Indian Council of World Affairs

Fazzur Rahman Siddiqui:  Very good afternoon. Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen. Before I proceed further, I would like to request to switch off your cell phone or put it on silent mode. His Excellency Ahmed Aboul Gheit, Secretary General, League of Arab States, respected Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad, and Ambassador Ngulkham Jathom Gangte, Acting Deputy Director General, Indian Council of World Affairs, distinguished member of Diplomatic Corps, academia, media, student, and dear friends. It's my pleasure to welcome you all to the first program being organized under ICWA Conversation Series. The title of today's conversation is “International Developments and its Impacts on the Arab Region”. His Excellency Ahmed Aboul Gheit, Secretary General, League of Arab States, will be in conversation with Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad, moderator of today's program, on the given theme. The order of the program will be as follows. We will begin with the welcome remarks by Ambassador Gangte, Acting Deputy Director General, Indian Council of World Affairs. The welcome remarks will be followed by conversation between His Excellency Ahmed Aboul Gheit and Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad. At the end of the conversation, we will have a brief discussion to be moderated by Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad. And we will conclude the program with a vote of thanks. With this, may I now invite Ambassador Ngulkham Jathom Gangte, Acting Deputy Director General, ICWA, to deliver his welcome remarks. Thank you.

Ngulkham Jathom Gangte:  Your Excellency Ahmed Aboul Gheit, Secretary General of the League of Arab States, Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad, distinguished members of the diplomatic corps, colleagues from MEA, members from academia, media, friends and students. I extend a hearty welcome to each one of you to the Indian Council of World Affairs. It is a particular privilege for us this afternoon to host His Excellency Ahmed Aboul Gheit, the Secretary General of the League of Arab States. We are grateful to him for joining us today and for consenting to engage in a conversation on a theme of profound contemporary relevance, international developments, and their impact on the Arab region. ICWA has over the decades served as a forum for thought-provoking and insightful dialogue on global affairs, and we have been fortunate to host leaders, policymakers, and thinkers from across the world. Today’s interaction fits squarely within that tradition, one that values informed conversation and reflective engagement. His Excellency brings to this discussion a rich combination of diplomatic experience and regional insight. A career diplomat, former Foreign Minister of Egypt, and now serving nearly a decade as Secretary General of the Arab League, he has led the organization through a period of exceptional turbulence. His tenure has coincided with civil conflicts, political fragmentation, and continuing regional crises that have tested institutions and norms, both regional and global.

We are equally fortunate to have Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad moderating today's conversation. Few diplomats bring to the table such deep professional engagement with the Arab world combined with a scholar's eye and a public intellectual's clarity. His familiarity with the region and its complexities will greatly enrich this exchange. We meet at a time when the international system itself appears unsettled. Established assumptions about order, institutions, and global governance are under strain. Conflicts today are no longer confined to battlefields alone, extending to economic domains, diplomatic spaces, and the realm of ideas. For regions such as the Arab world, deeply interconnected with global political and economic currents, these shifts have direct and far-reaching consequences. It is against this backdrop that today's conversation becomes especially timely, rather than seeking definitive answers, we hope to explore perspectives, understanding linkages and reflect on how regional and global developments shape and are being shaped by one another. I look forward to benefiting from the wisdom and experience that Your Excellency brings to this August gathering, drawn from decades of service and engagement with the developments in the region. I am confident that this conversation will offer valuable insights to all of us present. Once again, Your Excellency, we are delighted to welcome you to ICWA and thank you for joining us this afternoon. Thank you.

Fazzur Rahman Siddiqui:  Thank you sir. Now we would like to invite Mr. Talmiz Ahmad to moderate the conversation with His Excellency Ahmed Aboul Gheit and conduct the proceedings.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Your Excellency, it is a great honour for us to welcome you to this birthplace of Indian foreign policy thinking. This is our first foreign affairs think tank. This very room used to be visited by our first Prime Minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, who would sit here and talk to other scholars relating to foreign affairs. It is a very historic building. It has also, in its auditorium, welcomed numerous dignitaries who have spoken to the Indian people from the stage here. Your Excellency, we are meeting at this point at a period that is particularly difficult for the Arab world. The region seems to be suffused in conflict, confrontations and conflict. We have ongoing issues in Gaza and in West Asia in general, conflict in Sudan, in Libya, in Yemen. Your Excellency, at this period of despondency, do you see any silver lining for the region? Something that will be more positive for us to look forward to?

