King Fahd Reports Progress in Moving to Set Up Promised Consultative Council : Saudi Arabia: The assembly is seen as a key test of the royal family’s commitment to broadening political participation.

Renewing a limited pledge of reform for Saudi Arabia’s rigid political system, King Fahd has announced “notable progress” in establishing a long-awaited consultative assembly.

In a nationwide address, the king said he was reviewing final recommendations for the assembly, a body that, advocates hope, would for the first time give an institutional voice in government to Saudis from academic and business circles.

The reform is quite narrow in scope--members of the council would be appointed by the king and offer non-binding advice--but it is nevertheless seen here as a key test of the royal family’s commitment to broadening Saudi participation in official decision-making.

Fahd’s vaguely worded announcement in a speech Monday night followed lively internal debate in Saudi Arabia late last year over the way the country is run and the prospects for reform within an absolute monarchy, where neither elections nor political parties exist.

Awakened by the influx of American troops after Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait, but quieted during the latter months of the crisis, the debate pitted Western-educated liberals impatient for change against the powerful forces of conservative, Islamic-inspired tradition.

One of the chief demands made by those advocating reform is the establishment of the consultative council, or Majlis al Shura.

The king first announced his intention to form the advisory body last November. The pledge came in response to questions by newspaper editors, and much of Saudi Arabia has been waiting ever since to see whether Fahd would follow through.

Fahd said Monday that a government committee assigned to study the Majlis al Shura, as well as a system of provincial councils, has made “notable progress.” The committee is chaired by Fahd’s brother, Interior Minister Prince Nayif ibn Abdulaziz.

“Upon conclusion of the committee’s tasks, the committee’s recommendations shall be brought before the Council of Ministers (Cabinet), God willing,” the king said.

His remarks were significant more for the fact that he made them than for the news they contained. The forum chosen by the king was an annual national address marking the end of Islam’s holiest season, Ramadan, and the beginning of a popular three-day holiday known as Eid al Fitr.

“By repeating (the pledge to establish the council), it makes it more difficult for him to back out,” said a European diplomat. “He realizes people are serious about reform.”

Still, other analysts said the king’s pledge remains woefully short on details. They point out that setting up a consultative council allows Fahd to appear reform-minded without really ceding power.

The political debate in Saudi Arabia--which never advocated overthrowing the monarchy but urged better management and fewer restrictions--was typified by a recent letter addressed to King Fahd from 43 business leaders and intellectuals.

The letter, published in Egypt but circulated only informally in Saudi Arabia and never actually delivered to the king, was dramatic because Saudis rarely publicize their grievances.

In carefully couched language, it called for a 10-point agenda of social and political reform, including press freedoms, expanded rights for women and restraints on the matawain , or religious police.

“The difficult circumstances and the painful events through which the region and the nation go . . . make it the duty of each citizen to give advice to the rulers of what he sees right . . . ,” the letter stated.

Authors of the letter took pains not to challenge the monarch’s authority or the tenets of Islam.

Analysts suggest that the king is not necessarily responding to de- mands such as these but acting according to his own slow-paced, well-calculated plan for the country. The impetus for making changes is likely to come from within the ruling royal clique rather than from exterior influences, these sources say.

Nevertheless, hopeful Saudis were looking to the king’s latest words for encouraging signs.

“I think the fact that he mentioned (the Majlis al Shura) means it’s going to happen,” said Othman Y. Rawaf, a political scientist at King Saud University.

The idea of the consultative assembly faces a potential challenge from Saudi Arabia’s powerful religious right wing. Fundamentalists who follow a conservative interpretation of Islam oppose using anything but the Koran for political guidance.

The Majlis al Shura existed in the early days of the Saudi kingdom, in the 1930s, but it was phased out. Its revival was first proposed in 1979, but the plan was abandoned after the Muslim fundamentalist revolution in Iran.

Fahd also used his speech on the eve of Eid al Fitr to reiterate Saudi Arabia’s plans to increase the size of its armed forces and acquire high-tech weaponry as part of postwar security measures.

Although the king did not mention numbers, Saudi officials have previously talked of doubling the size of the nation’s ground forces to about 100,000.

“All branches of our armed forces . . . shall be developed and equipped with state-of-the-art military equipment and advanced technology,” Fahd said.

“We shall, God willing, improve the efficiency of our armed forces in all aspects and double recruitment activities to cater to the needs of protecting this precious country and safeguard its territory.”

In another indication of new postwar alliances, King Fahd opened his remarks with greetings for all “Muslim brother nations,” tellingly excluding Jordan, Yemen and Sudan, which sided with Iraq, and pointedly mentioning former rival Iran, which remained ostensibly neutral during the Gulf War.