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Saudi Arabia’s payments transformation: Building the infrastructure for a globally connected digital economy FinTech Futures

Oil Prices Jump as Attacks Choke Off Saudi Energy Supply The New York Times

Yield on 10-year US Treasury note at 5% for 1st time since 2023 The Korea Times

BAGHDAD — Iraqi authorities have seized a drone launch platform inside the country that was used in an attack on Saudi Arabia’s East-West oil pipeline, Iraq’s Security Media Cell chief Saad Maan said Saturday.“An intelligence and security task force made significant efforts and managed to locate and seize the launch platform inside Iraqi territory,” Maan said in a statement carried by the state-run Iraqi News Agency (INA).He said investigative procedures were continuing with the involvement of forensic experts, including technical documentation, examination and analysis of the platform.Maan said efforts were focused not only on securing the platform but also on intensive field and intelligence operations to identify those involved in the attack.Earlier Saturday, Iraqi army spokesman Sabah Al-Numan said security and intelligence agencies were continuing operations to arrest all those involved in the attacks targeting Saudi Arabia.The developments came after Saudi Arabia said Friday that its strategic East-West Pipeline in the Riyadh and Madinah regions had been targeted by several drones launched from Iraq, causing injuries and material damage.The Saudi Ministry of Foreign Affairs s

NEW DELHI — Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday called for expanding the UN Security Council to increase representation for countries from Asia, Africa and Latin America, saying the move would help strengthen the United Nations’ role in global affairs.Addressing the 18th BRICS Summit in New Delhi, Putin said Russia places particular importance on preserving and strengthening the UN’s central role and urged BRICS members to continue coordinating efforts to improve the organization’s effectiveness.“Naturally, expanding the UN Security Council — specifically by increasing representation for countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America — would contribute to this goal,” Putin said, according to a Kremlin transcript.Putin also called for reforms to major global economic institutions, saying there was a “long-standing need” to improve the International Monetary Fund, World Bank and World Trade Organization to better reflect current political and economic realities.He said the institutions remained important platforms for dialogue among leading economies and called for greater coordination among BRICS members within them.Turning to BRICS, Putin said the grouping’s intellectual and

KYIV — Russia and Ukraine traded massive waves of drone attacks overnight into Sunday, leaving civilians dead and injured and damaging energy infrastructure on both sides as Moscow intensified its air campaign ahead of winter.Two people were killed and 12 others injured when Ukrainian drones struck Nizhnekamsk in Russia’s Tatarstan region, according to the office of regional head Rustam Minnikhanov.The two civilians died after a drone struck a tree near their parked car, officials said.Nizhnekamsk is home to a major concentration of Russian oil refineries and petrochemical, rubber and polymer plants. Mayor Radmir Belyaev said a fire broke out at one of the city’s enterprises but provided no further details.Ukraine also said Sunday that its drones struck a major oil refinery in Slavyansk-on-Kuban in Russia’s Krasnodar region.Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence agency said drones hit a key oil-processing unit and the refinery’s tank farm, triggering a large fire.Krasnodar authorities said an attack on an enterprise in Slavyansk-on-Kuban injured three people, damaged an oil pipeline and caused a fire, but did not directly confirm Ukraine’s account of the target.Russia’s Defense Ministry sa

Manar Al Omran (MAO), the Kingdom’s scaffolding and formwork specialist since 1974, today announced the MAO Industrial Complex, an integrated industrial manufacturing platform spanning approximately one million square meters in the Eastern Province of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.The development brings together five production factories, a flagship corporate head office and a complete residential community for 7,000 employees, with Saudization ratio crossing 60% and aiming for more, establishing MAO as a fully automated, vertically integrated scaffolding industrial group serving the Kingdom’s construction, energy and infrastructure sectors.The complex is the largest collaborative investment in MAO’s history and marks the company’s transformation from the region’s scaffolding rental and services leader into a manufacturer of the systems themselves, in steel, cast Iron, aluminium extrusion and casting, and polymer, on a scale designed to serve the Kingdom’s giga-projects, its energy, petrochemical and other sectors and export markets worldwide.SCAFFOLDING, STEEL & CAST HOUSE AT UNPRECEDENTED SCALEAt the heart of the complex is a 750,000-square-meter Industrial Scaffolding & Steel Comp

Iran-allied Houthis say drones and missiles used in attack that targeted ‘weapons depots and command and control centres’ in southern Saudi Arabia Houthi fighters have said they used drones and missiles to attack a military base in southern Saudi Arabia, as Yemen’s Riyadh-backed government described the rebels’ swift advance along the Red Sea coast as a “painful” development in a new front in the Iran war. The UN said on Sunday that nearly 86,000 people had fled Yemen, most of them since early September when the Iran-backed Houthi rebels launched a large-scale offensive that last week resulted in the capture of a key port city and an island on the Bab al-Mandab strait, a crucial shipping alternative to the strait of Hormuz. Continue reading...

Iraq removes a military commander and opens investigations into the attack that came from an area bordering Iran.

DUBLIN — US President Donald Trump said Saturday that the war with Iran could end “very soon,” while accusing Tehran of seeking to prolong the conflict to influence elections.Speaking after a meeting with Irish Prime Minister Micheál Martin in Ireland, Trump said he expected the conflict to end shortly but reiterated that the United States would not allow Iran to obtain a nuclear weapon.“I think very soon,” Trump said when asked when the war would end. “I think it'll be probably right after election times.”Trump accused Iran of trying to “hold out as long as they can to complicate the election,” without elaborating.“Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. It's very simple,” he said.Trump also predicted that oil prices would fall sharply once the conflict ends.Trump said the United States had established strong control over the area through what he described as an aggressive naval blockade and claimed US forces were intercepting about 25 boats a day, most of them at night.The president also addressed Gaza, rejecting accusations that Washington was facilitating genocide or Israel’s occupation of the West Bank.“When you say Gaza, you know we put out the fire and we get all the hostages,” T

WASHINGTON — US officials have linked high-resolution satellite imagery supplied by Chinese entities to an Iranian missile strike that killed three American soldiers in Jordan in July, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday.Citing officials familiar with the matter, the Journal said Iran obtained satellite imagery before and after the July 17 attack on Muwaffaq Salti Air Base, where ballistic missiles struck a housing area, killing three US troops and wounding four others.The report described the finding as the clearest indication yet that assistance from Chinese entities to Iran during the war has had deadly consequences for US forces.Washington has not accused the Chinese government of direct involvement, and the identities of the entities that allegedly supplied the imagery were not disclosed, according to the report.Senior US officials raised the issue with their Chinese counterparts, who denied the allegations and requested evidence. China’s Foreign Ministry accused unnamed parties of attempting to link Beijing to the conflict.The development comes ahead of a planned Sept. 24 meeting between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping. The Journal reported that