WASHINGTON, Dec 12: The United States on Thursday launched an initiative to strengthen democracy in Middle East countries, partly to answer critics who say it favours authoritarian pro-American governments.

Secretary of State Colin Powell said the United States wanted to show that it was on the side of reform and change in the Middle East.

The so-called US-Middle East Partnership Initiative has been delayed several times as tensions have grown around Iraq.

The project “will provide funding and a framework for the United States to work together with governments and people in the Arab world to expand economic, education and political opportunity”, said the State Department.

“Any approach to the Middle East that ignores its political, economic and educational development will be built upon sand. It is time to lay a firm foundation of hope,” Powell said in a speech at the Heritage Foundation in Washington to launch the initiative.

“America wants to align itself with the people of the Middle East.”

He added that the new project was “an initiative that places the United States firmly on the side of change, on the side of reform on the side of a modern future for the Middle East and on the side of hope”.

“It is a bridge between the United States and the Middle East,” he declared, adding that Washington would, for example, help Saudi Arabia, Algeria and Lebanon to meet the criteria to get membership of the World Trade Organization.

Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage will serve as coordinator for the project, to be managed by the State Department’s Bureau of Near East Affairs.

But experts have warned that the programme, if not handled with care, risks offending Arab governments.—AFP