Qatar welcomes accord
The State of Qatar, represented by HE the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Ahmed bin Abdullah al-Mahmoud, took part in the signing ceremony of the Palestinian reconciliation agreement in Cairo yesterday.

Obama reserves right to act again in Pakistan
The White House said yesterday that US President Barack Obama reserves the right to act again against top terror suspects inside Pakistan, following the raid which killed Osama bin Laden.

Qatar’s fiscal surplus ‘set to widen by 7%’
Qatar’s fiscal surplus will widen to 7% of the GDP in 2011/2012 on the back of continued recovery in hydrocarbon prices, a double-digit surge in LNG export volumes’ growth as well as higher level of transfers from public enterprises, according to a new study.

United advance to Barcelona showdown
Manchester United will face Barcelona in the Champions League final later this month after completing an emphatic 6-1 aggregate semi-final victory over Schalke 04 at Old Trafford yesterday.

Rules seen limiting retail banking growth
New regulations on personal lending in Qatar will restrict the expansion of the country’s already competitive retail banking sector, Al Khaliji Commercial Bank’s chief financial officer said yesterday. “The retail market in Qatar will always be extremely competitive and it will be very difficult to justify a large retail franchise while you have a small local bankable population,” Christiaan de Beer, Al Khaliji’s group chief financial officer told reporters in Doha.

Voters set to reject electoral reform
Britain is set to decisively reject a change in the voting system in a referendum today, a poll revealed, sparking a final push by supporters on the last day of a bitter and divisive campaign. Some 66% said they wanted to retain the first-past-the-post system, where the candidate with the most votes wins, with just 34% backing a switch to the alternative vote (AV), a system of preference votes.