Ahmed Aboul Gheit: First of all, I wish to thank you very much for receiving this invitation to speak in the Council. I read about the council and I was really impressed and I know Indian foreign policy and Indian foreign policy establishment is known to be very knowledgeable, very deep, to the point that I was telling one of my assistants yesterday, actually my speech writer, I was telling him, if you want great books and good books and at the same time not very expensive, go to the bookstore in Delhi. How long am I supposed to stay with you today? One hour only? Starting from now. So now is five. Five minutes to five.

Talmiz Ahmad: So you take your time, sir.

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  So we'll end by six? By six.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Sir, there is some flexibility.

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  Very well, very well. The starting point is you are in a bazaar in the Middle East and you are negotiating how long. Now, in answer to your question, I have to admit that the region for an extended period of time was subject to conflicts and pressures from within and from outside, but from outside more than from within. That started or actually emanated with the colonial period. The colonial period started, came to be around, let's say, 1830 with the occupation of Algeria by France, and it went along the British and the French. We reached that point of the Second World War when the region sided with the allies and countries won their independence, or at least in Mashreq. The Arab world is divided into three or four areas, mainly Mashreq, Maghreb, North Africa, Mashreq, Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, the Nile Valley, Egypt, and Sudan, and add to them, of course, the Jazira and Gulf. So countries came to be independent, and with the gaining of independence comes the problem of Palestine. And as the Palestinian problem erupted in 1948, but it was a longstanding problem, started a century earlier. The problems of the region really started to play its role in creating havoc in that region.

However, Arab countries managed to play the game and to conduct foreign policy and to conduct themselves in a manner that allowed them to proceed economically, socially, in development, as well as to rise politically. Up to 2011, where the disaster struck, you might be hearing an opinion that is different than possibly what you have been told in many Western quarters. The disaster was the eruption of troubles that created havoc in many, many Arab countries. That came to be in relation to two influences or two factors. The first factor was the external intervention. It was clearly and obviously the interest of certain great powers not to allow that region to develop the way it was developing, and intervened to facilitate a change. Then comes the internal contradictions within the states themselves. So countries like what you named, Libya, Yemen, Sudan, Syria, Egypt, Tunisia and others too were subject to such.  The only region that was saved in my opinion was Gulf. The six Gulf countries were saved due, I have to admit, for two reasons also. The wisdom of the ruling governors and kings and emirs, they were very wise, conducting a policy that lasted for three-four decades, in raising the standards of living of the people and the awareness of the people. Also the great wealth that was used to develop the societies. So Gulf was saved. But the rest were subject to interventions and to difficulties that destroyed states, that led to failed states as we see them today. So you ask the question, a clear-cut question, do I see any prospects for improvement in the remaining states? Because I see two categories that were subject to the changes in 2011. A country like Tunisia managed quickly to balance and to stabilize its situation. A country like Egypt with the very recognized and appreciated intervention of the Egyptian army due to the pressures of the population itself. And I was there in Egypt and I saw and witnessed how the Egyptians were urging the army to intervene to get rid of Muslim brothers. So these were saved. Bahrain was saved by the intervention of GCC countries because Bahrain was subject also to interventions at the time. We have the Arab League, an ambassador from Bahrain who represents us. And you work for us, not for anybody else. So these countries were saved. So I see good prospects for them.

There were at the time also some attempts in Morocco, some attempts in Algeria, and they were nipped in the bud. But the rest were in difficulty, maybe because of lack of resources, maybe because of the nature of the intervention, maybe because of the composition of society itself. And sadly, I have to report to you that I am, in a way, pessimistic for the prospects of improvements in the near future. I see an ugly situation still in every country you named today. So this is my answer to you. If you want me to enlarge more, I am ready. But the intervention came, the foreign intervention came from two directions, and we have to admit, great powers, mainly Western powers, who claim to have certain values for their societies that they want to convey to the region. Values, in all honesty, that are embraced by us, applied by us, and proven to be just a pretext for them to intervene. And I have also to claim that the values were not applied to the Palestinians. When the killing continued, and the West, very late in the situation, finding itself under pressure, they had to admit that something is wrong being done in Palestine.

