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  • Saudi Vehicles
    18m vehicles likely on Saudi roads by year-end

    Eighteen million licensed vehicles are likely to be on Saudi roads by the end of this year, from 17 million last year, according to a study published by Al-Eqtisadiah daily. The number of licensed cars rose by 7 percent from 2011 to 2012, to 15.9 million vehicles, it said. This was a rise of 975,000 cars from the 14.9 million in 2011. About 81 percent of the registered vehicles in 2012 were in the three major provinces of Makkah, Riyadh and the Eastern Province.

  • Extremism
    Four Women jailed for supporting al-Qaeda

    Four women in Saudi Arabia have been sentenced to six to 10 years in prison for supporting al-Qaeda and preparing their sons to wage jihad.

  • Global Oil Markets
    Cheaper oil: Winners and losers

    But one group of countries gains unambiguously: those most dependent on agriculture. Agriculture is more energy-intensive than manufacturing. Energy is the main input into fertilisers, and in many countries farmers use huge amounts of electricity to pump water from aquifers far below, or depleted rivers far away. A dollar of farm output takes four or five times as much energy to produce as a dollar of manufactured goods, says John Baffes of the World Bank. Farmers benefit from cheaper oil. And since most of the world’s farmers are poor, cheaper oil is, on balance, good for poor countries.

  • ISIS and Baghdad
    Tribes in tense Abu Ghraib vow to keep IS out

    The Baghdad suburb of Abu Ghraib, best known for its infamous prison, sits close enough to Baghdad's airport that you can see the control tower in the distance. It's an enticing potential prize for Islamic State militants. For now, this Sunni-dominated town remains beyond their grip, despite recent reports to the contrary. Markets buzz with shoppers and young women in colorful clothes and headscarves walk freely through the streets. That's thanks in large part to the support of local Sunni tribal leaders who fought against extremists in the past are vowing to do so again. But to win the fight, they also need to combat long-held feelings of discrimination and what residents feel are arbitrary detentions and disappearances that continue to fuel resentment against the country's Shiite majority.

  • ISIS Doctrine
    Saudis at War With Islamic State Confront Echo of Kingdom’s Past

    A key difference is “the caliphate agenda,” Commins said, referring to the title used by Islamic State’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi. The revival of a term used by earlier Islamic leaders suggests a wider ambition to rule all Muslims. “That was never part of Wahhabi doctrine,” Commins said. Abdulaziz halted his expansion once most of the Arabian Peninsula was conquered, and turned against the Ikhwan, whose main leaders later surrendered to the British. That history underscores another distinction with Islamic State, that between an established power and an expansionist upstart, according to James Dorsey, a senior fellow in international studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore.

  • Asian Oil Imports
    China cuts Saudi oil imports amid Colombia crude boost

    “Chinese refiners are favoring supplies from Oman and South America over Saudi Arabia as their prices relative to output are more competitive,” Amy Sun, an analyst with Shanghai-based ICIS-C1 Energy, a consultant, said by phone from Guangzhou. “China is also increasing imports from Russia with a new contract signed last year.”

  • Afghanistan's Opium
    Afghanistan’s Opium Trade Is at an All-Time High

    Among the long-term goals of the U.S-led coalition in Afghanistan was helping the war-torn underdeveloped country kick its economic dependency on the cultivation of poppies for the world’s illegal opium markets. But after various agencies spent $7.6 billion over more than a decade on counternarcotics efforts, opium poppy cultivation levels in Afghanistan hit an all-time high in 2013, according to a report released Tuesday by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction.

  • Chevron
    Saudi Arabia, Kuwait shared zone tensions underlie oilfield closure

    Saudi Arabia's closure of an offshore oilfield it shares with Kuwait has revived speculation of renewed tensions between the two, and put Chevron's role in the shared Neutral Zone in focus.

  • Arab Jihadis
    The Arab World’s Foreign Fighter Problem

    The security services of many Arab states are excellent. Indeed, there is a Darwinian aspect to this: countries that lack strong security services often fall victim to a coup or rebellion. Yet a closer look reveals how uneven this competence is. Jordan and Saudi Arabia have impressive services, but Lebanon, Libya, Tunisia, and several other states have services that are far less skilled. Several of these countries already have a problem with jihadist violence, and there is little reason to think they have the capacity to closely track the volunteers to Iraq and Syria. Even some of the countries like Egypt that have strong services are more focused on domestic threats like the Muslim Brotherhood than on the potential threat from returning foreign fighters.

  • Qatar Case
    Final Ruling Set for US Couple Convicted in Qatar

    An American couple convicted in Qatar of child endangerment will receive a final verdict on their appeal on November 30, a Qatari judge announced on Monday. Matthew and Grace Huang of Los Angeles were originally jailed on murder charges following the January 2013 death of their adopted daughter Gloria. They were released from prison last November, but banned from leaving during the trial. In March, the court sentenced them to three years in prison for child endangerment.