Gulf rulers boycotting Qatar skip GCC annual summit

Qatar's emir said on Tuesday he hoped a summit of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) in Kuwait would help maintain stability in the region.

Al Jazeera TV reported though that four Arab heads of state involved in a rift with Qatar stayed away.

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain and Egypt which have imposed economic, diplomatic and trade sanctions on Qatar in a dispute that began in June, sent ministers or deputy prime ministers instead to the annual event.

Qatar's Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al Thani, who with Kuwait's Emir Sheikh Sabah al Ahmad al Jaber al Sabah were the only heads of state to attend the meeting, acknowledged that the summit took place in "highly sensitive circumstances" in the life of the GCC.

"I am full of hope that the summit will lead to results that will maintain the security of the Gulf and its stability," Tamim said, according to the Doha-based Al Jazeera.

Sheikh Sabah, opening the summit, called for a mechanism to be set up in the Western-backed grouping to resolve disputes among its members.

Relations within the Gulf have soured since the four Arab states accused Qatar of supporting terrorism. Qatar had denied the charges.

Kuwait, which had spearheaded unsuccessful mediation efforts since the rift began, had hoped the summit would provide an opportunity for leaders to meet face-to-face and discuss the crisis, according to two Gulf diplomats.

Alternative to the GCC?

Earlier, the UAE said it would set up a bilateral cooperation committee with Saudi Arabia, separate from the GCC, on political, economic and military issues.

UAE president Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed al Nahyan said the new committee would be chaired by Abu Dhabi's crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al Nahyan, Mohammed Bin Zayed, state news agency, WAM reported.

It is not clear which, if any, other countries will be invited to participate.

Saudi Arabia has not yet commented.

The proposal also coincides with an escalation in the conflict in Yemen, where both Saudi Arabia and the UAE are heavily involved. 

Veteran former president Ali Abdullah Saleh was killed in a roadside attack on Monday after switching sides in Yemen's civil war, abandoning his Iran-aligned Houthi allies in favour of a Saudi-led coalition.

Founded in 1980 as a bulwark against bigger neighbours Iran and Iraq, the GCC is facing an existential crisis after the Qatar dispute.

TRT World's Iolo ap Dafydd has more.

UAE-Saudi Arabia ties

The UAE and Saudi Arabia have cultivated even-closer ties in recent years. Emirati troops are deeply involved in the Saudi-led war in Yemen. Abu Dhabi's Sheikh Nayhan also is believed to have a closer relationship with Saudi Arabia's young Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

The Emirati announcement did not say whether any other Gulf Arab countries would be invited to join the new group but the development puts pressure the GCC which includes Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The United States and its European allies all have told the council's members that the region remains stronger with them working together as a whole, while the countries themselves still appear divided over their future.

The fact the GCC meeting in Kuwait was to take place at all is a bit of a surprise, given the unusually sharp criticism among the typically clubby members of the GCC pointed at Doha.

"This is the most important annual summit the GCC has held for more than two decades," said Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, a research fellow at the James A Baker III Institute for Public Policy at Rice University. "The GCC needs to illustrate its relevance after having been bypassed at every stage of the Qatar crisis."

Qatar dispute

The dispute began in June, following what Qatar described as a hack of its state-run news agency that saw incendiary comments attributed to its ruler, Thani. Soon after, GCC members Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates closed off their airspace and seaports to Qatar, as well as the small peninsular nation's sole land border with Saudi Arabia.

The boycott initially riled Doha, though it soon replaced food products with those flown in from Turkey and Iran.

For boycotting nations, they allege Qatar funds extremist groups and has too-cozy ties to Iran. 

Qatar has long denied funding extremists but it restored full diplomatic ties with Iran during the crisis. Doha shares a massive offshore natural gas field with Tehran that gives its citizens the highest per-capita income in the world.

A Trump-prompted call in September between Qatar's Sheikh Tamim and the Saudi crown prince that offered a chance at negotiations also broke down in mutual recriminations.

Kuwait's 88-year-old emir has tried to mediate the dispute, so far without success. However, Kuwait appeared in recent days to secure promises from the GCC to attend its annual high-level summit.