That was one direction. The other direction is the regional powers, the regional players…foreign regional players, not Arab. Arab countries didn't intervene against each other. It was the foreign border players. I have also to add a third factor, maybe, though it didn't play continuously all the time, was the invasion of Iraq, because it actually started by the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Then, in 2011, it started. This is the situation as I see it. Do you have some? Oh, here it is.

Talmiz Ahmad: Your Excellency, in your career as an Egyptian diplomat, you have straddled a large part of recent Egyptian history, starting in 1965, you have served successively Presidents Nasser, Anwar Sadat, and President Hosni Mubarak. And then, of course, now we have President Sisi. Sir, you have been personally…you have handled, in a large part of your career, issues relating to Palestine and pertaining to the peace process which involves Israel. We have watched with horror the extraordinary propensity to violence on the part of Israel. At no stage, except for a very short period during the Oslo Accord, which was abruptly ended with the assassination of Rabin, no Israeli leader has shown any serious attempt to address the issue of Palestine and to take seriously Palestinian aspirations. Most recently, for over the last two years, we have seen the capacity for unrestrained violence on the part of Israel. And now we have the U.S. President, who has intervened in this complex matter, and outside the United Nations, has set up a Board of Peace. Is it possible to take this Board seriously, given that A) it comes from President Trump, whose record with regard to Gaza and Palestine in general is not the most laudatory, and B) it involves Prime Minister Netanyahu, who has just told us a few days ago, there will never be a Palestinian state, and Israel will control the entire land from the Jordan to the sea. Tell me, sir, and tell us, all of us, who are deeply concerned about the fate of the Palestinians, do you think this peace initiative from the American President has any future, and that we should take it seriously?

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  You see, Ambassador Talmiz Ahmed, you are invoking an issue and a discussion that might last the whole evening beyond 6 o'clock. However, I will try as much to be brief, pinpointing the problem. As you said, over the last two years, there has been killing and destruction conducted by the most rightist government in the history of Israel. But sadly, I have to admit, that the important components who should have defended the rule of law and the United Nations, and everything valuable that we adhere to and we look for, was absent. Namely, the Biden administration. And again, I have to remind you, we have had a president in Washington who admitted that he was the Zionist himself. He was supporting directly Israel. And four times, there has been calls in the Security Council and draft resolution presented to the Security Council calling for a ceasefire in Palestine. And the American administration at the time vetoed them all, four times. Then we have also the Europeans who said put for at least a year to a year and a half before moving and saying enough is enough. Now the situation has changed, the advent of the Trump administration and the call for a ceasefire for the first time on the part of America. This should not be forgotten. It was the Americans who supported the idea of a ceasefire. So immediately Arab countries agreed because it is stopping the killing-- the horrendous killing that was taking place in Palestine. They were killing the way we all drink water, the Israelis. That is one aspect of the story. The second aspect is that the Palestinian problem has been there for a hundred years. I personally participated in so many negotiations and so many rounds of discussions with the Israelis, with the Europeans, with the Americans, with everyone seeking. I was a member of the Egyptian delegation to Camp David negotiations and the accords in 1978. So it is a longstanding problem that lasted for 80 years since the establishment of the state of Israel, but actually it was prior a hundred years to that. So again to see an administration ready to commit itself and its name and its weight for finding and leading a way out of this quagmire, we have to support and we have to say, okay, we give you the chance to do so. So, that is the logic of Arab countries going to Sharm El Sheikh. That is the logic of Arab countries going to the United Nations Security Council to adopt 2803, which is the resolution that supported and welcomed the world of peace. Comes now the idea of the world of peace. And when I read it for the first time, I felt that the American president himself in person was committing himself to lead a council board to supervise a settlement. Welcome. Of course, between someone who was saying, I am the strongest advisor and supporter to Israel, I am a Zionist, Biden, to a president, whatever your opinion about his policies anywhere, I am for peace and for the ending of the killing and ending the conflict and allowing the Palestinians to achieve their aspirations. It doesn't say a state. So, I support him. We support… we have to support… the logic compels us if we are logical. We have to try him, especially when he says and there will be an executive committee composed of Palestinians to implement whatever policies. There are, no doubt, snags, such as no participation of the Palestinian Authority. But the Palestinian Authority is crucial, and it has to be allowed to play its role in the West Bank as well as in Gaza. Why is it so? Because it is one people. They are not two people. One half of the population of Gaza came from the West Bank in 1940s and ’50s and ’60s and ’70s. One million and a half emigrated, moved from West Bank to Gaza. So they are same people, the Palestinians. The Word of Peace, again, receives a direction from the Security Council to supervise the settlement and the ability to rebuild Gaza. Okay, that is very well considered. The development after that makes one always put the question you put it.

