The European Investment Bank (EIB) has appointed Plutarchos Sakellaris as vice-president. His responsibilities on the EIB’s management committee include supervising financing operations in Denmark, Ireland, Greece, Cyprus, and African, Caribbean and Pacific countries. Sakellaris also takes over the EIB’s economic and financial studies division.

DLA Piper is taking on Tony Holland in its finance and projects practice in Dubai as regional head of finance. He brings over 25 years of extensive banking, project finance and infrastructure finance experience.

UniCredit Markets & Investment Banking (MIB) has strengthened its equity capital markets (ECM) team and appointed Christian Steffens as deputy head of global ECM, Mark Coxon as global head of equity and equity-linked syndicate and Tijs Jansen as a senior originator within ECM origination.

Neil Withers is taking over as VTB’s senior vice-president and head of investor relations and capital raising division. Since 2000, he has been a consultant with Vozrozhdenie Bank, and in 2003 joined the bank as advisor to the chairman. He had particular responsibilities for investor relations and strategy.

Troika Dialog, Russia’s oldest and largest private investment bank, has appointed Kanako Sekine as managing director and COO of Troika Capital Partners, the bank’s private equity arm.

Shamil Bank, a leading Bahrain-based Islamic commercial and investment bank and a wholly-owned subsidiary of Ithmaar Bank, has announced further staff promotions as part of its recent corporate restructuring.

Sorouh Real Estate, one of the leading Abu Dhabi-based real estate developers, has made further appointments to its senior management team.

Following a meeting of the board of directors of Abu Dhabi-listed Aabar Investments, HE Khadem Al Qubaisi, managing director of International Petroleum Investment Company (Ipic), has taken over the chairmanship of the board of Aabar Investments from outgoing chairman Abdulhamid Saeed

Investec Investment Bank and Securities, the specialist investment bank, has announced two appointments as the bank continues to build on its position as a leading mid-market specialist. Gareth Taylor has joined as a director in the corporate finance division to lead Investec’s coverage of private equity clients and Matthew Wesley has joined the expanding debt advisory team as an associate director.

Alan Pullinger, who has been deputy CEO since April, will take over as CEO of Rand Merchant Bank. He replaces Michael Pfaff who will remain on the RMB divisional board until December.

Morgan Stanley has further strengthened its Saudi Arabia team by appointing Habib Achkar, managing director, as chief executive officer of Morgan Stanley Saudi Arabia. Achkar will oversee the continued expansion of MSSA and will relocate to Riyadh.

The Qatar Financial Centre (QFC) authority has appointed Jon Morton as director for financial development. Morton has joined the QFC authority from Henley Business School in the UK, formerly Henley Management College, which merged with the University of Reading in August.