For decades, the MENA region’s pivotal role in the global economy has been rooted primarily in oil and gas exports. The region’s GDP grew from $1 trillion USD in 2000 to nearly $4.5 trillion in 2022, and more than 60% of that combined GDP is in its oil-exporting countries.
Across both the Biden and Trump administrations, the US has consistently viewed China as the primary global rival, particularly in the fast-evolving field of artificial intelligence. President Biden’s administration recently underscored this stance with the first-ever National Security Memorandum (NSM) on AI, which set a firm foundation for addressing the AI challenge posed by Beijing.
This article was first published in Policy Center for the New South. It was co-authored by Mohammed Soliman and Alberto Tagliapietra.
Read MEI’s weekly briefing featuring expert analysis of key regional developments for the week ahead.
AI is a pivotal catalyst for global innovation, with the United States at the forefront of the development of this transformative technology amid its ongoing great power rivalry with China. This report aims to define the concept of AI supremacy and to revise the US’ AI strategy in accordance with a more comprehensive understanding of it. The report also looks at how the competition has affected actors from the Middle East, namely the UAE and Saudi Arabia, attempting to steer the conversation on the global AI race toward a comprehensive conception of AI supremacy that is anchored in the realities of international affairs and US-China great power competition.
Wednesday, November 20, marks a somber anniversary for Ukraine: 1,000 days since Russia’s full-scale invasion of the country. Though the Ukrainians continue to hold out with Western assistance against Russian attacks, the past two-and-a-half years have been devastating for the country and its people. Ukraine now faces another winter at war as momentum appears to be shifting in Russia’s favor. What can the US and its allies do to ensure hostilities end as favorably as possible to Ukraine and in line with American strategic national interests?
The Black Sea has recently become one of the world’s most important dynamically shifting geostrategic maritime areas, with Ukraine playing a crucial role in upending the naval balance of power there. Ukraine’s efforts to push back against Russia, bolstered by Western military aid, have challenged the status quo and reshaped the region’s security landscape.
In a landmark move signaling the growing importance of the Middle East in the global tech landscape, Google has entered into a strategic partnership with Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF), the kingdom’s sovereign wealth fund. The partnership underscores the “growing interlink” between AI and energy, as Saudi Arabia — along with the United Arab Emirates and other Gulf states — uses its energy surplus to power data centers, a critical pillar of AI infrastructure.
At last month’s Summit of the Future, the more than 190 UN member countries agreed to unprecedented new commitments on behalf of future generations, and they pledged to build a long-term future perspective into their mechanisms of governance, domestically and multilaterally. MEI’s Strategic Foresight Initiative program director Steven Kenney reflects on attending the summit and its outcomes.
When President Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan (MbZ) of the United Arab Emirates visited the White House on Sept. 23, the joint US-UAE statement was one of the most extensive yet covering pledges to cooperate on nearly every technological sector and signaling a clear goal to shift the bilateral relationship away from hydrocarbons.
Expert regional analysis by MEI scholars and contributors.
The question of whether Armenia’s recent shift away from reliance on Russia is reversible is central to understanding its democratization trajectory. In recent years, Armenia’s dependency on Russia for security and economic stability has been severely tested, particularly during the 2020 Second Karabakh War and subsequent Azerbaijani incursions on sovereign Armenian territory, where Russia’s lack of support led to widespread disillusionment. This discontent has spurred Armenia to diversify its security, economic, and diplomatic ties, with a notable strengthening of relations with the United States. However, the sustainability of this shift remains uncertain, as it hinges on various societal factors and internal dynamics.
Azerbaijan’s takeover of Karabakh in September 2023, while a disruptive event, has opened the window for renewed dialogue to peacefully resolve the longstanding tensions between Azerbaijan and Armenia. While the ongoing negotiations are unlikely to lead to a comprehensive peace deal in the near term, they could alter the strategic calculus of key actors in the region. The most likely and consequential outcome of the talks will be a peace framework agreement that could rebalance the regional status quo, potentially leading to a peace deal between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Azerbaijan seeks to establish itself as a major actor in the global energy transition space as it prepares to host the 2024 UN Climate Change Conference (COP29) in Baku, on November 11-22. COP29 offers many opportunities to improve US-Azerbaijani energy cooperation, including by coordinating the United States’ clean energy technology goals with Azerbaijan’s renewable energy revolution.
After the Cold War, the Romanian government chose to slim down its sizeable defense industry, but it essentially maintained its state-backed structure, personnel, and management, thus producing a thoroughly inefficient system. Today, Romania retains a proclivity to purchase Western, and particularly American, defense equipment; but it has often neglected any thorough assessments of life cycle costs or real force design considerations.