Qatar is regaining its appetite for deals. In the past two months alone, the world’s richest country per capita invested in Turkey’s biggest poultry producer, Russian oil giant Rosneft PJSC, and U.K. gas company National Grid Plc. The investments have been made through the Qatar Investment Authority, created in 2005 to handle the country’s windfall from liquefied natural gas sales, of which it is the world’s biggest exporter. […]
“We open a new hotel every 36 hours,” Sébastien Bazin remarks, after outlining the impressive portfolio of French hospitality chain AccorHotels, with 4,100 hotels spread across 95 countries and employing 240,000 people. The significant sum includes properties gained through the recent acquisition of FRHI, a hotel management company formerly owned by Qatar Investment Authority, billionaire Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal’s private investment arm Kingdom Holding and Oxford […]
There is a reason Rolls-Royce Motors appointed its youngest-ever chief executive in 2010. “I don’t want to say the brand would die, but the brand would never have had the success it has had over the last couple of years if we hadn’t rejuvenated it,” CEO Torsten Müller-Ötvös boasts. He is probably right. Until a couple of years ago, the English automobile brand was predominantly known as […]
12 January 2017 The 2nd Gulf Arrhythmia Congress, the official scientific sessions of the Saudi Heart Rhythm Society (SHRS) and Gulf Heart Rhythm Society (GHRS) has been launched in Riyadh on the 13th & 14th of January at Movenpick Hotel. (GAC) is the result of the aligned visions of two professional societies to organize a state-of-the-science meeting in the Gulf and wider region highlighting the latest developments […]
13 January 2017 Manama, Bahrain: Batelco, Bahrain’s leading digital services provider officially launched EasyPay, the first of its kind mobile payment service, in partnership with Ithmaar Bank, a Bahrain-based Islamic retail bank, and Arab Financial Services (AFS), one of the region’s leading electronic payments outsourcing service providers, at Seef Mall, Manama, on Thursday 12th of January 2017. The new service was announced by the three leading organisations […]
Throughout the presidential campaign and since Donald Trump’s election, former diplomats, retired generals, and foreign-policy analysts have attempted to decipher, explain, and predict his foreign-policy strategy. Will he pursue the big-stick model of Teddy Roosevelt? Embrace a neo-Nixonian “madman” strategy? Is Trump actually a champion of foreign-policy realism, or perhaps no realist at all? But all those questions make the same mistake — they assume the incoming […]
For years, Iran has been under a series of international sanctions prohibiting it from exporting arms. The United States has frequently claimed that Tehran has violated the sanctions in support of proxy forces in many conflicts, including in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and the Palestinian territories. Photo Weapons seized in February from smugglers near Yemen’s coast. Credit Australian Department of Defense, via Small Arms Survey The grenade launchers […]
Crystal Lagoons, the patented technology developer of giant crystalline lagoons, has announced it has held a series of meetings with prominent Qatari real estate developers as the country looks to capitalise on a growth in tourism numbers and revenues. Designed to be self-cleaning, the lagoons only require topping up in response to evaporation and use up to 100 times less chemicals than traditional pool systems, and only […]
By Jamie McGeever | LONDON LONDON European and U.S. stocks looked to end a sluggish week on a high note on Friday, while the dollar was on track for its biggest weekly fall in two months and U.S. bond yields eyed their longest run of weekly declines since July. Investors largely shrugged off figures that showed Chinese exports fell the most last year since 2009, and will […]
After the excitement around Opec agreeing oil supply cuts with Russia and other non-members at the end of last year, attention in 2017 has quickly shifted to the next key question: will they actually deliver all the promised cuts? A group of companies believe that they are positioned to deliver that answer, trumpeting their years of experience tracking global oil flows, using everything from modern satellite technology […]
ANKARA: Turkey’s threat to close its strategic southern Incirlik Air Base to US-led international coalition flights seem to have paid off, according to analysts.The US recently announced its decision to provide regular aerial intelligence to support Turkey in its military operation against Daesh around the Syrian town of Al-Bab.Incirlik does not belong to NATO, but is a Turkish base that remains open to the operations of NATO […]
The new Online Application Platform sees that the visa is processes within 3 Business Days 12 January 2017 Brits, Indians, citizens and expatriates of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and 81 other nationalities will now be able to apply for Azerbaijan visa online in a safe and stress-free and way following the introduction of a hustle free online visa application technology by the Ministry of Culture and […]
Saudi Arabia, 12 Jan, 2017 One of Saudi’s leading travel agencies, Mosaid Travel and Tourism Services, has renewed its ten-year exclusive relationship with global travel technology provider, Sabre Corporation (NASDAQ: SABR), to support its vision to expand regionally, provide more personalised travel experiences and improve customer satisfaction. “The travel industry is fast-evolving with new trends and rapidly-changing traveller expectations,” said Nadir Kazalbash, General Manager, Mosaid Travel and […]
JEDDAH/KANDAHAR: The killing of five diplomats from the UAE in a bombing in southern Afghanistan marks the deadliest attack ever for the young nation’s diplomatic corps, though it’s too soon to tell who was behind it or if the Gulf envoys were even the targets.The UAE said it would fly the nation’s flag at half-staff for three days in honor of the dead from the attack Tuesday […]
By Patricia Zengerle and Yeganeh Torbati | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson expressed views on Wednesday at odds with President-elect Donald Trump’s positions on key foreign policy issues like nuclear proliferation, trade deals, climate change and relations with Mexico. In a nine-hour Senate confirmation hearing, the former chief executive of oil company Exxon Mobil (XOM.N) said he favoured maintaining U.S. sanctions against Russia for […]
