Syria Proposes New Arab Union - 11/10/1961

Great Bend Tribune (Great Bend, Kansas)

Wed, Oct 11, 1961 – Page 1

 

Syria Progress New Arab Union

Damascus, Syria (AP)

 

Syria’s new revolutionary regime today proposed that all Arab countries from the Atlantic to the Persian Gulf join in a United Arab States.

The U.A.S. said a 14-point appeal sent to all Arab governments, would be a “Voluntary Pan-Arab union on a constitutional, decentralized basis”.

The proposal obviously was designed to recapture from Egypt’s President Gamal Abdel Nasser the initiative toward Arab Unity, a popular cause among Arabs.

Premier Mamoun Kuzbari and his provisional government have described this country’s own short-lived union with Egypt – the United Arab Republic which was shattered by the Syrian revolution of Sept 28 – as an experiment in Arab unity that failed because it lacked a basis of “freedom and equality”.

Syria’s appeal, made jointly by the provisional government and the army revolutionary command and read over the Damascus radio by Kuzbari, said the United Arab States should follow an international policy of neutrality and peaceful coexistence.

All Arab governments were urged to call their parliaments into session to consider the Syrian proposals.