The UAE Central Bank Governor yesterday said the country had received and was complying with UN Security Council regulations freezing foreign assets held by the Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi and four Libyan officials.
Asked whether other requests to freeze Libyan assets within the UAE had been received, Sultan al Suwaidi said: "There's a window system in all GCC countries including the UAE. We normally deal with requests coming from specific countries."
Asset freezes against any country would include accounts and all types of investments identified by international regulators, he said.
Mr al Suwaidi said recent regional unrest had not adversely affected the UAE's financial system in the form of capital outflows.
Similarly, Bahrain's banking sector had yet to experience any serious negative impact from recent events in the country, said the kingdom's central bank governor Rasheed al Maraj.
"On the banking sector side, so far we have not seen any adverse impact," he said.
"All banks are operating normally, transactions are all at normal levels."
Bahrain still plans to go ahead with a US$1 billion (Dh3.67bn) sovereign bond sale despite the recent turmoil.
"We have not decided on the timing yet," Mr al Maraj said. "The plan is still on but we will have to enter the market at the right time."
Bahrain is facing rising pressure on its financial resources as it seeks to appease recent protesters with economic reforms.
The tourism and retail sectors had been disrupted since the turmoil, Mr al Maraj said. It would be able to assess the impact on its GDP forecast within the coming weeks once fresh data became available, he added.
tarnold@thenational.ae
Small Victories: The True Story of Faith No More by Adrian Harte
Jawbone Press
In numbers: China in Dubai
The number of Chinese people living in Dubai: An estimated 200,000
Number of Chinese people in International City: Almost 50,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2018/19: 120,000
Daily visitors to Dragon Mart in 2010: 20,000
Percentage increase in visitors in eight years: 500 per cent
Three ways to limit your social media use
Clinical psychologist, Dr Saliha Afridi at The Lighthouse Arabia suggests three easy things you can do every day to cut back on the time you spend online.
1. Put the social media app in a folder on the second or third screen of your phone so it has to remain a conscious decision to open, rather than something your fingers gravitate towards without consideration.
2. Schedule a time to use social media instead of consistently throughout the day. I recommend setting aside certain times of the day or week when you upload pictures or share information.
3. Take a mental snapshot rather than a photo on your phone. Instead of sharing it with your social world, try to absorb the moment, connect with your feeling, experience the moment with all five of your senses. You will have a memory of that moment more vividly and for far longer than if you take a picture of it.
The drill
Recharge as needed, says Mat Dryden: “We try to make it a rule that every two to three months, even if it’s for four days, we get away, get some time together, recharge, refresh.” The couple take an hour a day to check into their businesses and that’s it.
Stick to the schedule, says Mike Addo: “We have an entire wall known as ‘The Lab,’ covered with colour-coded Post-it notes dedicated to our joint weekly planner, content board, marketing strategy, trends, ideas and upcoming meetings.”
Be a team, suggests Addo: “When training together, you have to trust in each other’s abilities. Otherwise working out together very quickly becomes one person training the other.”
Pull your weight, says Thuymi Do: “To do what we do, there definitely can be no lazy member of the team.”
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The chef's advice
Troy Payne, head chef at Abu Dhabi’s newest healthy eatery Sanderson’s in Al Seef Resort & Spa, says singles need to change their mindset about how they approach the supermarket.
“They feel like they can’t buy one cucumber,” he says. “But I can walk into a shop – I feed two people at home – and I’ll walk into a shop and I buy one cucumber, I’ll buy one onion.”
Mr Payne asks for the sticker to be placed directly on each item, rather than face the temptation of filling one of the two-kilogram capacity plastic bags on offer.
The chef also advises singletons not get too hung up on “organic”, particularly high-priced varieties that have been flown in from far-flung locales. Local produce is often grown sustainably, and far cheaper, he says.