By Emily Chow | SUNGKAI, Malaysia SUNGKAI, Malaysia The Malaysian plantation district of Sungkai has become an initial – and unlikely – battleground for an election that embattled Prime Minister Najib Razak is expected to call this year. Sungkai is home to ethnic Malays who work for the national palm plantation operator, Federal Land Development Authority (Felda). Known as “Felda settlers”, they have long been among the […]
11 January 2017 A new report from the Arab Advisors Group analyzes the cellular tariffs for 42 cellular operators in 16 Arab countries. The analysis revealed that the average prepaid package rate was US$ 70.82, while the average postpaid package rate was US$ 47.77. Lebanon had the highest prepaid and postpaid average package rates, while Sudan and Morocco had the lowest postpaid average package rates. The analysis […]
Airbus posted an eight percent rise in deliveries last year, beating its own forecasts by a comfortable margin to set a company record, and pulled off a last-minute surge in orders to beat arch-rival Boeing in the race for new orders. Confirming an estimate published by Reuters, the European planemaker said on Wednesday it delivered 688 aircraft in 2016, compared with an official company forecast of more […]
In order to survive, the Syrian regime has had to rely to an extraordinary degree on Russian and Iranian forces, and their proxies, like Hezbollah. It really wasn’t the Syrian Arab Army that retook Aleppo. Indeed, the Syrian military is stretched so thin by geography and attrition that last month it lost most of the city of Palmyra (again) to the Islamic State while pro-government forces were […]
Jan. 10, 2017 DUBAI, United Arab Emirates– (BUSINESS WIRE/ME NewsWire) GMO GlobalSign K.K., a leading provider of trusted identity and security solutions and one of the longest established Certificate Authorities in the world, today announced the inauguration of its new office in Dubai. The local entity, GMO GlobalSign FZ-LLC, based in Dubai Internet City, is strategically located to cater to further strengthen GlobalSign’s presence in Asia, particularly […]
Economic growth will slow in Bahrain throughout 2017 and the government will continue to post large deficits as social instability limits opportunities for effective spending cuts, according to new research. In two separate reports this week, BMI Research warns that domestic instability in Bahrain will cause revenues to remain low by historical standards, even as oil prices start to recover. BMI forecasts Bahrain’s budget deficit to come […]
Prince Alwaleed: “This transaction marks yet another success for Kingdom’s value realization strategy” 10 January 2017 Kingdom Holding Company (KHC) chaired by HRH Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Bin Abdulaziz Alsaud, announces that it has successfully sold its 100% interest in the Mövenpick Hotel Ambassador Accra to QG Africa Hotel LP, a Mauritius-based fund managed by Quantum Global Investments Africa Management Ltd. for a consideration of $100M. The […]
Submitted by Soeren Kern via The Gatestone Institute, Sharia courts administering Islamic justice in Britain are run by clerics who believe some offenders should have their hands chopped off, according to Muslim scholar Elham Manea. She described the prevailing attitude as “totalitarian” and as more backward than some parts of Pakistan. Teaching children fundamental British values is an act of “cultural supremacism,” according to the National Union […]
Abu Dhabi // Rulers and officials of the GCC on Monday sent messages of condolence to the Iranian president and the family of Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the senior revolutionary figure and pragmatist who had developed good relations with member states and presided over a thaw in Tehran’s relations with Riyadh during his tenure as president. Rafsanjani died on Sunday at the age of 82 after suffering a […]
No one can ever confidently predict what will happen in the following 12 months, but forecasting 2017 is particularly difficult. The surprises of 2016 (Brexit and the election of Donald Trump are at the top of the list but there were others, including the sacking of the entire Kuwaiti parliament, Saudi Arabia’s backflip on its oil production policy and the sudden demonetisation in India) demonstrate that we […]
A high-profile forum co-hosted by the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) and European Union (EU) is to take place in Riyadh on Monday. In information carried on its website, the EU said that several GCC and EU officials would participate in the meeting aimed at expanding cooperation and encouraging bilateral investment. European Transport Commissioner Violeta Bulc is to lead the EU representation in the GCC along with […]
Who would now warn publicly against “Islamic fascism,” when the hard-liners sought to influence elections? Who would state openly that there should be a nuclear compromise? Continue reading the main story Mr. Rafsanjani said things others would not dare to say, all agreed, and his voice had at least created some tolerance for debates. “Hard-liners will be happy, but this is the start of a period of […]
08 January 2017 Ixtel technologies, one of the UAE’s leading digital services provider was recently awarded as the Best SME in GCC for 2016. The awards ceremony organized by the GCC Ministers of Labor council acknowledged the ixtel’s efforts towards innovation & technology transformation initiatives. The award was presented at the 33rd GCC Ministers of Labor council summit that took place in Riyadh. The ceremony was attended […]
More tourists from the Philippines, Pakistan and China visited Dubai in the first 10 months of 2016 compared to the same period last year, official figures from Dubai Tourism reveal. The Philippines reported a 19 percent increase in visitor numbers, growing from 262,000 to 311,000. They were closely followed by Pakistanis which registered 16 percent jump to 489,000 from 421,000. The third on the list were Chinese […]
Banks and petrochemicals stocks could be relative strong performers in the GCC in 2017 thanks to benchmark interest rate rises and a recovery in the global crude oil price, although slowing economic growth may weigh on regional markets. Both sectors have suffered in the last couple of years due to the dramatic oil price decline. The knock-on effect of lower investment and economic growth hit banks, with […]
