30th Sep

IO N CR IP T SU BS

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Pope’s butler goes on trial in ‘Vatileaks’ scandal

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Bahraini teen killed in clash with police

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NO: 15584

Lee breaks every rule in new ‘Life of Pi’ film

Bale stars as Spurs shock United

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www.kuwaittimes.net

THULQADA 14, 1433 AH

Saudi teenager dies of wounds after police raid

DUBAI/RIYADH: Bahraini riot police killed a teenager when they fired shotgun pellets during clashes with protesters following a demonstration on Friday, the country’s opposition said yesterday, the second young protester to die in six weeks. Security forces opened fire yesterday to disperse angry Shiite protesters following the funeral of the youth. Several protesters were wounded as police fired shotguns, as well as stun grenades, to disperse protesters after thousands of mourners took part in the funeral of 17-year-old Ali Hussein Nemat in the village of Sadad, outside Manama, witnesses said. Images posted online by Al-Wefaq Shiite opposition showed thousands of men and black-clad women marching behind the coffin of the teenage boy.

Thousands rallied on Friday in an officially authorised protest called by the main opposition group Al-Wefaq, but as the event ended around 100 demonstrators clashed with police. Witnesses on Friday said riot police used tear gas and stun grenades to disperse those demonstrators, who, the authorities said, were throwing petrol bombs and wielding iron bars. The police described the incident after the protest as a “terrorist attack” on a security patrol that “targeted the lives of members of the patrol” late on Friday evening. The police had defended themselves “according to their legal authority”, a statement said, confirming one of the protesters had died. Bahrain, headquarters of the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet, has been in turmoil since mass demonstrations started at the height of Arab Spring unrest last year, led by its Shiite majority. The protests were put down by the Sunni monarchy which imposed martial law and invited Saudi Arabia to send troops in support.

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US pushes Gulf over missile defense plans NEW YORK: The United States is pushing Gulf countries to develop missile defense plans, amid what they see is a rising threat from Iran, US officials said Friday. “It’s the United States’ goal, to encourage the GCC countries to develop this missile defense architecture, because... to truly protect the region by missile defense, it requires a regional approach,” a senior US official said ahead of talks with the sixnation Gulf Cooperation Council. “To be able to defend against a missile in your territory often requires radars and other types of capabilities outside your territory.”

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta had been due to attend the New York talks alongside US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton held on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, but bad weather forced him to abandon his travel plans. The US official said Washington has already expressions of interest from some of the Gulf nations in developing missile defense capabilities and they hoped to have some announcements of contracts in the coming months.

The discussions are taking place within the framework of a new strategic cooperation forum set up in March, which has also led to the first joint Continued on Page 13

Max 39º Min 24º High Tide 11:46 Low Tide 05:34 & 17:44

SADAD, Bahrain: The casket carrying Ali Hussein Nemat, 17, who was shot dead by riot police late Friday, is accompanied by his father, Hussein, seated holding a picture of his son on the front of the vehicle, and his younger brothers, crying beside the father and seated second left on vehicle, during a politically charged funeral procession attended by thousands in this western village yesterday. (Inset) Bahraini women sit on the street and mourn the youth’s killing during an anti-government protest early yesterday. — AP

Last Western detainee at Gitmo returns to Canada Shabab rebels abandon last urban bastion AUVERS-SUR-OISE, France: President of the National Council of Resistance of Iran and Mujahedeen-e-Khalq (MEK) Maryam Radjavi flashes the victory sign upon her arrival to take part in a rally yesterday. — AFP

Iran condemns US for delisting MEK TEHRAN: Iran condemned yesterday the Obama administration for taking an Iranian militant group formerly allied with Saddam Hussein off the US terrorism list, saying it shows Washington’s “double standards”. The Mujahedeen-eKhalq (MEK), which began as a guerrilla movement fighting Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, helped overthrow the monarch in 1979 then quickly fell out with the Islamic Republic’s first leader,

Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. It fought in the 1980s alongside Saddam’s forces in the eight-year Iran-Iraq war but disarmed after the US invasion of Iraq in 2003.

The State Department delisted the group on Friday, meaning that any assets the MEK has in the United States are unblocked and Americans can do business with the organization. Iranian State TV criticized the decision, saying that the Continued on Page 13

MOGADISHU: Al-Qaeda-linked Shabab fighters yesterday abandoned their last bastion in Somalia, retreating from the port city of Kismayo almost a year after Kenya sent troops against the Islamists. The withdrawal from the southern city that has been a key economic lifeline for the insurgents came a day after African Union troops launched a major assault to finally dislodge the rebels. “The military command of Shabab mujahedeen ordered a tactical retreat at midnight” from Ali Mohamud Rage Kismayo, Shabab spokesman Ali Mohamud Rage told AFP. Shabab also used Twitter to announce the news it was leaving Kismayo. “Last night, after more than 5 years the Islamic administration in Kismayo closed its office,” the tweet said.

