Middle East

Jeddah, Feb 9: Investors may have to pay a whopping SR 2 million for a square meter of land in the central zone around Makkah by the end of 2013, said chairman of the real estate committee at the Makkah Chamber of Commerce and Industry Mansour Abu Rayash. Prices ranged between SR 500,000 and SR 1.5 million in 2012. A square meter in a strategic area in Japan is about $ 100,000, seven times cheaper

Abu Dhabi, Feb 7: Around 62,000 illegal immigrants have sought permits to leave the country under the two-month amnesty period that ended on February 4. Over half of them have already departed for their home countries. Ruling out the extension of the general pardon, Major-General Nasser Al Awadhi Al Minhali, Acting Undersecretary of Naturalisation, Residency and Ports Affairs at the Ministry of

Jeddah, Feb 6: About 60,000 Saudis are unable to pay off their loans, said Abdullah Marei bin Mahfouz, chairman of the Jeddah branch of the national committee for the care of prisoners and their families. Bin Mahfouz said that currently about 300 Saudis are imprisoned in the Kingdom who are unable to settle their bank debts. In addition, about 500 prisoners are unable to pay off credit card debts

Riyadh, Feb 4: About 13 private schools in Jeddah laid off staff and students after experiencing significant financial hardships following the decision by the Ministry of Labor to raise minimum wage for Saudis teachers, school officials said. The closure of private schools will increase public education costs on the government. “Private schools save the government SR12 billion annually, given the

Jeddah, Jan 29: Torrential rains and dust storms have swept the Kingdom, resulting in evacuations from wadis and other threatened areas of Tabuk and the closure of Tabuk schools on Monday. Weather forecasters are saying that the bad weather could stay around for the next couple of days. Clearly, the hardest hit area was Tabuk where schools were also closed for the week out of concern for the

Dubai, Jan 27: A man died in an accident at the Funfair Area of Global Village on Thursday evening after which the authorities decided to close rides area, according to a a press statement. “Global Village announces the suspension of the operations of the funfair rides area, which are owned and operated by Freij Entertainment, until further notice. These precautions come as a result of yesterday’s

Dubai, Jan 23: Thick fog covered most parts of Dubai and neighbouring emirates on Tuesday morning as motorists reported near-zero visibility. The fog, which continued well into the day, caused minor accidents though no major ones were reported. It also caused traffic snarls on some roads. “There were no serious accidents which required any intervention from the Roads and Transport Authority (RTA)

Jeddah, Jan 22: Hotels in Saudi Arabia experienced noticeable increases in occupancy rates, with Jeddah increasing by 7.0 percent year-to-date, and Madinah increasing 2.0 percent year-to-date, Ernst and Young Middle East said in its latest Hotel Benchmark Survey. Compared to November 2011, Riyadh’s occupancy rate increased by 17.0 percent in November 2012. This is accredited to the various

Dubai, Jan 21: After mobile phone texts lying to victims that they have won large cash prizes, a new phone scam appears to have just surfaced in the UAE. Several victims say they receive brief calls and when they call back, they hear obscene voices before discovering that part of their call credit has gone. While Dubai police say they are working to track the source of these calls

Jeddah, Jan 17: Calls are mounting for the government to repeal the proposed levy for businesses not meeting Saudization requirements. Analysts have said that implementing the measure will impose an additional economic burden of some SR60 billion annually on Saudi families across the country. Employers are now forced to pay SR2,400 a year for each foreign worker that pushes the work force at a