Tag Archives: Qatar

The United States and the United Arab Emirates will work together on coordinating finance to decarbonise the economy, focusing on areas including hydrogen, renewable energy and low carbon urban design, a joint statement said on Monday. U.S. climate envoy John Kerry, who is leading efforts to get countries to step …

Afghan President Ashraf Ghani will put forward a three-phase peace roadmap for Afghanistan during a proposed meeting in Turkey, seeking an agreement with the Taliban and a ceasefire before elections, a document seen by Reuters shows. Washington is pushing for a conference to be hosted by Turkey, with U.N. involvement, …

International deliveries of arms were flat in the period 2016-2020, ending more than a decade of increases, the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said in a report on Monday. The United States, France and Germany – three of the world’s biggest exporters – increased deliveries, but falls in exports …

Turkey’s actions must show alignment with Egypt’s principles and goals for relations between the two countries to return to normal, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry said on Sunday. Shoukry confirmed contacts between Cairo and Ankara after years of tensions but indicated that dialogue was limited. Relations have been frosty since …

A powerful car bomb near a police station on Friday night killed at least seven people and wounded more than 50 others in Afghanistan’s western Herat province, officials said. Herat Governor Sayed Abdul Wahid Qatali said several women and children were among the dead. He added that at least 53 …

U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez said on Tuesday a May 1 deadline for withdrawing U.S. forces from Afghanistan may have to be reconsidered because the Taliban are not meeting their commitments under a 2020 peace deal. “I’m very concerned about the viability of the peace process in …

The U.S. special envoy to Afghanistan proposed a shakeup of the stalled peace process this week, including an interim government and a conference of key players, according to diplomatic and political sources, but his plan faced immediate objections by the warring sides. Afghan-born U.S. diplomat Zalmay Khalilzad is on a …

Libya’s eastern strongman Khalifa Haftar has offered his backing for a peace process that seeks to end a decade of chaos, after meeting the head of a new transitional presidential council. The military commander met with Mohammed Younes Menfi, a former diplomat who also comes from eastern Libya, and who …

Egyptian authorities on Saturday released a journalist working for Qatar’s Al Jazeera television network who was held in pre-trial detention for more than four years, his brother and a lawyer told Reuters. Mahmoud Hussein, an Egyptian detained in December 2016‮‮ ‬‬after arriving in Cairo from Doha on vacation, was held …

Iran has hosted the political leader of Afghanistan’s Taliban during the past week, offering Tehran’s own help as a mediator in peace talks between the insurgents and the Afghan government that have become stalled in Qatar. Shi’ite Muslim Iran has been a foe of the hardline Sunni Muslim Taliban for …

After months out of the global spotlight, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman has swept back to centre stage with eye-catching diplomatic and economic moves aimed at showing the new U.S. president he is a valuable partner who can get things done. Within the span of a few weeks, the …

The UAE Minister for Foreign Affairs Dr. Anwar Gargash has told Arab News that the GCC is “collectively in agreement with any threat towards its security” from Iran. In a virtual press conference on Thursday, the minister addressed the 41st GCC summit held in AlUla where an agreement was signed …

The debate as to whether Diego Maradona is the best player the world has ever seen will spark back into life with the news of his death at the age of 60 on Wednesday, However, those lucky Saudi fans who saw him in action in Jeddah in 1987 will surely …

Female assassins who lured an Afghan security official to his death with promises of sex before shooting him and dumping his body at a cemetery are among thousands of Taliban criminals freed as part of a fragile peace plan. While the ultra-conservative Islamists ban women from many areas of life …

Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister said on Saturday he was confident that Democrat Joe Biden’s incoming U.S. administration would pursue policies that help regional stability and that any discussions with it would lead to strong cooperation. Riyadh is bracing itself for a new U.S. president who pledged on the election campaign …

A prominent women’s rights advocate who was part of Afghanistan’s government’s team of negotiators at the intra-Afghan talks with the Taliban said that despite the negotiations in Doha, Qatar, the insurgent group believe in regaining power “through military means.” “(Since signing the deal with the US), the Taliban feel they …

