‘Canada will respond’ if US imposes tariffs: Trudeau

LONDON: Saudi creatives are writing and telling their stories to the world after years of borrowing the narratives of others, Princess Noura Al-Saud, the founder of two leading Saudi cultural incubators, said on Wednesday.

“Finally, now, we are taking ownership and writing our own stories. We are proud of it and are showcasing who we really are. (We’re) not trying to fit into other people’s expectations,” she said.

Princess Noura was speaking at the annual networking forum of the Creative Women Platform, of which she is a Saudi patron, at Palastiers’ Hall in London’s Square Mile.

She is the the founder of Rukun Creative Exchange and Almashtal Creative Space, a destination for creatives in Riyadh to receive support and nurture their talent.

On Wednesday, she joined dozens of entrepreneurs, policymakers and business leaders from the food, steel and sports sectors, as well as celebrities, philanthropists and fitness experts, to discuss sustainability and the role of women in shaping the future.

She acknowledged that building a space for creatives could be relatively easy but said that the most critical factor was creating a place of belonging where people could share meaningful experiences.

At Almashtal, which means plant nursery in Arabic, the focus was on the tiny details, such as the interior design and the background music, to foster a cultural identity in the space, Princess Noura said.

“Nature is a major source of inspiration for me. Plant nurseries provide the right climate and nutrition, so the plant builds strong roots to live in the outside world, and this is also our goal at Almashtal,” she told Arab News.

Almashtal, founded in 2019, has four labs focusing on creativity, business, glass and sound, and offers workshops, mentorship and other resources. The space has become essential for sharing ideas, networking and experimenting among Saudi creatives, Princess Noura said.

She told Arab News that Saudi women in the private sector who work in sciences, technology and entrepreneurship should “speak more about their work and achievements, and show the efforts it took to reach this stage.

“I tell them to be proud and share their stories as it will inspire others,” she added.

Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 has transformed women’s lives in the Kingdom through a series of reforms since 2016 that empowered them to take part in the workforce and business. There are increased opportunities for women to pursue careers in the creative industries such as design, architecture, film, fashion and the arts. The Kingdom made “major strides” in the cultural sectors, according to a 2024 Harvard Business Review report, driven by a “commitment to preserving and showcasing its abundant history, national identity and heritage.”

During a conversation with Olga Balakleets, founder and CEO of the Creative Women Platform, Princess Noura said: “Creativity is essential to life. It is what grounds us ... it is how we connect, and it has always been that for me, and my mission is to help others see and understand that.”

Balakleets told Arab News that her journey with the forum was “an exciting one,” and added that creative women are “united by their belief in making a creative impact,” contributing positively to society by finding solutions to global problems.

At Wednesday’s event, speakers included author and philanthropist Sarah Ferguson, duchess of York; Shaikha Fouz Al-Sabah, founder of Khaleejesque, a Kuwait-based online magazine that covers the cultures of the Arab Gulf youth; and Tessa Clarke, co-founder and CEO of Olio, a community app designed to help people share food and reduce waste. Daniela Baumann, CEO of LOFTI Studios, spoke about the ups and downs that led her to establish a series of pole fitness studios, while Paula Owen, founder and CEO of ECO Action Games, highlighted the importance of raising climate awareness through games and avoiding tactics that induce guilt or fear.

Aswar Kadie, a young entrepreneur of Somali descent who grew up in Sweden, is the founder and CEO of Aswar Sports Agency, established in 2021. She told Arab News that Aswar’s clientele includes football players under 18 and 21 in the Premier League and La Liga academies.

She recently returned from a visit to the Kingdom and said her agency is set to be involved with the Saudi Ministry of Sport as the country prepares to host the FIFA World Cup in 2034. She described the Creative Women Platform as a “huge” opportunity for a woman entrepreneur in a male-dominated industry.

“I always worked with men in a very competitive environment ... coming (to this event), I feel really inspired and the women here have become role models and I’m learning a lot from them,” she said.

The Creative Women Platform will return to Riyadh next November to feature Saudi entrepreneurs and leaders from various sectors, according to organizers.

Since launching in 2016, the networking forum has celebrated the leadership and entrepreneurial achievements of women from more than 50 countries.

