Saraya Real Estate MENA Fund announced its first investment in 'Saraya Islands'

Mr. Shehab Gargash, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Daman Investments PSC and a member of the Real Estate MENA Fund Board of Directors, was appointed as the Fund's representative on the Board of Directors of Saraya Islands. The announcement was made during the Saraya MENA Fund's Board of Directors meeting held on February 20, 2007. The Fund Board of Directors also elected Mr. Ali Kolaghassi, Vice Chairman and CEO of Saraya Holdings Limited as its Chairman.

The meeting was attended by Saraya Real Estate MENA Fund's Board of Directors including the following members: Ali Kolaghassi, Vice Chairman and CEO of Saraya Holdings; Jawdat Al-Halabi, Global Head of Private Banking at the Arab Bank Group and Managing Director of AB Invest; Oussama Kabbani, Managing Director of Millennium Development; Yousef Al-Essa, Chief Executive Officer of Bahrain-based Addax Investment Bank (Addax); Adel Kasaji, Chief Financial and Operating Officer at AB Invest; and Shehab Gargash, founder and Chief Executive Officer of Daman Investments PSC, in addition to Qutaiba Hawamdeh, Head of Asset Management at AB Invest. It is noteworthy that the Fund is managed by AB Invest, with Saraya Development Group assuming the role of the Property Advisor.

Mr. Kolaghassi thanked the Board Members for their valuable trust and emphasized on the Fund's strategy, which aims at achieving high returns and profits for investors by capitalizing on the economic growth and development witnessed in the region, and the high demand for real estate and tourism products and services. The Fund will primarily invest in targeted tourism and real estate projects through direct equity investment, with an initial focus on countries of the GCC and the Levant. Investing in the Saraya Islands project comes in line with this strategy, and is expected to capitalize on the opportunities offered by the tourism and real estate sectors of Ras Al Khaimah.

The placement of the closed-end Bahraini Fund was one of the largest placements in Arab capital markets during 2006. Saraya Holdings and Arab Bank provided a seed capital of $50 million ($25 million each), while 2,000 investment units, with a par value of $100,000 per unit, were offered for subscription. These were taken up entirely by institutional and individual investors in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Oman, Jordan and Palestine.