almotamar.net - SANAA - Yemen is to ask donors for 10 billion dollars in aid over five years to help prepare Yemen for membership of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC), Yemen�s minister of planning and international cooperation said in comments published Monday.
Minister Abdel Karim al-Arhabi told the London-based Arabic-language daily Al-Hayat that the appeal would be made at a donors' conference in the British capital on November 15-16.
Arhabi said a total investment of 25 billion dollars would be needed in the 2006-2010 plan to begin bringing Yemen up to the level of the six states currently in the GCC but that 15 billion would be provided from domestic sources.
The minister is currently on a tour of Europe and North America to drum up support from donors ahead of the London conference, which is being jointly sponsored by the World Bank and the GCC, the Saudi-owned daily said.
Further massive investment will be needed under a second five-year plan before Yemen's infrastructure begins to approach GCC levels. The minister further said that the two five-year plan are distinguished meant for integration and ambitions attached to them are much bigger than previous plans, stressing that the present plan focuses on development of human resources in the first place, taking into consideration that natural resources are limited.
The minister said the German minister of economic cooperation and development has promised him to attend the donors� conference in London on 15-16 November; especially that Germany is a major development donor to Yemen.
Formed in 1981 in the midst of the Iran-Iraq war, the bloc currently consists of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
Yemen, which has long had ambitions to join the wealthy bloc, has had observer status in the bloc's forums for education, social affairs, health and sport since December 2001.