a) Egypt and Lebanon b) Jordan and Egypt c) Jordan and Iraq d) Iraq and Egypt What does Israel want to
Respostas
Resposta:
Iraqi President Barham Salih and Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi meet with King Abdullah II of Jordan and Egypt's President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, in Baghdad, Iraq, June 27, 2021. REUTERS/Khalid al-Mousily
ORDER FROM CHAOS
Egypt, Iraq, and Jordan: A new partnership 30 years in the making?
Katherine Harvey and Bruce RiedelFriday, July 2, 2021
In April, the news that Iraq was mediating between longtime rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran captivated Middle East watchers. Iraq’s new role as a Saudi-Iran intermediary comes as the Saudis have taken concrete steps in recent years to build a meaningful relationship with their northern neighbor, such as reopening their border last November for the first time since 1990. Yet while the new Saudi-Iraq relationship is indeed noteworthy, Iraq has simultaneously been forging a regional partnership with two other Arab states: Egypt and Jordan. Indeed, Baghdad hosted a summit in late June attended by Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi and King Abdullah II of Jordan. It was the fourth time leaders of the three countries have met together since March 2019, and the first time on Iraqi soil. It was also the first visit by an Egyptian president to Iraq in more than 30 years.
At first glance, a partnership grouping together Egypt, Iraq, and Jordan appears rather strange. One commentator, not without reason, called it an alliance composed of the “region’s odd fellows.” However, Iraq has historically had important economic relationships with both Egypt and Jordan, and in fact the three countries — along with North Yemen — came together in a very short-lived partnership called the Arab Cooperation Council (ACC) from 1989 to 1990. Today, like 30 years ago, economic cooperation lies at the heart of the trilateral relationship. But then and now it has also had strategic goals. And in the longer term, the new partnership potentially heralds a far more ambitious project to bring together not just Egypt, Iraq, and Jordan, but the countries of the Levant more broadly.
Back to the Future
Iraq’s close economic ties to Egypt and Jordan date to the 1980s, during the Iran-Iraq War. Jordan became Iraq’s economic lifeline at that time, serving as a conduit for imports and oil exports through the port of Aqaba. Jordan also received most of its own oil, highly subsidized, from Iraq. King Hussein was Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s closest ally at the time, visiting Baghdad often during the war. Egypt, meanwhile, saw more than one million of its citizens relocate to Iraq during the 1980s to fill jobs made vacant by the mass conscription of Iraqi men into the armed forces — so many that Iraq constituted Egypt’s largest source of remittances.
Soon after the end of the war, the three countries, joined by North Yemen, formed the ACC. Each had a political motive to forge the pact. All wanted allies to balance against the Gulf Cooperation Council, the Saudi-led alliance of the six Gulf monarchies created during the war. Saddam owed the Saudis billions of dollars in loans from the war, while Amman and Sana’a had longstanding concerns about Saudi expansionism and interference in their internal affairs.
Nevertheless, economic cooperation formed a central pillar of the formation. The ACC was envisioned as a mechanism to increase trade among member states, as well as to facilitate labor movements, particularly from Egypt and Jordan to Iraq.
The ACC had barely launched before it fell apart due to Saddam’s invasion of Kuwait in August 1990. But even during the 1990s, while Iraq faced an onerous international sanctions regime, trade between it and Egypt and Jordan continued. Iraq continued to be Egypt’s second biggest export market, under the U.N. Oil-for-Food Programme. Jordan remained dependent on Iraqi oil, which it continued to receive with U.S. acceptance. King Hussein only very reluctantly broke with his long-time friend, Saddam, when Washington agreed to welcome Jordan back as a close ally.