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TORONTO: The last Western detainee held at the Guantanamo Bay US military prison has returned to Canada after a decade in custody and has been transferred to a maximum security prison in Canada where he awaits parole, Canada’s public safety minister said yesterday. Vic Toews said that 26-year-old Omar Khadr arrived at a Canadian military base on a US government plane early yesterday and was transferred to the Millhaven maximum security prison in Bath, Ontario. Khadr pleaded guilty in 2010 to killing a US soldier in Afghanistan and was eligible to return to Canada from Guantanamo Bay last October under terms of a plea deal.

Khadr was 15 when he was captured in 2002 in Afghanistan, and has spent a decade at the Guantanamo prison set up on the US naval base in Cuba to hold suspected terrorists after the Sept 11, 2001 attacks. He received an eight-year sentence in 2010 after being convicted of throwing a grenade that killed Army Sgt 1st Class Christopher Speer during a 2002 firefight .

Toews noted that the US government initiated the transfer and suggested that Canada had little choice but to accept him under Canadian law. “Omar Khadr is a known supporter of the Al-Qaeda terrorist network and a convicted terrorist,” Toews said. “Omar Khadr was born in

Omar Khadr Canada and is a Canadian citizen. As a Canadian citizen, he has a right to enter Canada after the completion of his sentence.” John Norris, Khadr’s Canadian lawyer, has said Khadr would be eligible for parole as early as the spring of 2013. It will be up to Canada’s national parole board to release him, Toews said.

“I am satisfied the Correctional Service of Canada can administer Omar Khadr’s sentence in a manner which recognizes the serious nature of the crimes that he Continued on Page 13

in the

news

US carjacker shoots himself live on TV WASHINGTON: A high-speed chase turned ugly for Fox News on Friday when it televised - live - a fleeing carjacking suspect shooting himself in the head in the Arizona desert. Twitter exploded in reaction to the real-time broadcasting flub, while video of the graphic incident briefly found its way onto YouTube, as a badly shaken senior Fox News anchorman apologized profusely. The Fox affiliate in Phoenix said police had pursued the carjacking suspect at speeds of up to 175 km per hour for more than an hour, mostly on westbound Interstate 10. From the expressway, the red Dodge Caliber hatchback veered onto dusty back roads in the vicinity of Salome, a town west of Phoenix. The driver, wearing an American football jersey, was then seen abandoning the car and fleeing on foot, with no police officers visible in the tightly framed aerial shot. (See Page 9)

Flight in emergency landing in Nigeria

Former NYT publisher Sulzberger dead at 86

LAGOS: A Qatar Airways flight from Doha safely made an emergency landing in Nigeria’s economic capital Lagos yesterday after encountering a problem with one of its tyres, the civil aviation body said. “The plane has landed safely,” said Harold Demuren, the head of Nigeria’s Civil Aviation Authority. “We lost one of the tyres.” The aircraft landed at the cargo terminal of Murtala Mohammed International Airport and was then towed to an area where passengers were able to disembark. Qatar Airways flight QR592 was travelling the regular Doha-Lagos route and reported the tyre problem to Nigerian airport authorities, said Demuren, who identified the aircraft as an Airbus A330. He said no passengers were injured during the emergency landing and that one of the plane’s tyres had to be replaced. A mechanic at the airport said one of the plane’s left tyres was flat. Three passengers who were on board told AFP that the crew had made no announcements about a mechanical problem during the flight.

NEW YORK: Former New York Times publisher and CEO Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, a driving force in the evolution of one of the most prestigious US media outlets, died yesterday, his newspaper reported. He was 86. Sulzberger died at his home in Southampton, New York after a long illness, the Times reported, without specifying the cause of death. Sulzberger oversaw the Times’ transformation from a tightly-controlled family operation - his grandfather had bought the daily in 1896 - to the nucleus of a news powerhouse that now includes magazines, TV and radio stations and online operations.

Sulzberger served with the paper for 34 years, as publisher of the paper and Sulzberger chairman and chief executive officer of its parent company. US President Barack Obama said in a statement that he and his wife Michelle were “saddened” to hear of Sulzberger’s death.

Qatar worried about value of dollar, euro RIYADH: Wealthy Qatar, a major investor in US and European assets, worries that haphazard attempts by countries to shore up their economies could weaken the dollar and the euro, its prime minister said. “What should happen is we should have a full package with a full strategy to solve the problems,” Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim Al-Thani, who also heads the country ’s sovereign wealth fund, Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), told US financial broadcaster CNBC in an interview aired on Friday.

Sheikh Hamad said the central banks were right to act to prevent worse crises, but added: “With more printing money, without having a strategy, I believe the value of the money will go down very soon.” However, Sheikh Hamad added that Qatar would retain holdings of strategic stocks and buy when prices dropped, and that it would continue to make new investments in promising assets.

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

LOCAL

Egyptian fights in Jleeb reports ‘baseless’ Call to change voting system KUWAIT: The Egyptian foreign ministry’s official spokesman, plenipotentiary minister Amr Roshdi, denied news reports about 30 Egyptians being injured in a scuffle in Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh, Kuwait. Roshdi said Egypt’s consul to Kuwait, Ambassador Wael Gad, had immediately dispatched a number of his staff members to the area’s police station to verify the news but there were no reports about such a fight. He said contacts were made with Egyptians in the area in question and they, too, denied any such development.

