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In 2014 two human rights researchers from Britain went missing in Qatar. They had gone to investigate the conditions of migrants working in the Gulf state and it turned out that the authorities, displeased by the researchers' activities, had arrested them. International media took up the… Read more
Last November Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist, travelled to Riyadh for an interview with the heir to the Saudi throne – an interview that has since proved memorable for all the wrong reasons.
Under a headline announcing "Saudi Arabia’s Arab Spring, at Last", Friedman wrote… Read more
A lobbyist who has received at least $120,000 for PR activities on behalf of Libyan warlord Khalifa Haftar is one of the scheduled speakers at a controversial meeting to be held in the House of Lords later this month.
The meeting, billed as a discussion on postwar "reconstruction and… Read more
The disappearance and suspected murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul is the latest in a long line of reasons for questioning Britain's relationship with Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf monarchies.
It's a relationship that has never been viewed with much… Read more
As the humanitarian situation in Yemen continues to worsen, there are signs that the Houthis who seized control of the capital in 2014 face a growing challenge in the form of public discontent.
On Saturday more than 50 people were arrested outside Sana'a University while protesting against food… Read more
Isa Blumi is a senior lecturer at Stockholm University and author of a book published earlier this year – "Destroying Yemen: What Chaos in Arabia Tells Us about the World". It's a "superb" book according to a commentator on RT, the Russian propaganda channel, and Vanessa Beeley, a prominent… Read more
Peter Hitchens, the Mail On Sunday columnist, claims to have detected a "very interesting pattern" in official reports about chemical weapon allegations in Syria. The pattern, he says, is that "if official reports don't justify punitive attacks on Syria, new reports then appear, which do… Read more
A "vast body of evidence" supports claims that a chemical attack took place in Douma earlier this year, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Syria said yesterday.
The reported attack, on April 7, led to airstrikes by American, British and French forces six days later. As on all previous occasions… Read more
Video footage of a faked chemical attack in Syria, which the Russian military claimed would be "handed to global news outlets by the end of Tuesday", has so far failed to materialise.
According to a briefing note issued by the Russian Centre for Reconciliation of Opposing Sides in… Read more
Fighting near the Yemeni city of Hodeidah intensified at the weekend after peace talks in Geneva were abandoned before they had even begun.
The talks foundered over a dispute about travel arrangements which meant that representatives of the Houthi rebels who control much of northern Yemen… Read more
ARAB ART ONLINE: Susan Hefuna: Al Sabr Gamil (Patience is Beautiful) 2007. Ink stained on wood 140 x 170 cm. More information | Click to enlarge
