First Independent Mena Newspaper
The newest version of Microsoft Operating system Windows 8, which has generated a lot of buzz in the IT industry, offers to the Berber-speaking populations across North Africa (Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia and Libya) the possibility of using their personnel computers in their native spoken language. A preview of Windows 8, to be officially launched in […]
Several international experts, intellectuals and human rights activists are wondering whether the idea of setting up a task force to fight the upsurge of illegal immigration will ever work?. The proposed task force, to include delegates or agents from North Africa (Algeria, Libya, Morocco, Mauritania & Tunisia) and their European partners (France, Italy, Malta, Portugal […]
Tunis Financial harbor was the topic of discussion between the Tunisian government and Bahrain’s investment bank Gulf Finance House. The latter wants to develop the harbors aiming to be North Africa’s first offshore financial centre. A high profile delegation from GFH led by acting CEO, Hisham Alrayes, and Lutfi Alzaar, the CEO of Tunis Financial […]
Malta played host this weekend to the Five-plus-Five summit, gathering five Maghreb and five European countries whose heads of state or government came together to discuss ways to foster inter-Mediterranean ties. The Five-plus-Five forum, which brings together leaders from Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco and Tunisia, the five countries forming the Arab Maghreb Union (UMA) along […]
Before the Soviet Union controlled the former republics of Central Asia, Sufi brotherhoods dominated the religious scene in Chechnya, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. However, the Soviet policy toward Islam drove these Sufi groups underground for fear of persecution. In the aftermath of the fall of the Soviet bloc, legions of radical Islamists filled the gap left […]
US House lawmakers have blocked a $450 million emergency aid the Obama administration was planning to give to the new government of President Mohammed Morsi, facing unprecedented economic crisis, with an estimated budget deficit of $12 billion. Republican Rep. Kay Granger of Texas, chairwoman of the Appropriations subcommittee on foreign operations, says “I am not […]
Tunisia Amen bank, the 2nd largest private bank in the North African country, has received backing from the International Finance Corporation, a member of the World Bank, to boost the company’s efforts to improve governance and modernize management practices. The IFC backing comes at a time when Tunisian banks are implementing new central bank regulations […]
Head of Tunisia moderate Islamist Ennahda party, Rached Ghannouchi, has vowed to fight and stand up to the hardline salafists who showed lately their real face when they added oil to the fire in the deadly violence that rocked the country over anti-Islam film. “These people pose a threat not only to Ennahda but to […]
The countries of the Maghreb set up in February 1989 a union that was designed to be a milestone in promoting inter-Maghreban relations on the political, economic, cultural and social scales. More than twenty years after the Arab Maghreb Union, also known by its French acronym as UMA, came into being, little has been achieved […]
France, fearing a backlash after a French satirical magazine published provocative cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, has decided to temporarily close on Friday its diplomatic missions, cultural centers and schools in 20 Islamic countries and asked the authorities of these countries to tighten security measures around these compounds. In some countries, French schools were shut […]