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Oman's Sultan Haitham Bin Tariq Al-Said paid a series of visits to military bases in mid-March. He was at the Royal Air Force of Oman (RAFO)’s Adam Air Base, and at Shafa Garrison, accompanied by his eldest son Crown Prince Sayyid Theyazin bin Haitham Al-Said.

Bahrain's Royal Endurance Team captain Sheikh Nasser Bin Hamad Al-Khalifa was presented with the Order of Ahmad Al-Fateh at an event in Manama, held to mark his recent win in the 160km race of the FEI Endurance World Championships in the UAE.

UAE President Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan (MBZ) began the annual process of prisoner pardons to mark Ramadan, by ordering the release of 1,025 inmates. Such pardons are a staple of UAE life, but the number of people pardoned this year is substantially higher than last year.

The UAE has withdrawn from the race to hold the annual meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank in 2026 and instead thrown its support behind Qatar’s bid.

A day after his appointment to the Mubadala board, Sheikh Theyab Bin Mohammed Al-Nahyan gained another role when his father UAE President Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan (MBZ) appointed him to chair the newly-established Abu Dhabi Transport Company.

Kuwait's Emir Sheikh Nawaf Al-Ahmed Al-Jaber Al-Sabah returned home on 19 March, following his latest trip to receive medical treatment in Italy. He had left just over two weeks earlier, on 4 March.

While America and Europe continue to present a united front in response to Russia’s war in Ukraine, the UAE’s more ambivalent stance continues to cause concern in western capitals – and has the potential to undermine, or at least complicate, the country’s diplomatic and commercial relations with the United States and its allies.

The world has changed radically in the two decades since the United States-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, but few of the key players appear to have changed their minds on whether the invasion was justified – and many supporters continue to distance themselves from responsibility for the tumultuous events that followed. GSN followed the build-up to the conflict with great attention, as western intelligence and other agencies searched for a ‘smoking gun’ that didn’t really exist.

Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) states are reshaping their regional outlook, as transactional relationships replace some of the more ideologically-driven approaches taken since the 2011 Arab Spring. Former outcasts led by Iran and Syria are being welcomed into Gulf palaces once again, at least in part due to concerns the US can no longer provide a trusted security umbrella. In this rapidly changing environment, Iran could yet emerge as a significant new market for GCC investors.

The UAE’s relationship with Israel – formalised via the 2020 Abraham Accords – is under renewed pressure as a result of incendiary comments by Israeli finance minister Bezalel Smotrich, who said that the Palestinian village of Huwara "needs to be wiped out".

Saudi National Bank (SNB)’s investment in banking giant Credit Suisse has proved to be a costly transaction, with the value of its stake falling by around $1.2bn in the space of a few months.

Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) is preparing to launch a new body to oversee shipbuilding and ship maintenance and repair services in the kingdom in the near future, in its latest effort to diversify the economy and develop new industrial sectors.

Qatar's former finance minister Ali Al-Emadi and several other unnamed individuals were referred to the Criminal Court, following an investigation by the Public Prosecution. They face charges including bribery, appropriation of public money, abuse of office, abuse of power, damage to public money and money laundering.

In a sign of shifting regional alignments, Qatar is said to have revised its previous backing for the Al-Ikhwan Al-Muslimeen (Muslim Brotherhood or MB)-affiliated Ennahda party, opening the prospect of much-needed funds coming to Tunis from a source that has been missing in recent years, having previously been Tunisia’s second largest investor after France.

Hydrogen Oman (Hydrom), a subsidiary of state-owned Energy Development Oman (EDO), signed six term-sheet agreements with developers to invest in green hydrogen projects worth more than OR20bn ($52bn) and involving some 15GW of renewable energy capacity.