Further, he explained that on contacting the interior ministry’s operation room, it was found that

a report had been made on Sept 26 about the involvement of a number of Egyptians in a fight in front of the Khaitan sports club, but when police patrols were dispatched to the scene, there was no sign of the fighters or of any witnesses.

voting for four candidates was the reason behind many coalitions and vote-trading amongst different tribes and it helped candidates running in larger constituencies at the expense of those running in less densely populated ones.

Shulaimi appeal Former fourth constituency candidate in the previous parliamentary elections, Khaled AlShulaimi has urged HH the Amir to issue a decision on changing the voting system to entitle voters to vote for only one candidate instead of four which is currently followed. Al-Shulaimi argued that

Financial violations Kuwait’s Medical Professions Union (MPU) has disclosed that the health ministry has committed huge financial violations to favour Kuwait Medical Association (KMA), Kuwait Dental Association (KDA) and Kuwait Pharmaceuticals Association (KPA). In a press statement, MPU chairman, Dr. Hussein

Al-Khabbaz, explained that the violations involved annual deductions from salaries of doctors, dentists and pharmacists to benefit the three NGOs representing them without any official authorization from the ministry or the concerned doctors. “Such serious financial violations show how corrupt the ministry is,” Al-Khabbaz said, adding that a complaint had been made to the health minister last April regarding forcing the Kuwaiti and expatriate doctors to join the three associations and deduction of membership fees directly from their salaries. “Such membership should be optional,” he said.

More traffic awareness campaigns soon KUWAIT: The Public Relations Director at the Ministry of Interior, Col Adel Ahmad AlHashash, has said that many activities for traffic awareness have been readied as per informative plan.

The teams of officers and members of supporting authority have fanned out to cover all the school roads to distribute brochures and informative publications to a large number of students, parents and other road users.

This will help reduce traffic jams, especially in front of schools and along roads leading to them, and also reduce rate of accidents. It will also end traffic violations happening in front of the schools and cases of eve teasing where teenaged boys chase buses carrying girls.

Security men will be at hand to deal with them as per the plan drafted and implemented from the start of the academic year. The plan was prepared by senior security officials in coordination with all other concerned parties.

Al-Hahsash emphasized that all sectors of ministry of health were coordinating

Kuwait nominated for UPU’s Financial Board

Col Adel Al-Hashash round the clock to ensure the success of the informative plan which is supported by traffic patrols on the roads and around the schools.

DOHA: Kuwait is nominated for position at the Universal Postal Union’s (UPU) Financial and Investment Board, said Head of the Postal traffic at Kuwait’s Ministry of Communication Khaled AlQasbah here yesterday. Al-Qasbah told KUNA that on the sidelines of The 25th Universal Postal Congress of the UN Universal Postal Union (UPU), which began here on Sept 24, noted that Kuwait was nominated for the membership at the UPU’s board, adding that elections on Oct 10 would determine if Kuwait would win the post. The Kuwaiti official stressed the importance of the UPU’s Congress here, revealing that around 2,000 delegates from 192 states were partaking in the event. He also revealed that Kuwait was member of the UPU Executive Board since the Geneva Conference in 2008. The Universal Postal Union (UPU) is a specialized agency of the United Nations that coordinates postal policies among member nations, in addition to the worldwide postal system. It was established in October 9th, 1874. — KUNA

Municipality destroys expired red pepper KUWAIT: The Kuwait Municipality has destroyed 4,522 kg of red pepper, grounded and packed in buckets of 14 kgs each, since the product had expired on Sept 16. This was in addition to 35 buckets, each of 60 kgs, which had expired on Dec 15, 2011.

All these products were confiscated from a food store at Al Rai area. A citation for dealing and storing food products which were past their expiry date was handed to the owners, and they, in turn, signed documents agreeing to accept

their destruction. A press release by the municipality indicated that across all governorates of Kuwait, supervisors were focussing on all organizations dealing in food products and food stores by applying a supervisory program bringing any violators of municipality rules and regulations to book.

The report pointed out that the municipality leaders were closely tracking supervisory work and have appreciated the honest efforts put in by the supervisors who worked round the clock.

Top opposition leader rejects need for demonstration KUWAIT: A top opposition leader has said there was no need to stage a demonstration at the Iradah Square tomorrow (Monday) because the issue has already been settled “and the government has no other choice but to dissolve the parliament and call for early elections.”

“I believe that the Constitutional Court’s decision to uphold the electoral law has settled the political crisis,” MP Khalid AlSultan said in recent statements made to Al-Rai. He was commenting on reports hinting at a possible demonstration to be staged by the Nahj group to press for the dissolution of the parliament that was reinstated last June by a Constitutional Court ruling which had found its dissolution process to be unconstitutional.

Several lawmakers, activists and political groups have urged the government since Tuesday’s ruling to finalize the process to dissolve the parliament and call for new elections as per the present law as soon as possible. “The Prime Minister has a responsibility towards the Kuwaiti people to avoid messing with the present electoral law,” Dr. Adel Al-Damkhy, a member of the annulled 2012 parliament, said. Al-Damkhy is also part of a coalition of 34 oppositionists who constituted a majority in the same parlia-

ment, better known as the ‘Majority Bloc’.

