Barbara Walters chats with Forward Syria
Swaying between art and seduction
Discussing monetary policy with the man in charge
Where the earth screams in horror
12/02/2010 - Issue 46
The wisdom of looking east
by Sami Moubayed
When relations hit rock bottom between Syria on one front, and George W. Bush and Jacques Chirac on another, conventional wisdom said that the doors to the outside world do not stop at the gates of the White House and Élysée Palace.
The term “heading east” has been on the mind of Syria experts since 2005, when Bouthaina Shaaban, now presidential advisor on media affairs, penned an excellent article outlining this foreign policy approach. She wrote, “Perhaps the time has come to bring the Arabs, from a state of complete submission to the hostile west, towards the east and countries that share with us values, interests and orientation.” She then asked, “What did we get from the west, to which the Arabs affiliated themselves for the entire past century, except for occupation, hatred and war?” She made reference to the Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammad, one of the many champions of the east, who similarly “headed east” towards Japan, Korea and China when reforming his country between 1981 and 2003.
That policy has been maturing and cementing itself as the days go by. It actually started right after the Iraq war, when President Bashar al-Assad paid a visit to Malaysia in 2003, followed by China in 2004, and India in 2008. Trade with China, for example, stood at $2.2 billion; making an Association Agreement with the EU seem even less urgent for the Syrians. Earlier this year, the Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari came to Syria, followed by Russian President Dmitri Medvedev, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, and Indian President Pratibha Patil last November. President Assad has visited heavyweight countries in eastern Europe, Romania and Bulgaria, and is scheduled to visit Ukraine this December. The foreign policy title no longer became “heading east” - Syria was reaching out to potential friends, left and right, on all four corners of the globe. The highlight of this approach was a summer visit to Latin America where the Syrian president toured Caracas, Havana, Brasilia, and Buenos Aeries.
All of these countries are rising economies and world powers; with Brazil and India aiming for a seat on the UN Security Council. Additionally, unlike the US, they are willing to engage with Syria, with no preconditions. All of them are supportive of Syria’s right to restore the occupied Golan Heights and all share views on issues dear to Syria’s heart, vis-à-vis lifting the siege of Gaza or ending settlement expansion in the West Bank. A natural question would be: why haven’t the Arabs targeted friendships with these countries beforehand? Why did they wait for so long? Well, perhaps because of the region’s colonialist past; whenever the outside world is mentioned, the first things that comes to mind are the former colonizers themselves: France and Great Britain, or the superpower that replaced them, being the United States. There is an entire world out there that is different, more honest, more promising, and both willing and able to engage.
