Stocks across the Gulf Arab region tumbled yesterday as a crisis of confidence triggered some of the steepest falls in years, with Dubai losing nearly 12% to hit an 11-month low after breaking a key support level. Many Gulf equity markets have been in the red this year for the first time since 2002, but [...]
A fleeting smile lit up the stern face of Sheik Abdul-Atheem al-Bahrani when asked if he worried that the sectarian tensions in Iraq would spread to the Gulf. “The good in Iraq overflows, but so do its evils,” said the Bahraini Shiite cleric, quoting an old saying. The spiral of Shiite-Sunni clashes in Iraq unleashed [...]
The following is an assessment by the U.S. State Department of the situation of Shiites in five Gulf nations in 2005, as it appeared in “Country Reports on Human Rights Practices,” released Tuesday. Bahrain : The government rarely interferes with what it considers legitimate religious observances. The government permitted public religious events, most notably the [...]
Buoyed by the overwhelming response most IPOs generated last year, GCC markets will witness a spurt of new initial public offerings worth more than $33 billion in two years, analysts recently said. With some 116 IPOs having an average value of $292 million expected to be floated between 2006-08, the market will continue to ride [...]
Sectarian violence in Iraq could spread across the region, a top expert has warned.Gulf countries are also vulnerable to terrorist attacks on oil installations, following the foiled attack in Saudi Arabia, says Toby Craig Jones, who until recently worked in Bahrain as a political analyst with the International Crisis Group. He is concerned that the [...]
Young Saudis, thirsty for cinema in a country with no big screens and just the bare bones of a movie industry, are determined to drag the ultra-conservative Muslim kingdom into the celluloid world. Seven Saudi movies will take part in a film festival in the United Arab Emirates’ capital Abu Dhabi in March, the strongest [...]
