BEIJING: China will speed up free trade talks with six countries on the Arabian peninsula and begin trade negotiations with Israel next year, state media said yesterday, as Beijing accelerates efforts to sign such agreements.
China and members of the Gulf Cooperation Council — Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates — started free trade talks in 2004, and a deal will help China cut costs on energy imports from the region, the official China Daily said.
“GCC countries consider China as a major market for their petrochemical products, and this (FTA) will assist those nations in their industrial development,” Zhang Shaogang, head of the Commerce Ministry’s international trade and economic affairs department, was quoted as saying.
Zhang added that the ministry has finished a feasibility study on launching free trade talks with Israel, and hopes to sign it sometime in the next few years, the English-language newspaper said.
China inked major free trade agreements with Australia and South Korea this year, and already has deals with a handful of other countries, including Costa Rica, Peru, New Zealand and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
Bisco Misr takeover bid deadline extended
CAIRO: Egypt’s financial regulator has extended until January 11 the bidding period for Bisco Misr, the subject of a takeover battle pitting Kellogg , the world’s largest breakfast cereal maker, against UAE-based Abraaj Asset Management.
Kellogg raised its bid for the Egyptian snack maker on Wednesday, topping an offer from private equity company Abraaj in an intensifying $144m battle.
The tussle has shown foreign investors are returning to Egypt. It is part of flurry of mergers and rights issues boosting activity on the Cairo bourse, an exchange which has struggled to revive investor confidence during the political and economic turmoil which has followed the Arab Spring uprisings.
Abraaj, the Middle East’s largest private equity firm, has been battling Kellogg since last month, when the US group scuppered its deal to snap up the Egyptian cake and biscuit maker.
Each suitor has made four offers, and the battle has driven up the bid price by more than a fifth from Abraaj’s opening gambit of 73.91 pounds per share.
Bisco Misr is an established brand with three factories in Cairo and Alexandria.
Reuters
