Gulf Business speaks to Raghu Malhotra, division president, Middle East and North Africa, MasterCard.
The comments were made at the 24th meeting of the GCC Ministerial Committee for Planning and Development in Kuwait.
The lack of progress in talks that ended last week in Vienna had raised doubts over a breakthrough by the July 20 deadline.
The six youngsters were detained for what police called their “obscene” behaviour, one of them said in an online posting.
Mubarak has been under house arrest at a military hospital since August.
Abdullah Elshamy, one of four reporters being held in Egypt, has been on hunger strike since Jan. 21 to protest against his detention.
Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmed al-Sabah will visit Iran on May 31-June 1 at the invitation of Iranian President Hassan Rouhani.
Heavily armed gunmen stormed Libya’s parliament on Sunday demanding its suspension.
Security forces have detained thousands of Brotherhood supporters since the military deposed president Mohamed Mursi last July.
Total value of building construction expected to reach $128.5 billion, with the medical sector getting the biggest market share.
KIPCO, OSN’s parent company, had indicated that an IPO was expected to happen this year.
Narendra Modi’s BJP party won the 2014 Indian elections with a landslide majority.
Poor financial reporting and an absence of credit bureaus are hindering SME lending.
Natixis currently has around 40 staff in Dubai, as well as a small representative office in Egypt.
The UAE and other Gulf states promised more than $12 billion in loans and donations to support the Egyptian economy after Mursi’s removal.
Global oil demand growth will be slightly higher than previously thought in 2014, at 1.32 million barrels per day (bpd), the IEA said.
U.S. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel addressed a meeting of GCC defence ministers in Jeddah.
There has been a marked increase in the number of direct air connections between the two regions in the last year.
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has visited most of Kuwait, Qatar, Oman and the UAE since the nuclear pact.
The Fund estimates that subsidies cost the region $237 billion annually.
The passenger was on Saudi Airlines Flight 113 from Jeddah to London.
Beck’s Belcanto will be another ‘casual fine dining’ concept, similar to Social by Heinz Beck at The Waldorf Astoria Dubai Palm Jumeirah.
The Southeast Asian country is boosting social media promotion and working on improving air connectivity to lure more visitors from the GCC.
Despite a closing of the gap between Western and Arab salaries in 2014, average wages have declined overall.
The Gulf Business 2014 Salary Survey found that salaries for Western expatriates in the GCC fell steeply last year.
The Gulf Business 2014 Salary Survey found that the average wage of an Asian expatriate in the GCC dropped by 4.27 per cent.
The Gulf Business 2014 Salary Survey found that there has been an influx of well-qualified Arab expats into the GCC in the last year.
Russia’s military intervention on Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula and its aftermath in eastern Ukraine have rattled oil markets for the last few months.
Housing allowance currently stands at around 25 per cent of basic pay across most GCC countries.
The disease, a form of coronavirus, has killed 121 people in Saudi Arabia since it was identified two years ago.