GCC monetary council to meet in March

Abdulrahman Al Attiyah, secretary-general of the Gulf Cooperation Council, has said the bloc's central bank governors will hold the first meeting of their joint monetary council on March 30, the next step towards monetary union, Reuters has reported. Governors will discuss legal and administrative issues in order 'to speed up the single currency', and form a board of directors for the project, he said. Attiyah said there was still hope the UAE, which opted out of the monetary union in May in protest over a decision to base the Gulf central bank in Saudi Arabia, would change its mind.