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Article: Arab league collapse carries steep economic price: efforts to create a pan-Arab trading bloc suffered a severe setback with the abrupt cancellation of the March Arab League summit. Failure to act may prove very costly, compelling Arabs to accept American or European alternatives.(Business & Finance)
- Article from:
- The Middle East
- Article date:
- May 1, 2004
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 2004 IC Publications Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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When Tunisha's President Ben Ali announced cancellation of this year's Arab League Summit, literally hours before it was to open, the international response was surprisingly phlegmatic. But the true cost of that cancellation may be very high, for with it died an opportunity to relaunch the Arab League as the engine for a host of economic and political reforms.
Above all, cancellation dealt a blow to efforts to secure approval for creation of an Arab-formulated free trade zone, to compete with other trading blocs in the emerging global economy.
The proposed Arab Free Trade Area--known by the acronym AFTA--would link all 22 Arab League members, creating a ...