According to its articles, this Agreement is a binding on any country that has signed and ratified it. As mentioned earlier, the discussion about this agreement started from the first year of the GCC's establishment and perhaps member countries took a while before ratifying it because this agreement is binding. It was not until 2004, in the Interior Ministers' 13th meeting, that the Interior Ministers of the UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Oman signed the agreement. The Supreme Council appreciated this achievement and stated that this agreement would strengthen existing cooperation and would achieve what the people of the member countries were looking for: to facilitate the movement of people and goods between member countries.136 In the next year (1995), the Supreme Council stressed the importance of security cooperation and the importance of bringing the Security Agreement into effect after it had been ratified by all the member countries.137 The Supreme Council was referring to Kuwait, as it was the one member country which had not ratified the Agreement.
On 5 May 2010, in a regular meeting of the Interior Ministers, the Kuwaiti government stated that the Security Agreement, which Kuwait had not yet ratified, needed some amendments. The rest of the member countries did not reject the Kuwaiti proposal,138 but there is no information yet as to what the Kuwaiti proposal was. In this context, the GCC does not appear to be an influential institution in this matter. It has been mentioned that the main purpose of establishing international institutions is to facilitate the process of making agreements between member countries.139 This thesis critiques the role of the GCC in facilitating agreements made between the member countries, taking into account that the security issue is one of the major concerns of the member countries. The core issue regarding the GCC having an effective role relates to the nature of the ruling system of member countries. These absolute monarchies are not willing to move quickly towards changing their ruling systems especially if that requires them to sacrifice some of their sovereignty. This agreement was likely a huge pressure
135 This agreement can be found in the Annex.
136 See Ibid,15, (1994).
137 Supreme Council, 16 (1995).
138Asharq Al-Awsat Newspaper, 11482 (6 May 2010).
139 Beck, Arend, & Vander Lugt, Eds. (1996), p.166.
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on Kuwait, as the GCC were pushing Kuwait to sign this Security Agreement but Kuwait refused for many years until the GCC accepted to make some amendments.
In the same context, the member countries did better with regards to counter-terrorism cooperation. In 2002, member countries adopted a security strategy for fighting terrorism-related radicalism and in 2004, member countries signed the GCC Counter-Terrorism Agreement.140 In addition, the GCC formed a Permanent Anti-Terrorism Committee in 2006,141 while the Supreme Council urged international cooperation in this regard.142 However, the Security Agreement was more controversial than this counter-terrorism agreement.
5.4.2.1 - Kuwait’s objections
This chapter analyses that an implicit reason behind the Security Agreement was to protect the ruling systems in member countries to be strong enough to face internal and external challenges. The preamble of this agreement states that the aim is "to defend the Islamic faith and idealistic views from destructive views and party activities."143 The first part of this article refers to a specific Islamic doctrine namely Al-Salafiyah. The political Islamic view, according to the Al-Salafiyah perspective, advises that people have to obey their king or ruler and not challenge him by demonstrating. Instead, any public rejections of the ruler‟s policy have to be presented to him directly. One of the main leaders of this school in the Islamic world is the Saudi Council of Senior Islamic Scholars, declaring that demonstrations are prohibited in Saudi Arabia and warning that such political activities are likely to be linked to intellectual deviance influenced from a foreign political party.144
The GCC Security Agreement requires member countries to take all the necessary actions in order to "prevent its citizens from interfering in the internal affairs of other member countries."145 In the Saudi official perspective, this means that every member
140 Secretariat General (2009),p. 35.
141 Ibid p. 36.
142 Supreme Council, 30 (2009).
143 The GCC Security Agreement (1982).
144 See AsharqAl-awsat Newspaper, 11787, 7 March 2011.
145 Article 3, the GCC Security Agreement.
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country has to prevent its citizen from doing any political activities such as demonstrating against any of the ruling regimes in other member countries.
It has been mentioned in the Gulf media that Kuwait is rejecting some aspects of the GCC Security Agreement,146 but no specific information has been released about what these rejections are.147 Therefore, this part analyse the articles of the GCC Security Agreement in light of Kuwaiti Constitutional law in order to understand the Kuwaiti rejections.
The Saudi position mentioned above limiting the public freedom to engage in political activities is not in line with the Kuwaiti Constitution. The Kuwaiti Constitution gives people the right to initiate “private assembly without permission or prior notification, and the police may not attend such private meetings.”148 Kuwaiti constitutional law states more precisely that “Public meetings, demonstrations, and gatherings are permitted in accordance with the conditions and manner specified by law, provided that their purpose and means are peaceful and not contrary to morals.”149
However, Article Two of the Security Agreement states more specifically, "Abstaining from allowing the circulation or transfer of pamphlets, printed material or posters that are antagonistic to the Islamic faith or that harm morality, or those directed against the ruling regimes of the GCC member Countries."150 It is worth mentioning that this agreement does not protect the rulers of the member countries personally but rather it protects the regimes in these countries, meaning that it is not legal to criticise the political system of these countries. It has been mentioned that Kuwait is the most liberal country of the area and therefore the freedom in Kuwait can be regarded as the top level of freedom in the area, as evidenced by the Kuwaiti Constitution which gives more freedom to the Kuwaiti citizens than that given to the rest of the GCC countries.
146 See Al-Shamary, Mansor (23 May 2012) Alrai Newspaper. Kuwait.
147 Many efforts have been made by the author of this thesis to get to the bottom of the Kuwaiti objection on the GCC Security Agreement. I have personally asked the Department of Legal Affairs in the Secretariat General of the GCC for some information and they directed me to the Department of Security Affairs in the Secretariat General. I did request some information from them but they responded that this information is not for the public.
148 Article 44, Kuwait Constitution.
149 Ibid
150Article 2, GCC Security Agreement (1982).
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Article 54 of the Kuwaiti Constitution states that the Amir is the head of Kuwait, and
"his person is immune and inviolable,"151 which means that it is legal to criticise the government but not the Amir, while even other key members of the ruling family, such as the head of the Council of Ministers, do not have immunity against criticism. The head of the Kuwaiti Council of Ministers Prince Nasser Al-Sobah has faced hard criticism during the last few years to his mismanagement of the government by the Kuwaiti press.152 Some members of the Kuwaiti Parliament have criticised Prince Nasser for his unprofessional conduct in his position and asked the Government to withdraw trust. The Amir then dissolved the government and, surprisingly, asked Prince Nasser himself to instruct the government again while all the criticism that the government had faced was about the work of Prince Nasser personally and not the government.153
The Kuwaiti Constitution guarantees freedom of opinion and expression as well as the freedom of press: Article 36 states that "Freedom of opinion and of scientific research is guaranteed. Every person has the right to express and propagate his opinion verbally, in writing, or otherwise, in accordance with the conditions and procedures specified by law."154 Also, Article 37 States that "Freedom of the press, printing, and publishing is guaranteed in accordance with the conditions and manner specified by law.”155 The GCC Security Agreement means that the people and the press in Kuwait who are free to publish their objections on the work of their own government are not free to publicly criticise the government of other GCC countries. If the Kuwaiti Government signed up to the GCC Security Agreement as is, that would lead to a legal conflict between the Kuwaiti Constitution and the GCC Security Agreement.