Judith Apter Klinghoffer raises an important question:

WILL AL GORE TOO BETRAY OUR DANISH ALLIES?
On Saturday the annual Jeddah Economic Forum 2006 will open and Denmark will not be invited. I suspect a more precise wording would be that Denmark has been disinvited as punishment for refusing to "punish" the offending JP.

The pertinent question is who will stand up to this Saudi effort to punish a country for having a free and independent press?

Former Vice President Gore is amongst the invited dignitaries. Will he refuse to go along with this despicable boycott of a democratic ally or will he follow in former president Clinton's cowardly footsteps?

What will the others on this list do? Will any of them emerge as a profile in courage? Let's make sure they know we are watching. Here is the list:

According to JEF 2006 Chairman Hassan Enany, global speakers include Irish President Mary McAleese, Congo Brazzaville President Denis Sassou N'Guesso, Gambia President Al Hajji Jammah, Ghana's former President Jerry Rawlings, former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, former US Vice President Al Gore, human rights lawyer Cherie Blair, Forbes Inc. President & CEO Steve Forbes, Forbes Magazine Editor in Chief Peter Roberston, Vice Chairman of Chevron Corporation, Abdul—Salam Al—Majali, former prime minister of Jordan, Haifa Al—Kaylani, founder and chairman of Arab International Woman's Forum, Mohamed Alabbar, director general of the Department of Economics Dubai and Chairman of Emaar Properties, Bahia Hariri, member of the Lebanese Parliament and sister of Rafik Hariri, Andre Azoulay, counselor to King Mohammed VI of Morocco.

Anwar Ibrahim, former deputy prime minister of Malaysia, and Thoraya Obaid, executive director of the United Nations Population Fund, will also speak at plenary sessions.

Ed Lasky   2 08 06