Kuwait calls for eradicating landmines worldwide
Source: Kuwait News Agency (Read full story)
Kuwait called on the international community to implement measures that would rid the world from landmines, said a Kuwaiti diplomat here Tuesday. In his speech to the meeting of members’ states in the Convention on the Prohibition of the Use, Stockpiling, Production and Transfer of Anti-Personnel Mines, Kuwait’s permanent representative at the UN and international organizations Ambassador Jamal Al-Ghunaim said that his country was in support of the international community efforts to ban landmines on a worldwide scale.
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Iran’s Zarif stretches Gulf trip to include UAE
Source: The Peninsula (Read full story)
Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, on a tour of Gulf states, will visit the United Arab Emirates today, he wrote on his Facebook page. “Following the visit last week of the UAE’s foreign minister to Tehran, tomorrow I will go to the Emirates and will have meetings with the high-ranking officials … in Dubai and Abu Dhabi,” Zarif said in his post. … The Emirates, which hosts a major Iranian expatriate community, was the first among Gulf nations to welcome the landmark deal clinched in Geneva on November 24.
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KSA spends SR530m on Syria relief programs
Source: Arab News (Read full story)
Interior Minister Prince Muhammad bin Naif, supervisor of the Saudi National Campaign for Syrians, has approved several relief programs for Syrian refugees at a cost of SR32 million. The amount will be utilized to supply 3,000 new tents, 300,000 blankets, 200,000 jackets, 600,000 sweaters and other clothes to equip refugees against the severe cold during winter.The Saudi charity will distribute emergency supplies through its offices in Jordan, Lebanon and Turkey. The campaign has already spent more than SR530 million on 81 relief programs for Syrians.
UAE economy to gain steam in 2014
Source: Khaleej Times (Read full story)
The UAE economy is poised to gain new momentum in 2014 with three key sectors — including huge non-oil sector investments, the buoyant trade and services sector, and the booming tourism industry — primarily driving the upswing in the country’s gross domestic product to 4.5 per cent from 4.4 per cent in 2013, Standard Chartered said on Tuesday. The bank, predicting a better 2014 across the world with the global economy picking up steam to rise to 3.5 per cent from 2.7 this year, and “inflation staying benign”, estimated that non-oil project spending in Abu Dhabi would reach $34 billion in 2014 in line with the emirate’s long-term development and diversification goals.
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IMF welcomes Kuwait”s recent economic performance
Source: Kuwait News Agency (Read full story)
Kuwait’s high oil prices and increased production have enabled the government to continue to record high fiscal and external surpluses and build strong buffers, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said in a report. The IMF showed in its report, released after its Executive Board concluded Article IV consultation with Kuwait on November 25, that “overall real non-oil gross domestic product (GDP) growth is projected to increase modestly to three percent in 2013, driven by an increase in domestic consumption and pick-up in public investment.” It showed that “the overall average consumer price inflation (CPI) is projected at three percent in 2013,” whereas the fiscal and external surpluses are projected at 27 percent of GDP and 39 percent of GDP, respectively, in 2013.
Ahmadinejad challenges Rowhani for debate
Source: The Peninsula (Read full story)
Former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad yesterday invited his successor Hassan Rowhani to debate “baseless and unfair” accusations that he is largely responsible for Iran’s economic ills. During a televised speech to mark his first 100 days in office last week, Rowhani said Ahmadinejad’s profligacy and mismanagement were as much to blame for inflation and currency devaluation as international sanctions. He said his government had inherited some $67bn of debt from Ahmadinejad, even though Iran raked in $600bn in oil revenue during his eight-year tenure. Writing to Rowhani, Ahmadinejad, who left office in August, said he had decided to respond to what he called factually incorrect comments that could lead to “misguided” decision-making.
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