After the Sheikhs

by Davidson, Christopher

  First, as a natural extension of the domestic rentier state and their popular wealth distribution strategies, the Gulf monarchies have become increasingly keen to distribute some of their resources to less fortunate neighbours, mostly in the form of development aid, charity, or gifts to other Arab, Muslim, or nearby states. Second, efforts have been made by most Gulf monarchies to use their location and resources to position themselves as useful ‘active neutrals’—either by despatching peace-keeping missions or mediating regional disputes. This strategy has usually allowed them to avoid taking sides in nearby conflicts, while also consolidating a reputation of benevolence and peacefulness in less stable or potentially threatening states. Also it has helped deflect broader Arab public opinion away from their difficult-to-disguise dependency on Western military protection. Third, there have been long-running efforts to fund museums, universities, and other cultural projects and institutions in the Western powers—and increasingly their Eastern counterparts—in order to improve recognition and opinion of the Gulf monarchies, and thus help build up their ‘soft power’ base in these influential states. In some cases even development aid has been channelled into these countries for this purpose. As with the domestic survival strategies, there are again significant divergences in these sets of policies, depending on the individual circumstances of each Gulf monarchy. Nevertheless, a pattern is clearly evident, with at least some aspects of each strategy being visible in each monarchy.

  Development assistance and international charity

  Since the 1970s the wealthier Gulf monarchies—notably Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Kuwait—have been among the biggest donors of development aid to the poorer Arab states in the Middle East and North Africa. More recently they have been joined by gas-rich Qatar, and their aid programmes have now reached out much further, with countless donations to communities in East Africa, South Asia, South East Asia, and even Eastern Europe. Most of the aid has been carefully controlled by the Gulf monarchies’ respective ministries for foreign affairs or by well-established state-controlled institutions such as the Saudi Fund for Development (set up in 1974), the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development (which dates from 1971 under the name Abu Dhabi Fund for Arab Development),2 and the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development (established in 1961, making it the first foreign aid vehicle set up by a developing state). However, such official development assistance (ODA) is only part of the story, given the many individual ruling family members and other state-sponsored charities in the Gulf monarchies also involved in such activities. The UAE has probably gone the furthest in trying to organise its various efforts under one umbrella, by setting up an External Aid Liaison Bureau in 2008. This was partly a response to disbelief and criticism from various United Nations representatives following a potentially accurate claim from a UAE minister that 3.6 per cent of GDP was allocated to development aid.3 Unsurprisingly, given the various rulers’ described efforts to boost their personal legitimacy, many of the more tangible results of development assistance (such as hospitals, mosques, and schools) in recipient countries are named after the monarch in question.

  Overall, throughout the period 1976–2006 it was estimated that over 4.2 per cent of Saudi Arabia’s GDP or about $49 billion was devoted to development aid,4 while in the UAE, Kuwait, and Qatar it is thought that aid has often been over 3 per cent of GDP. Although this is still much less than the Gulf monarchies spend on military hardware—which is usually between 4 and 11 per cent of GDP5—the gap does seem to be narrowing as ODA becomes an increasingly central pillar of foreign policy for these states. It is important to appreciate that Gulf ODA as a percentage of GDP is often higher than in the West, including the United States. In the Arab world, Palestine has unsurprisingly been the oldest and most generously targeted ODA destination. Over the past decade Saudi Arabia has supplied the Palestinian Authority with nearly $500 million in aid, and in addition has channelled hundreds of millions of dollars to help Palestinian refugees through both the Arab League and the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. Today it is thought that Saudi Arabia alone provides Palestine with between $14 million and $17 million per month.6 Likewise, the UAE has supplied Palestine with considerable aid over the years and in the past decade it is thought that over $4 billion has been provided, including a $62 million residential complex built in 2004 and named after Abu Dhabi’s late ruler, Zayed bin Sultan Al-Nahyan, and the $70 million rebuilding of the Jenin Camp after its destruction in 2002.7 Crucially, despite Hamas’ surprise election victory in 2006, Gulf ODA to Palestine has not slowed. If anything, it has accelerated—perhaps best symbolised by the Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Mosque in Bethany, named after Abu Dhabi’s current ruler. At a cost of nearly $5 million, the mosque will have the tallest minarets in Palestine when complete.8 This response contrasts with other donors such as the US—which has been reviewing its aid programme given Hamas’ ostensible ties to terror organisations.9 As such, the Gulf monarchies’ role in Palestine’s development is now unparalleled.

