Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani said on Sunday his country was prepared to take more legal migrants as part of its efforts to block irregular migration.
On a visit to Cairo, Mr Tajani held discussions with Egyptian counterparts about ending the political deadlock in Libya as means of solving the migration crisis.
Egypt has largely prevented migrant boats from leaving its Mediterranean coast since 2016. The number of Egyptians crossing to Europe through Libya has risen sharply, with 20,542 disembarking in Italy last year, up from 1,264 in 2020, according to Italian government figures.
Egyptians also make up the largest group by nationality of migrants landing in Italy, Italian interior ministry data suggests.
Italy is “ready to have more legal migrants, including those coming from Egypt”, Mr Tajani said at a joint news conference with counterpart Sameh Shoukry on Sunday.
He spoke about pilot projects to give migrants grants to study and train in Italy, although he did not give any indication of the numbers who would be allowed in.
He also called for a resolution of Libya's political and security crisis as a prelude to elections and a new constitution. “The solution to the Libyan problem is also part of the solution of the illegal immigration problem,” Mr Tajani said.
Both Egypt and Italy have been invested in efforts to find a solution for the crisis in Libya, an energy-rich North African state where human traffickers take advantage of the lawlessness to do business.
Libya has been mired in chaos since a Nato-backed uprising toppled and killed dictator Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. The country is now split between two rival administrations with claims to legitimacy.
On more direct relations between the two nations, Mr Tajani said he had received assurances from President Abdel Fattah El Sisi that his government would work towards resolving the case of an Italian researcher murdered in Cairo in 2016.
A second case concerns an Egyptian who is enrolled at an Italian university but is banned from leaving Egypt following his release in 2021 after two years in jail for publishing a contentious article about the human rights of Coptic Christians in Egypt.
The cases of Giulio Regeni, the Italian postgraduate student found dead in Egypt in 2016, and Patrick Zaki, the Egyptian who was studying in Italy and is on trial for spreading false news, were addressed in talks with Mr El Sisi and Mr Shoukry, said Mr Tajani.
“The problem was raised with the president, who told me it was the intention of Egypt to resolve the problems, and remove all the obstacles,” he said without giving details what Cairo intended to do.
“I asked for and received assurances for strong co-operation on the Regeni and Zaki cases,” Mr Tajani wrote on Twitter.
The Regeni case rocked Cairo’s relations with Rome, with Mr Regeni’s family and Italian authorities accusing Egyptian security forces of torturing and killing him. They denied involvement in his abduction or death.
Mr Regeni, 28, was a Cambridge University doctoral student researching labour movements in Egypt when he was abducted on January 25, 2016.
His body was found along a roadside several days later bearing marks of torture.
Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
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The biog
Hometown: Cairo
Age: 37
Favourite TV series: The Handmaid’s Tale, Black Mirror
Favourite anime series: Death Note, One Piece and Hellsing
Favourite book: Designing Brand Identity, Fifth Edition
Sole survivors
- Cecelia Crocker was on board Northwest Airlines Flight 255 in 1987 when it crashed in Detroit, killing 154 people, including her parents and brother. The plane had hit a light pole on take off
- George Lamson Jr, from Minnesota, was on a Galaxy Airlines flight that crashed in Reno in 1985, killing 68 people. His entire seat was launched out of the plane
- Bahia Bakari, then 12, survived when a Yemenia Airways flight crashed near the Comoros in 2009, killing 152. She was found clinging to wreckage after floating in the ocean for 13 hours.
- Jim Polehinke was the co-pilot and sole survivor of a 2006 Comair flight that crashed in Lexington, Kentucky, killing 49.
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
