BEIRUT // Syrian Kurdish fighters were within 55 kilometres of the ISIL stronghold of Raqqa last night after capturing the key town of Ain Issa.
The latest victory yesterday came after ISIL lost control of a military base on Monday night and the border town of Tal Abyad more than a week ago.
“Ain Issa has come under our full control, along with dozens of villages in the surrounding area,” said a spokesman for the YPG, the Kurdish People’s Protection Units.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitor based in Britain, said ISIL had withdrawn from the town and YPG and rebel forces were sweeping it to clear mines laid by the extremists.
Both the military base and Ain Issa are on the main road between Kurdish-held territory in Aleppo province to the west and Hasakeh province to the east.
The same route links territory held by ISIL in Aleppo and Hasakeh provinces.
“It’s also a defence line for Raqqa,” said Mutlu Civiroglu, a Kurdish affairs analyst. “Considering that Raqqa is a sort of capital of the ‘caliphate’, it creates a lot of pressure on ISIL.”
The advance by the YPG and rebels opposed to the regime of Bashar Al Assad has been backed by air power from the US-led coalition fighting ISIL.
The Observatory said at least 26 extremists were killed in air strikes in and around Ain Issa on Monday. At least 2,896 people, mostly ISIL militants, had been killed in coalition strikes in Syria since the air campaign began in September last year.
Despite the string of defeats, the extremist group, which controls a large area of territory in Iraq and Syria, continues to commit atrocities and acts of destruction.
A video yesterday showed ISIL militants murdering 16 men by drowning them in a cage, decapitating them with explosives and firing a rocket-propelled grenade into a car.
The video, apparently shot in Nineveh province in Iraq, was one of the most brutal yet in a series released by the extremists of killings of opponents in areas under their control.
ISIL has executed hundreds of people by gunfire, dozens by beheading, stoned some to death, thrown others from buildings and burned a captured Jordanian pilot alive.
The men killed in the latest video are said to be “spies”, and some of them made recorded “confessions”.
The group also claimed yesterday to have blown up two ancient shrines they consider sacrilegious in Palmyra, the 2,000-year-old Unesco World Heritage site in central Syria.
The militants seized control of the ancient city in May. Syrian regime forces have bombed the city, and the militants camped within it, since then.
Before-and-after pictures showed several militants carrying explosives and the shrines, which are not among the city’s Roman buildings, reduced to rubble.
The Observatory said this week that the militants had planted mines in Palmyra but that it was not clear whether it was preparing to destroy the site or wanted to deter government forces from advancing towards it.
* Agence France-Presse and Reuters
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.”
Like a Fading Shadow
Antonio Muñoz Molina
Translated from the Spanish by Camilo A. Ramirez
Tuskar Rock Press (pp. 310)
VEZEETA PROFILE
Date started: 2012
Founder: Amir Barsoum
Based: Dubai, UAE
Sector: HealthTech / MedTech
Size: 300 employees
Funding: $22.6 million (as of September 2018)
Investors: Technology Development Fund, Silicon Badia, Beco Capital, Vostok New Ventures, Endeavour Catalyst, Crescent Enterprises’ CE-Ventures, Saudi Technology Ventures and IFC
'Shakuntala Devi'
Starring: Vidya Balan, Sanya Malhotra
Director: Anu Menon
Rating: Three out of five stars