A third category or a third kind of board was added, composed mainly of American officials and others to supervise the council, the Arab executive, the Palestinian, as well as to supervise the rebuilding of Gaza. And there, one has to ask how it will proceed, and what kind of relationship with the United Nations, and are we witnessing the enlargement of the Board of Peace Authority, and Prerogatives to handle solely on its own the situation in Gaza, or there are limits, and there are constraints on them? These are questions that one reflects on, and only time will tell how. The general idea was positive. How the implementation will proceed remains to be seen. Comes the Israeli position. How many times Churchill in 1943 and ‘44, in the midst of the war, and he rejects the independence of India, and he rejects to receive Gandhi, or to allow Gandhi even to talk to him? How many times? How many times the British rejected withdrawal from Egypt? So an occupying power will never tell you, yes sir, you are permitted to do, and we will accept your demands. Let him do whatever he wishes to do. What we should urge is the unity of the Palestinians, because the sad thing is that he is benefiting, taking advantage of the division amongst the Palestinians. And actually, and in all honesty, he was the one, he and the country, Israel, and the intelligence services of Israel created Hamas, allowing the division to take place. These are facts that should be known. So with the division, the Palestinians have been weakened and we have Fatah and Hamas. So what we should do is to allow them both, not to allow them, to pressure them both to unite. Again, I make reference to the divisions of the populations of the region. The region witnessed a phenomena of conflict, deep differences between an Islamist trend, a trend that thinks that salvation comes through applying everything Islamic that was practiced in the 7th century A.D., and a secular trend with a secular approach to life and secular approach to government. That was obvious up to maybe the late 70s. So these two trends, the Islamist and the secular, allowed Hamas and Fatah to emerge, to get in conflict, and to destroy the prospects of the Palestinians allowing the Israelis to overrule them both. So my appeal is always unite your action, you Palestinians.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Your Excellency, shall we now go beyond West Asia and take a look at the state of our world? It's an obvious truism that there is a churn in world affairs. And the churn is overwhelmingly conflictual again. You have the ongoing war in Ukraine, the American forces are being massed in the Gulf to carry out an assault upon Iran, a very major armada, as the peace-loving President of the United States has just proclaimed, and then you have major confrontations between the Americans and the Chinese in the West Pacific. It appears as if the West that had put together a series of institutions to create what they laughingly called the world order, a liberal world order, is being broken down by themselves. That means the so-called world order that they put in place, which in terms of our own experience was Western hegemony, is being now challenged by them and possibly will break down on the basis that it has outlived its all utility, and that a series of other nations, referred to loosely as middle powers, are now emerging. Your Excellency, could you share with us your perspectives, A) with regard to the breakdown of this hegemonic world order that the West had put in place, and what are the prospects of this multipolar order that we have been reading about for so long?

