Mohammed bin Saleh Al-Athel has been the deputy governor of the Saudi General Authority for Military Industries (GAMI) since May 2019.
He was the secretary-general of the GAMI board of directors from November 2017 to October 2018 and was secretary-general and a member of the armaments contracts review committee at the Saudi Ministry of Defense, in Riyadh, between 2017 and 2019.
For more than four years, Al-Athel worked as a project director at both Saudi Arabian Military Industries and the Kingdom’s Public Investment Fund.
He has also been a board member at several institutions in Bahrain including Malath Cooperative Insurance Co., the Filing and Packing Materials Manufacturing Co., and Venture Capital Bank.
Al-Athel obtained a bachelor’s degree in finance from King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, in Dhahran, and a master’s degree from Smith School of Business at Queen’s University in Kingston, Canada.
On Monday, GAMI confirmed that the Kingdom will increase support for scientific research from its military budget to 4 percent during the next 10 years, in order to convey technology, weapons industry and military industries in general.
Talking to Arab News, Al-Athel said that the Kingdom had the world’s third-largest budget allocated to weapons, after the US and China, and was the largest importer of arms.
Mohammed bin Saleh Al-Athel, deputy governor of the Saudi General Authority for Military Industries
Mohammed bin Saleh Al-Athel, deputy governor of the Saudi General Authority for Military Industries
Saudi wildlife authority releases predatory birds in Al-Soudah Park
- Aim to reintroduce, breed threatened wildlife
- Birds were acclimatized to area’s environment
LONDON: Saudi Arabia’s National Center for Wildlife has released several predatory birds into the wild under the Kingdom’s Green Initiative and the National Environment Strategy to breed and reintroduce threatened species.
On Wednesday, the NCW released them in Al-Soudah Park in collaboration with the Soudah Development Co. They included three griffon vultures, a black kite, Arabian scops owl, and a Eurasian sparrowhawk, all of which had been rehabilitated.
The birds underwent acclimatization to ensure they were ready to adapt to the area’s environment. Their release aims to enhance ecological balance and restore biodiversity in Al-Soudah Park, one of the Kingdom’s most prominent mountainous environmental zones.
They will help stabilize local species in mountain ecosystems by regulating food chains and maintaining habitat health, the Saudi Press Agency reported.
The NCW will track the movement and behavior of the birds. It noted that this initiative is a part of ongoing programs across Saudi Arabia.
