|By Matein Khalid| OPEC”s ministerial meeting on December 6 will have a seismic impact on the outlook for global oil markets. OPEC has been unnerved by a 30% fall in crude oil prices in the past two months on expectations of lower oil demand due to a Chinese economic slowdown, spectacular growth in US shale oil supply, King Dollar’s chilling impact on the commodities complex and long […]
|By Arabian Post Staff|Smart Dubai and IBM announced the launch of the Dubai Blockchain Platform, the first government-endorsed blockchain platform as-a-service in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Delivered through an IBM Cloud environment and built locally in the UAE, the enterprise-ready platform will serve as a stepping stone for organizations in the UAE and globally to transition their blockchain testing and development into full-production. It will also […]
|By Arabian Post Staff|In a bid to achieve food security in developing countries and eradicate global poverty, Abu Dhabi Fund for Development (ADFD), the leading national entity for development aid, has allocated nearly AED3.2 billion towards development projects in the agricultural and irrigation sectors. Representing 7 per cent of the total financial assistance contributed by the Fund in supporting developing countries to date, this assistance has allowed […]
Is the human race winning? It seems that the answer is no. We go slowly along a pathway that plays with the notion of progress. We digress constantly from focussing upon what would fix issues of division, disagreement and despair. The fundamentals are wrong. This is because we became strong believers of what deceives us. We see policies formulated on the basis of hatred, and not practicality. […]
|By Arabian Post Staff| Media reports have quoted Houthi forces as claiming a rocket battalion attack on the Dubai International Airport. The UAE General Civil Aviation Authority (GCAA), however, denied the Houthi media claims and affirmed that the UAE air traffic was operating business as usual. The denial was carried by official news agency WAM in a one-sentence statement. According to the Houthi forces’ official media wing, […]
|By Arabian Post Staff| Ras Al Khaimah Petroleum Authority (RAKPA), the regulator of the petroleum sector in the Emirate of Ras Al Khaimah (RAK) in the United Arab Emirates, is seeing a high level of interest from Indian companies to qualify for the 2018 RAK licensing round. Growing demand in the Indian market and the unique opportunity for Indian companies to explore and develop oil and gas in […]
By James M. Dorsey Message to Abu Dhabi, Riyadh and Tel Aviv: Not to worry, US President Donald J. Trump has no intention of meeting his Iranian counterpart, Hassan Rouhani, unconditionally. On the contrary, Mr. Trump’s surprise announcement that he is willing to talk to Mr. Rouhani is likely part of a plan formulated almost a year before he returned to government service by his national security advisor John […]
By James M. Dorsey China appears to be shifting gears in its multi-billion dollar Belt and Road initiative. Long projected as driven by economics and the benefit of infrastructure linkages, China appears to be increasingly adding a security component to the initiative against the backdrop of President Xi Jinping positioning of his country as a superpower rather than a developing nation. The emergence of a security component […]
By James M. Dorsey This month’s inauguration of a fibreoptic cable linking Pakistan with China could prove to be a double-edged sword. Constructed by Chinese conglomerate Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd, the cable is likely to enhance both Pakistan’s information communication technology infrastructure as well as the influence of Chinese authoritarianism at a moment that basic freedoms in Pakistan are on the defensive. The $44 million, 820-kilometre underground Pak-China Fibre […]
By James M. Dorsey The Pakistani government’s removal of a virulently anti-Shiite militant from its terrorism list at the very moment that an international money laundering and terrorism finance watchdog was deciding to put the country on a watchlist highlights Pakistan’s struggle to come to grips with militancy. The decision by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) that was reported by Pakistani media but has yet to be announced […]
Dubai property developer Danube Properties announced the launch of its 11th project, a Dh550 million Lawnz at the International City.Construction of the project is expected to start in 2018 with completion in 2020. Lawnz is Danube Properties’ first project at the International City and its first gated complex. “This is our biggest project so far that will add 1,064 units to our existing portfolio and we are […]
|By Matein Khalid| Crude oil prices plunged by 7% in two sessions as Saudi Arabia and Russia confirmed that they would release 1 million barrels a day in the wet barrel markets. Speculative froth in the oil futures markets vanished, to be replaced by a new trading calculus based on the realities of supply and demand – as well as the unknowable (and unquantifiable!) arc of […]
