia is now taking strong steps for total boycott of the Doha conference.

Some Arab diplomatic sources have also aired the view that should Doha insist in inviting the Zionist regime, more Arab countries will ultimately decide not to attend the conference.

In order to voice their opposition to the participation of Israel in the Doha WTO meeting, the People's Coordination Council of Asia-Africa countries has also decided to organize an international non-governmental conference on world trade next November for the purpose of assuring the failure of the Doha conference.

The insistence of the World Trade Organization for inclusion of Israel in an international meeting participated by many Arab countries is a flagrant show of insensitiveness to the feelings of more than a billion Muslims throughout the world.

Israel is killing Arab Palestinian women and children every day. Arab houses and dwelling are bulldozed and destroyed by Israeli tanks. Arab lands and properties have forcefully been taken away from them by the Zionist entity. How can the WTO expect the Qatar government encourage Arab countries to sit around the same table with the butchers of their brothers and sisters and discuss trade and partnership?

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