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We go to the East the way we go to the West
Al-Riyadh Editorial
Published in Alriyadh on 05 - 03 - 2014

If An Arab High Official went to Asian countries or agreed about common investments with them, the Western doubts start commenting on such visit through focused campaigns to the extent of that KSA Crown Prince Salman's visit to Pakistan has been put under a red circle by the European & American media men. The predicted that the purpose of the said visit is buying nuclear weapons from Pakistan for making a power balance with Iran! However, we do not realize such excessive sensitivity in the Asian countries when the Arab High officials go to the West in spite of that they are the biggest buyers of weapons and the major partners in common trade with them, in addition to that the reserves of the Western banks are consisted of Aram money and fortunes.
General Sisi went to Moscow for making Arms deal financed by Saudi Arabia and United Arab Emirates. The said visit had no ideological background as leaders of most Arab countries used to go there during the Soviet Union time under the socilast trend against the imperial enemy. In spite of this, Egypt has been put under the microscope of Media and monitoring and analysis entities who wondered how would this visit affect their relationship with Egypt and does such trend mean the return of Russia strongly to the region for becoming the objective alternative of the West?
This is happening at this time in which such thinking or distribution of roles does not impose making friendships under the principle of alliances any more as that time has gone and the relationships are now built on the bases of interests only.
Prince Salman, for example, visited Pakistan and is heading to Japan after it. At this point, questions have started to be asked not only from the West but from China, the highly sensitive state, as well, to the extent of raising questions about whether such visit means making oil and petrochemical deals with Japan together with common investments at the expense of China.
The source of such fears is related to its political movement towards supporting Al-Assad's regime and marching behind the Russian policy, in spite of that these fears have no background as the options of the Kingdom in regard to its relationships are not subject to temporal reactions. What the Kingdom may get from Japan may not get it from China and vice versa. China's attitude regarding the Syrian condition has no background unless the obsession of the cold war with the West is still present in its mind together with considering that sacrificing a nation for the sake of its regime is a part from administrating the invisible war. The interest of China with the United States, Europe and GCC region is hundreds of times more than its economic and commercial relationships with Russia or Syria to the extent that even Bahrain is more important than Syria in regard to the commercial exchange with China.
Through following the same concept, Prince Salman is going to visit India which have a sharp disagreement with Pakistan together with rooted disputes about the borders and other religious and national revenge issues. The Kingdom knows that diversification of its relationships is not subject to Eastern or Western interpretations. The proof of this is that the European and American financial and economical activities in the Saudi Market is tens of times more than their activities in Asia. This does not make any concerns that may make a certain country disturbed from another one due to that each state has its options of finding its interests with any party. During the cold war era, we used to be heading towards the West more than the East and that trend cost us politically, economically and socially, in addition to that it had raised hostilities with external and Arab countries. However, we had headed where we thought that our targets meet with others' targets. It had been an independent and free behavior which is not subject to any party.
It is true that we are not in a state of permanent harmony with the American partner which represents the biggest one to us. However, our countries interests have not been subject to damage because of this as we do not mix between politics and interests which may be linked together in many situations. We still have the same level of strategic relationships with the United States and Europe as well. The problem of these countries is that they build their vision on monopolizing this relationship without realizing that the Kingdom is not one of the countries which receives aids and loans. This independence freed the Kingdom from any guardianship or interference in its affairs whether from the East or from the West.


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