Middle East News – Hariri forms unity government

Hariri forms unity government
Lebanon’s pro-western prime minister, Saad al-Hariri, unveiled a new unity government, including two ministers from the pro-Syrian and pro-Iranian Hizbollah movement, in a 30-member cabinet

Libya to put Swiss businessmen on trial
Libya has said it will put on trial two Swiss businessmen who have been prevented from leaving the country for more than a year after a spat with Switzerland sparked by the brief arrest in Geneva of Hannibal, a son of Muammar Gaddafi , the Libyan leader.

Qatar to issue second sovereign bond
Qatar is set to return to the credit markets with another bumper sovereign bond amid optimism about its fast-growing economy

US fails to match Mideast rhetoric
Top diplomats acknowledge that Washington has failed to make substantial progress on the Arab-Israeli conflict and that Tehran was likely to reject a compromise offer

Travails test Alba’s mettle
The Bahraini aluminium producer has had to adapt in order to survive a catalogue of problems, including a corruption inquiry, plunging prices and a change of management

Iran executes Kurdish activist
In a rare application of the death penalty against a political prisoner, Iran has hanged Ehsan Fattahian, a Kurdish activist, on charges of armed struggle against the Islamic regime

Yemen conflict enters new phase
Concern is mounting that conflict with Houthi movement is distracting Sana from other challenges such as a growing al-Qaeda presence in the north, an unemployment crisis, dwindling natural resources and a secessionist movement in the south

Iran’s artists join growing boycott of state
A growing boycott of state-sponsored ceremonies is under way by many Iranian cultural figures in protest at the policies of the hardline regime

War veterans make Iraq their business
Growing number of prominent former American military officers and diplomats are using their Iraq experience to develop business links in the country. The US experience in Iraq, however, has been fraught with suspicion

Iran criticises Oxford memorial to Neda
A college of Oxford University has set up a scholarship in memory of Neda Salehi Agha-Soltan, the young Iranian woman whose death during the June post-election unrest provoked outrage and became a symbol of regime brutality

Oil heavyweight ponders landscape
The head of the world’s most influential state oil company predicts demand will grow at a ‘reasonable pace’, increasing annually by perhaps 1m to 1.5m barrels per day from 2010

Yemen gas investors set sail in choppy water
President Ali Abdullah Saleh insists Yemen’s LNG project will unify the country, but natural gas prices have collapsed with the economic downturn and his country is dealing with political instability

Fatah signals change of direction if Abbas quits
Shaken by the prospect of losing their veteran leader, senior Palestinian officials have started debating new strategies in their long-running conflict with Israel in the hope of galvanising international support

Abbas offers bleak view of peace
The Palestinian Authority president cast further doubt on the possible resumption of peace talks but declined to address his future at the PA

Abbas hits out from the shadows
Mahmoud Abbas’s decision not to contest the next Palestinian presidential election is a reflection of how quickly and dramatically the hopes for peace that accompanied the election, a year ago, of US president Barack Obama have been extinguished, writes Roula Khalaf

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