The demands come in the light of speculation that the cabinet can still delay the parliament’s dissolution or change the electoral law before new elections are held.

“Any attempt in that direction means that the Cabinet commits political suicide,” AlDamkhy said. Meanwhile, sources told AlRai that the Majority Bloc “could abandon their plan to change Kuwait’s electoral system by adopting a single constituency and election by list system.” The reason for that is that the recent ruling “secured the present system which divides Kuwait into five constituencies,” the sources said, adding that the opposition could resort to alter the distribution of voters within the five constituencies, or adopt a system that divides Kuwait into two constituencies.

The issue will be discussed during a meeting of the bloc to be held sometime after the Cabinet’s weekly meeting tomorrow (Monday), the sources added.

In the meantime, another local daily has reported that members of the pro-government majority in the 2009 parliament may “seek to activate the current parliament’s role” by attempting to convene in order to address pending issues including the electoral constituencies.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

LOCAL

ISPs plan new offers to attract more customers Price reduction welcomed KUWAIT: The Ministry of Communication has recently issued a decree making it mandatory for the internet companies to reduce the cost of the internet service by 40 percent. The Ministry held that the internet services cost in Kuwait was very high when compared to other countries in the region.

Currently, there are four main internet service provider (ISP) companies in Kuwait, all charging the same price.

According to Talal from the Gulfnet Communication, the fall in price did not affect the company.

“In fact, the Ministry of Communication had decreased their price for the service. Earlier, our company was paying them KD 40 from the KD 80 charged from the customer. Now, we pay only KD 8 for the annual subscription that costs KD 48 instead of KD 80,” he told the Kuwait Times.

Customers have welcomed the new decision. “Of course, it is great news for us as we will save more. I think that this decision will increase the competition among the companies providing the internet service. In the end, it will encourage me to upgrade my subscription to a higher speed,” 25-year-old Ahmad said.

Talal from Gulfnet also said that their company had not yet launched any new special offers following the decision, but would do so within a month. “We already provide many special services that make us different from others. For instance, we have the technician visiting the customer’s house free of charge if the problem was from our side. We also provide many other services which others do not,” he said.

He said the unified prices set by the Ministry for all companies were better for both the provider and the customer. He also pointed out

that after the price slash, more customers doubled the speed of their service or extended their subscription for a longer period.

Some customers thought that the price of internet services was even now somewhat higher when compared to other Arab countries.

“The new decreased price is now somehow acceptable and similar to the price in Jordan. The old price was much higher, and this decrease will encourage more people to use internet services in their homes,” said 50-year-old Mazin.

Jarrah from the Qualitynet Company admitted that the prices of internet services in Kuwait were earlier higher than in most other countries, and were now comparable.

“The recent decrease was not the first, as last year too, the Ministry reduced the price of the internet by another 40 percent. So the decrease is 80 percent in 13 months. I think that the unified

price of internet is better and the competition is now about providing ser vices. We have not yet launched any new offers, but I expect that we will do so soon,” he explained.

Mohammed from Kems noted that they have not launched any special offers yet, but noticed that there was an increase in the subscription demands.

“So those of our customers who had subscribed to our services for one year have extended their subscription up to two years and so on,” he said.

Fasttelco was the first one to come up with a special offer immediately after the price reduction. “ We are now offering our customers a 50 percent discount on their subscription. So, basically, we offer an additional discount to the Ministry’s discount. We care about our customer’s satisfaction more than the price. We provide quality to our subscribers,” noted Fatma.

Eyad Al-Qadoumi

Hani Al-Abdulhadi

Mohammad Farooq

Shareef Muntaser

By Nawara Fattahova

Turkey tops demand list at property expo Turkey’s real estate emerged on top of the demand list of investors in Kuwait and the Gulf region as the Kuwait International Property Show concluded last night at the Kuwait International Fairground in Mishref. Demands for tourism-related and religious real estate (in Mecca and Medina) came in second and third places, followed by the Egyptian market marked by signs of stability in the North African country.

These were the most significant outcomes of the event which was organized by the Top Expo Group in cooperation with the Kuwait International Fair company. The exhibition saw an increased interest from Kuwaiti and Gulf investor in the European market, but registered a declining interest in the Kuwaiti real estate.

One of the local projects shown during the markets, the ‘Faris Villas’, was presented by the Dinar Company in Al-Khairan. “The project saw a large turnout for the second consecutive year with an increased number of clients seeking to benefit from it,” sales manager Hani Al-Abdulhadi said in a recent statement.

The Kuwait Projects Management company displayed its own project also in Al-Khairan during the event. It featured a 108 villas compound to be opened in June 2013. “The project cost was an estimated total of KD40 million for 600 square meters villas, each of which would have a swimming pool and would be overlooking the Khairan Khor,”

Deputy CEO Mohammad Fahad said.

