As the Foreign Affairs Committee warns against air strikes, would UK military action in Syria simply be irrelevant? November 3, 2015 Professor Michael Kerr, the director of the Middle East & Mediterranean studies programme and the Centre for the Study of Divided Societies at King’s, says Yes There is no obvious benefit to UK military intervention at this time; bombing Syria will not significantly alter the balance of power between its warring factions. In the absence [...]
Netanyahu heads to No 10 for PM meeting September 9, 2015 ISRAELI Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is heading to Downing Street this morning to meet counterpart David Cameron. It will be the first in-person meeting for the prime ministers since March 2014, when Cameron visited Israel. Foreign policy issues are set to dominate their discussions, with counterterrorism efforts, the rise of Islamic State (IS) and the [...]
Government on the defensive as North Sea suffers through another oil price slump January 13, 2016 The government was forced to defend its efforts to shore up the British oil industry yesterday, as record US stocks sent the price of Brent crude oil falling below $30 a barrel in late evening trading. During Prime Minister's Questions (PMQs), Sir Alan Duncan, a former oil trader, asked Prime Minister David Cameron to launch an [...]
Crude oil price drops on Opec supply figures August 11, 2015 CRUDE oil production by members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) reached its highest level in three years in July, despite Saudi Arabia indicating it had pulled back, figures showed yesterday. Brent crude oil tumbled to below $49 a barrel at one point yesterday, after rallying on Monday, driven by concerns over continued [...]
China doesn’t fear a Donald Trump presidency: It relishes the prospect February 2, 2016 There was a game I would play with Beijing taxi drivers when asked where I was from. I gave one of three answers: America, the UK or Iran, to see how their reaction differed. To the latter I received a thumbs up, and gesticulations of a nuclear bomb going off. “Boom kapow!” the driver would [...]
Brent crude oil price falls 1.7 per cent as Opec output reaches three year high August 11, 2015 Crude oil production by members of the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (Opec) reached its highest in three years in July, despite Saudi Arabia indicating it had pulled back, figures published today showed. Brent crude oil is trading 1.7 per cent lower. Opec's monthly oil market report suggested total output among member countries rose 100,700 [...]
Republican Presidential nominee frontrunner Donald Trump finally has a policy August 17, 2015 Given multi-billionaire Donald Trump’s controversial comments about Mexican immigrants since the start of his Presidential campaign, it is perhaps not surprising that when he finally came out with a policy, it was on the issue of migration across the Mexican-American border. Read more: Donald Trump goes up in the Republican Presidential nomination polls after each [...]
Oil prices continue to slide as US benchmark WTI crude falls below $50 a barrel for first time since April July 20, 2015 US benchmark West Texas Intermediate (WTI) dipped under $50 a barrel today, as speculation that increasing Middle Eastern shipments will worsen global oversupplies. WTI fell as low as $49.92 before closing slightly up, at $50.13 a barrel, the lowest prices WTI has been trading at since the beginning of April, showing that sales continue to [...]
Oil price slide casts shadow over Shell’s £47bn takeover of BG Group December 15, 2015 Shell's mega merger with BG Group was given the green light by Chinese regulators yesterday, but the deal has been rocked after tumbling oil prices led to a major shareholder questioning its viability. The price of international benchmark Brent crude oil yesterday fell to fresh lows of $36.33 per barrel before a rally in early evening [...]
Afghanistan earthquake 2015: Which country has the most earthquakes? And is the UK at risk? October 26, 2015 Today, the world was struck by yet another major earthquake. This time it was in the mountainous Kush region in northern Afghanistan, close to the border with Pakistan. It was a 7.5 magnitude quake, according to the US Geological Survey (USGS), and at least 135 deaths have been recorded so far. The event comes just [...]