Qatar’s purchase of a 10 per cent stake in the Istanbul stock exchange last month drew attention to the huge amounts of money being pumped into the Turkish economy by its Gulf ally.
The $200 million deal between the Turkey Wealth Fund and the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) was one of 10 agreements signed when Qatari Emir Tamim Al Thani visited Ankara on November 26.
During the visit the QIA snapped up a 30 per cent stake in Istinye Park, a luxury shopping centre in Istanbul, for a reported $300m from Dogus Holding, a company that has been hard hit by the fall in the lira's value this year.
Meanwhile, QTerminals, a partly state-owned Qatari port operator, spent $140m on the contract for Antalya’s Port Akdeniz from Global Ports Holding.
An unspecified amount was invested in Istanbul's Golden Horn Marina project while agreements were signed on trade promotion, economic co-operation and diplomatic exchanges.
While trade between the countries rose 6 per cent last year, Qatar’s investment in Turkey amounted to $22 billion at the end of 2019, making the gas-rich emirate the second biggest investor in Turkey after the Netherlands, which has $33bn invested in Turkey.
More than two thirds of Turkey’s $150bn foreign direct investment comes from Europe, a pattern of investment that dates back decades. Qatari financing, meanwhile, reached nearly 15 per cent of total foreign investment in Turkey over the past five years.
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Coronavirus around the world:
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Qatar has also helped Turkey after it burnt through its foreign reserves trying to shore up the faltering lira this year, tripling its currency swap to $15b nin May.
Doha’s stake in Turkey is highlighted by the Qatar-owned QNB Finansbank, which was valued at $42bn earlier this year, more than the combined value of all of Turkey’s other listed banks.
Qatar National Bank acquired the lender, which has about 650 branches in Turkey, when it paid $2.94bn for the National Bank of Greece’s 99.81 per cent stake five years ago.
In 2016, the Commercial Bank of Qatar bought out Turkey’s ABank when it purchased the remaining 25 per cent of stock for $222.5m.
Investment in the banking sector is mirrored across the Turkish economy.
The beIN Media Group stamped its mark on the TV market when it bought satellite broadcaster Digiturk for an estimated $1.5bn in 2016, giving it the rights to show Turkish and foreign sports. At the time Digiturk was the country's leading pay-TV operator with 3.3 million subscribers.
Qatar entered the media sector eight years earlier when Lusail International, a subsidiary of the QIA, partnered with Calik Holding to buy the Sabah-ATV media group for $1.1bn.
At the time, Calik was headed by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s son-in-law Berat Albayrak, who went on to become Turkey’s finance minister. Lusail later sold its 25 per cent holding.
However, it is Qatar’s growing stake in the defence industry that has caused most controversy in Turkey, which has sought to reduce its reliance on foreign weaponry in recent years.
Nearly half the stock in BMC, a commercial and military vehicle manufacturer, was sold to the Qatar Armed Forces Industry Committee in 2015 for $300m, going into partnership with Turkish businessmen with close ties to Mr Erdogan.
Over the following years, BMC benefited from generous government incentives, such as the controversial offer of a 25-year, $50m lease on Turkey’s largest tank factory to produce the Altay battle tank.
Meanwhile, Qatari investors have been busy buying up mansions along the Bosphorus as well as building villas and hotels along the Turkish coastline.
According to Turkish Deputy Foreign Minister Yavuz Selim Kiran, about 170 Qatari companies were operating in Turkey at the start of the year.
The five pillars of Islam
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The specs
Engine: 0.8-litre four cylinder
Power: 70bhp
Torque: 66Nm
Transmission: four-speed manual
Price: $1,075 new in 1967, now valued at $40,000
On sale: Models from 1966 to 1970
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Killing of Qassem Suleimani
Farage on Muslim Brotherhood
Nigel Farage told Reform's annual conference that the party will proscribe the Muslim Brotherhood if he becomes Prime Minister.
"We will stop dangerous organisations with links to terrorism operating in our country," he said. "Quite why we've been so gutless about this – both Labour and Conservative – I don't know.
“All across the Middle East, countries have banned and proscribed the Muslim Brotherhood as a dangerous organisation. We will do the very same.”
It is 10 years since a ground-breaking report into the Muslim Brotherhood by Sir John Jenkins.
Among the former diplomat's findings was an assessment that “the use of extreme violence in the pursuit of the perfect Islamic society” has “never been institutionally disowned” by the movement.
The prime minister at the time, David Cameron, who commissioned the report, said membership or association with the Muslim Brotherhood was a "possible indicator of extremism" but it would not be banned.
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
Killing of Qassem Suleimani
The burning issue
The internal combustion engine is facing a watershed moment – major manufacturer Volvo is to stop producing petroleum-powered vehicles by 2021 and countries in Europe, including the UK, have vowed to ban their sale before 2040. The National takes a look at the story of one of the most successful technologies of the last 100 years and how it has impacted life in the UAE.
Read part four: an affection for classic cars lives on
Read part three: the age of the electric vehicle begins
Read part one: how cars came to the UAE
Zayed Sustainability Prize
Key facilities
- Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
- Premier League-standard football pitch
- 400m Olympic running track
- NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
- 600-seat auditorium
- Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
- An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
- Specialist robotics and science laboratories
- AR and VR-enabled learning centres
- Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
Conflict, drought, famine
Estimates of the number of deaths caused by the famine range from 400,000 to 1 million, according to a document prepared for the UK House of Lords in 2024.
It has been claimed that the policies of the Ethiopian government, which took control after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie in a military-led revolution in 1974, contributed to the scale of the famine.
Dr Miriam Bradley, senior lecturer in humanitarian studies at the University of Manchester, has argued that, by the early 1980s, “several government policies combined to cause, rather than prevent, a famine which lasted from 1983 to 1985. Mengistu’s government imposed Stalinist-model agricultural policies involving forced collectivisation and villagisation [relocation of communities into planned villages].
The West became aware of the catastrophe through a series of BBC News reports by journalist Michael Buerk in October 1984 describing a “biblical famine” and containing graphic images of thousands of people, including children, facing starvation.
Band Aid
Bob Geldof, singer with the Irish rock group The Boomtown Rats, formed Band Aid in response to the horrific images shown in the news broadcasts.
With Midge Ure of the band Ultravox, he wrote the hit charity single Do They Know it’s Christmas in December 1984, featuring a string of high-profile musicians.
Following the single’s success, the idea to stage a rock concert evolved.
Live Aid was a series of simultaneous concerts that took place at Wembley Stadium in London, John F Kennedy Stadium in Philadelphia, the US, and at various other venues across the world.
The combined event was broadcast to an estimated worldwide audience of 1.5 billion.
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Place of birth: Kalba
Family: Mother of eight children and has 10 grandchildren
Favourite traditional dish: Al Harees, a slow cooked porridge-like dish made from boiled cracked or coarsely ground wheat mixed with meat or chicken
Favourite book: My early life by Sheikh Dr Sultan bin Muhammad Al Qasimi, the Ruler of Sharjah
Favourite quote: By Sheikh Zayed, the UAE's Founding Father, “Those who have no past will have no present or future.”
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UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
Mohammed bin Zayed Majlis
