Wednesday, December 8, 2010 • Muharram 2, 1432 A.H. • 2 Riyals • Vol. XXXV I• No. 7 • 28 Pages • www.arabnews.com
GCC backs Iran nuke talks
Forum seeks to find answers to women's employment hurdles Summit calls on Tehran to respond positively to big power peace efforts FATIMA SIDIYA & DIANA AL-JASSEM | ARAB NEWS
JEDDAH: Only 15 percent of the Kingdom’s employed manpower is female and there are several questions about women’s employment that need answers, said Princess Lolowah Al-Faisal at the first day of the Women in Leadership Forum at the Park Hyatt Jeddah hotel on Tuesday. Answers to questions such as why so few Saudi women are employed, what women can do to get employment and what sort of plans are required to effect change need to be found at the forum, said Princess Lolowah while delivering her opening speech at the two-day event. Speaking about the SR70 billion in women-owned disposable wealth lying untapped in banks, Princess Lolowah, who is vice chair and general supervisor of Effat University’s board of trustees, said “this question needs to be directed at businesswomen.” “Empowerment of women can only be achieved with the cooperation of the private and government sectors, and the Kingdom’s chambers of commerce,” she said. Speaking about employing women in the Kingdom’s industries,
Nadia Al-Dossary, chief executive officer of Al-Sale Eastern Co. Ltd., said many difficulties exist. “I employ women in segregated offices but I cannot employ women to work on the factory floor, because setting up separate sections for men and women on the factory floor is not possible,” she said. Al-Dossary added that her company is not a charity; it is profitoriented and not required to employ women. “We want to train women and employ them in the industrial sector. But we want the government sector to cooperate with us because there will be gender mixing. We have to understand that gender mixing in the workplace is not khulwa,” she said. Speaking about Minister of Labor Adel Fakieh’s eight-week plan to organize women employment, as announced last week at a two-day event organized by the Khadijah bint Khuwailid Businesswomen’s Center, Al-Dossary criticized the minister saying that despite repeated requests for a meeting during his last visit to the Eastern Province, he failed to show up. (Continued on Page 3)
ARAB NEWS
ABU DHABI: GCC leaders said Tuesday they were monitoring with “utmost concern” developments in Iran’s disputed nuclear program and asked Tehran not to meddle in their internal affairs. A final communiqué issued by the six leaders at the end of a twoday summit said they wanted the dispute over Iran’s nuclear program to be resolved through “peaceful means” and make the Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction. The leaders of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain, Oman, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates also urged Iran to “respond positively” to talks with world powers on its contentious nuclear program. The summit approved a 15-year comprehensive development strategy, a cultural development strategy and a project to link the six member countries with a railway system. It also allowed GCC companies to open their branches in member countries. “The council followed developments in the Iranian nuclear file with the utmost concern and stresses again the importance of commitment to the principles of interna-
UAE President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al-Nahyan listens to outgoing GCC Secretary-General Abdul Rahman Al-Attiyah at the closing session of the GCC summit in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday. (EPA)
tional legitimacy and the resolution of conflicts through peaceful means,” said the communiqué. The annual summit coincided with a new round of nuclear talks between Iran and world powers in Geneva. The West suspects Iran’s nuclear program is designed to produce nuclear weapons, a charge
Tehran denies, insisting its objective is to generate electricity. “It is important that Iran is committed to the basis of good neighborly relations, mutual respect and noninterference in internal affairs, resolving disputes peacefully and not resorting to force or making threats to use it,” said the communiqué.
The communiqué expressed the six leaders’ regret about what they said was Tehran’s lack of response to efforts to resolve a territorial dispute between Iran and the UAE over three strategically located Gulf islands. The GCC considers the islands “an integral part of the UAE.”
GCC states “welcome international efforts, including those made by the P5+1, to peacefully resolve Iran’s nuclear crisis and hope it will respond positively to these efforts,” said outgoing Secretary-General Abdul Rahman Al-Attiyah. Bahrain’s security chief Abdullatif bin Rashid Al-Zayani is the new GCC secretarygeneral. The summit stressed the “right of all countries in the region to develop civilian nuclear energy within the standards and under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).” These standards had to be applied to all countries in the Middle East, including Israel, the region’s sole nuclear weapons-possessing state. The summit threw its support behind the Palestinians’ refusal to negotiate with Israel without a settlement moratorium, stressing any freeze on construction should include East Jerusalem as well as the West Bank. (Continued on Page 5) 49
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