Riyadh, March 27 (NNN-KUNA) Arab leaders or their representatives start flocking into the Saudi capital, Riyadh, Tuesday to participate in the 19th Arab summit, due here in the next two days.
Kuwait will be represented by His Highness the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, who is expected in the Saudi capital on Tuesday afternoon.
A large number of Arab leaders are expected to attend the summit, with a shadowy picture on who will be missing the high-level meeting. Saudi foreign minister Prince Saud Al-Faisal had anticipated some absences with news reports confirming Libya is missing the summit.
The leaders will be discussing a host of political and economic issues like the Arab-Israeli conflict and the situations in Iraq and Lebanon, in addition to a paper presented by Kuwait and Egypt to hold an economic summit, the completion of measures to establish the free trade zone and approving a timetable to launch the custom union.
The leaders will be re-emphasizing the Arab peace initiative as a tool to solve the Arab-Israeli conflict through offering normalization of relations with Israel in return for freedom of all Arab lands occupied by the Jewish state in 1967.
Press reports showed that among Arab leaders taking part in the summit would be the Presidents of Egypt Hosni Mubarak, Emile Lahoud (Lebanon), Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al-Nuhayyan (UAE), Omar Al-Bashir (Sudan), and Palestinain President Mahmoud Abbas. This is in addition to Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and Syrian Bashar Al-Assad.
Also attending are Presidents of the Comoros Ahmad Abdullah Sambi, Mauritanian President Ely Ould Mohamed Vall, King Mohammad VI of Morocco, Jordanian King Abdullah II, the Amir of Qatar Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al-Thani, and Djibouti's Ismail Omar Guelleh, in addition to the host King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.