As Covid-19 vaccines become more available, here is a country-by-country roundup of the situation in the Middle East and North Africa. While some countries are still waiting for supplies, in others the roll-out is well under way.
Some – mostly the wealthier ones – have struck deals with major… Read more
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In just six years a small team of investigators at the Bellingcat website have chalked up some remarkable achievements. One was their naming of Russian agents who poisoned Sergei and Yulia Skripal with Novichok in Britain – followed, a couple of years later, by identifying those behind a similar… Read more
Secretary of State Blinken: "It’s vitally important that we do everything we can to get humanitarian assistance to the people of Yemen"
When Antony Blinken, the newly-appointed US Secretary of State, gave his first press briefing on Wednesday the first topic to come up was the war in… Read more
News that an international conference on "Gender Identity and LGBT Rights" is to take place in the United Arab Emirates is causing a stir in the gay media.
The idea of holding a conference on LGBT rights in the Emirates is not only surprising but potentially significant. It would be the first of… Read more
REGIONAL OVERVIEW
New Covid-19 infections in the Middle East and North Africa averaged just under 28,000 a day during December, bringing the total since the pandemic began to almost five million, according to official figures.
Across the region as a whole… Read more
The attack on Aden airport in war-torn Yemen which killed at least 25 people and injured more than 100 on Wednesday appears to have had a political purpose rather than a military one.
Crowds had gathered to welcome a plane carrying ministers in one of the country's two rival governments. Minutes… Read more
The Saudi billionaire who came to London, met Tony Blair and the Queen ... and took home a bogus PhD
The American University of London is no ordinary university. Instead of having a campus it has a mailbox at a shop in the Old Brompton Road. And it once offered to sell a degree in business administration to a dog for £4,500.
Though operating from the UK, the American University of London (AUOL… Read more
Dozens of students received worthless degrees at this ceremony
Following the discovery that a Kuwaiti government minister who uses the title "Doctor" had got his PhD from a bogus university, more dodgy degrees among the Gulf state's citizens have come to light.
Videos posted on YouTube show "… Read more
A cabinet reshuffle in Kuwait last week saw the appointment of Dr Abdullah Abdul-Samad Marafie as minister in charge of housing. Biographical notes circulated by the government show he has a PhD in management and finance from the American University in London. Marafie has several other academic… Read more
REGIONAL OVERVIEW
A million new cases of Covid-19 were recorded in the Middle East and North Africa during November, bringing the region's total since the pandemic began to more than four million. To put it another way, a quarter of all… 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
