A1SaudiArabia.com

RIYADH – Saudi Arabia is planning to launch tenders worth more than SR17 billion ($4.5 billion) this year to modernize two airports in the Kingdom, an official said.

Traffic at Saudi airports has reached 30 million passengers annually and is expected to double to 60 million over the next 10 years, said Alaa Samman, director of business development at the General Authority of Civil Aviation (GACA).

In order to cater for this growth, the government wants to launch projects costing at least SR55 billion to overhaul airports to be completed over the next 20 years, he added. For this year alone, GACA wants to launch tenders to build a new airport in the holy city of Madina and a commercial center near Jeddah airport.

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DUBAI – The United Arab Emirates pledged its support for Dubai on Tuesday but said the emirate had yet to ask for federal help, which analysts said would come reluctantly and with strings attached.

The UAE finance minister said the federal government would support the emirate as it negotiates a plan to restructure $26 billion in debt and said he expected a deal to be finalised soon.

State-owned conglomerate Dubai World is holding informal talks with major creditors, which include HSBC and Standard Chartered, in London this week as it finalises a deal.

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DHAKA – An international group of banks pledged on Tuesday to expand their social benefits network to 1 billion people by 2020 as part of a campaign to serve the unserved and those vulnerable to climate change.

At the end of a three-day meeting on the outskirts of the Bangladesh capital, the Global Alliance for Banking on Values (GABV), an independent network of 11 banks, said that it would look to adopt genuinely values-driven models.

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RIYADH – Saudi Arabias bank lending growth is set to recover this year as confidence in the global economy rises and the domestic banking system is liquid and well capitalised, the countrys central bank governor said.

Muhammad Al-Jasser, Governor of the Saudi Arabian Monetary Agency, told Reuters in an interview that strong supply in the real estate sector will help keep inflation in check in the worlds largest oil exporter, adding that he expected this years non-oil sector growth to be similar to that of 2009.

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SEOUL – A consortium led by South Koreas Hyundai Heavy Industries Co (009540.KS) has won a $2 billion power plant order in Saudi Arabia, the online eDaily reported Monday.

Citing South Koreas Economy Ministry and unnamed industry sources, the report said the consortium was picked as the preferred negotiator for the project last Friday.

Hyundai Heavy said it had not been informed of the reported outcome. – Reuters

LONDON – Easing fears about the US economy and European debt buoyed world equity markets on Monday, extending a rally that has taken many bourses into positive territory for the year.

Wall Street looked set to open flat after a big jump on Friday.

MSCIs all-country world stock index was up half a percent, driven by strong performances in Japan and emerging markets. European shares were flat to higher.

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WASHINGTON – The US government, while pushing for tougher sanctions against Tehran, has given $107 billion in the last 10 years to US and foreign companies doing business in Iran, much of it in the energy sector, The New York Times reported Saturday.

Despite the threat of punishment for companies that seek US federal contracts while dealing with Iran, the Times said successive administrations have struggled to exert authority over foreign companies and overseas units of US firms.

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DUBAI – DP World shares rose to a three-week high on Sunday after a newspaper report said it may offer new shares to shareholders and troubled parent Dubai World could sell an additional stake.

The port operator, which has a market capitalisation of about $6.7 billion, is considering offering 5 percent of its shares in a rights issue, while its mother company could offer a 10 percent stake to the public, a move which could raise $1 billion, local daily The National reported.

Citing unidentified senior sources at the company, the report said DP World was aiming to become part of the FTSE 100 share index in a bid to boost liquidity and raise the stocks free float shares to 35 percent.

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A miner talks on his mobile phone in a coal mine in Changzhi, Shanxi province, Sunday. Chinas Shanxi Province, traditionally the countrys top coal producer, expects its coal output to rise by up to 30 percent in 2010, the provinces party boss said on Saturday. – Reuters

BAGHDAD – Iraq has extended a memorandum of understanding with Royal Dutch Shell on a natural gas venture around the southern oil hub of Basra for six months from March 2010, Iraqs oil minister told Reuters on Sunday.

“We will resume talks with Shell after the election,” the minister, Hussain Al-Shahristani, said after he cast his vote in the countrys second full parliamentary election since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

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