Dubai presses on with port takeover ("American double standards")

[Bush_Eats_Beef]

By Dayan Candappa 14 minutes ago

DUBAI (Reuters) - Dubai Ports is pressing ahead with a takeover that gives it control of six major U.S. ports despite a Congress committee vote to block the deal, sources familiar with the deal said on Thursday.

Government and company officials in the United Arab Emirates declined comment on Wednesday's vote by U.S. lawmakers to block the deal on the grounds that handing the ports over to a Gulf Arab state-owned firm would threaten U.S. national security.

But the sources said the vote had not taken Dubai Ports any closer to relinquishing the six ports at the center of a political firestorm. "The vote in the House of Representatives has not change anything in that respect. We are not at that point," one Dubai-based source said.

Analysts said the political furor was bound to provoke businesses in the world's biggest oil exporting region, which is an increasingly important source of financing for the huge U.S. current account deficit. "It's American double standards. Do you think that businesses and governments here won't react and even retaliate?" said Wadah Al Taha of the National Bank of Abu Dhabi.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060309/pl_nm/security_emirates_ports_dc