Saudi Arabia moved to quell investor fears on Wednesday, saying it is committed to safeguarding the rights of investors in the wake of an anti-corruption campaign that has seen the detention of prominent businessmen including the billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal.
The country's council of economic affairs, presided by its Chairman Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, also stressed that the Saudi Arabian government was committed to protecting the rights of individuals under investigation.
"The Chairman of the Council instructed the relevant ministers to ensure that national and multinational companies operating inside and outside the Kingdom, including those wholly or partly owned by individuals under investigation, were not disrupted while investigations into corruption were underway," according to an official statement carried by the state-run news agency SPA.
"The Council recognised the importance of these companies for the national economy, and the importance of ensuring that investors could operate with confidence in Saudi Arabia."
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Read more:
Prince Alwaleed’s Kingdom Holding shares plunge 9.78%, lowest level since December 2011
Regional markets face bumpy ride as Saudi anti-corruption drive intensifies
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In conjunction with the council's committment to safeguard the rights of individual and corporates, Saudi Arabia's central bank, Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (SAMA) said the suspension of bank accounts of persons of interest is in response to the Attorney General's request pending the legal cases against them.
"Concerned individual accounts rather than their corporate businesses have been put in suspension until final court rulings," SAMA said. "In other words, corporate businesses remain unaffected. It is business as usual for both banks and corporates. Also, SAMA would like to reiterate that there are no restrictions on money transfers through proper banking channel."
The move to tackle corruption comes as the country takes a host of measures to revive its economy following several years of low oil prices that had curtailed job creation and growth. The measures include a reduction of energy subsidies, plans to raise taxes such as a value added tax and selling off state assets including a 5 per cent stake in Aramco, the world's biggest oil producer which is estimated to raise as much as $100 billion.
Shares of Kingdom Holding Company (KHC), the investment vehicle of billionaire businessman Prince Alwaleed, dropped to the lowest level on Tuesday since December 2011, following reports of his detention and other prominent figures amid the anti-corruption crackdown in the country. The company, which is 95 per cent controlled by Alwaleed, saw its share price plunge 9.78 per cent by mid-day on Tadawul to 8.12 riyals, as investors continued to react to reports of his prolonged detention and other high profile individuals in the wake of an investigation launched by a newly established anti-corruption committee. The company’s share price had dropped to 7.85 riyals on December 18, 2011.
The prince's net-worth has declined by more than $1.3 billion in the past two days. Meanwhile the Saudi Tadawul market had declined as much as 3 per cent on Tuesday before closing down 0.7 per cent.
RESULTS
6.30pm Handicap (TB) $68,000 (Dirt) 1,200m
Winner Canvassed, Par Dobbs (jockey), Doug Watson (trainer)
7.05pm Meydan Cup – Listed Handicap (TB) $88,000 (Turf) 2,810m
Winner Dubai Future, Frankie Dettori, Saeed bin Suroor
7.40pm UAE 2000 Guineas – Group 3 (TB) $125,000 (D) 1,600m
Winner Mouheeb, Ryan Curatolo, Nicholas Bachalard
8.15pm Firebreak Stakes – Group 3 (TB) $130,000 (D) 1,600m
Winner Secret Ambition, Tadhg O’Shea, Satish Seemar
9.50pm Meydan Classic – Conditions (TB) $$50,000 (T) 1,400m
Winner Topper Bill, Richard Mullen, Satish Seemar
9.25pm Dubai Sprint – Listed Handicap (TB) $88,000 (T) 1,200m
Winner Man Of Promise, William Buick, Charlie Appleby
The Perfect Couple
Starring: Nicole Kidman, Liev Schreiber, Jack Reynor
Creator: Jenna Lamia
Rating: 3/5
23-man shortlist for next six Hall of Fame inductees
Tony Adams, David Beckham, Dennis Bergkamp, Sol Campbell, Eric Cantona, Andrew Cole, Ashley Cole, Didier Drogba, Les Ferdinand, Rio Ferdinand, Robbie Fowler, Steven Gerrard, Roy Keane, Frank Lampard, Matt Le Tissier, Michael Owen, Peter Schmeichel, Paul Scholes, John Terry, Robin van Persie, Nemanja Vidic, Patrick Viera, Ian Wright.
