The Arab world's most influential nations - Egypt and Saudi Arabia - will not be represented this week when US President George W. Bush hosts Arab leaders at the Group of Eight summit to discuss his expectations for Middle East reforms.
Kuwait, the oil-rich US Gulf ally that the United States went to war to liberate from Iraqi occupation in 1991, also is not expected to send representatives to meet with Bush and other G8 leaders, according to the administration's list of attendees. Nor does the list include the Gulf nation Qatar, home to the popular Arab satellite television network Al Jazeera, which has angered Washington with its graphic coverage of Iraq.
The White House said it has invited Arab heads of state from Iraq, Algeria, Bahrain, Jordan and Yemen as well as the leaders of two other Muslim nations, Turkey and Afghanistan. All seven have accepted invitations.
Those officials were scheduled to have lunch on Wednesday with the G8 leaders to discuss the Bush administration's Greater Middle East Initiative, which has been rejected by many Arabs as a system of Western-imposed values.
Turkey is expected to showcase its success in developing secular democracy, US officials said.
But the White House has offered no explanation for the absence of several countries that are normally strong US allies in the Muslim world.
Egypt, home to one in four Arabs, and Saudi Arabia, which possesses the world's largest petroleum reserve, have said their leaders will not attend because of other commitments.
Tunisia also will not attend. Nor does Morocco, which the Bush administration designated as a major non-Nato US ally last week, appear on a White House list of attendees.
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