The main focus of Middle East peace efforts should be to bring Israel and the Palestinians back to the negotiating table, the Saudi foreign minister said on Thursday in a comment suggesting that Israeli-Saudi normalization is unlikely any time soon. “I believe that the focus now needs to be on …

A suicide bomber drove an explosive-laden truck into a checkpoint in Afghanistan late on Wednesday killing 11 people, as peace talks between the government and Taliban militants in Qatar seemed to have no bearing on the violence at home. No group claimed responsibility for the attack in the southern province …

Despite over a year of negotiations, Sudan is facing a fresh obstacle to its removal from a U.S. terrorism list that has hindered its economy: a demand that it normalize relations with Israel, three sources familiar with the matter said. However, three Sudanese government officials told Reuters on Thursday that …

Saudi Arabia’s price for normalising relations with Israel is the creation of a sovereign Palestinian state with Jerusalem as its capital, a senior member of the Saudi royal family reaffirmed on Friday. Prince Turki al-Faisal was apparently responding to U.S. President Donald Trump who said on Wednesday he expected Saudi …

by James M. Dorsey | Jul 14, 2020 An initial version of this story was first published in Inside Arabia A podcast version of this story is available on Soundcloud, Itunes, Spotify, Stitcher, TuneIn, Spreaker, Pocket Casts, Tumblr, Podbean, Audecibel, Patreon and Castbox. A Palestinian move to secure Palestine’s energy needs by tying them to high-stakes Turkish regional gambits constitutes an effort to reduce Palestinian dependence on …

Israel called on Tuesday for the immediate resumption of indirect talks on the return of two Israeli civilians and the remains of two soldiers held for years in Gaza, but the territory’s Islamist rulers Hamas dismissed the overture. The Israeli appeal came in a statement from Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s …

Facebook Inc (FB.O) said on Monday it had removed two networks of fake accounts linked to digital marketing firms in Egypt and India which were pushing dueling narratives about countries in the Gulf on the Facebook and Instagram platforms. Facebook, in its first monthly report on information operations, said both …

U.S. President Donald Trump hailed the agreement signed between the United States and the Taliban on Saturday as a move to end American’s longest war and bring U.S. troops home from Afghanistan. “We are working to finally end America’s longest war and bring our troops back home,” a White House …

The Taliban said on Sunday they will not hold direct talks with the Afghan government and rejected a statement from a senior minister about plans to hold such a meeting in the next two weeks, a senior Taliban official said. State Minister for Peace Affairs Abdul Salam Rahimi said on …

Qatar said on Sunday that there was a disconnect between the Palestinians and the United States over a U.S. blueprint aimed at ending the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians, warning that a solution could not be imposed on Palestinians. The U.S. blueprint, driven by Jared Kushner, Donald Trump’s son-in-law …

The is a translation of an interview conducted by Mohamed Nazreen Shahul Hamid and published in the November 2018 edition of “Dewan Sastera“, a Malaysian literary magazine edited by Zaharahanum Kamarudin. The interviewee, Emad El-Din Aysha, PhD, is currently a member of the Egyptian Society for Science Fiction (ESSF) and a …

Qatar has airlifted 24 armored vehicles to Mali, in a move it said would help the countries of the African Sahel region combat terrorism. Qatar has increased efforts to show it is a force for good in international security since its Gulf Arab neighbors imposed a diplomatic and economic boycott …

A $15 million Qatari cash infusion was paid out to impoverished Palestinian civil servants in the Gaza Strip on Friday, offering the enclave’s dominant Hamas Islamists a potential domestic reprieve though Israel said the money would not go to them. Hamas’s political rival based in the West Bank, Palestinian President …

Russian oil giant Rosneft (ROSN.MM) said on Tuesday that the Qatar Investment Authority sovereign wealth fund would pay around 3.7 billion euros ($4.23 billion) for a half of a 14.16 percent stake in the company. The QIA would become the third-largest Rosneft shareholder as a result of the deal after …