By James M. Dorsey A recent upsurge in insurgent activity in Kashmir likely explains Pakistani and Chinese reluctance to crackdown on internationally designated militant Hafez Saeed and the network of groups that he heads. So does the fact that Mr. Saeed and Lashkar-e-Taiba, an outlawed, India-focused ultra-conservative Sunni Muslim group widely seen as one of South Asia’s deadliest, have assisted Pakistani intelligence and the military in countering […]
Etisalat Digital announced that it has signed strategic partnerships with four scale-ups as part of the ‘Dubai Future Accelerators Program,’ the world’s largest governbment supported accelerator. The 4th cohort of the ‘Dubai Future Accelerators’, launched in March this year with the participation of Etisalat Digital and other government bodies and in cooperation with the world’s most innovative companies, came to a close on xx May. The program […]
By James M. Dorsey Ousted Pakistani prime minister Nawaz Sharif kicked up a storm when he earlier this month seemingly admitted that Pakistan had supported militants who attacked multiple targets in Mumbai in 2008, killing 166 people. Mr. Sharif’s admission, which he has since tried to walk back, put a finger on Pakistan’s controversial policy of selective support of militant groups at a sensitive time. Pakistan is gearing up for elections that […]
|By Saifur Rahman, Associate Editor| The historic first cargo of two million barrels of crude oil from the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company (ADNOC), destined for the Indian Strategic Petroleum Reserves Ltd (ISPRL) has been loaded and is en-route to India, in the presence of Dharmendra Pradhan, Indian Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas, and Dr. Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, UAE Minister of State and ADNOC Group CEO at a ceremony in Abu […]
By James M. Dorsey A Saudi Moroccan soccer spat speaks volumes about the depth of change in the Arab world. The spat over Saudi Arabia’s refusal to support a Moroccan bid for the hosting rights of the 2026 World Cup tells the tale of the rise of individual country nationalism at the expense of Arab solidarity, Saudi determination to safeguard its alliance with the United States at whatever cost, […]
By Matein Khalid A dismal legacy of civil war, sanctions, insurgency, foreign invasion and terrorism has had a catastrophic impact on the Iraqi economy. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi told the assembled global elite at Davos 2018 that Iraq needed $100 billion in postwar construction. Yet money alone will not solve Iraq’s problems of systemic corruption, a society divided by sectarian cleavages, poverty, the displacement of 2 million […]
By James M. Dorsey Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s investment of $1 billion and option to pump a further $480 million into Richard Branson’s ventures in space, confirmed during the prince’s recent visit to the United States, was more than just another headline-grabbing move. By focusing on space sciences, long a field rejected by ultra-conservative Islamic scholars, some of whom insist that the earth is flat, Prince […]
By James M. Dorsey Twin attacks earlier this week on Pakistani security forces in the troubled province of Balochistan cast a light on a sustained and violent campaign against police and paramilitary units as well as Shiite and Christian minorities. The attacks by groups, some of which have had links to Pakistan’s powerful military and intelligence apparatus as well as Saudi Arabia, spotlight the Pakistani state’s inability to […]
/By Daniel Markuson/The Tor browser is a powerful free tool for browsing the internet anonymously that also unlocks a portion of the deep web in the form of .onion addresses. If you own or are looking to create a website, you may want to learn how to create a .onion site to protect yourself and your visitors. What is a .onion domain and how does it work […]
By James M. Dorsey Stepped up Saudi efforts to forge close diplomatic, economic and cultural ties to Shia-majority Iraq in a bid to counter significant Iranian influence in the country appear to be paying off. The Saudi initiative demonstrates the kingdom’s ability to engage rather than exclusively pursue a muscular, assertive and confrontational policy towards the Islamic republic and its perceived allies. It raises the question whether […]
By James M. Dorsey Bangladesh, in a twist of irony, is looking to Saudi Arabia to fund a $ 1 billion plan to build hundreds of mosques and religious centres to counter militant Islam that for much of the past decade traced its roots to ultra-conservative strands of the faith promoted by a multi-billion dollar Saudi campaign. The Bangladeshi plan constitutes the first effort by a Muslim country to enlist […]
By James M. Dorsey Iranian leaders are struggling, three months after anti-government protests swept the Islamic republic, to ensure that environmental issues that helped sparked a popular uprising in Syria in 2011 leading to a brutal civil war don’t threaten the clergy’s grip on power. Like Syria, Iran has been confronting a drought that has affected much of the country for more than a decade with precipitation dropping to its lowest […]
