It is film festival season in Egypt, and it is the time when lots of disgruntled people begin to express their frustration, disappointment, and dissatisfaction with these events' organisation, programming, and priorities. Many of these concerns are certainly legitimate, and indeed call for concrete action and solutions.

During the liberal years that started in 1919, the civil Coptic Society used to strongly participate in the charitable construction of schools, hospitals and non-governmental organisations.

Several years ago, even before the two revolutions, I was in a cab in Heliopolis minding my own business when the cab driver said something that translates to, “This is fishy!” “What?” I asked anxiously. He pointed to a man carrying a carton of bottled water walking out of a store. “That’s the fifth person I see in the last few hours buying bottled water,” he exclaimed.

Democracy and violence have disparate missions and routes that are not comparable. Yet, this reality should not keep us from admitting that while western countries, led by the United States, have failed to promote the spread of democracy to the Arab World, a small number of Arab terrorists have successfully managed to extend their violent activities beyond their countries’ borders and into the west. The philosophy, according to which democracy is not exportable and cannot be imposed on nations, is based on a true and valid argument. Nevertheless, the soundness of this viewpoint should not leave us empty-handed; numerous soft strategies that can be used to advocate for democracy (while evading the silly accusation of “interference in domestic affairs”) exist. Meanwhile, the perpetrators of terrorist acts, universally condemned by almost all civilians, have had more success carrying out quite a few terrorist activities not only within the Arab region, but also in many western countries.

After much wavering, the state finally announced an economic plan with a set of concrete fiscal and monetary measures designed to staunch the hemorrhage of the public budget and restore balance to the currency market.

I ended the previous paper with the question: is the Islamic dress code the symbol of the ‎rising hegemony of a religion? Of the return of the claims of religious people who want to ‎define what is acceptable or not in the public sphere? ‎

An Egyptian businessman with close ties to general-turned-president Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi has submitted a bid for the broadcasting rights of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) in a move that is widely seen as an effort to polish the image of Egypt, tarnished by massive abuse of human rights, failing economic policies, and a military coup that in 2013 put an end to the country’s first democratic experiment.

Egypt has signed a staff level agreement with the International Monetary Fund in order to receive loans worth $12 billion from the IMF and $3 billion from the World Bank as well as additional loans and deposits from the Gulf countries and dollar bonds ranging between $5 to $7 billion.

Several security-related incidents have had a substantial impact on Egypt’s tourism industry as of late. However, the country now seems to believe that these incidents are over and done with, and President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi believes that the tourism industry is about to rebound.

A new Champions League season is starting amid ongoing debate about its controversial upcoming reforms. The changes will only benefit the continent’s biggest clubs and damage UEFA, writes Olivia Gerstenberger. On Wednesday, a new UEFA president will be elected in Athens. And it is about time. There has been a power vacuum at European soccer’s governing body for months, and the shrewd bosses of the continent’s biggest clubs exploited the opportunity. They pushed through reforms, which were grudgingly signed off on by UEFA and are to come into effect in 2018.

During the recent days, I was keen to follow the different reactions over the departure of four Coptic minors to Turkey seeking asylum in Switzerland. Despite their legal status as minors, they have been sentenced to five-year imprisonment in accusation of religious contempt.

The number of detentions that the Israeli occupation army has inflicted on the sons and daughters of the Palestinian people is estimated to be one million since the beginning of the occupation in 1967. It is estimated that approximately 40 percent of all male adults have been subject to arrest or detention at the hands of the Israeli army in one way or another.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989, there appeared to be something of a pause in dramatic events for the United States and much of Europe.

When France enacted its ban on "ostentatious symbols" in public schools in 2004, the so-called "veil ban" was justified under the guise of a warped form of European cultural relativism. It's just the French way, you see. Over the years, legislation in France has continued to encroach into the private sphere of Muslim citizens, with a keen focus on women. French officials push back against burkinis

IBM is one of the oldest companies in the IT industry, and they have become pioneers in the field. As pioneers, they are always leading the market towards huge transformations and revolutionary trends. IBM will introduce a glimpse of the next transformational era: the cognitive era.

Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan holds Fethullah Gulen, the self-exiled conservative leader of Hizmet, one of the world’s biggest Islamic movements, responsible for the attempt to overthrow his democratically elected government. Erdogan asserts that Gulen’s followers infiltrated the military, police, judiciary, bureaucracy, and education system as well as the media. In response, he has arrested tens of thousands and fired a similar number of military and police officers, judiciary personnel, teachers and professors, and bureaucrats accused of being Gulen sympathisers.

India learned its lesson from China, and knows that industrial development is the best way for India’s economy to grow. Prime minister of India Narendra Modi knows this very well. After he implemented this strategy in Gujarat, he ruled for 13 years and achieved a great deal of success.

Ahmed Kamal, a medical student, was arrested by police and delivered to his family the following day via the mortuary. Ahmed had been sentenced to two years in absentia and only recently arrested and killed by Egyptian police, possibly tortured to death. Sometime in the past this may have been breaking news, causing outrage in Egyptian society, and perhaps even internationally. But in today’s Egypt, this is a repeated story, predictable in every way.

Egypt has recently been the subject of a number of deeply unflattering articles in the international business media. Many criticisms have been levelled at the actions, and inaction, of Cairo’s economic policy-makers. These criticisms have not made many friends in Egypt—so I do not propose to repeat them. I also think that, like much of today’s media coverage, the opinions are expressed at times with unhelpfully negative vocabulary and appear to appeal as much to sentiment as to reason.

The pressing issues for banks today are many. Apart from known concerns like capital and figuring out how to comply with the requirements of Basel III, I see that the enforcement of sanctions and embargoes is the nightmare that is really keeping bankers awake at night. Let’s start with the obvious. Sanctions and embargoes are political trade restrictions put in place against specific countries with the aim of maintaining or restoring international peace and security. Mostly, they are political trade tools imposed by the United Nations, the European Union, and the United States, which are known to place some of the most severe sanctions in the world.

The pressing issues for banks today are many. Apart from known concerns like capital and figuring out how to comply with the requirements of Basel III, I see that the enforcement of sanctions and embargoes is the nightmare that is really keeping bankers awake at night. Let’s start with the obvious. Sanctions and embargoes are political trade restrictions put in place against specific countries with the aim of maintaining or restoring international peace and security. Mostly, they are political trade tools imposed by the United Nations, the European Union, and the United States, which are known to place some of the most severe sanctions in the worl