Mosed Shaye Omar, 64, a naturalized American citizen since 1978, sued the State Department and Secretary John Kerry, claiming he was coerced into acknowledging that he had a name different from what was on his passport. By LIZ ROBBINS May 27, 2015 For nearly five hours on Jan. 21, 2013, in a windowless room at the United States Embassy in Sana, Yemen, an American citizen and Brooklyn grocery store […]
UAE. The private equity market in the Middle East has matured in the last five years in terms of deal structures, volumes and values, according to speakers at a debate organised by ICAEW’s Corporate Finance Faculty in the UAE. ICAEW members and guests gathered at Jumeirah Emirates Towers in Dubai last week (Wednesday, 20th May) to discuss private equity in the region. The event, sponsored by Merrill […]
By RICK GLADSTONE May 27, 2015 France challenged Iran’s supreme leader on Wednesday over a disputed element of the Iranian nuclear talks, asserting that it would not sign any pact unless Iran allowed all its nuclear installations, including military sites, to be inspected. The French position was stated by the foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, just as negotiations reconvened in Vienna with the aim of reaching a final agreement by […]
From left: Maziar Bahari, Reza Taghavi and Amir Hekmati. By THE NEW YORK TIMES May 27, 2015 In the past seven years, other journalists and American travelers have been arrested in Iran for spying. All have denied the accusations. ▪ Roxana Saberi: An Iranian-American journalist arrested in January 2009 on accusations of spying, and sentenced to eight years. She was released after 100 days and wrote a book about her experience. […]
By JODI RUDOREN May 26, 2015 JERUSALEM — Hinting at a new strategy as he starts his fourth term with a more conservative coalition, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel told the European Union’s foreign policy chief that he wants to negotiate with the Palestinians over which settlements in the occupied West Bank would be annexed by Israel, officials said Tuesday. Palestinian leaders quickly rejected the idea as a […]
By JODI RUDOREN May 25, 2015 JERUSALEM — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel on Monday named a longtime confidant who is hawkish on Iran and the Palestinian issue to run the foreign ministry, the latest in a series of moves that consolidate Mr. Netanyahu’s conservative grip on his new government. The new ministry director, Dore Gold, is a former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations and a prolific […]
By MERNA THOMAS and KAREEM FAHIM May 23, 2015 CAIRO — An Egyptian court on Saturday acquitted 17 witnesses who had been facing criminal charges after some of them came forward to testify about the apparent police killing of an unarmed poet and activist in January, lawyers for the defendants said. The group had seen riot police officers violently disperse a peaceful march on Jan. 24, including by firing birdshot. The […]
UAE. Landmark real estate regulatory changes including the UAE-wide Federal Mortgage Cap and Dubai’s doubling of Property Registration Fees last year, which was aimed at curbing speculative activity, have together gradually and successfully contained a market that was in danger of overheating with the level of transactional activity now dramatically reduced, according to latest research released by international real estate consultancy Cluttons. Cluttons Spring 2015 Dubai Residential […]
Each week, we will post a Friday quiz question, offering our readers a chance to win exciting prizes. Simply SMS the answer to 3660 (for both Etisalat and du) to enter. The contest is open until midnight on Friday. The winner will be notified on Sunday. Terms and conditions apply. This week’s question: In which country did UAE conservationists recently release 55 falcons into the wild? Here’s […]
MOSCOW/FRANKFURT Russia’s media watchdog has written to Google, Twitter and Facebook warning them against violating Russian Internet laws and a spokesman said on Thursday they risk being blocked if they do not comply with the rules. Roskomnadzor said it had sent letters this week to the three U.S.-based Internet firms asking them to comply with Internet laws which critics of President Vladimir Putin have decried as censorship. […]
Sepp Blatter, the FIFA president, center, with Ofer Eini, head of the Israeli soccer association, left, in Jerusalem on Tuesday. By JODI RUDOREN May 19, 2015 RAMALLAH, West Bank — The Palestinian grievances against Israel are familiar ones: hampering travel, blocking import of equipment, rampant racism and the treatment of settlements in the occupied West Bank. The Israeli response is also a repeat: security concerns, mostly. But this round […]
|By TAP Staff| Oil is poised to slump to $45 US a barrel by October as a surplus of crude and producers’ easy access to cash weigh on the market, according to Goldman Sachs Group Inc. A recovery in prices to near $60 a barrel from a six-year low in March is premature, analysts including Jeffrey Currie said in an e-mailed report dated May 18. The availability […]
