(Slate) Christopher Hitchens - On a small peninsula on the forbidding coast of Saudi Arabia, the tiny emirate of Qatar plays host to Al Jazeera and to the key U.S. base in the region. Qatar is a hereditary Wahabbist monarchy, but several years ago the current emir, Sheik Hamad al-Thani, decided to depose his autocratic father, abolish censorship, and allow women to drive, vote, and run for office. The immigrant workers of the country, mostly Indian, are allowed to follow their own religions and receive a much better deal than their semi-indentured fellows in Riyadh and Jeddah. Since Qatar holds an astonishing amount of the world's natural gas, it is now perhaps the richest nation per capita on the planet and has become a cross between Switzerland and Hong Kong.
2005-04-20 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive