All eyes last Wednesday were on Paris for the announcement of the host city of Expo 2020. The UAE took centre stage after Dubai won by a resounding majority the right to host the world’s greatest trade exhibition, noted Taoufik Bouachrine, the publishing director of the Morocco-based daily Akhbar Al Youm.
Dubai managed to win the vote in the third round by 70 per cent, ahead of Turkey (Izmir), Brazil (Sao Paulo) and Russia (Yekaterinburg), all major countries with great tourism infrastructure and economic capacity.
Home to more than 200 nationalities, Dubai’s living standards match those of developed countries. The emirate offers proof that Arabs can achieve an urban renaissance and live in modern, clean cities where cultures, faiths and modern technology are welded together, he noted.
Today, Dubai and Abu Dhabi attract about 18 million tourists from the four corners of the world; both cities run ambitious projects including Abu Dhabi’s Masdar City, which relies on renewable energy sources.
Abu Dhabi also has a major tourism and cultural project on Saadiyat Island, which will feature three iconic museums and galleries, and offers a developed framework of life that combines the specificities of the desert environment and the requirements of modern technology.
The digital-savvy government in the Gulf state is growing at a rapid pace, and so are its airlines. Most vital facilities in the UAE operate as companies with independent budgets and well-defined goals.
With great incentives, the UAE has attracted the best talent from around the globe to help develop the country. Having set its sights on shifting away from its dependence on oil in coming decades, the country – which only 50 years ago relied on basic trade caravans and fishing – is now investing millions of dollars in education, scientific research, renewable energy, free trade and foreign investment.
Today the GDP in the UAE is worth $985 million (Dh3.6bn), and its per capita income ranks fourth in the world after Norway, the US and Singapore. The UAE attracts $11 billion of foreign investment, a clear testament to the country’s friendly investment climate, the writer said.
The economic and urban growth in the UAE is not accompanied by political openness to western democracy, which UAE officials themselves admit, saying that this is not easy and needs gradation considering the complex demographic and tribal structure.
Oil does not account for all these successes in the UAE. Larger oil countries in the region and beyond are still very far from developing successful economic models.
The key factor here is willpower and planning for the future, as with the Expo caravan that will stop in Dubai in 2020.
Obama administration prefers to play it softly
Those who slam the policy of US President Barack Obama in the Middle East as “perplexing”, “undecided” and “indifferent” are naive, Faisal Al Qassem wrote in the pan-Arab paper Al Quds Al Arabi.
They fail to realise that in politics, indifference and hesitancy are meaningful and intentional. Most of these people do not follow the platform of this or that US president once he is in the White House.
Americans are mostly blunt when it comes to announcing their foreign policies. The Obama administration has, since the beginning of its first term, frequently said that it would adopt a political line completely different from that of George W Bush.
Mr Obama clearly said that he wanted to “play softly” in contrast to his predecessor, whose policies were very costly. In other words, Mr Obama abandoned the image of the political “cowboy” which marked previous administrations, electing instead to advance diplomacy and ruse to achieve his goals.
The “cowboy” mindset has brought the US a lot of catastrophes and hatred, especially in Iraq and Afghanistan; but Americans are capable of attaining their goals without it.
Mr Obama said early in his first term that he would rely on “intelligence wars” rather than military wars, because they are more efficient and much less costly.
As others have noted, Americans are no longer willing to directly get involved in conflict.
Iran as a new player reflects a shrinking US
Lebanese writer Rushdi Maalouf used to say that if someone with a gun fights another with a nuclear bomb, the former will win because the latter cannot use his weapon.
Iran went to the Geneva conference with a gun and a nuclear bomb; it entered the conference as a state from outside the international community and walked away as a member of the New Middle East, Samir Attalah noted in the London-based newspaper Asharq Al Awsat.
The “New Middle East” is a vague term that was used by Gen Colin Powell who led the war on Iraq from Washington.
Early signs show that a new player, Iran, has for the first time been acknowledged; Russia has returned as a partner to the US in the region; and the Arab nations have failed to have any input.
The novelty here is that the US, which was once fighting for the number one position and repelling any power entering its sphere of influence, is now accepting partners and seeking exits. After the debt-ridden US has lost its economic power, without announcing it, it is now announcing its loss of political power, according to the writer.
Since confused and unconfident US secretary of state John Kerry took office, the concessions of President Barack Obama have come out into the open.
* Digest compiled by The Translation Desk
translation@thenational.ae
