Saudi Arabia’s king appoints women to advisory council for 1st time
Bloomberg News: King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia has appointed female members to the Consultative Council for the first time, naming 30 women to the 150-member advisory body.
The appointments, reported by the official Saudi Press Agency, came after Abdullah issued a decree requiring at least 20 percent of members should be women. It says they must observe Islamic law and be properly covered, and will enjoy full rights in the council, have a separate entrance to the chamber and sit in a special section apart from men.Photo: King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud of Saudi Arabia (Hassan Ammar / AP, file)
This is a huge step for that region. Curious to see where things go from here.
Crown Prince Nayef, the hard-line interior minister who spearheaded Saudi Arabia’s fierce crackdown crushing al-Qaida’s branch in the country after the 9/11 attacks in the United States and then rose to become next in line to the throne, has died. He was in his late 70s.
Nayef’s death unexpectedly reopens the question of succession in this crucial U.S. ally and oil powerhouse for the second time in less than a year. The 88-year-old King Abdullah has now outlived two designated successors, despite ailments of his own. Now a new crown prince must be chosen from among his brothers and half-brothers, all the sons of Saudi Arabia’s founder, Abdul-Aziz.
The figure believed most likely to be tapped as the new heir is Prince Salman, the current defense minister who previously served for decades in the powerful post of governor of Riyadh, the capital. The crown prince will be chosen by the Allegiance Council, an assembly of Abdul-Aziz’s sons and some of his grandchildren.
Big news of the morning.
(Source: joshsternberg)
An “expiration date”: Here’s a look at an interview recently conducted with Jordan’s King Abdullah, who speaks in understandably pessimistic terms about the nature of the Bashar al-Assad government in Syria. While predicting that the use of violence against his own citizens meant that Assad could not maintain power unchallenged, he also expressed concern as to who would lead Syria afterwards — a member of the same regime doing little good. This comes at a time of great violence in Syria; just yesterday between fifty and seventy-one people were killed. source
Between this and getting kicked out of the Arab League, Syria’s leadership is officially on the ropes.
When neighbors with borders turn against your leadership, that’s a major sign that you’ve lost your backing and need to go.
Any sane Arab, Muslim or anyone else knows that this has nothing to do with religion, or ethics or morals; spilling the blood of the innocent for any reasons or pretext leads to no path to…hope.Saudi King Abdullah • Denouncing the Syrian government’s violent crackdown on anti-government protests. Abdullah’s denunciation is politically significant, given his significance in the Arab world, and it comes on the heels of a similar condemnation from the Arab League. However, it’s worth noting that last March, Abdullah provided military support to the Bahrainian government to help it suppress on its own anti-government protests, so for him to now suddenly condemn counter-revolutionary government crackdowns seems just a tad insincere. source (via • follow)
» For the first time, the Arab League has condemned the al-Assad regime’s violent assaults on the protesters, and Saudi Arabia has withdrawn its ambassador to Syria. Saudi King Abdullah strongly denounced the violence, calling for “an end to the death machine and bloodshed.”
I wouldn’t see it as a sign of liberalisation. With his previous premiership, he talked the talk of reform but little actually happened.London’s City University Professor of Middle East policy studies Rosemary Hollis • Revealing about Jordan what’s probably obvious from the fact that a previous prime minister (Marouf Bakhit) was appointed to replace the current one (Samir Rifai): It’s likely an act and probably won’t have any real effect on the leadership of the country. “He’s someone who would be seen as a safe pair of hands,” she noted. To be clear, that’s a safe pair of hands for King Abdullah. source (via • follow)
Jordan’s new Prime Minister, Maruf Bakhit, an old hat at this job: Meet Jordan’s new Prime Minister, Maruf Bakhit. Look familiar? He should. He was Prime Minister from 2005 to 2007. Talk about change you can believe in. source
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Tumblr this morning. [h/t anne]
#@#$%!.tumblr.com
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I said ‘Hello, minister.’ He just turned away.Secretary of State Hillary Clinton • On the icy reception she received from Iran’s foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki, at a nuclear conference in Bahrain. He wouldn’t even look at her. Icy! Mottaki denies that he was rude to her and claims that he was trying to say hello to King Abdullah of Jordan. Next time they run into one another, they should give each other a big hug to emphasize the lack of hard feelings. source (via • follow)
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