Meanwhile, CEO of Kuwait Projects Management Company, Alaa Abu Alyan, said there was significant interest in the ‘Burj Al-Jewar’ and ‘Rawdat Al-Safwah’ projects that are running in Mecca and Medina in Saudi Arabia. Visitors also showed interest in a project carried out by a local company in Bosnia as part of its expanded operations. “The clients try to invest in places where they can sense safety and security, advantages that they currently think are presented by Bosnia and Herzegovina,” the marketing manager at the BAZ company, Mohammad Ibrahim, said. He was talking about the ‘Baz Sarajevo’ project, which was displayed at the exhibition along with the ‘Manazel AlAin’ in Mecca, Saudi Arabia and ‘BAZ Marina’ in Egypt as the company’s top three projects.

Meanwhile, Commercial Director of Green City, Mohammad Farooq, said that his company made 20 percent profit during the first three days of the exhibition, during which their display focused on their projects in Egypt. Visitors also showed interest in real estate projects in Egypt owned by the Tabarak Holding Company, according to its board member Amina Al-Derbas.

Other markets featured during the event were the Sultanate of Oman where the Kalander Real Estate Company displayed several properties at the Salalah City.

“The projects included fully furnished luxurious

villas and gardens that boasted of more than 20 kinds of fruit trees,” General Manager of the United Real Estate Company, Dr. Hesham Kalander, said.

The CEO of New Palaces Real Estate, Shareef Muntaser, attributed the massive interest shown by visitors in his company’s projects “to the increased number of investors looking for suitable opportunities in Turkey”. His company had displayed an apartments compound and a villas compound projects in the Turkish city of Kusadasi.

Turkey was one of many foreign destinations mentioned by Development Manager of the Rawaj Real Estate Company, Eyad Al-Qadoumi, as being among those preferred by people looking to make a foreign investment or for buying a vacation home.

Other countries included Germany, the United Kingdom, Jordan, as well as the Gulf Cooperation Council countries, particularly Saudi Arabia.

Shortage of staff at execution department KUWAIT: At least 25,000 traffic sentences were either unregistered or unexecuted while more than 20,000 criminal sentences remained unexecuted, a local daily reported yesterday quoting a security source with access to Ministry of Interior statistics.

The source, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, indicated that around KD70 million was the total cost of fines due to the government for sentences that remained unexecuted.

While he blamed the ministry for this situation, the source also pointed out “significant shortage of staff” at sentence execution departments.

“Despite efforts undertaken to execute sentences, the departments face many obstacles including lack of patrolling vehicles. Often, fugitives are arrested by officers driving their own cars,” the source added.

“Does it make sense that a country like Kuwait suffer staff shortage while there are fugitives roaming the country freely?” the source asked, pointing out that there were a limited number of employees left to deal with files related to thousands of cases.

KUWAIT: The Chinese ambassador Cui Jianchun hosted a reception on Wednesday on the occasion of the 63rd anniversary of the founding of the People’s Republic at the Regency Hotel. It was attended by diplomats and other dignitaries.

— Photos by Yasser Al-Zayyat

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

local

Woman held with qat

By Hanan Al-Saadoun

further investigations were in progress.

KUWAIT: Kuwait International Airport Custom rangers recently arrested an Ethiopian woman on arrival for possessing two kilograms of qat (a drug plant).

As per case papers, customs inspectors noticed that the woman, who had arrived at dawn, seemed confused and thus aroused suspicion. A search of her luggage led to the recovery of drugs. She later confessed that she had indeed brought drugs into Kuwait with the purpose of selling them. A case was filed and

Suicide attempt A citizen was arrested for attempted suicide, said security sources. Case papers indicated that the young man climbed a mosque minaret in Sabah AlNasser area and threatened to jump but did not cite any reason. Security forces, however, managed to talk him out of the attempt. He was later escorted to Sabah Al-Nasser police station for interrogation where he was found to be suffering from some psychological disorder.

Kuwait exerted strenuous efforts for Syria resolution GENEVA: The Arab Group in the UN Human Rights Council exerted strenuous efforts to persuade Russia accept the Arabproposed resolution on Syria, to no avail, said Kuwait’s permanent delegate to the UN nation’s office in Geneva Ambassador Dharar Razzouqi.

Razzouqi said the Arab representatives had to be engaged in marathon discussions with the Russian delegation, with the aim of reaching a consensus resolution, endorsed by a unanimity of the member states, but “regretfully Russia rejected it.”

Nevertheless, the leading Kuwaiti diplomat expressed satisfaction that 41 states approved the draft resolution, despite rejection of Russia, China and Cuba and abstention of India, the Philippines and Uganda.

“Such continuing efforts of the Arab Group in the UN Human Rights are aimed at finding a peaceful solution to stop the non-stop bloodshed in Syria,” he said, affirming that this policy would proceed for exerting further pressure on the Syrian regime and activate mission of the UNArab envoy Lakhdar Brahimi.

“The resolution constitutes a continuing message to the international community and Syria that there is insistence on reaching a peaceful settlement to stop the blood-shedding,” the senior diplomat explained, emphasizing that the international community must intervene to halt the daily killing in this country.

Kuwait, along with other members of the council, was architect of the resolution, adopted on Friday, following the marathon diplomatic efforts among the delegates and diplomats.

The resolution partially called for extension of mission of the UN panel on Syria and urged Damascus to cooperate fully with the international team. It was backed by 41 member states. India and the Philippines abstained, while Russia, Cuba and China opposed it.

