AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE,
Note, editor's perspective: Logically and realistically, only way to get rid of WMDs in middle east is to free the whole region from Nuclear and Chemical weapons, this includes Israel and Iran as well as any other country in middle east developing weapons because of a clear threat from another country's WMD program. Allowing one country to continue with its Weapons of Mass Destruction program while threatening others with military action is imperalistic bullying and strategically insane! This view is shared by those who are living in Gulf Countries and is something we should not ignore.
Doha: The head of the Gulf Cooperation Council called on NATO Friday to press for the elimination of nuclear arms in Gulf region so that it does not become a “sandwich” between Israel and Iran.
“I call on NATO to exercise direct pressure to eliminate WMDs (weapons of mass destruction) from our region, without exception,” said Sheikh Abdul Rahman al-Attiyah, GCC secretary general.
Attiyah, who was speaking on the sidelines of a conference in Qatar on NATO's role in Gulf regional security, said “we do not want our region to be sandwiched by arms here and arms there.”
While Israel strongly denies that it already has a nuclear arsenal, it is widely believed to have one.
Iran, which is pressing ahead with a campaign of civil nuclear development, is suspected by many countries of using that program as a cover for developing atomic weapons. Tehran strongly denies those claims.
Attiyah said Iran's nuclear program “has become worrisome for the region and a fundamental concern for all the countries of the world… but we also ask that Israel's arsenal be controlled.”
Asked if he was reassured by Tehran's insistence that its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes only, he said: “We hope so, because that is exactly what we want … a secure and non-nuclear zone.”
But he said that “Israel was the first to introduce these types of arms into the region, which has led other states to seek to imitate it.”
He expressed concern about a cycle of action and reaction that could lead to a spread of atomic weapons throughout the region.
