PARIS // The United States and Israel were facing controversy on Monday surrounding each country’s representation at an anti-extremism rally in Paris, attended by more than 40 world leaders and over one million people.
The march on Sunday was a show of unity after last week’s terrorist attacks in the French capital, which killed 17 civilians.
US secretary of state John Kerry said on Monday that he would travel to Paris later this week, following sharp criticism of the Obama administration for not sending a senior official to the rally.
During a visit to India, Mr Kerry said: “I really think that this is sort of quibbling a little bit in the sense that our assistant secretary of state Victoria Nuland was there and marched, our ambassador was there and marched, many people from the embassy were there and marched.”
Mr Kerry, who will arrive in Paris on Thursday, said that as soon as he heard about the march, he asked his team what the earliest time was that he could go.
Meanwhile, Israel’s prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu was also facing criticism on Monday after it was revealed that France had asked him to stay away from the march but that he ignored the request and attended anyway.
Israeli media reported that Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas had also been asked not to attend the rally in a bid to avoid the event being clouded by the Middle East conflict.
When Mr Netanyahu rejected the appeals of the French government, however, Mr Abbas was swiftly invited, Channel Two television and Israeli newspapers said.
The news followed claims of bad behaviour at the march after the Israeli prime minister was seen pushing his way to the front of the procession after earlier attempting to push his way onto a bus.
Liberal newspaper Haaretz said that the prime minister’s actions had infuriated the French president, who demonstrated his “anger” at a ceremony in Paris’s main synagogue on Sunday to commemorate the deaths of four Jews killed in last week’s attack on a kosher supermarket.
“[W]hen Mr Netanyahu’s turn at the podium arrived, the French president got up from his seat and made an early exit,” the paper said.
The Israeli prime minister has also been accused of exploiting the attacks as an opportunity to campaign for a March 17 general election, in which he is seeking a fourth term.
On Monday, Mr Netanyahu – who has made the dangers of radical Islam a key part of his campaign – called on world leaders to support his nation’s fight against terrorism, as he met with envoys of the French-Jewish community.
He later visited the kosher supermarket in eastern Paris, where admirers were gathered, chanting his name.
Mr Netanyahu has also come under fire for earlier comments in which he called on French Jews to migrate to Israel.
* Associated Press, Agence France-Presse and Bloomberg
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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Name: Yousef Al Bahar
Advocate at Al Bahar & Associate Advocates and Legal Consultants, established in 1994
Education: Mr Al Bahar was born in 1979 and graduated in 2008 from the Judicial Institute. He took after his father, who was one of the first Emirati lawyers
