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GV Former Arab League HQ building in Cairo, Egypt (2 shots)
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GV INTERIOR Pan-Islamic delegation seated at meeting
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GV PAN Members of League give Sadat a standing ovation as he enters hall
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SV Sudanese delegation seated
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SCU ZOOM OUT SV Sadat seated at desk with other executives
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SV ZOOM IN TO SCU Sadat speaking in Arabic as members listen (2 shots)
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SV Sadat continues speaking PAN AROUND Audience
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Script is copyright Reuters Limited. All rights reserved

Background: Egypt disclosed on Monday (10 November) that it has been giving military aid to resistance fighters in Afghanistan. President Anwar Sadat said that his country was helping the Mujahidin to counter the Soviet occupying forces.

SYNOPSIS: The Egyptian President made the disclosure at the launching of a new Pan-Islamic League in Cairo. The opening was held in the building used by the Arab League before it expelled Egypt and moved base to Tunis. The new organisation is called the League of Islamic and Arab Peoples. This was the first sitting of its constituent assembly.

Delegates gave President Sadat a standing ovation as he entered the hall to deliver the opening speech. Most of the constituent assembly are Egyptian. But a small Sudanese delegation also took part in drawing up a charter for the new League.

Mr. Sadat denied he had set up the organisation as a rival to other Pan-Islamic bodies. And he said it wasn't a forum to hit back at his Arab critics. But the Egyptian leader described Syria, Libya and South Yemen as Moscow's satellites in the Middle East. He accused them of an alliance with the Kremlin while the Soviets committed what he called "atrocious daily massacres of the Moslem Afghan people".

Mr. Sadat said the new organisation should work to revive the true Islamic-Arabic heritage. He set it several goals. Among them, the establishment of an Islamic-Arabic Trade Union Federation and a Youth Federation. Envoys from nine countries, Nigeria, Niger, Turkey, Oman, Senegal, Chad, Gabon, Upper Volta and Malaysia, were present for opening. But they took no part in the assembly's debates.