Timeline of Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Summits, 1981-2013
On occasion of the GCC’s 35th Heads of State Summit in Doha, Qatar, the Qatar News Agency published an infographic highlighting key GCC summit moments since its formation in 1981.
From the National Council’s Arabia, the Gulf, and the GCC Blog
Imad Harb – The Return of Strong GCC-U.S. Strategic Relations
From the National Council’s Arabia, the Gulf, and the GCC Blog
The National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations’ 23rd Annual Arab U.S.-Policymakers Conference included a session on “The Gulf Cooperation Council: Role in Regional Dynamics” that featured Dr. John Duke Anthony, H.E. Dr. Abdullah I. El-Kuwaiz, Dr. Abdulaziz Sager, Ambassador (Ret.) Stephen A. Seche, Dr. Abdullah AlShayji, and Dr. Abdulkhaleq Abdulla.
An audio and video recording of the session as well as a link to the transcript are available below. Videos of the entire 2014 conference are available on YouTube and podcasts of the conference are available through iTunes and FeedBurner.
National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations Founding President & CEO Dr. John Duke Anthony periodically responds to questions posed by friends and followers of the National Council’s Arabia, the Gulf, and the GCC Blog. Below are three recent questions Dr. Anthony fielded regarding the U.S. relationship with the Gulf Cooperation Council countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates).
John Duke Anthony – The Gulf Cooperation Council: Deepening Rifts and Emerging Challenges
John Duke Anthony – From Arabia to Asia: Does a Policy Shift Make Sense?
GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL: ROLE IN REGIONAL DYNAMICS
Chair:
Dr. John Duke Anthony – Founding President and CEO, National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations, and author, inter alia, of Arab States of the Lower Gulf: People, Politics, Petroleum; Historical and Cultural Dictionary of the Sultanate of Oman and the Emirates of Eastern Arabia; and The United Arab Emirates: Dynamics of State Formation.
Speakers:
Mr. Jason Buntin – Director for Europe and Middle East Affairs, Office of the U.S. Trade Representative.
Dr. Abdullah AlShayji – Chairman, Department of Political Science, Kuwait University; author, Kuwait’s Ceaseless Quest for Survival in a Hostile Environment.
Dr. Ken Katzman – Specialist in Middle East Affairs in the Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Trade Division, Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress.
Mr. Michael Buonvino – Vice President for Global Development, Hill International.
Ambassador Richard Schmierer – Deputy Assistant Secretary for Public Diplomacy, Bureau of Near East Affairs, U.S. Department of State; former U.S. Ambassador to the Sultanate of Oman.
John Duke Anthony – The Gulf Cooperation Council As An Opportunity
POLICYMAKING OPPORTUNITIES AND LESSONS LEARNED FROM REGIONAL GEO-POLITICAL DYNAMICS: THE ARABIAN PENINSULA (GCC COUNTRIES AND YEMEN)
Chair:
Dr. John Duke Anthony
Speakers:
Dr. Abdel Aziz Abu Hamad Aluwaisheg – Assistant Secretary General for Negotiations and Strategic Dialogue, Gulf Cooperation Council.
Dr. Abdulkhaleq Abdulla – Professor of Political Science, United Arab Emirates University (Abu Dhabi); lead author, 2008 Arab Knowledge Report.
Dr. Abdullah K. Al-Shayji – Chairman, Department of Political Science, Kuwait University; author, Kuwait’s Ceaseless Quest for Survival in a Hostile Environment.
A Window onto the Gulf Cooperation Council, Together With a View Regarding Its Involvement Of Late With Yemen – remarks by His Excellency Dr. Abdul Latif Bin Rashid Al Zayani, Secretary General of the Gulf Cooperation Council, to the Gulf Research Center’s Third Annual Gulf Research Meeting, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, United Kingdom. Introduction by Dr. John Duke Anthony, Founding President and CEO of the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations.
From the National Council’s Arabia, the Gulf, and the GCC Blog
Remarks on GCC Economic Issues by Dr. Odeh Aburdene at the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations’ Capital Seminar on “The Gulf Cooperation Council at Thirty Plus One: Implications for GCC and U.S. Interests and Policies.”
From the National Council’s Arabia, the Gulf, and the GCC Blog
Dr. John Duke Anthony spoke to KSA2 (Saudi Arabian, English-language TV) on June 14, 2012 about the 31st anniversary and growing international importance of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC). The GCC is comprised of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. Dr. Anthony is the only American to have been invited to each of the GCC’s Ministerial and Heads of State Summits since the GCC’s inception in 1981.
John Duke Anthony – The Future Significance of the Gulf Cooperation Council (.pdf file)
This essay appeared in: The Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research. Global Strategic Developments: A Futuristic Vision. Abu Dhabi: The Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research, 2012. pp. 63-103.
GULF COOPERATION COUNCIL (GCC) DYNAMICS (III)
Chair:
Dr. John Duke Anthony – Founding President and CEO of the National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations, and author, inter alia, of Arab States of the Lower Gulf: People, Politics, Petroleum and Historical and Cultural Dictionary of the Sultanate of Oman and the Emirates of Eastern Arabia.
Speakers:
Dr. Abdulkhaleq Abdulla – Professor of Political Science, Emirates University (Abu Dhabi); lead author, 2008 Arab Knowledge Report. (UAE)
Dr. Abdulla Al-Shayji – Chairman, Department of Political Science, Kuwait University, and author, Kuwait’s Ceaseless Quest for Survival in a Hostile Environment. (Kuwait)
Mr. Jeremy Jones – Author of Negotiating Change: The New Politics of the Middle East and the forthcoming Oman, Culture and Diplomacy; Senior Associate Member, Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies; National Council on U.S.-Arab Relations Distinguished International Fellow. (Oman)
Dr. Thomas Mattair – Executive Director, Middle East Policy Council; former Research Scholar, Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research; author,The Three Occupied UAE Islands: The Tunbs and Abu Musa and Global Security Watch — Iran: A Reference Handbook. (Bahrain)
Commentator:
Mr. Robert Lacey – Historian, and author of, inter alia, The Kingdom: Arabia & the House of Sa’ud (1982) and Inside the Kingdom: Kings, Clerics, Modernists, Terrorists, and the Struggle for Saudi Arabia (2009). (Saudi Arabia)
John Duke Anthony – 20 Years Ago Today
February 28, 2011 marks the anniversary of a momentous event: the reversal of Iraq’s aggression against Kuwait from August 2, 1990 to February 28, 1991. For Kuwaitis, the citizenry of their fellow GCC members, and people from many other countries, including the United States and other Allied Coalition members, the multifaceted damage inflicted by Iraq in the course of its invasion and occupation of Kuwait unleashed changes from which the world has yet to fully recover.
John Duke Anthony – The GCC Summit in Perspective: A Conversation with John Duke Anthony (via ArabiaLink)
John Duke Anthony – On the Eve of the GCC Summit: A Conversation with John Duke Anthony (via SUSRIS)
John Duke Anthony – Economic Development in the GCC Region in Focus (.pdf file)
In 2007 Dr. Anthony was contracted by Britannica Book of the Year (BBOY), publication of Encyclopaedia Britannica, to write an original essay on “Boom in the Gulf.” The essay focused on the extraordinary construction boom underway in the six GCC countries of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The essay, which can be accessed through the above link, was accepted and appears in the 2008 edition of the BBOY. The National Council is pleased that Encyclopaedia Britannica has granted permission for the Council to reprint the essay in full.
VIDEO
John Duke Anthony –