WASHINGTON/LONDON: US President Donald Trump and British Prime Minister Keir Starmer on Thursday announced a limited bilateral trade agreement that leaves in place Trump’s 10 percent tariffs on British exports, modestly expands agricultural access for both countries and lowers prohibitive US duties on British car exports.
The “general terms” agreement is the first of dozens of tariff-lowering deals that Trump expects to land in coming weeks after upending the global trading system with steep new import taxes aimed at shrinking a $1.2 trillion US goods trade deficit.
Trump hailed the deal in the Oval Office with Starmer patched in on a speaker phone, as US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and top trade negotiator Jamieson Greer head to Switzerland to launch negotiations with Chinese negotiators.
He pushed back against seeing the UK deal as a template for other negotiations, saying that Britain “made a good deal” and that many other trading partners may end up with much higher final tariffs because of their large US trade surpluses.
In April, Trump imposed reciprocal duties of up to 50 percent on goods from 57 trading partners including the European Union, pausing them days later to allow time for negotiations until July 9. He has also heaped new 25 percent tariffs on auto imports, ended all exemptions on steel and aluminum duties, and announced new tariff probes on pharmaceuticals, copper, lumber and semiconductors. This week he added movies to the list.
“It opens up a tremendous market for us,” Trump told reporters, noting that he had not fully understood the restrictions facing American firms doing business in Britain.
“This is a really fantastic, historic day,” Starmer said, noting that the announcement came nearly at the same hour 80 years ago when World War Two ended in Europe. “This is going to boost trade between and across our countries, it’s going to not only protect jobs, but create jobs, opening market access.”
The two leaders heralded the plan as a “breakthrough deal” that lowers average British tariffs on US goods to 1.8 percent from 5.1 percent but keeps in place a 10 percent tariff on British goods.
A UK official told reporters that the United States and the United Kingdom have more serious work to do, and noted the deal did not include Washington’s demand for restructuring of Britain’s digital services tax, levied at 2 percent of UK revenue for online marketplaces. Washington could revisit the issue, but there was no agreed process for doing so, the official said.
“This is not a finished, classic ‘bells and whistles’ free trade agreement. It started off as a tactical response to President Trump’s tariffs, but actually morphed into a more substantive trade deal,” the official said. “And it will be built on. ... We’ve done the Oval Office, now we’ve got more serious work to do.”
Trump’s first trade deal fueled a rally on Wall Street, sending major US indexes briefly up over 1 percent. The S&P 500 passenger airlines index closed up 5.4 percent, led by a 7.2 percent surge in Delta Air Lines  as US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said British-made Rolls-Royce engines would enter the US duty-free.
Trump’s administration has been under pressure from investors to strike deals and de-escalate its tariff war after the US president’s often chaotic policymaking upended global trade with friends and foe alike, threatening to stoke inflation and tip the global and US economies into recession.
Lutnick told CNBC on Thursday that Washington will roll out dozens of trade deals over the next month.
Trump’s biggest challenge, however, is resolving a virtual trade embargo between the US and China, with tariffs of 145 percent and 125 percent, respectively on each side. Greer and Bessent will lead talks with Chinese officials in Switzerland, on Saturday and Sunday. Trump said the talks would be substantive — more than an ice-breaker — and predicted the tariffs would come down.
Warm relationship, some disappointment
The British-American Business group expressed disappointment that the deal leaves in place Trump’s 10 percent tariffs for many products, including cars, raising costs for UK exporters. It said it hoped that the deal would be a start of deeper US-UK trade integration including the digital economy.
The deal will provide potential new export opportunities for American producers worth $5 billion a year, Lutnick said, while the higher tariffs would generate $6 billion in annual US revenue.
It will reduce US tariffs on British auto imports to 10 percent from the current 27.5 percent, according to a UK statement. The lower rate will apply to a quota of 100,000 British vehicles, almost the total exported to the US last year.
US tariffs on imports from the struggling UK steel industry will fall to zero from 25 percent, while Britain’s 19 percent tariffs on US ethanol will fall to zero through a 1.4 billion-liter  quota that far exceeds US exports last to the UK last year.
Both sides have agreed to new reciprocal market access on beef, with UK farmers given a first-ever tariff-free quota for 13,000 metric tons.

There will be no weakening of UK food standards on imports, despite repeated entreaties by the US side.
Crucially there will be no weakening of UK food standards on US beef imports, which was an election manifesto pledge for the Labour government. That means US beef bred with growth hormones still won’t be allowed in.
US Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said the deal would “exponentially increase” US beef exports to Britain.
But much depends on whether American beef could compete with the British beef on price and find favor with British consumers.
Currently 100 percent of the fresh beef sold by Britain’s two biggest supermarket chains Tesco and Sainsbury’s is British and Irish.
Details were scant on tariffs on UK pharmaceuticals imports, which could damage AstraZeneca and GSK, although a White House fact sheet said the deal would create a secure pharma supply chain.
The US agreed to give Britain preferential treatment in any further tariffs imposed under Section 232 national security investigations, which include ongoing probes of pharmaceutical and semiconductor imports. GSK and AstraZeneca declined comment.
In addition to assurances “future-proofing” Britain from additional sectoral tariffs, the UK official also welcomed Trump’s assurance during the Oval Office event on finding ways to avoid his new push to tariff foreign-made movies.
Starmer’s government has been seeking to build new trading relationships post-Brexit with the US, China and the EU without moving so far toward one bloc that it angers the others.
With the British economy struggling to grow, the tariffs had added to the pressure on his government.
Jaguar Land Rover paused its shipments to the US for a month and the government was forced to seize control of British Steel to keep it operating.
Economists and one FTSE 100 chief executive said the immediate economic impact of a tariff deal was likely to be limited, but that trade agreements in general would help long-term growth. Britain struck a free trade agreement with India this week.