The resolution was adopted following intensive deliberations and consultations

among officials and delegations representing the member states of the council.

The resolution, proposed by Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Libya, Jordan and Morocco, essentially called for extending mission of the Independent Commission of Inquiry on Syria, set up by the UN Human Rights Council last year, to follow up on human rights breaches in Syria and submit a report to the 22nd UN council session, due next year.

It calls on the panel to update the reports about human rights violations since March 2011, reiterates the call upon the Damascus regime to cooperate fully with the commission, allowing its members to have free access to all regions of the country.

Moreover, it stipulates that the UN secretary general should be briefed directly about these reports, condemns wide-scale breaches of human rights in Syria, acts of violence and terrorism, by the Syrian authorities and the loyal paramilitary forces, urges the warring sides to end all forms of violence, respect international laws in full, take necessary measures to protect women and girls from sex violence and rape. The decision urges the Syrian authorities to free, immediately, all persons of who have been held behind bars arbitrarily, reveal a list of all detention places and allowing independent observers to reach the detention centers. Furthermore, it urges the Syrian authorities to honor its commitments of protecting the citizens, calls for international investigation into cases of abuse including those that are viewed as tantamount to crimes against humanity. It affirms respect of aspirations of the Syrian people for democracy, urges potential donors to secure financial aid for the stricken nation, calls on the authorities to secure free access for humanitarian agencies to all areas, condemns usage of heavy arms against civilians, genocides, arbitrary executions, torture, sexual violence and maltreatment that also involve children.— KUNA

Medical Sciences award ceremony in December KUWAIT: The College of Medicine at Kuwait University (KU) has won Sheikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al-Maktoum Award for Medical Sciences as the best college in the Arab World for its tremendous efforts in boosting education and medical services.

The award was dedicated to His Highness the Amir of Kuwait Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah who has been a top sponsor for science and scientists.

The college seized the award because of notable efforts in keeping its curricula up-to-date and promoting scientific research in all fields of medicine. This effort, as a consequence, would provide the community with highly qualified physicians.

The Award-giving ceremony will take place in December 2012 at Dubai

International Convention and Exhibition Centre with attendance of the Award’s patron Sheikh Hamdan Bin Rashid AlMaktoun, Ruler of Dubai, UAE’s Minister of Finance and Industry and President of the Dubai Department of Health and Medical Services.

Sheikh Hamdan Bin Rashid AlMaktoum Award for Medical Sciences was established in 1999 under the patronage of Sheikh Hamdan, with the objective of honoring scientists from every part of the world who tirelessly pursue distinctive medical research that serves the larger interests of humanity.

It has a vision to upgrade medical services systems at local, regional and international levels by adopting the excellent world-class standards. —KUNA

Retired police officer held with drugs in Jleeb area Two addicts in police custody KUWAIT: A retired police officer was arrested in Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh area recently for possessing drugs. The suspect, who identified himself as a retired Lieutenant Colonel in the Ministry of Interior, wanted to leave after showing his civil identification papers. The patrol officers, still suspicious about the man’s behavior, decided to search his car and found 250 grams of hashish. The man was arrested and taken for investigations to find out the source of the drugs and why he was carrying them. (Rai) Meanwhile, two drug addicts were held at the Abdullah Port Road after clashing with patrol officers who thwarted their escape bid.

The suspects reportedly tried to escape on foot when they were forced to stop after they initially ignored orders to pull over. The two patrol officers managed to overpower them after a brief scuffle, and found hashish and drug pills inside their cars. They were taken to the relevant authorities to face charges.

Car hits trees A male driver was critically wounded in an accident reported early Thursday morning at the Fifth Ring Road. The victim, a Kuwaiti man in his 20s, was reportedly tossed 100 meters out of his car after his vehicle hit the roadside trees. He was admitted to the intensive care unit of the Mubarak Hospital with serious bone fractures and other injuries. Investigations were on to determine the circumstances which led to the accident that left the Japanese-made car a complete wreck. (Watan) Misuse of power An employee of the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor was arrested after co-workers pressed charges of misuse of power and verbal assault.

The man was taken into custody by Hawally police who had visited the MSAL office in the area and recorded testimonies of the complaining employees. He was put behind bars inside the Nugra police station. Arrangements were being

made to refer him to the Public Prosecution.

Sexual assault Hawally police are trying to arrest a man accused of sexually assaulting his ex-wife inside her house. In her statement to the local police, the woman complained that her ex-husband was allowed into the house by her mother after he made her believe that he wanted to come over to ‘mend the fences’. Investigations are on.

Fugitive at large Search is on for a fugitive who managed to escape arrest recently when drugs were recovered from his car. The suspect reportedly disappeared, leaving behind his car after he met with an accident during a police chase. He had initially tried to escape when the police had stopped him and found him driving without a license. A plastic bag containing heroin was found inside the suspect’s car. A case was filed. —Al-Rai, AlAnba, Al-Watan

Riham makes Wataniya, Kuwait proud KUWAIT: Wataniya Telecom’s Communication, Brand and Customer Experience Senior Director; Riham Al-Ayyar is ranked number 25 in the list of top 50 female telecom executives in the Middle East and Africa by CommsMEA. The winners were selected based on their commitment to excellence, innovation, leadership and management.

