Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on Friday that Kyiv’s proposal remains the only viable path towards achieving enduring peace between Russia and Ukraine.
“No nation in the world wants peace more than Ukraine; our country suffers the most,” Mr Kuleba told the 193 members of the UN General Assembly on the anniversary of Russia’s invasion.
“Simply putting the war on hold and hoping that the aggressor will be merciful enough to eventually choose peace is not a realistic plan,” he noted.
President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s 10-point peace plan is “the only serious peace proposal on the table,” he added.
The Ukrainian diplomat who was seeking to rally support for Mr Zelenskyy' plan, said that, in less than a year, the number of countries and international organisations taking part in Ukraine’s peace formula meetings had risen from 15 to 82.
The plan calls for expelling Russian forces, establishing a special tribunal to prosecute Russian war crimes and building a European-Atlantic security architecture with guarantees for Ukraine.
Switzerland's Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis called on the UN General Assembly to work for peace and not to “give in to pessimism”.
He announced that Switzerland is planning to organise a high-level Ukraine peace conference "by the summer" at Kyiv's request and "would therefore like to take this opportunity to invite all nations ... to work together towards our common goal".
The summit aims to follow on the four previous national security-level gatherings in Copenhagen, Jeddah, Malta and Davos.
Mr Kuleba said countries now saying Ukraine should negotiate with Russia and end the war are either “ill-informed” or didn't follow events after 2014, when Russia seized Crimea and backed an armed rebellion in eastern Ukraine. The two countries, he said, held approximately 200 rounds of negotiations and made 20 cease-fire agreements.
Two years of the Russia-Ukraine war – in pictures
“All of these peace efforts ended two years ago, when Russia tore apart the Minsk process and launched its full-scale invasion of my country,” Mr Kuleba said.
“Why would anyone suggest today that following the same logic will bring us to a different result?”
Russia's ambassador to the UN Vasily Nebenzya slammed Mr Zelenskyy's plan calling it "nothing other than an ultimatum to Russia and an attempt to lure as many countries as possible into endless meetings on this utopian project at any price possible."
Britain’s Foreign Secretary David Cameron said he recognised that there is a sense of fatigue with the war and a compromise might seem attractive, but he said Russian President Vladimir Putin isn't seeking compromise.
“Rather, this is a neo-imperialist bully who believes might is right,” he said. “If Putin were to eke out some kind of win, the rest of the world would suffer, too. What starts in Ukraine would not end there."
Speaking to journalists in New York, Luxembourg’s Foreign Minister Xavier Bettel expressed concern over Ukraine's diminishing strength in comparison to Russia, emphasising that without a shift in the balance of power, Russia is unlikely to engage in peace negotiations.
If Ukraine is abandoned, "we don't know who will be next," warned Mr Bettel.
He urged the international community to bolster support for Ukraine, highlighting the significance of Mr Zelenskyy's peace proposal as a viable solution.
“We have a peace plan by Zelenskyy which shows that Ukraine has a solution without [it] being humiliated. And the support for Ukraine is a support also for the negotiations.”
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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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A widely accepted definition was made by the All Party Parliamentary Group on British Muslims in 2019: “Islamophobia is rooted in racism and is a type of racism that targets expressions of Muslimness or perceived Muslimness.” It further defines it as “inciting hatred or violence against Muslims”.
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“Safeguarding, not just in sport, but in all walks of life, is making sure that policies are put in place that make sure your child is safe; when they attend a football club, a tennis club, that there are welfare officers at clubs who are qualified to a standard to make sure your child is safe in that environment,” Derek Bell explains.