Middle East & North Africa

22 Mar 2021; MEMO: A recent study has found that only four per cent of households in the Gaza Strip have access to safe water, compared with 39.5 per cent in the rest of Palestine.

According to a study released by the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) and the Palestinian Water Authority yesterday and reported by the Wafa news agency, 66.2 per cent of Palestinian households in the occupied West Bank have access to safe water.

22 Mar 2021; MEMO: Qatari and Mauritanian officials met in Doha yesterday to discuss restoring diplomatic ties for the first time since they were severed as part of the 2017 boycott of Qatar by a number of Gulf and other Arab states.

(AP) --- Iran has made threats against Fort McNair, an Army post in the U.S. capital, and against the Army’s vice chief of staff, two senior U.S. intelligence officials said.

They said communications intercepted by the National Security Agency in January showed that Iran’s Revolutionary Guard discussed mounting “USS Cole-style attacks” against the Army post, referring to the October 2000 suicide attack in which a small boat pulled up alongside the Navy destroyer in the Yemeni port of Aden and exploded, killing 17 sailors.

SANAA, Mar 21 (NNN-SABA) – Yemen’s Houthi rebels said yesterday, three tear gas bombs, fired by their riot forces, are the cause of the deadly fire, that broke out earlier this month, inside a migrant detention centre in Sanaa, and killed at least 45 African migrants.

There were a total of 862 African migrants in the seven-ward migrant detention centre, and the accident took place on Mar 7, in Ward No. 1, which hosted 358 of the detained African migrants, according to the Houthi-controlled interior ministry’s statement.

21 Mar 2021; MEMO: The Saudi-led coalition battling Yemen's Houthi group struck military targets belonging to the Iran-aligned movement in the capital Sanaa in the early hours of Sunday, residents said, according to a report by Reuters.

21 Mar 2021; MEMO: President Tayyip Erdogan pulled Turkey out of an international accord designed to protect women, the government said on Saturday, prompting protests and criticism from those who said it was necessary to tackle rising domestic violence, reported Reuters.

21 Mar 2021; MEMO: Thousands of Israelis demonstrated outside the residence of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem on Saturday, calling for an end to his leadership just three days before the country's fourth election in two years, reports Reuters.

Protesters filled through streets closed to traffic by police, waving flags, banging drums, blowing horns and shouting chants to replace the 71-year-old conservative.

21 Mar 2021; MEMO: Saudi Arabian state oil giant Aramco is betting on an Asian-led rebound in energy demand this year after it reported a steep slide in net profit for 2020 on Sunday and scaled back its spending plans, reports Reuters.

The COVID-19 pandemic took a heavy toll on the company and its global peers in 2020, but oil prices have rallied this year as economies recover from last year's downturn and after oil producers extended output cuts.

DUBAI (Reuters) - An explosion killed one person and injured three others on Sunday in a southeastern Iranian town that was the centre of bloody unrest last month, Iran’s state news agency IRNA reported.

A Revolutionary Guards statement quoted by the agency blamed what it called terrorist groups for the blast in a square in Saravan, near the border with Pakistan.

DUBAI (Reuters) - The United Arab Emirates urged all citizens and residents aged 16 and above to register for COVID-19 vaccinations from Sunday as the Gulf state widens its immunisation drive after inoculating about 56% of the eligible population.

The UAE, the region’s commercial and tourism hub and a global travel centre, has set a blistering pace for its vaccine rollout to keep its economy open for business. It ranks second globally behind Israel for doses per 100 people.