Widening of US attacks worries Arab leaders

By RAWHI ABEIDOH and RUPERT CORNWALL

Islamic nations meeting in Qatar are worried that US-led military strikes against Afghanistan could extend to other Muslim countries.

The Organisation of the Islamic Conference (OIC), representing the world's 1.2 billion Muslims, is unlikely to condemn the offensive against Afghanistan's ruling Taleban.

But Arab ministers who met on the eve of the OIC emergency talks voiced fears that some Muslim countries might be the next targets after US President George W. Bush said his campaign against terrorism would not end in Afghanistan.

Arab League Secretary-General Amr Moussa said: "It is not possible that we become part of any coalition against an Arab country."

The unease across the Muslim world after three days of bombing is also being duplicated in Washington, where the Administration is worried about holding together the Arab and Islamic elements of its coalition against Osama bin Laden and his terrorist followers.

The official message is upbeat, with Bush aides giving assurances that whatever the deafening public silences from some friendly Arab governments about the air strikes, the coalition was intact and "in good shape".

But concern about the protests welling up on the streets in Pakistan and Indonesia is one factor pointing to an early end to the initial "softening-up" bombing campaign, and a shift to more precise, less visible ground operations with a lower level of air support.

Diplomats say that this also makes less likely, in the short term at least, a substantial US attack on Iraq, despite the frequently voiced allegation that Baghdad's intelligence services may have been linked to the attacks.

For now, the cautious views of the Secretary of State, Colin Powell, are prevailing.

The focus should be on Osama bin Laden and his followers and protectors in Afghanistan, he says.

Algerian Foreign Affairs Minister Abdelaziz Belkhadem said many Muslims were concerned the war against terror could be widened.

"Islam is not synonymous with terrorism, and if a [terror] act is perpetrated by some Muslims it is not linked to Islam.

"Is it within our right to say that what is being perpetrated in Britain and Ireland is linked to Christians?"

The 56-member OIC was not concerned about the fate of the Taleban, whose extremist ideology has won it little sympathy among Islamic governments.

Ordinary Muslims and Arabs have reacted sharply to the attacks on Afghanistan, but their governments have remained largely silent after years of criticising the Taleban for hosting militants.

Only Syria, Iraq and Iran have publicly criticised the strikes.

Hussein Amin, a Middle East analyst based in Cairo, said: "Most Arab and Muslim nations silently approve of the US strikes but they cannot confront their people with this support without risking their legitimacy.

"On the one hand, they see the Taleban as an embarrassment to the faith and they also do not want to jeopardise US aid or support.

"But on the other hand, they have to deal with rising anti-US sentiment."

- REUTERS,

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