Manama: With the key note address by His Royal Highness Crown Prince, Deputy Supreme Commander at the BDF and the First Deputy Premier, Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the 10th IISS Manama opened on Friday at the Ritz Carlton Hotel.
Earlier, the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), the organizer of the event, announced key delegates participating in Manama Dialogue being held from 5-7 December 2014 in the Kingdom of Bahrain.
On Friday, Sky News Arabia hosted the opening televised plenary entitled ‘Beyond Conflict: Imagining the Future of the Middle East.’
It featured Shaikh Khaled bin Ahmed Al Khalifa, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Bahrain; Hoshyar Zebari, Minister of Finance, Iraq; and Seyed Hossein Mousavian, Research Scholar, Princeton University and former Head, Foreign Relations Committee, Supreme National Security Council, Iran. Fadila Souissi of Sky News Arabia moderated the discussion.
HRH Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Crown Prince and First Deputy Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Bahrain, hosted the dinner on Friday.
The senior officials participating in the conference throughout the weekend include, among others: John Baird, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Canada; Dr Abdullatif Al Zayani, Secretary General, Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf; Sameh Shoukry, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Egypt; Jean-Yves Le Drian, Minister of Defence, France; Dr Ibrahim Al Jaafari, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Iraq; Dr Nizar bin Obaid Madani, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Saudi Arabia; HH Sh Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Minister of Foreign Affairs, United Arab Emirates; Philip Hammond, Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, UK; Michael Fallon, Secretary of State for Defence, UK; and General Ali Al Ahmadi, Chief, National Security Bureau, Yemen.
The IISS Manama Dialogue is an inter-governmental summit held to foster regional security diplomacy in the Gulf. It provides a space for national security leaders and analysts from the Gulf, the wider Middle East, North America, Europe and Asia to debate and consult bilaterally and multilaterally on key security and foreign policy challenges. Now in its tenth year, the IISS Manama Dialogue has become a key pillar in the evolving Gulf security architecture.