At the Arab League summit meeting which began today in Riyadh, King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, a close friend of the Bush family and one of United States' strongest ally in the Middle East, signalled his intention to distance himself from the White House on the Iraq war, while voicing criticism concerning the lack of progress related to current negotiations between US, Israeli and Palestinian representatives. According to a news report by New York Times correspondent covering the summit:

<The king of Saudi Arabia, King Abdullah, condemned the presence of American forces in Iraq as an "illegitimate foreign occupation" in a speech today, and said the withholding of aid to Palestinians should end.The king's speech, at the opening of the Arab League summit here, appeared to distance his country's position from that of the United States. Saudi Arabia has been a powerful Arab ally to the United States in the Persian Gulf region.The speech was wide-ranging, but in referring to the Palestinians and the conflict in Iraq he touched on two of the biggest issues in the Middle East. "In our dear Iraq, the blood is spilling between our brothers in light of an illegitimate foreign occupation," he said.>

According to article in HeraldTribune.com on February 15, the voting machine manufacturer had sent a memo last August that pointed out slow response times of the touch-screen machines used in Sarasota County that would fail to register a voter's choice, which state and local election officials ignored.

Such 'criminal' negligence is tantamount to disenfranchisement of a large number of voters in Sarasota County in last November's election. It cries out for a new election to be held as soon as possible!

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