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  That is a very complex question that calls for a long answer. A long answer that can be summed up in few words. Ambassador Talmiz, in all honesty, I don't know. And you tell me, you have been working and reading for the last seventy years about international affairs and you claim to have done so and so and you don't know, then I answer you by telling you the following. First, the situation as I see it is very fluid. Fluid due to the fact that there is no one trend that you can say, now I can claim that I understand what is happening. There is a zigzag all the time in every problem, in every aspect of anything that is raised. But to try to analyze every situation in separate, again I would tell you the following. It started by the implosion of the Soviet Union in December 1991, January 1992. When the Soviet Union disappeared, there was the unipolar hegemon, the United States, thinking that she will last for eternity on its own, dominating the world. It didn't last beyond 25 years. And everyone who read history knew that that unipolar hegemon will not last forever. On the contrary, they always end by decline. So the decline is coming. The important thing is for you to study the elements and the factors that affect decline in order to seize them, to arrest them, to stop them. The Romans and the Roman Empire didn't see it coming. The British, even the British with all their knowledge and their experience and their universities and their studies and at least someone like Arnold Toynbee didn't see the decline and it declined and disappeared. The empire. So the decline of the empire with the Americans, of course the word empire with them makes them sensitive, itchy. They reject the word an American empire but it is a fact of life. They know that the decline comes through certain elements. So as the decline takes dominance, other powers appears. And with the urge of China and the resurgence of the so-called new Soviet Union, Russian Federation. The re-emergence of the Russian Federation, we can see the attempt of the empire, the US Republic trying to seize, to arrest the situation. This is my reading of the situation. What we see today is an attempt to ensure the dominance of the dollar as the currency that stabilizes the international economy. Bretton Woods, the UN, there is no way, Ambassador, there is no way, for a new order to emerge without war. And I take you through history. The Second World War ends by the United Nations. The First World War ends by the League of Nations. The Napoleonic Wars end by the Concert of Europe and the Vienna meetings. Even the Peloponnese War ends by a new international order ruled by Alexander and his father. So the international order will not change. What will change is the international situation or scene. And I make a difference between the two, the international order and the international situation. The emergence or re-emergence of China. The emergence and re-emergence of India. Thank God that both of you are emerging again. Because you were yourself important players and power in the 17th century and the 18th century till the British intervened and the Europeans intervened in China.

So this is the way I see it. I claim that I saw a second Cold War emanating glimpses since possibly five years, six years. I claim that we are in the midst of a Cold War and that the West is claiming or trying to abort the potential of China through all the measures that we see. The West suffered a stumble with the claim of Greenland. The West suffered a stumble with the division around the Ukraine, I see Russia emerging through paying a very costly price, but regaining its status again, or it will, in my opinion, end by the ending of the Ukraine war and the re-emergence of Russia again. The whole Ukraine war is due to two factors, the desire of the West to extend further and the desire of Russia not to defend itself, but to regain the superpower status. So this is my characterization of the situation. How is it affecting the rest? It is deeply affecting the rest. You can detect it in the BRICS, you can detect it in Palestine, you can detect it everywhere. People are finding themselves not able to make a permanent policy or to adopt and embrace a permanent position because everything is in fluidity. How long it will last? The Cold War will last, I don't know when, up until when. You might tell me an answer to this characterization. How do you claim that there is a Cold War while the American president is going to China in April, or that the Russian president visited Anchorage and the American president promised him that he will repay this by going to Moscow and I tell you the lesson of Brezhnev, and the lesson of Nixon, and Russia, and China, and America. In the midst of a Cold War, they were maintaining peace because without doing this, nuclear weapons would have been activated. So the principles are there, but how long it will last, I don't know. Russia is building its potential. There is no way to defeat Russia in Ukraine. You can defeat Russia in Mozambique. You can defeat Russia in wherever, but not across the borders. You defeated Russia in Afghanistan because it was 11,000 miles away from Moscow. So this is the situation, very difficult situation, and it compels one to keep thinking deep about whatever consequence of whatever that is happening. The Americans are seeking to draw Russia away from China, and many studies were written and published about Nixon reversed, about luring Russia to join. Russia wanted to join even NATO, in ’93-‘94, with the emergence of Putin and the offer of some American, some French politicians. That is no more. There is deep skepticism that the Russians will play the same game of Nixon-Kissinger. The Russians and the Chinese are together in one space, the Euro-Asian space. The Euro-Asian space is central to their thinking.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Your Excellency, you are now in India, you have brought with you foreign ministers of several Arab countries. This is a major Indian encounter with the Arab world.

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  I accompanied them. Do not claim that I brought them because else I will lose my standing with them.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Sir, your seniority and stature is such that I can use these remarks. But anyway, we are now poised for a very major encounter with the Arab world at the minister level. This follows an earlier discussion that our external affairs minister had with the GCC foreign ministers in October 2024. The signal that is coming from New Delhi is that we take the Arab world seriously, that we are anxious to build substantial ties with the Arab world and that we are watching the situation in West Asia very carefully and possibly we would like to see peace and stability there so that we can progress our ties in the areas that really matter to both sides. What do you think, sir, are the prospects for India's ties with the Arab world given that we are building on very substantial ties earlier and now are looking at new opportunities in this period of churn, confusion, discord and confrontation?

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  The India-Arab relations are very, very old and deep. The exchanges, whether culture, scientific, language is very old. It's enough to visit Gulf to see how many Indians are working and helping in the building of Gulf. I make reference to Egypt, Syria, Iraq during the ’50s and the ’60s. I make reference to the names of Nehru and Indira Gandhi in Arab streets and naming Arab streets and Arab capitals. So it is a longstanding practice and tradition for both countries, both India-Arab cultures, to easily engage and easily connect. In fact, maybe the last 10 years, the development was slower than the previous periods. But I understand that there is a recognition in Delhi and a recognition in Arab capitals today that we need to regenerate interest in the relationship. The Arabs understand the potential of India. You are Indians, so you do not recognize the way others, especially the Arab region, looks at you. We look with great admiration to your achievements. And we want to benefit from them and to benefit through exchanges, trade, culture, and allowing ourselves the potential to work together. So we are open to everything. I have had today a session with the Indian foreign minister. We agreed exactly on these lines. We will be seeing Prime Minister Modi tomorrow as Arab ministers and myself and I am optimistic for the future.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Thank you, sir. Sir, with your permission, I'll ask for at least two questions within the time we have. Two questions. What I would like is a very crisp question to the point and focus, no comment and no personal views involved here. Two questions.

Sanjay:  Sir, good evening.

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  Good evening. How are you?

Sanjay:  Fine, sir. This is Sanjay from Arab News. My question is about this, the conflict that's now happening between Saudi Arabia and UAE.

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  I will not react. I tell you why I will not react. I tell you, but just allow me to explain to you. Ask the question I will not answer. Whatever the question, the answer is simple or no, for one simple reason. My job as the Secretary General of the League of Arab States, I do not intervene in internal positions or positions on my constituency. They are member states. I have an opinion, no doubt, but whether I will explain my opinion openly, forget it. Forget it for one simple reason. You might get a piece of news. I might get in trouble.

Unidentified Speaker:  Excellency, thank you very much for elaborating. I'm being very honest with you. Thank you very much for giving us a brief about the situation and how you see it. Now the topic is international development and its impact on Arab region. Now what we see is that an armada has arrived in the region and its impact on the region, in case there is an aggression on Iran, how do you see that the Arabs would react or Arabs should react and what would be its impact on the region?

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  The Gulf expressed itself well in advance always. They do not want intervention and they want stability to be pursued and to settle problems through discussions and negotiations. That was established from every capital in Gulf. And if you read Arab press and media everywhere, you find it the same. What I want to make reference to is that the presence of the American fleet in Gulf or Bahr al-Arab or Red Sea or Mediterranean is not a new development or phenomena. It has been there since 1945. The Americans established the headquarters of the Fifth Fleet in Gulf in 1945. So it isn't a new phenomena.  What is new is the politics and the policies of the United States with the current administration as it practices its geopolitical approach to whole thing. This is a longstanding confrontation started with the toppling of the Shah in 1979-’80. It is 46 years old. It's not a new phenomena. It serves the Americans well to signal that their fleet is approaching. The fleet has been always there. They maintained always one to two aircraft carriers in Indian and Bahr al-Arab, more or less. They maintained always one aircraft carrier in the Eastern Mediterranean, always, since they have the Sixth Fleet in the Mediterranean. So I'm not taken by declarations or announcements. Yes, they want to settle an Iranian problem from their point of view, thinking that Iran is building a nuclear potential.

