Blog archive all

3rd October 2020
Week ending 3 October 2020   REGIONAL OVERVIEW   Almost 2.4 million Covid-19 infections have now been recorded in the Middle East and North Africa and the situation has worsened considerably over the past month. New cases, which were averaging around 15,000 a day… Read more
29th September 2020
Two Iraqi politicians have been awarded bogus degrees by a self-proclaimed university in Denmark, it has emerged. ● Former interior minister Qasim al-Araji received a worthless MA certificate from the unrecognised Aalborg Academy of Science in February 2019. ● Ahmad al-Ubaidi, the current minister… Read more
28th September 2020
On Saturday police in the Indian city of Mysore raided a ceremony where more than 100 people dressed in gowns and mortarboards were about to receive fake degrees. The would-be graduates had paid up to 100,000 rupees ($1,357) for doctorates from the bogus International Global Peace University,… Read more
26th September 2020
Week ending 26 September 2020   REGIONAL OVERVIEW   More than 2.2 million Covid-19 infections have now been recorded in the Middle East and North Africa and the situation continues to worsen. The total of new cases across the region, which was averaging around 15,… Read more
19th September 2020
Week ending 19 September 2020   REGIONAL OVERVIEW   Covid-19 infections in the Middle East and North Africa continue to rise. The total of new cases across the region, which was averaging around 15,000 a day at the start of this month, is now around 20,000… Read more
17th September 2020
There are a few countries in the world where the coronavirus pandemic has not followed the course that scientists expected – and the reasons are puzzling. Yemen is one example in the Middle East and there are others in Africa such as Kenya, Tanzania, Sudan and Somalia. Covid-19 took a long time to… Read more
17th September 2020
By: Nima Khorrami
Guest post from Nima Khorrami:  Iran’s angry reaction to the normalisation of relations between Israel and Bahrain and the UAE was to be expected. However, its fury, especially with regard to the UAE, has less to do with the possibility of a future military strike staged from Emirati soil or closer… Read more
16th September 2020
The Aalborg Academy of Science is not a university, though it pretends to be one. It is the latest in a series of privately-run institutions found to be operating in Europe without proper accreditation and issuing worthless degree certificates to people in the Middle East. Two were uncovered in… Read more
12th September 2020
Week ending 12 September 2020   REGIONAL OVERVIEW   Covid-19 infections in the Middle East and North Africa have risen to new heights over the last few days. The total of new cases across the region has averaged almost 18,000 a day this week, according to the… Read more
5th September 2020
Week ending 5 September 2020   REGIONAL OVERVIEW   New Covid-19 infections in the Middle East and North Africa remain fairly constant according to official figures, ranging between 14,000 and 15,000 cases a day during the last three weeks. Among the 20 countries… Read more