The first ArabBank exhibition opened at Dubai’s World Trade Centre. The three-day summit will be the impetus for regional bankers to interact with solution providers. The exhibition was formally opened by Shaikh Hasher Maktoum, Dubai Director of Information. International heavyweights like IBM, Xerox, Unisys Compaq, Dun and Bradstreet, as well as a separate division of global telecommunications giant AT&T are keeping a keen eye on the rapidly unfolding developments in the banking segment. Local banks have consistently expanded their networks and operations, acquiring the finesse and reach to match big league players. Emirates Bank and MashreqBank have recently expanded operations into such intricate segments as relationship banking. The banking scene in the GCC has seen exponential growth, with 47 in the UAE alone, 28 of which are subsidiaries of foreign banks. A division of IBM, which offers software solutions, is making major acquisitions to back its credentials.
Other important events:
1865 Andrew Johnson becomes the 17th US president after Lincoln’s assassination.
1923 Insulin, discovered by Canadian Dr Frederick Banting, is made available for general use by diabetics.
1945 Japanese-occupied Laos, with Japanese support, declares independence from France.
1956 The first TV station in the world broadcast all of its programming in Colour-WNBQ in Chicago.
1959 Cuban leader Fidel Castro arrives in Washington to begin a goodwill tour of the US.
1964 Ian Smith becomes premier of Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe).
1968 Two unmanned Soviet satellites link up while in orbit around the Earth.
1974 Military coup in Niger overthrows government of president Hamani Diori.
1982 Five militant Muslim militants are executed in Egypt for assassination of President Anwar Sadat.
1986 US fighters attack Libya in retaliation to a bomb attack on a West Berlin discotheque.
1993 A car bomb explodes at a shopping mall in Bogota, Colombia, killing at least five people.
1995 An express train plows into a crowded bus in the Nile Delta north of Cairo, killing 42 people.
1996 More than 100 rebels ambush a six-vehicle military convoy near the Ecuador border, killing 31 Colombian soldiers.
1997 A blaze guts 70,000 tents in Mina, Saudi Arabia, killing 343 pilgrims.
1998 Pol Pot, leader of the Khmer Rouge, dies at 73.
1999 Nato takes responsibility for the bombing of a refugee convoy in Kosovo that killed 75 civilians.
2002 An Air China passenger aircraft crashes into a wooded South Korean mountain, killing 128 people but 39 people had a miraculous escape.
2005 Flames and smoke send people jumping from windows of a hotel in Paris in an overnight fire that leaves 20 dead.
2006 Scientists find antibodies in camel which may treat colon cancer.
2007 A daring robbery takes place in Graff, a luxury store in Wafi City mall in Dubai.
2008 Maoists win more than half of the directly elected seats in Nepal.
2012 Mercedes and German driver Nico Rosberg wins the Chinese Grand Prix in Shanghai.
2013 Two bombs explodes near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing three people.
2014 Saudi Arabia appoints General Yousuf Bin Ali Al Idrissi as intelligence chief.