  The Lebanon has been another major Gulf ODA destination, given its similar centrality and relevance to regional politics. After the resolution of the Lebanese civil war in 1990, the UAE injected between $500 and $700 million into the stricken country, and funding was provided for the Lebanese Army to purchase high-tech mine-clearing equipment.10 Following the 2006 conflict with Israel, the UAE Red Crescent Society provided Lebanon with a further $300 million as part of the Emirates Solidarity Project. Most of the money has been spent on rebuilding physical infrastructure damaged by Israeli bombing and constructing new hospitals and schools.11 Since then the UAE is believed to have pledged and delivered a further $300 million in aid to Lebanon.12 In 2006 and 2007 Saudi Arabia provided the Lebanese Central Bank with nearly $2.7 billion, including $500 million to be spent on reconstruction.13 Qatar has been equally keen to assist, having ploughed an estimated $250 million into rebuilding Bin Jbeil—the most badly damaged Lebanese town in the 2006 war. Much of this money was used to construct 12,000 new houses and repair 470 places of worship—including Sunni and Shia mosques and Christian churches.14

  Iraq has been a more problematic recipient of aid from the Gulf monarchies, mostly due to Kuwait’s insistence that the post-2003 Iraqi government eventually repays about $16 billion of loans—most of which were provided to Saddam Hussein’s government by Kuwaiti banks prior to Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990. Nevertheless, in its keenness to head off Iranian encroachment in Iraq, Saudi Arabia’s assistance has been very generous, ranging from reconstruction projects to the pledging of billions of dollars of export guarantees and the providing of massive soft loans. The UAE’s assistance to Iraq has perhaps been even greater, with several large donations having been made since 2005, including a gift of $215 million for the reconstruction effort,15 and the UAE Armed Forces’ supplying of helicopters and other equipment for the new Iraqi military.16 In summer 2008 the UAE announced that it would also scrap all of Iraq’s outstanding debts to the UAE—amounting to some $7 billion—so as to ‘help alleviate the economic burdens endured by the brotherly Iraqi people’.17

  Many East African countries have benefited from Gulf ODA: originally those with substantial Arab or Muslim populations, but more recently some others have begun to receive assistance. The UAE has been dispensing aid to Somalia since the early 1990s, and in 2008 began supplying medicines and foodstuffs to the Sudan.18 Saudi Arabia has followed a similar path, having allocated $10 million in aid to the Horn of Africa countries through the World Food Programme and with ruling family member Al-Waleed bin Talal Al-Saud having personally provided a further $1 million of aid, specifically to help Kenya. The latter gift prompted the World Food Programme’s Executive Director to claim ‘… it is exactly the kind of support that these desperate people deserve from both private donors and governments’.19 Qatar is also getting involved, having recently paid for the reconstruction of the Asmara International Stadium in Eritrea and the building of a new ‘Qatari-Eritrean Hall of Friendship’ as par
t of the complex.20 Although these sums and assistance packages are far smaller than those currently being channelled to the Arab states, it is likely that more Gulf ODA will be sent to East Africa as security in the region deteriorates and it remains open to pirates and terror groups that may target Gulf interests.