Brand equity and their contribution to the growth of the business and industry were also taken into consideration.

Until a few years ago, telecom was a male dominated industry. But in the last few years some inspiring women have slowly climbed the ladder of success and have made significant contribution to the development of this sector with their resilience and hard work.

In addition to Riham Al-Ayyar, 5 female leaders from Qteldominated the list; Buthaina Al Ansari and Malika Krafsig from Qtel, Dalia Al-

Hassani and Amaal Hussain AlLawati, from Nawras Oman and Hager Lamine from Tunisiana.

Eng. Abdul Aziz Fakhroo, Wataniya’s Deputy CEO said, “Wataniya is extremely proud to see one of our team members on CommsMEA’s list. Riham has always been a great leaderat Wataniya; her

ideas, vision and perseverance has enabled the company to create a brand identity that is unique.I would also like to congratulate the other 5women from Qtel who have made us proud.”

Wataniya’s Brand and Communication department has initiated and developed several

Abdul Aziz Fakhroo

Riham Al-Ayyar

campaigns under Riham’s guidance which are not only beneficial to the organization but are driven by genuine desire to help the Kuwaiti community. The GiveKuwait campaign that provided opportunities to young entrepreneurs, The Mishref Walkway revamp and Breast Cancer Awareness programs are some of the popular initiatives.

Ayyar was overwhelmed with joy and said, “It is great to be recognized and honored this way but all that matters to me is that I do my job well. I started my career in Wataniya 12 years ago and Wataniya has been a second home to me therefore I have always done my best for the company.”

“I’m thankful to the Wataniya for giving me the opportunity to excel and grow. Lastly I would like to congratulate all of my colleagues from Qtel who were listed. They have all worked hard to achieve such recognition and I wish them the very best.” Al-Ayyar concluded.

Al Ahli to reward customers for updating personal profile KUWAIT: Al Ahli Bank of Kuwait, eager to provide premium customer care has now launched a campaign to reward its customers for updating their personal profile in the bank! Customers that update their personal information at any ABK branch located across Kuwait will automatically be entered into a draw for a weekly chance to win an iPad 3 or a Samsung Galaxy S III and a monthly draw to aim to win cash prizes.

Stewart Lockie, General Manager of the Retail Banking Division explained that, “ABK is dedicated to providing its customers with the very best of banking services and to be able to do this to its full potential we need to be up-to-date as to who our customers are and what their changing requirements are.” Lockie further explained that, “By updating our customers’ information we not only get a better understanding of our valued customers, but we can also improve

Kuwait-Peru relations on ascending track LIMA: Kuwaiti-Peruvian relations were on an ascending track in the last few years, crowned by a visit to the country last July by Deputy Foreign Minister of Peru Jose Beraun Aranibar.

Voicing that his country “is pinning high hopes” on Kuwait’s participation in the upcoming Third Summit of Heads of State and Government of South American-Arab Countries (III ASPA Summit), due here from Sept 30 to Oct 2.

Aranibar, speaking back then at a news conference, pointed to bilateral agreements signed with Kuwait, including the one on exempting diplomats from both countries from visa entry permits and a memorandum of understanding for both countries’ foreign ministers to conduct regular consultations.

Aranibar also affirmed significance of the accord his delegation had signed with Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) for cooperation for exchange of news and training, saying the agreement would contribute in boosting the ties and help in shedding light on issues in Peru, Kuwait and the Gulf region.

The deputy foreign minister also indicated that a deal was reached with a local private company to import some natural herbs from Peru for treating diabetes and another for organizing tourist trips to his country.

He also revealed efforts for enabling Peruvian students study and learn Arabic Language at Kuwait University through a Masters and PhD degrees’ scholarships’ program in collaboration with the National University of San Marcos; Peru’s most important and respected higher-education institution, which was founded in 1551, making it one of the oldest in the world.

Next November, a Peruvian cultural festival will take place, which will include shows on local heritage and food, in addition to tourism-promoting presentations. — KUNA

the safety and reliability of their cards and banking procedures. Please also note that we absolutely guarantee that all the information provided will be treated with utmost confidence and will only be used in accordance with banking requirements and for the benefit of our customers.”

Lockie concluded by saying that, “It gives the bank great pleasure to be able to offer these terrific incentives to our customers as we know how valuable their time is. We are excited that so many of our esteemed clientele will win one of the numerous prizes in this new campaign Update Your Info with ABK.” For more information regarding updating your information or to learn about any of our other services, please visit www.eahli.com to talk directly with one of our Account Managers through Al Ahli Chat Service or call Ahlan Ahli on 1899899.

Senyar wins NAUI awards KUWAIT: The Senyar Dive Team won two awards pre sented by the National Association of Under water Instructors (NAUI) for the year 2012, the President of Kuwait’s Voluntar y Work Center, Sheikha Amthal Al-Ahmad AlSabah, announced yesterday.

“The Senyar team won the Environmental Enrichment Award for voluntary works that contributed in improving the aquatic environment,” Sheikha Amthal said in a statement released by the VWC yesterday.