I tell you a story about Iraq and America in 2003, 2002, 2001. The Iraqis intervened against the Israelis in ’91, ’92, and earlier. They bombed Israeli cities. They had to pay from an Israeli-American point of view. So they paid the price in 2003, 2004. And the ruling government in Iraq at the time, Saddam Hussein and his people were not having or trying to have a nuclear capability. They didn't have it. And they were not after it. They didn't declare that they were not having it. They didn't open up. So my advice is, do not give your enemy a pretext to strike at you. My advice is, come to the open and tell everything as it is. Or else, there will be repercussions, too. That is a practical approach. If it is a revolutionary approach, okay, it will affect us all negatively. Sadly, I feel for the people of Iran. And I feel for any suffering. And I reject it. It shouldn't be so. There has to be an international effort. There has to be an attempt to nip it in the bud and to stop it. Because the repercussions will affect everyone from China, to Russia, to the region, to Europe. Everybody will pay a price if there will be a strike against Iran, no doubt about it.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Would any lady like to ask a question?

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  One question and finish because I have another session at 7 o'clock today. And the traffic in Delhi, I discovered it is extremely difficult. I had an appointment with the foreign minister today and it took me 40 minutes and I was told it is only 15 to 20 minutes.

Aditi Thakur:  Good evening, Your Excellency. I'm Aditi Thakur from National Maritime Foundation. My first question is, what is the League's self-image? Is it a platform, a mediator, a norm-setter or it's just merely a diplomatic forum? Second question is regarding the...

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  No, no, one question.

Aditi Thakur:  Sir, what does the league, the Arab League think of itself, its self-image?

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  I tell you, and I tell you to facilitate everything for you. When the Arab League was established in ’45 prior to the UN, the planners at the time and the drafters of the charter at the time imagined a super body on top of the members, something similar to Brussels today. Some members objected to that idea and said the maximum we accept is that the Arab League should be a coordinating body. Coordinates foreign policy, coordinates internal economic policy, social policy and everything else in the field of human activity. So, if you take the United Nations, study it well, the structure and how it is functioning, you would exactly see an Arab League, but a mini Arab League only for the Arab region, doing everything exactly like the United Nations internationally, everything, even how to organize custom activities in Arab ports, rules and regulations are applied everywhere, or at least written, agreed upon. The Arab League is not only a political body, and that is important, very important, because if it is only a political organization, then often people will say, no need for it. But it is also focused on economic, on cultural, on social, trade, cooperation with countries. Today I am at 7 o'clock addressing the Arab-Indian Trade Chamber of Commerce. That is an action of the Arab League, mainly an action of the Arab League. It's a huge organization, but appears to be a mini-organization, actually it is huge, limited to the 22 states. It is 10 minutes past 6. Thank you very much.

Talmiz Ahmad:  Thank you very much, sir. Thank you for your candor and for explaining matters that were unknown to us. We have benefited a lot from your intervention. Thank you, sir.

Fazzur Rahman Siddiqui:  On behalf of Indian Council of World Affairs, it's my pleasure to deliver the vote of thanks. I would like to express my sincere gratitude to His Excellency, Ahmed Aboul Gheit, Secretary-General of the League of Arab States, for giving his insight.

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  I really wonder how you pronounce Gheit, because everywhere in the world they say Ahmed Aboul Gheit. Only in the Arab world we say Aboul Gheit, so you managed to...

Fazzur Rahman Siddiqui:  I'm thankful to His Excellency for giving his insight on the regional and global politics. I'm sure our audience has benefited immensely from his views on the subject. On the occasion, I would also like to thank Ambassador Talmiz Ahmad for moderating the session organized in the ICWA Conversation Series. We also express our thanks to esteemed members of the audience for their presence today. With this, we conclude the program. Now you're invited to join us for high tea at the foyer.

Ahmed Aboul Gheit:  Thank you very much.

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