From the NYTimes of Sunday October 14, 2001.

Ex-Kuwaiti Official Assails His Nation as Feeble in Its Backing of U.S.

By JUDITH MILLER

In a stunning denunciation of what he called a "shameful" betrayal of the United States, a former Kuwaiti government minister and member of the ruling family has scorned what he called his country's "hesitant and timid" support for America's war against terrorism.

Writing in a London-based Arabic daily on Saturday, Sheik Saud Nasser al-Sabah, Kuwait's former oil and information minister, criticized what he described as his country's lackluster support for the American-led campaign against Osama bin Laden and his associates. He blamed his government's policy of "abdication" on Kuwait's militant Islamic groups and some of their charities, which he accused of having "hijacked" the country's foreign policy.

"I say that this country of ours is kidnapped, hijacked by groups that call themselves Islamic but in truth use Islam as a cover and a garb for political goals," he wrote in Asharq al-Awset, a popular Saudi- owned newspaper.

Sheik Saud called such groups "a menace" not only to the future of Kuwait, but to "the Arab world as a whole," and urged his fellow Kuwaitis and other Arabs to be "brave" in opposing them.

"We should remove the veil of secrecy that protects these groups and their financial and political activities in Kuwait and abroad," he wrote. If not, he warned, "we will face more destruction and ruin."

A senior Bush administration official called Sheik Saud's request for stronger support for the Untied States "most welcome" and said he hoped that there would be more such appeals. But reluctant to criticize Kuwait — a key American ally in the Persian Gulf region and an avowed member of the anti-bin Laden coalition — he and other administration officials declined comment tonight on Sheik Saud's charge that Kuwait was unwilling to rein in the militant Islamic groups that provide financial aid and political comfort to Mr. bin Laden's Al Qaeda network.

Several independent Middle Eastern analysts, however, called Sheik Saud's statements both unusual and courageous.

"This man of the Kuwaiti state, a man of power and influence, has shown how Kuwait has ceded the ground to militant Islamists," said Fouad Ajami, a professor at Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies. "It is a remarkable look at Arab fears behind the scenes of power."

Sheik Saud's indictment of what he called his country's unwillingness to stand solidly with the United States in its anti-terrorism campaign is all the more unusual in that he remains influential in Kuwait and close to power, one Arab analyst said.

"He knows who these militants are and what they want, because he tangled with them as information minister, and often lost," the analyst said.

Sheik Saud was also Kuwait's ambassador to Washington when Iraqi forces invaded and occupied his country in August 1990. His outrage may reflect the gratitude he has long felt and the friendships he developed with Americans during that period. The United States led the coalition that forced Iraq out of Kuwait in the 1991 Persian Gulf war.

"What would have become of us had the United States adopted the same hesitant position towards us that we have adopted of late?" Sheik Saud lamented.

In his article, Sheik Saud criticized his government for letting the Kuwaiti House of Finance and General Association for Religious Endowments provide financial assistance "with no supervision and no oversight."

Similarly, he said, Jamiyyat al- Islah, or the Society of Reform, a major Kuwaiti charity, had "forgotten its original mandate of charity" in pursuit of politics. He said that Islamic militants dominated another charity, Jamiyyat Ihya al-Turath, the Society for the Restoration of Tradition, which the government ostensibly outlawed three years ago.

"But the government was never strong enough to enforce this ban," he wrote, and the influence of such groups was "devouring" Kuwait from the inside.

Wolfgang Schwanitz, a researcher on Middle East policy at the German Oriental Institute of Hamburg who is conducting research at Princeton, called Sheik Saud's allegations about specific charities and Kuwaiti groups bold and unusual.

"What he has done is publicly charge that there are financial institutions that work independently of the central bank, and that these charities channel money to causes, most of which are legitimate, but some of which, he says, are not," Mr. Schwanitz said. "It's very courageous, because he's taken on some very politically powerful groups. Given the domestic strength of such groups, such a statement is personally dangerous."

Mr. Ajami agreed, noting that it was "extremely rare to have a man of the state take his state on." At the same time, he added, Sheik Saud was expressing what many Arabs thought but were now afraid to say: "Where was Islamist gratitude for America's role in preventing Muslims from being slaughtered in Bosnia in 1995, and in Kosovo in 1999?

"American power was used three times between 1990 and 2000 to rescue Muslims from ruin, but no Islamist has ever thanked them," Mr. Ajami said.

Robert Satloff, the executive director of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said the Arabs had been "remarkably silent" about the American-led campaign against Mr. bin Laden. "It's obviously disappointing," he added.

While administration officials say that more than 40 countries have granted the United States air-transit and landing rights, they also say that no Muslim government is taking part in the attack on Afghanistan. This is in sharp contrast to the situation a decade ago, when Arab forces helped eject Iraq's army from Kuwait. While American forces are based in Kuwait, they have not openly participated in the offensive against Afghanistan. But Kuwait has declared support for the United States airstrikes on Al Qaeda bases and Afghan military positions. And reports in the British press said that it had offered the use of its bases.

Earlier this month, Kuwait stripped Mr. bin Laden's spokesman, Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, of his citizenship. However, a week after the Sept. 11 attacks, the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Rai Al-Amm published a fatwa, or a religious ruling, by Mr. Abu Ghaith in which he called on Muslims to fight "Jews, Americans and all their allies."

Sheik Saud said that Mr. Abu Ghaith was but "one in a band," and that Kuwait needed to know "who are his partners who live among us." The spokesman, he disclosed, was able to enter and leave Kuwait at will, "the last time only weeks before the terrible events of Sept. 11." Stripping of him of his citizenship, he added, "is not enough to uproot terror."

----------------

Snap, snap.