Arabic

The Egyptian government said on Wednesday it would supply more gas and diesel to power stations to deal with electricity shortages that have worsened in recent months after the cash-strapped country failed to import enough fuel.

Saudi Arabia faces a possible inflation risk due to buoyant growth that may warrant policy action to prevent the economy from over-heating, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) said on Monday.

Twenty percent of private-sector companies in Saudi Arabia are not meeting quotas for the employment of nationals, despite a program aimed at boosting recruitment that launched two years ago, a labor official said.

Libya will have to pay Kuwait’s Kharafi group $930 million in damages for former leader Muammar Gaddafi’s cancelling of the construction of a vacation resort, Kuwaiti newspapers reported on Monday.

Qatar’s sovereign wealth fund has bought a 40-percent stake in a new 290,000-square meter skyscraper project near the center of Milan with a commercial value of 2.0 billion euros ($2.6 billion), the companies said on Friday.

Kuwait Airways signed a deal with Airbus to buy 15 A320neo and 10 A350-900 planes with options for 10 more, five from each category, chairman Sami al-Nasef said on Thursday.

Marking Labor Day, which coincides on May 1, the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) said Tuesday that unemployment rate in Palestine in 2012 was 23%, or 256,000 people were unemployed.

Pakistan and Palestine need to focus on developing bilateral trade cooperation to create better economic opportunities for their people, Walid A.M. Abu Ali, Ambassador of Palestine said while addressing the business community at Islamabad Chamber of Commerce & Industry.

Gulf state Qatar has bought a 5 percent stake in Indian telecoms firm Bharti AirtelLtd for $1.26 billion, the firm said on Friday, extending an overseas buying spree from mainly developed countries to Asia’s third-largest economy.

EFG Hermes, one of the largest investment banks in the Middle East, plans to cut costs, sell non-core assets, and return cash to shareholders after a planned tie-up with Qatar’s QInvest failed on Wednesday.