Moroccan King Mohammed VI meets South Sudanese president Salva Kiir Mayardit.
A business bridge extends from Saudi Arabia, while Morocco confronts its Saharan nemesis. To subscribe to this daily roundup by Mideast specialist Joseph Braude, click here.
Saudi Arabia announces $500 billion for a business and industrial zone extending into Jordan and Egypt. The venture, to be led by a former senior Siemens executive, will focus on biotechnology, water, food, manufacturing, and entertainment. In so doing, the kingdom approaches the potential to connect with a network of qualified industrial zones among Jordanian, Egyptian, and Israeli manufacturers. Saudi Arabia’s border with Jordan is not far from the port city of Eilat. Earlier this year the kingdom regained sovereignty from Egypt over the nearby islands of Tiran and Sanafir, pledging to uphold the terms of the Camp David accords with respect to those territories.
Moroccan-Algerian tensions flare ... Rabat recalled its ambassador from Algiers after Algeria’s foreign minister claimed Moroccan banks are using sub-Saharan Africa to launder drug money.
... while Rabat makes new friends in South Sudan. The South Sudanese foreign minister visited Rabat and said his government was “very understanding” of the Moroccan position on the Sahara dispute. The statement represents something of a turnaround for the nascent African state, after Polisario separatists seemed to be making headway in cultivating Juba as an ally earlier this year.