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The QIA’s new $200m fund is designed to bring more foreign investment into Qatar, as the first step of a wider plan to partner with local and international asset management firms.

Abu Dhabi’s ADQ has joined with its exhibitions group subsidiary Adnec to buy a large minority stake in Egyptian hotel operator Icon. It comes as ADQ’s chief investment officer returns to the investment giant after a two-year sabbatical at defence conglomerate Edge Group.

Sheikh Ali Bin Khalifa Bin Mohammed Al-Khalifa has been named secretary-general of the Royal Humanitarian Foundation, taking over from former oil industry executive Mustafa Al-Sayed.

Moody’s sovereign credit upgrade has returned Qatar to the investment grade level it enjoyed before the 2017-21 boycott by regional foes.

Royal Commission for Al-Ula chief executive Amr Bin Saleh Al-Madani has been arrested for money laundering and other offences, according to the Oversight and Anti-Corruption Authority (Nazaha), in a sign that the authorities’ patience with public servants enriching themselves is wearing thin.

Iraq is buffeted by regional conflicts and domestic political and economic pressures; the dinar remains stressed and the population even more so. This is the first of a much-expanded series of GSN Risk management reports, in an online format intended to provide easy-to-access updates, analysis and contexts as a point of entry into this complex, often opaque region.

The Saudi government has told Saudi Aramco to scrap a plan to increase its maximum production capacity to 13m b/d, as first announced in March 2020. It is not clear how much progress Aramco had made in pursuing the goal.

Saudi ambassador to the US Princess Reema Bint Bandar has defended the idea of the season finale for women’s tennis being held in Saudi Arabia, following criticism of the idea by former stars Chris Evert and Martina Navratilova; Reema has also been speaking out about the Gaza war and the plight of Palestinians.

Iran launched missiles and drones at targets in Iraq, Syria and Pakistan in mid-January, claiming it was striking back at terrorist groups and Israel-linked sites, in a tough approach that has been accompanied by a domestic clampdown on moderate politicians ahead of elections in March. This suggests the regime continues to feel vulnerable to opposition at home, while speculation builds around the eventual succession to Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who is the subject of the first of a series of GSN profiles.

UAE state minister for foreign affairs Sheikh Shakhbut Bin Nahyan Al-Nahyan has been on another African tour in January, visiting the capitals of Democratic Republic of Congo and Uganda, as well as Angola’s Cabinda province, as the UAE look to continue recent momentum for investments and wider engagement in Africa.

In a rare inward investment into Yemen, Oman’s Salalah Mills is paying $6.5m for a 50% stake in a grain mills and silos business in Mukalla, Hadhramaut government, which it will run with an unnamed Yemeni partner.

The latest phase of tensions in Hadhramaut involves UAE-backed factions competing with groups linked to Saudi Arabia.

Revised January 2024, this map of Yemen illustrates the extent of Houthi attacks on Red Sea shipping between 19 November 2023 and 22 January 2024 as well as US and UK airstrikes on Houthi targets since 12 January 2024. Attack sites and airstrikes are marked on the map, with a text panel providing a brief note on each incident. The base Yemen map is shaded to show areas of control by each faction in the war (September/October 2023), with the main areas of conflict marked. The map also shows the location of key infrastructure including roads, airports, oil, and gas fields, pipelines, refineries, oil tanker terminals and gas processing facilities.

Revised January 2024, this map illustrates Iraq's oil and gas infrastructure and governorate populations and governors.  The locations of onshore and offshore oil and gas fields and pipelines are marked alongside associated infrastructure including oil refineries, gas processing plants, tanker terminals and LNG facilities. The map is available as a PDF file using eps graphics, meaning that there is no loss of resolution as the file is enlarged.

The US and UK have announced sanctions on four senior Houthi figures linked to the campaign against commercial shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden. GSN’s latest map of the Yemen/Red Sea conflict zone shows a conflict zone where more than 30 ships have been targeted by Houthi missiles and drones since mid-November, forcing hundreds more vessels to divert around the southern tip of Africa – adding costs and delays to global trade.