Israel Palestine on Swedish TV 1958-1989
Director: Goran Hugo Olsson
Rating: 5/5
Fanney Khan
Producer: T-Series, Anil Kapoor Productions, ROMP, Prerna Arora
Director: Atul Manjrekar
Cast: Anil Kapoor, Aishwarya Rai, Rajkummar Rao, Pihu Sand
Rating: 2/5
Attacks on Egypt’s long rooted Copts
Egypt’s Copts belong to one of the world’s oldest Christian communities, with Mark the Evangelist credited with founding their church around 300 AD. Orthodox Christians account for the overwhelming majority of Christians in Egypt, with the rest mainly made up of Greek Orthodox, Catholics and Anglicans.
The community accounts for some 10 per cent of Egypt’s 100 million people, with the largest concentrations of Christians found in Cairo, Alexandria and the provinces of Minya and Assiut south of Cairo.
Egypt’s Christians have had a somewhat turbulent history in the Muslim majority Arab nation, with the community occasionally suffering outright persecution but generally living in peace with their Muslim compatriots. But radical Muslims who have first emerged in the 1970s have whipped up anti-Christian sentiments, something that has, in turn, led to an upsurge in attacks against their places of worship, church-linked facilities as well as their businesses and homes.
More recently, ISIS has vowed to go after the Christians, claiming responsibility for a series of attacks against churches packed with worshippers starting December 2016.
The discrimination many Christians complain about and the shift towards religious conservatism by many Egyptian Muslims over the last 50 years have forced hundreds of thousands of Christians to migrate, starting new lives in growing communities in places as far afield as Australia, Canada and the United States.
Here is a look at major attacks against Egypt's Coptic Christians in recent years:
November 2: Masked gunmen riding pickup trucks opened fire on three buses carrying pilgrims to the remote desert monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor south of Cairo, killing 7 and wounding about 20. IS claimed responsibility for the attack.
May 26, 2017: Masked militants riding in three all-terrain cars open fire on a bus carrying pilgrims on their way to the Monastery of St. Samuel the Confessor, killing 29 and wounding 22. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attack.
April 2017: Twin attacks by suicide bombers hit churches in the coastal city of Alexandria and the Nile Delta city of Tanta. At least 43 people are killed and scores of worshippers injured in the Palm Sunday attack, which narrowly missed a ceremony presided over by Pope Tawadros II, spiritual leader of Egypt Orthodox Copts, in Alexandria's St. Mark's Cathedral. ISIS claimed responsibility for the attacks.
February 2017: Hundreds of Egyptian Christians flee their homes in the northern part of the Sinai Peninsula, fearing attacks by ISIS. The group's North Sinai affiliate had killed at least seven Coptic Christians in the restive peninsula in less than a month.
December 2016: A bombing at a chapel adjacent to Egypt's main Coptic Christian cathedral in Cairo kills 30 people and wounds dozens during Sunday Mass in one of the deadliest attacks carried out against the religious minority in recent memory. ISIS claimed responsibility.
July 2016: Pope Tawadros II says that since 2013 there were 37 sectarian attacks on Christians in Egypt, nearly one incident a month. A Muslim mob stabs to death a 27-year-old Coptic Christian man, Fam Khalaf, in the central city of Minya over a personal feud.
May 2016: A Muslim mob ransacks and torches seven Christian homes in Minya after rumours spread that a Christian man had an affair with a Muslim woman. The elderly mother of the Christian man was stripped naked and dragged through a street by the mob.
New Year's Eve 2011: A bomb explodes in a Coptic Christian church in Alexandria as worshippers leave after a midnight mass, killing more than 20 people.
