Would Syria be present in the file of the talks?

Almost certain, the parties finally agreed on the schedule of the visit that was postponed more than once, and its final arrangements have entered into practice.

Things looked normal in the Mauritanian capital Nouakchott; there were normal security measures, and the planning for the public reception began by dealing with a number of local dignitaries to bring thousands of former slaves from the neighborhoods and the outskirts of the city to receive the Qatari guest. The Mauritanian regulations used to prepare such a scene when welcoming its various African and Arab visiting leaders. It “welcomed the great Guest and expressed the depth of the feeling of brotherhood toward each other”, as said by the official Mauritanian media in every similar event.

As for the official media, it has ignored the event thus far, and did not give it the usual momentum given to similar visits, and also the members of the government avoid talking openly about the arrival of the Qatari Prince to Mauritania. Perhaps this comes for security arrangements; the people in charge fear the accustomed interference of Al-Qaeda and its related groups against the senior official guests visiting the country.

The visit’s reasons and the dialectic of the timing:
Often, we do not ask about the secret of the visit of an Arab President to an Arab country, but the interior political atmosphere, the renewable regional events, and the traditional dispute between a strict Mauritanian vision against the foreign intervention in the foreign countries, and a Qatari one leading many of the processes of internal tension in the issues relating to such regimes, raise more than one question?

Barely, we will not find two people in Nouakchott disagreeing about the fact that the issue of the Syrian crisis and the current situation in Libya will be the most prominent themes of the visit, and that the Prince of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa, would probably be carrying a lot regarding Arab consensuses yet to come relating to the Syrian file before the meeting of the Arab League that is scheduled to be held this weekend in Cairo at the end of the visit of the Arab observers to Syria. This comes amid fears among some people of a sudden change in the Mauritanian policy towards the Syrian file, what could pave the way for internationalizing the crisis more and more, in light of the decline of the Algerian position, not to mention that some Gulf countries are forcibly pushing the Syrian file towards the interface of the events.

More than one party say that the prince of Qatar will be carrying important Gulf promises to the Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz in return for changing his position on many regional issues, particularly the Syrian and Libyan files and the relationship with Tehran.

However, some of those who are loyal to the ruling regime in Mauritania exclude the fact that the focus would be during the visit on regional issues, and believe that the Qatari Emir Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa is coming now to Nouakchott to launch a series of stalled developmental projects that have been affected by the estrangement caused to the relationship between the two parties.

Most of those say that the final statement of the visit will carry a lot of conventions, especially in the fields of reconstruction, education, health, and transport, and that Nouakchott will not change its foreign positions based non limited investments, through which its owners want to make profit before anything else.

Inappropriate timing:
Nevertheless, political parties who oppose the Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz do not see that the timing of the visit was appropriate; they even say that Qatar is maintaining double standards. According to them, at the time when Qatar is supporting the Libyan revolution, as well as the revolutions of Egypt, Tunisia and Yemen, it is now trying to consolidate the foundations of a totalitarian regime that its opponents agree that its departure is …

These parties believe that the Mauritanian President Mohamed Ould Abdel Aziz is trying, through giving concessions to the Qataris, to convince them to set some developmental projects that have been stalled since he assumed power through a military coup in 2008 so that to absorb the anger of the rebellious street, and to generate the Gulf funds to counter the signs of dehydration that their premises are terrifying the local population.

Opposition sources say that the opposition political leaders and the heads of the parliamentary blocs and figures, those who belong to them, would boycott the visit of the Qatari Emir to Mauritania via sending a negative letter to Doha that states that the timing is wrong and that the people are not satisfied with the support of the Qataris to the current regime in Mauritania.
Perhaps the most people who oppose the Qatari visit are the supporters of the late Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, who welcomed him with critical and cynical writings amid a Gulf anger that was unhidden by the Qatari Embassy in Nouakchott.

The daily newspaper “Al-Badil al-Thalith”, which is issued on behalf of the Movement for Direct Democracy, talked about a status of alert being found in the restaurants of Nouakchott after the visit of the Princess of Qatar, and it also went to ridicule him and his wife, describing him as disobeying his parents.