  For many years South Asian states—primarily India and Pakistan—have received generous aid from the Gulf monarchies, not least due to their shared economic histories and labour migration flows. But over the last decade the value of aid has dramatically increased, mainly as a response to the perceived threat of al-Qaeda and other Afghanistan and Pakistan-based organisations to the region’s security. After the 2005 earthquake in Kashmir, Saudi Arabia immediately donated $3 million to Pakistan and promised a further $570 million in follow-up assistance—the largest package provided by any donor state. A new organisation was set up—the Saudi Public Assistance for Pakistan Earthquake Victims—which set about constructing over 4,000 new houses at a cost of $17 million for some of the homeless Pakistanis.21 More recently, following the 2010 floods in Pakistan, Saudi Arabia has again been the primary donor to Pakistan’s relief efforts, supplying more than $360 million in aid and helping to build two new hospitals.22 Over the same period it is believed that Saudi Arabia provided Afghanistan with over $200 million in aid. Both Kuwait and the UAE pledged $100 million to Pakistan after the 2005 earthquake,23 and their collective aid efforts to Afghanistan also amount to several hundred million dollars. Since 9/11 the UAE Red Crescent Society has supplied over $40 million, with a further $30 million having been supplied by other Abu Dhabi-based groups.24 This has been used to construct a large hospital, six clinics, a public library, eleven schools and even a 6,000 student capacity Zayed University of Afghanistan. A Zayed City is also being built to house over 2000 displaced persons,25 again named after Abu Dhabi’s late ruler.

  Development aid has been channelled into other parts of Asia too, especially in countries with either a predominantly Muslim population or a labour supplying relationship with the Gulf monarchies. Although Gulf aid was slow to reach Indonesia and elsewhere in East Asia following the 2004 tsunami, with Saudi Arabia’s response being described as ‘shameful’ by Al-Jazeera and with Kuwait’s Al-Qabas newspaper urging its government ‘to give them more as we are rich’,26 the same mistake is unlikely to be made again. Qatar, for example, now has a new state-sponsored charity—Reach Out to Asia—specifically to provide aid and educational outreach to poorer parts of South East Asia. Chaired by one of the emir’s daughters, its significance has been described as ‘not being lost on Qatar’s large population of South East Asian migrant workers’.27 The UAE is being similarly proactive, with its aid programme now reaching as far as Mongolia. Commissioned by the new Mongolia-based Zayed bin Sultan Al-Nahyan Charitable and Humanitarian Foundation and supervised by a lesser member of the Abu Dhabi ruling family, a complex containing housing, schools, mosques, and healthcare facilities is being built at a cost of about $1 million. Significantly, the project has been described as being for ‘…the Mongolian Muslims living in Olgiy… situated in the extreme west of Mongolia and sharing borders with China and Russia’.28

  Surprising to many, Gulf ODA has also played a major role in Europe, or more specifically the development of Muslim communities in Eastern Europe. Most notable has been the substantial aid that has flowed into Kosovo and other parts of the Balkans since the conflicts of the late 1990s. The government-backed Saudi Joint Committee for the Relief of Kosovo spent $5 million funding housing projects and providing food and medical supplies; it also paid for the building of mosques and the setting up of ‘religious programmes’,29 while the Saudi Red Crescent Society despatched medical volunteers to the various refugee camps.30 The UAE has been equally if not more active in Kosovo, with its total aid programme now believed to have totalled some $30 million. The Muhammad bin Rashid Charitable and Humanitarian Establishment—named after the current ruler of Dubai—ploughed several million dollars into the Kosovo relief effort, and in 1999 the UAE’s terrestrial TV stations participated in a charity telethon. The event raised $15 million and then Muhammad doubled this sum, although not anonymously. The money was used to build over fifty new mosques in Kosovo in 2000.31 Upon visiting Dubai in 2009 to take part in a university graduation ceremony, former US Secretary of State Colin Powell referred to this and other Dubai development assistance in the presence of Muhammad by stating that the ‘emirate is now on a par with New York, London, and Paris’ and ‘praising the humanitarian and charitable campaigns launched by the wise leadership to help people around the world realise the concept of wealth-sharing and achieve social equality among peoples in various communities, especially the poor’.32

  Active neutrality: peacekeeping and mediation

  Closely connected to the dispensing of development assistance and international charity have been the increasingly extensive peace-keeping missions despatched by some Gulf monarchies to regional hotspots—often involving the same countries in receipt of ODA. Although there are some exceptions, in most cases the Gulf deployments have not seen frontline action and have usually been in a supporting role to forces from other states. Nevertheless their activities have often led to favourable regional and international headlines. As a small state with a small indigenous population, the UAE perhaps provides the best example of this strategy. Having tried to intervene in almost every regional dispute since the 1970s, its peace-keeping missions have helped it punch well above its weight in the Arab world. In 1977 UAE soldiers33 were deployed overseas for the first time, when a contingent was sent to join the Joint Arab Deterrent Force in the Lebanon.34 And in 1992 the UAE Armed Forces made its maiden intervention outside the Middle East by sending engineers and a peace-keeping force to assist US operations in Somalia.35 During the mid-1990s more UAE troops arrived in Somalia in addition to Rwanda and Mozambique.36 Significantly, in 1995 the UAE was the first Arab state to intervene in a modern European conflict when it airlifted wounded Muslims out of Bosnia. And by 1999 the UAE was again proactive in the Balkans, sending a force to help protect the embattled Kosovars37 in tandem with its development assistance efforts to the region.

  Probably the most important Gulf peace-keeping mission came to light in 2008, again involving the UAE. First revealed by the BBC, likely because the UAE authorities were initially cautious about publicising their anti-Taliban activities and explicit support for the US-led coalition, it was reported that about 250 UAE troops and a number of armoured cars had been deployed to Afghanistan since 2003 in order to maintain supply line security and deliver humanitarian aid. It was also reported by the BBC that the UAE contingent had had to fend off Taliban attacks, thus making it the only Arab force in Afghanistan that was actually engaging the enemy.38 The commanding officer had stated ‘if we have any types of personal attacks we react with fire. And after that we go to the elders in this area and say: “Why are you shooting us? We came here to help you.” And we try to convince the people about the US, about British. They came to give peace’.39

  More recently, the UAE’s state-backed media has reported extensively on the contingent’s activities, claiming UAE troops have been actively participating in the Afghan National Army’s ‘hearts and minds’ campaign in Helmand province. According to one British observer attached to the troops, the presence of such Muslim troops in Afghanistan has been drawing crowds, with many Afghans ‘willing to shake hands with these men from “Arabistan”… and with the Emiratis handing out copies of the Koran, notebooks, pens, and chocolate’. The observer went on to describe what he considered the UAE contingent’s ‘most effective weapon in the conflict in Afghanistan’—the offering of invitations from senior UAE soldiers to village elders to join them for midday prayers. He claimed this was ‘…a potent force at work—one the Taliban dared not challenge and one the [US-led] coalition cannot wield. The robust kindness offered by these Emirati troops is a simple but powerful weapon for change in Afghanistan’. The observer also connected th
e peace-keeping operation with the UAE’s development assistance to Afghanistan, explaining that close to the UAE’s base in the country ‘Afghan men can drive their families along a UAE-funded tarmac road, visit a UAE-built clinic where their women and children can receive treatment from Emirati female doctors, while a UAE-funded radio station offers news and music programming in Pashtun’.40

  Best reflecting the massive political benefits to the UAE’s ruling families of the mission in Afghanistan was the widely reported screening of a documentary film at the crown prince of Abu Dhabi’s majlis in August 2011. Attended by a vast number of UAE dignitaries, including most of the UAE’s rulers, crown princes, and ministers, there were also delegations present from other Gulf monarchies, including Bahrain’s minister for foreign affairs, along with about 400 other guests. Entitled ‘Mission: Winds of Goodness’, the documentary focused on ‘honouring the brave individuals fulfilling important duties on behalf of their country’ while also demonstrating ‘how the UAE forces must rely on their courage, training, and most importantly each other, in order to carry out this important work in the most hostile and challenging of circumstances’. Significantly, the press release published by the UAE’s official state news agency also described the ‘UAE’s policy to provide support to Afghanistan including healthcare and education projects, such as the construction of clinics and schools; and developing sufficient community infrastructure, such as mosques, roads, and schools’ before concluding that ‘…the UAE’s presence as part of an international coalition in Afghanistan has helped maintain security to ensure that humanitarian projects are not undermined by criminal forces that seek to disrupt the provision of aid’.41