'West Skirting Israeli Nuke Issue'.

In a tense debate on Feb. 25 at the Jeddah Economic Forum on the issues of security in the Middle East, Prince Turki al-Faisal accused the US and its European allies of always avoiding the issue of Israel's possession of nuclear weapons. He said: "The Middle East should be free of all weapons of mass destruction. There is unwillingness on the part of America and its European allies to discuss Israel's weapons. As you have seen just now Gen. Clark and others will go first to Iran, then other countries, and then to Israel".

To loud applause from the audience, Prince Turki's remarks were in response to former US Gen. Wesley Clark's answer to a question asking what the US should be doing to disarm Israel of nuclear weapons. During the panel discussion at the end of the session, which included Baroness Symons of Vernham Dean and Peter Robertson, vice chairman of the board of directors of Chevron, an attendee asked why Iran was not allowed to develop its own nuclear weapons when Israel was known to have a nuclear arsenal. Clark said: "We need to open up a security dialogue in this region and we need to bring Iran back - after 30 years - into the dialogue. We need to stop the slogan of 'democracy now', as you can't implement such things overnight. Eventually that dialogue will move on to include Israel".

Gen. Clark is a former supreme allied commander of NATO.