#2 I still hope that Iraq gets ambitious enough to become the nucleus of a Middle East Common Market.
Ironically, the only other group in the ME I've read who sees the logic of doing this, is of all people, Iran. Trouble is, such a common market is dependent on its members being real democracies with transparent government, at least to some degree. Which of course, leaves Iran, in its current form, out of the picture.
But if such a common market would ever evolve, with perhaps Iraq, Turkey, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE, Qatar, and a few others, it would easily challenge the EU on an economic level.
To double the irony, Iran might be to a MECM in the same position as Russia is to the EU--too large to join. |