Qatar rejects accusations of meddling in Bahrain’s internal affairs, Qatar’s foreign ministry said in a tweet. “The State of Qatar condemns that its name was mentioned in Bahrain’s internal conflicts,” the ministry said. A Bahraini court on Sunday ordered life sentences for three senior opposition members, overturning a previous acquittal …

Qatar’s BeIN says it has “irrefutable evidence” that a pirate channel illegally showing hundreds of live European football matches is being carried on the Saudi-based satellite provider Arabsat Qatari broadcaster BeIN said Thursday it has “irrefutable evidence” that a pirate channel illegally showing hundreds of live European football matches is …

Qatar pledged $15 billion (Dh55.09 billion) of investment in Turkey that will be channeled into Turkish financial markets and banks, a government source told Reuters yesterday. The investment package was announced after Qatar’s Emir Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani met President Tayyip Erdogan in Ankara, as Turkey grapples with a …

QNB Group, the largest financial institution in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) region, announced its results for the six months period ended 30 June 2018. For the first half of 2018, Net Profit reached QAR7.1 billion (USD1.9 billion), up by 7% compared to last year. Total assets increased by …

The International Court of Justice has announced that Saudi Arabia, Egypt, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain filed an appeal against the decision handed down by the UN’s global civil aviation body over complaints made by Qatar. The Applicants invoked Article 84 of the Chicago Convention, read in conjunction with …

The European Commission is investigating the bloc’s biggest seaborne gas supplier Qatar Petroleum over potentially restrictive 20-year supply agreements inhibiting development of a single gas market, its latest challenge to a major gas supplier. The bloc, having just wrapped up a seven-year market abuse probe into Russian giant Gazprom, said …

BeIN Sports, the Qatari-owned broadcaster, reportedly went dark in the UAE overnight, with viewers discovering on Saturday morning that they were no longer able to access the channels via Du or Etisalat. This is not the first time the network has been unavailable: Last summer, due to the Qatar crisis, …

Charles Kushner, the real-estate developer and father of President Donald Trump’s senior adviser, Jared, said in an interview with The Real Deal that his much-scrutinized meeting with the Qatari finance minister last year was “wrong.” The meeting occurred in New York City just months after Trump’s inauguration, and the men …

The UAE and Russia signed on Friday a Declaration of Strategic Partnership to cooperate in various sectors such as politics, security, economy and culture, along with cooperation in the humanitarian, scientific, technological and tourist domains. The declaration was signed by His Highness Shaikh Mohammad Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Abu Dhabi …

On Tuesday night, the British tabloid The Daily Mail reported that Michael Cohen had asked Ahmed al-Rumaihi, who runs a $100 Qatari sovereign wealth fund, to send him “millions” of dollars, which he would then pass on “to Trump family members.” The tabloid attributed this claim to a “senior Kuwaiti government source” – …

As Gazans continue to participate in mass protests amid heightened frustrations at their dire humanitarian situation, Qatari aid and infrastructure projects in the besieged strip have been dying out following the blockade imposed on Qatar by Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt since June 2017. An Israeli study by …

Gaza’s Hamas rulers have shut the offices of a Qatari-Palestinian cellular provider in connection with its investigation into an explosion that targeted the visiting Palestinian prime minister. Hamas police spokesman Ayman Batniji said Saturday that Wataniya Mobile, a subsidiary of Qatar’s Ooredoo, was being closed down for “refusing to cooperate” …

The GCC’s non-financial corporate sector is expected to face pressure on profitability resulting from fiscal consolidation efforts in the current year and the next, according to ratings agency Moody’s. “GGC governments have done fairly well in balancing reform implementation while preventing any systemic shock to the corporate sector. However, fiscal …

Banks across the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) are expected to see stabilisation of the financial profiles and performance from the second half of 2018 after two years of significant pressure, according to S&P Global Ratings. While analysts expect to see further easing of liquidity and funding with improvement in asset …