Heavy rain forecast in Saudi Arabia and UAE as France and Spain cool down after weekend of high temperatures
Intense thunderstorms are forecast across parts of the Gulf on Monday and Tuesday, bringing very high rainfall to the region and a significant flooding risk in parts.
Low pressure over the Arabian peninsula will deepen on Monday while a flow of moist tropical air moves into the region, significantly enhancing the production of showers as a result.
Continue reading...Crown prince’s pet project was sold as a 105-mile-long city of the future, but finances may have led to a rethink
It was billed as a glass-walled city of the future, an ambitious centrepiece of the economic plan backed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to transition Saudi Arabia away from oil dependency.
Now, however, plans for the mirror-clad desert metropolis called the Line have been scaled down and the project, which was envisaged to stretch 105 miles (170km) is expected to reach just a mile and a half by 2030.
Continue reading...Saudi Arabia is likely to host the 2034 tournament, but a Guardian investigation has revealed there are already a high number of ‘unexplained’ migrant worker deaths in the Gulf kingdom
Human rights organisations are warning that another World Cup will be tainted by the deaths and suffering of low-paid workers if Fifa does not take urgent steps to ensure that Saudi Arabia deals with the widespread abuse of its migrant workforce.
As the sole bidder, Saudi Arabia is almost certain to be anointed by Fifa this year as host of the World Cup in 2034, but rights groups said “workers cannot afford a repeat of Qatar 2022”.
Continue reading...Salah Fustok alleged by UK prosecutors to have been a middleman for nearly £10m in payments to Saudi prince
A Foreign Office official floated the idea of giving an honour to a businessman who was later alleged to have helped facilitate millions of pounds of bribes to a Saudi prince and his high-ranking associates.
Salah Fustok was alleged by UK anti-corruption prosecutors to have been a middleman for nearly £10m of payments to Prince Miteb bin Abdullah and other Saudi officials as “an inducement or reward” for the awarding of a contract by the Saudi Arabian national guard.
Continue reading...United States Commission on International Religious Freedom cuts visit short after rabbi told to remove Jewish head covering
A US delegation on religious freedom said on Monday it cut short its visit to Saudi Arabia after one of its members was asked to remove his Jewish head covering, or kippah.
The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) said its delegation was near Riyadh visiting Diriyah, a historic town and Unesco world heritage site, when the commission’s chair, the Orthodox rabbi Abraham Cooper, “refused their requests that he remove his religious head covering”.
Continue reading...Harris had longstanding relationship with ABTSS, later alleged by British prosecutors to have handled or received illegal payments
One of the largest military contractors in the US paid commissions to a Saudi company later alleged to have been a conduit for bribes for the kingdom’s royal family.
A document disclosed in a UK criminal trial revealed that Harris Corporation, now L3Harris, paid commissions to the Saudi company for over two decades for services in the kingdom.
Continue reading...The US singer has been called out by human rights activists for hosting a summit and performing on stage in the repressive state
Performer Alicia Keys projects a powerful position on women’s rights, hosting a regular Women to Women summit and posting inspirationally on Instagram on Friday for International Women’s Day. But the singer-songwriter’s message is undermined for some by the revelation that she is hosting the third edition of her summit this weekend in Saudi Arabia.
The American performer and her guests, including Pharrell Williams, best known for his worldwide hit Happy, are to discuss “how women are pushing the culture forward in Saudi Arabia and around the world”, she has announced, before the get-together in the coastal city of Jeddah.
Continue reading...Documents show officials stressing need to ‘keep the Saudis on side’ after revelations about notorious al-Yamamah deal
Britain’s Ministry of Defence moved questionable payments through its own bank account amid one of the biggest corruption scandals in history, despite concerns the money could be pocketed by the Saudi royal family.
Previously confidential documents show how the MoD agreed to make the payments to a Saudi bank account after the transactions came under scrutiny following an investigation by the UK anti-corruption agency, the Serious Fraud Office (SFO).
Continue reading...Revelations about payments by Ministry of Defence are culmination of decades of British deal-making with Saudis
The revelation that the Ministry of Defence paid millions of pounds to a firm that would later be accused of being a conduit for secret payments to high-ranking Saudi officials is the culmination of a scandal that has been half a century in the making.
The £8m paid from an MoD bank account between 2014 and 2017 was in connection with a large defence deal, Sangcom, first struck in the 1970s.
Continue reading...Project Arrow contract signed amid scramble to keep on track £1.6bn defence deal and ran until at least 2017
The UK Ministry of Defence paid millions of pounds to a company later alleged to have been a conduit for secret payments to high-ranking Saudi Arabian officials including a member of the royal family.
The MoD payments, worth £8m, were made under a contract codenamed Project Arrow that ran until at least 2017, according to documents that surfaced in a criminal trial.
