Major international banking conference to be held in Abu Dhabi

Mr. Michael Tomalin, Chief Executive Officer of the host bank of the conference, the National Bank of Abu Dhabi, will open the event and underscore the increasingly important roles that banks in the Middle East and North Africa are playing in international finance. He will stress at the same time that significant efforts are now underway to strengthen the region's banking institutions. These are two of the prime themes of the forthcoming meeting.

Prominent speakers at the conference will include His Excellency Dr. Moh'd S. Abu Hammour, Minister of Finance, Jordan, His Excellency Sultan Bin Nasser Al Suwaidi, Governor, Central Bank of the United Arab Emirates, and Mr. Mohammed Al-Abbar, Director General, Department of Economic Development, Dubai. Meeting behind closed doors at the Emirates Palace Hotel the leaders of finance will first assess critical global and regional economic trends with presentations by Mr. Charles Dallara, the IIF's Managing Director and by Mr. Howard Handy, the IIF Director for the Middle East and Africa.

The IIF is seeing significant growth in its membership in the Middle East and North Africa region and is organizing an increasing range of high level meetings, including a Chief Risk Officers forum and an economic forum.

In addition to discussions of economic developments, the finance leaders will focus on such key topics as prospects for the region's capital markets, managing and developing human resources in banking in the Middle East, retail banking and financial sector consolidation in the region. Among the presenters to the meeting are Mr. Mohamed Taymour, Chairman, EFG-Hermes, Mr. Henry Azzam, CEO Jordinvest, Mr. Lynton Jones, Chairman, Dubai International Financial Exchange, Mat Green, Russell Reynolds Associates, Mr. Lulwa Al-Mutlaq, Senior Vice President, Arab Banking Corp., Mr. Sherif S. Samy, Chairman, SKILLRATE Advisors SAE, Mr. Mahmoud Sayed Abdel Latif, Chairman, Bank of Alexandria, Mr. Mohamed Berro, Global Head - Retail Banking Group, Arab Bank, Mr. David Hodgkinson, Deputy Chairman, HSBC, Middle East, Mr. Hans-Martin Stockmeier, Principal, McKinsey, Mr. Georges Zard Abou Jaoudé, Chairman, Lebanese Canadian Bank, Mr. Daniel Abut, Managing Director, Global Bank Strategist, Goldman Sachs & Co., Mr. Hisham Ezz Al-Arab, Chairman and Managing Director, CIB.