|By Nafeesa Syeed & Rinat Gaynullin|Saudi Arabia is burning through foreign reserves at a record pace as the largesse of the new king and regional turmoil ratchet up pressure on public finances already hurt by the oil price slump. The kingdom spent $36 billion of the central bank’s net foreign assets — about 5 percent of the total — in February and March, the biggest two-month drop […]
|TAP Special| Citibank has lost a key decision in its defense of a lawsuit in Abu Dhabi accusing the bank of self-dealing, defrauding investors, and attempting to cover-up investor losses. The Abu Dhabi Commercial Court of First Instance on April 14, 2015 determined the lawsuit should proceed and ordered the appointment of a Committee of Experts to review evidence and determine Citibank’s culpability. The Court’s decision is […]
When American writer Kate Bolick was in her mid-twenties, she and her boyfriend used to go running after work, jogging through Boston in the early evening. One night, they passed a woman running behind her toddler in an all-terrain buggy. Her boyfriend smiled and said: “Look: there’s you someday.” Bolick’s stomach lurched, like in a scene from a Woody Allen: the career woman horrified by smug maternity, […]
/Marshall Hargrave/investorsalley.com/The end of Google’s reign as the king of search is near. Competitors are eating away market share and growth is sputtering. Trying to cherry-pick the next winner in search, however, is akin to rolling dice at a casino. All luck. Where investors are going to make their millions is in this red hot sector that is on the vanguard of life-saving technology that will revolutionize […]
In my previous column, I outlined the innovative German system of cooperative study and universities of applied sciences. These institutes in particular support a practical, hands-on approach to learning about engineering. But where do managers of mid-sized business learn the tools of their trade? As we have seen, traditionally, the answer would be through common sense and trial and error. The majority of world-leading mid-sized enterprises were […]
A $1.5 billion nine-year loan for Dubai’s Emirates National Oil Company (ENOC) is being marketed to banks after receiving commitments from seven lenders to fully back the financing, three sources aware of the matter said on Thursday. The syndication phase was launched on Wednesday and will allow additional lenders to join in the facility, which ENOC said in January it would raise for general business purposes and […]
The specter of an atomic arms race in the world’s most volatile region has heightened the stakes in Iran’s nuclear talks after Saudi Arabia’s repeated hints it would seek its own atomic weapons if Tehran ever did the same. Riyadh’s unprecedented action in assembling a coalition of other Sunni Muslim countries to bomb Tehran’s Houthi allies in Yemen this week has shown how seriously it takes the […]
Iraqi security forces in Tikrit, Iraq, on Monday. By ROD NORDLAND March 30, 2015 TIKRIT, Iraq — Secretary General Ban Ki-moon of the United Nations used a visit to Baghdad on Monday to warn the Iraqi government to treat civilians decently after it liberates territories like Tikrit, where a government offensive has been supported by heavy American-led airstrikes for the past five days. “Civilians freed from the brutality of […]
|By TAP Staff| Dubai’s stock exchange operators Borse Dubai Ltd said it was selling its remaining stake of 17.4 percent in the London Stock Exchange Group. Borse Dubai holds the biggest shareholder in the premier global exchange, valued at about $2.2 billion. Borse Dubai is the holding company for Dubai Financial Market (DFM) and NASDAQ Dubai. Borse Dubai was created 6 August, 2007 to consolidate the Government […]
|By Shakir Noori| The images captured by mobile cameras flicker across the television screen, much in the manner of old Hollywood wild-west movies. The blue waves of the Mediterranean turn crimson with the blood of Egyptian workers in Libya, transforming the small screen into an inferno of bloody rivulets. And yet again, as I sit a spectator to Daesh’s (self-proclaimed Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) […]
Lloyds Banking Group and Natixis have sold their holdings in debt of Dubai World, the state-owned conglomerate nearing a $14.6 billion debt restructuring, according to sources familiar with the matter. Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) also sold at least part of its exposure in the conglomerate, said two sources, which could mean more than $1 billion of Dubai World’s debt has changed hands. The moves help pave […]
Salim Al Aufi, Oman’s undersecretary for oil and gas, likens attempts to cut the reliance on oil during a price slump to acting “with a gun pointed at your head.” If you have to make decisions under pressure, “you will probably make the wrong ones,” he said March 3 in Muscat during a panel discussion on the impact of the oil shock. Oman relied too much on […]
