MUST-READS

• Automotive
  Saudi Arabian auto parts demand valued at $3.8bn

  Demand for automotive spare parts in Saudi Arabia has been valued at $3.8bn, according global analysts Frost & Sullivan.

• Rebuilding Egypt
  Egypt Needs More Investments, Not Aid

  First the good news: Egypt’s foreign reserves ticked up to $16.87 billion at the end of September – enough to comfortably cover imports for more than three months as the country’s economy strengthens and foreign investors continue to buy Cairo-listed stocks.

• Kobane
  U.S. frustration rises as Turkey withholds military help from besieged Kobane

  “They want the U.S. to come in and take care of the problem,” a senior official said, but the Pentagon has said U.S. strikes alone can’t drive the Islamic State from Kobane, on Turkey’s border.

  • Foreign Policy - Destroying a $30,000 Islamic State Pickup Truck Can Cost Half a Million Dollars
  • Reuters - ISIS Seizes One Third of Syrian Town Kobani: Monitor
  • Washington Post - U.S. strikes Islamic State targets inside Mosul
  • AP - Buffer zone for Turkey debated in militants' fight
• Tadawul Opening
  Saudi capital markets regulator seeks local opinion on stock market liberalization

  The Saudi capital markets regulator is seeking the opinions of stock market analysts, economists and a host of other local financial experts on final steps to liberalize the country’s stock market for foreign investment, informed sources have told Asharq Al-Awsat, as the bourse prepares to launch the region’s biggest-ever IPO later this month.

• Islamic State
  Brother fears missing Saudi student now Islamist militant

  Meshaal Suhaimi, the Saudi student who “mysteriously” disappeared in Malaysia last month is believed to have joined one of the terrorist groups in Syria or Iraq.

• Afghanistan
  5.7m Afghan refugees return in past decade

  Returning migrants are increasingly avoiding rural areas of their origins and moving to urban areas, especially Kabul, in search of security and livelihoods.

• Pakistan-India
  Five more civilians killed in worst India-Pakistan fighting for years

  The fighting comes at a time of changing power dynamics in South Asia, with Pakistan's army taking a more assertive role in politics and India's new nationalist Prime Minister Narendra Modi promising a more muscular foreign policy. Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has been weakened by opposition protests that started in August. He won the army's backing but in the process ceded space to the generals on some issues, including relations with India.

  • Reuters - U.S. Drones Strike Northwest Pakistan Two Days Running
• Celebrities and Islam
  Bill Maher And Ben Affleck Have A Fierce Debate Over Radical Islam

  Ben Affleck appeared on "Real Time With Bill Maher" on Friday to promote his latest film, "Gone Girl." But Affleck didn't leave without getting into a heated debate with Maher over radical Islamic principles. Affleck and Maher -- joined at a roundtable by Sam Harris, Nicholas Kristof, and Michael Steele -- fiercely battled after the 42-year-old actor called Maher's criticism of the religion "gross and racist."

• Oil
  Saudi Arabia absorbs lower oil prices

  As the price of Brent crude continues its seemingly relentless slide – down more than 20 per cent since a mid-June high of $115 a barrel to $90 on Wednesday – a number of conspiracy theories have started to do the rounds.

• Iran Negotiations
  P5+1 Nuclear Talks with Iran Down to the Wire

  Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters this week that a deal between Iran and the P5+1 is “95 percent complete.” At the same time, he acknowledged that the final five percent yet to be agreed covers some of the most difficult issues on the table. In bilateral talks between the US and Iran, the Obama Administration has made significant new concessions that approach Washington’s own “red line.” The US is prepared to allow Iran to maintain as many as 4,500 centrifuges, while limiting the size of Iran’s stockpile of five percent enriched uranium. Washington has even conceded that the quantity of uranium reserves can be increased at any future time that Iran can demonstrate a genuine need. Right now, Iran has a contract with Russia to receive all of the necessary fuel rods for the Bushehr reactor through 2019. And although there are agreements in principle between Moscow and Tehran to build at least one new reactor, no final deal has been yet signed.

  • Reuters - Iran nuclear talks set for next week in Vienna: Iran foreign ministrynni tribe joins fight against Islamic State
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