Continue reading...Jury acquits Jeffrey Cook and John Mason after lawyers argue payments were authorised by UK and Saudi governments
Two men have been acquitted of paying bribes totalling millions of pounds to high-ranking Saudis after they argued that they had been unfairly prosecuted.
Jeffrey Cook and John Mason had been accused of bribing a Saudi prince and his associates to secure and maintain a huge defence deal for a British company. But on Wednesday, a jury in London acquitted them after lawyers argued the payments had been authorised by the British and Saudi governments.
Continue reading...Head of Islamic Revolutionary Guards defiant as US prepares ‘very consequential response’ to drone attack on Jordan base
The head of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) has vowed the country is not afraid of war with the US, as the Pentagon weighs how directly to respond to the killing of three US servicemen in a drone attack in Jordan.
The IRGC commander-in-chief, Maj Gen Hossein Salami, said: “We hear some threats from American officials about targeting Iran. We tell them that you tested us and we know each other. We do not leave any threat unanswered, and we do not look for war, but we are not afraid of it. This is the well-known truth.”
Continue reading...Blow to Joe Biden, who had hoped to benefit from lower pump prices in an election year
Saudi Arabia has cast doubt on the future of the global oil market after abandoning plans to grow its crude production capacity by 1m barrels a day.
The world’s biggest exporter signalled a big change in policy by ordering the state oil company, Saudi Aramco, to drop plans to expand its maximum production capacity to 13m barrels a day by 2027.
Continue reading...Shop will be open only to non-Muslim diplomats – but some fear it is first step to wider availability of alcohol in teetotal kingdom
The news that Saudi Arabia will allow its first alcohol shop has citizens and foreigners alike mulling one question: is this a minor policy tweak, or a major upheaval?
Sources familiar with preparations for the store disclosed details of the plan on Wednesday, as a document circulated indicating just how carefully leaders of the teetotal Gulf kingdom will manage its operations.
Continue reading...Human Rights Watch’s annual report highlights politicians’ double standards and ‘transactional diplomacy’ amid escalating crises
Human rights across the world are in a parlous state as leaders shun their obligations to uphold international law, according to the annual report of Human Rights Watch (HRW).
In its 2024 world report, HRW warns grimly of escalating human rights crises around the globe, with wartime atrocities increasing, suppression of human rights defenders on the rise, and universal human rights principles and laws being attacked and undermined by governments.
Continue reading...The Turkish Super Cup final between Galatasaray and Fenerbahce scheduled to be played in Saudi Arabia’s capital, Riyadh, on Friday was postponed over what the clubs have described as “some problems” in the event’s organisation.
At the heart of those issues, according to media reports, was the wish of the two teams to wear T-shirts featuring the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, during the warm-up before the evening kick-off.
Continue reading...Diplomats say the group’s threats to merchant vessels it claims are linked to Israel jeopardise the deal
The US has warned Houthi rebels that the peace plan for Yemen that was negotiated with Saudi Arabia and handed to the UN peace envoy will fail if attacks on merchant shipping off the coast of Yemen continue.
The French defence ministry said on Tuesday that the French frigate Languedoc intercepted and destroyed a drone that was threatening the Norwegian oil tanker Strinda in a complex aerial attack originating from Yemen on Monday evening.
Continue reading...Investors may sell shares to oil-rich state’s Public Investment Fund, which already owns a stake, report says
Saudi Arabia could take effective majority control of London Heathrow, the UK’s major airport, with other investors considering selling their stakes, according to reports.
The oil-rich state’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) allied with private equity investor Ardian to announce the purchase of a 25% stake in the airport last month from Ferrovial, the Spanish infrastructure giant that had been the primary owner of Heathrow for 17 years.
Continue reading...As the Cop28 climate summit begins in Dubai today, a secret Saudi Arabian plan to get poorer countries ‘hooked on its harmful products’ has emerged. Damian Carrington reports
Delegates from every country in the world are meeting today at the beginning of the Cop28 climate talks in Dubai, hosted by the United Arab Emirates. The scale of the challenge ahead of them is immense: phasing out the fossil fuels that power the global economy before a planetary tipping point is reached.
As the Guardian’s environment editor, Damian Carrington, tells Michael Safi this week, that task has got even tougher. It has emerged that Saudi Arabia is driving a huge global investment plan to create demand for its oil and gas in developing countries. Critics say the plan is designed to get countries “hooked on its harmful products”.
Continue reading...Spanish firm Ferrovial sells off holding after 17 years, with other 15% going to French group Ardian
Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund has taken a 10% stake in Heathrow for £1bn from the Spanish infrastructure company Ferrovial, which is selling off its holding in Europe’s biggest airport after 17 years.
Ferrovial has sold its entire 25% stake in Heathrow’s parent company, FGP Topco, for £2.4bn, with a 15% share of the firm going to the French private equity group Ardian and the rest going to the Saudi Public Investment Fund (PIF).
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