Slowing global growth and elevated tensions in trade and geopolitics are posing economic challenges for countries in the Middle East, according to the International Monetary Fund.
"Global developments are affecting the outlook for this year, namely the slowdown in growth especially on trade, the volatility in the oil price, as well as also the global financing conditions, in additional to a certain number of country specific issues," Jihad Azour, the IMF's director of the Middle East and Central Asia, told CNBC on Sunday.
"Despite the current increase in prices, the medium-term price projections of oil remain in the corridor of the mid-$60s," Azour said. In the past 18 months, the IMF's Reported Social Unrest Index — which calculates the share of articles in major news sources that include key terms relating to protests, demonstrations, and other forms of social unrest — has hit multi-year highs in some countries in the Middle East region.
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