Relations Steady Yet Shaky

By: Ibrahim M Ibrahim

The parasitic invasive way of living had been the chief way to exist in the ancient times.

Sadistically, it continued to exist in the past century in the term of occupation; to benefit from

one country's resources depriving the locals from their right to have control over their

territories and their natural godsends. Many European countries had practiced some kind of

occupation upon the Arab world and finally lately had vacated. The concept of mutualistic

relations had then developed to be implemented in some regards. At the present time, Europe

is not paying costs back to Arabs but in an advanced way gets advantages through

cooperative agreements between what is now the European Union (EU) and Arab countries.

Economics, politics, and development issues are the core of these relations. Yemen, Gulf,

central Arab countries, and the periphery of the Arab world are all involved in these relations.

Although, cooperation is there between the EU and Arabs, certain barriers are still existing.

For Yemen, currently, the relations are mostly at the advantage of Yemen. The EU is

mainly contributing to Yemen development through aid assistance. The aid given to Yemen

between 2007 and 2010 is estimated to be nearly €60 million beyond established projects.

These donations aim at developing the country starting from the encouragement of

democracy through strengthen the electoral framework and public participation to fostering

the private sector in agriculture and food industry. Not only does Europe donate but a great

deal of European imported goods like cars, aircrafts, heavy equipments, and medical

equipments and instruments are in the Yemeni market today. Another bright example of the

EU-Yemen dialogue is Yemen's participation in many student exchange programs and

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scholarships that illustrates academic and cultural cooperation. Through this the EU actively

engages the public and governmental sectors, gaining political stances and their loyalty.

On the other hand, Yemen forms a fertile ground for investment in fishery, tourism, and

natural gas industries. Also Yemen exports high value tuna loins and fish worth around € 8

million, as in 2001-2003 estimation. The cooperation is increasing progressively as the old

concepts, of parasitism, occupation, and colonialism, are deteriorating and both parties are

becoming conscious of the modern concept of mutualism.

For the same region of the Arabian Peninsula, the gulf countries are showing a brilliant

bilateral cooperation in all sectors. The EU is the top partner of the Gulf Cooperation Council

(GCC). The relations between these two parties are principally in economic cooperation.

Since the gulf countries are predominant in Organization of the Petroleum Exporting

Countries (OPEC), the main sector in the cooperation agreements is oil and its derivatives,

that, 70% of the EU fuel is imported from the GCC. Furthermore, is the free trade agreement

recently signed by the European free trade association (EFTA) and the GCC. In 2007, € 61.5

billion was the cost of the EU exported products, in the meanwhile € 30.7 billion was the cost

of the imported products. The total investment revenues of the gulf countries in Europe are

estimated to be $542 billion. For instance, gulf investors own 14% of shares in Mercedes

Benz Company and the United Arab Emirates bought lately 5% of the shares of the famous

sports cars Ferrari shares which is almost €114 million of the total capital. In addition, In

September 2008 the Abu Dhabi United Group purchased the football club Manchester City.

In contrast, the GCC depends on the EU for the aircrafts, locomotives, power generation

plants, and medical equipments, electrical machineries as well. Moreover, in Gulf, Europe is

contributing to the educational systems and founding new institutions based on qualified

European curriculums. The relations between these parties are clear and cooperative but

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people still needs to encourage their positive attitude to meet the international mutualism and

universal peace.

In my opinion, the current practices of mutualism are wonderful, nonetheless, toward

better understanding between Europe and Arab nations some challenges should be overcome,

indeed. First, there is an awful stereotype that Europeans consider Arabs to be terrorists.

Therefore; this perception of Arabs as aggressive and bloody is damaging the relations.

Consequently, the number of European tourists over the past ten years has been declining and

EU countries have become no longer easily accessible to Arabs. Second, because of

particular traditional barriers, there is a lack of Arabian women participation in the EU-Arab

communication. Third, is the biased media for both EU and Arabs; meaning that each side

interprets events according to its interests, which is obviously creating misconceptions of

political and economical events, on both target communities. These were only three examples

that illuminate simply the gap in the EU-Arab dialogue. On the contrary, Arabs see the aid of

EU as to have undercover goals. And this stands a barrier for additional dialogue on extended

and deeper issues. Besides, Arabs fear the intercultural negative affection and rather than

drawing red lines and putting limits, they completely avoid such contact. Another thing is the

new radical ideologies which are non-Islamic but absolute deviations from the pith of Islam.

The enduring faith of over a billion Muslims is so much bigger then the narrow hatred of the

few. Finally, mankind have the common sense and should peaceful interact with one another

regardless of nations, religions, but humans.

To conclude, the dialogue is present in some life aspects as mentioned above but

cooperation should extend farther from the mere states' interests to serving the whole

humanity. To have this world peaceful; people of all nations had better communicate and

represent themselves the way they want to convey their views, political stances, and become

free enough to reform and stand for their rights. Lastly, the history of humans progress shows

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how concepts and believes had changed as the human cognition developed, So having

reached this level the dialogue should improve and overcome difficulties attaining the

concept of mutualism for stable world with no fears.