The dive team leader Husain Al-Qallaf won the Outstanding Training Support Award for his “achievements and contributions in the environmental awareness field,” the statement added.

“We are filled with pride by

these rewards and we dedicate them to HH the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad AlSabah, whose continuous sup-

port for the team is essential for its success in protecting national aquatic environment,” Sheikha Amthal said.

local

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

KUWAIT: (Left) The 40th celebration of the establishment of St George Universal Syrian Orthodox Church Kuwait at the Ramada Hotel on Friday. (Right) Sheikha Fariha Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber AlSabah releases the anniversary souvenir as other dignitaries look on.

Patriarch of Antioch thanks Kuwait leaders Universal Syrian Orthodox Church celebrates 40th anniversary

By Sajeev K Peter KUWAIT: Ignatius Zakka I Iwas, the Patriarch of Antioch and All the East and the Supreme Head of the Universal Syrian Orthodox Church, on Friday inaugurated the 40th anniversary celebration of the establishment of St George Universal Syrian Orthodox Church Kuwait. The patriarch arrived in Kuwait on Thursday accompanied by bishops and an Apostolic delegation from Lebanon. A host of dignitaries, guests and parishioners attended the grand and solemn public meeting held at the Ramada Hotel Riggae.

“I extend my gratitude to all the rulers of the State of Kuwait who have supported us and given us the freedom of worship in the state,” the Patriarch said in his inaugural address. He said the church will continue its humanitarian charities to the deprived.

“Her Highness Sheikha Fariha AlAhmed Al-Jaber Al-Sabah’s presence on this auspicious day is remembered as a grand recognition to the church,” he added in his speech.

Catholicose Aboon Mor Baselios Thomas I, in his presidential address, announced new projects of medical aid, housing aid and educational assistance, being initiated by the parish.

“MBYA has undertaken humanitarian and social service schemes and as part of it, it has implemented a social service

program under the name of St Basil Housing Project to build and donate houses to needy persons in one of the dioceses each year.” The project was inaugurated by Anoop Jacob, Kerala Minister for Food and Civil supplies, Consumer Protection and Registration.

Later, Sheikha Fariha Al-Sabah released the anniversary souvenir. Fr Amanuel Ghareb, the NECK chairman,

KUWAIT: Patriarch of Antioch Ignatius Zakka I Iwas, delivers the inaugural speech. was decorated by the Patriarch on the occasion. The occasion also marked the 32nd year of the enthronement of Ignatius Zakka I Iwas, the Patriarch of Antioch and the All the East, and Baselios Thomas I, the Catholicose and

the head of the Malankara Jacobite Syrian Orthodox Church.

Mor Theophilus George Saliba released the directory while Mor Gregorios Joseph, Secretary of the Holy Synod, delivered a felicitation speech on 32nd year of the enthronement of the Patriarch of the Antioch. Minister Anoop Jacob was also decorated with the highest title of the church ‘Commander’ by the Patriarch.

Mor Chrysostomos Michael Shamoun, patriarchal vicar of the Patriarchal Institutions in Lebanon, Kerala’s Minister of Excise K Babu, Apostolic Nuncio to Kuwait Archbishop Peter Rajic, Indian Ambassador Satish C Mehta, Lebanese Ambassador Dr Bassam Al-Nomani, Iraq Ambassador Mohammed Bahr Al-Uloom, Armenian Ambassador Fadey Charchoglyan and Bishop of the Armenian Orthodox Church Shahe Panesian were among the dignitaries who addressed the anniversary celebration.

St George Universal Syrian Orthodox Church, Kuwait was established 40 years ago. From its beginning with just 13 Malayalee Jacobite families owing allegiance to the Patriarch of Antioch as members, the parish today has grown to the strength of more than 650 families with around 2,500 members. It is one of the largest parishes in the Gulf region.

The church was elevated to ‘Reesh’ church later.

Al-Saadoun abandons Barcelona over Shalit’s invitation KUWAIT: Former parliament speaker Ahmad Al-Saadoun has announced that he would not be supporting the Barcelona football team after the club’s management invited Israel’s Gilad Shalit to attend a match next month.

“After years of being a Barcelona fan, I find myself obligated to stop sup-

porting and following the team and get rid of all belongings that have to do with it after the club’s provocative step to provide free tickets to Zionist soldier Gilad Shalit,” Al-Saadoun posted on Twitter.

He was commenting on the Spanish giant’s invitation to Shalit to attend the

traditional ‘El Clasico’ match against archrivals Real Madrid.

“The fact that the Zionist soldier Gilat Shalit is Jewish doesn’t concern me, but I’m taking this decision because he is a member of the Zionist army occupying the land of Palestine,” Al-Saadoun added.

Jleeb repossession report ready next week

By A. Saleh KUWAIT: A governmental committee tasked with studying the best process for repossessing Jleeb Al-Shuyiukh’s properties will meet next week to prepare its report, which will then be referred to the Cabinet.

The report will include the appropriate price for each repossessed unit, according to sources who have knowledge of the case.

The sources, who wished to remain anonymous, also indicated that the file is likely to be referred to the Cabinet in October, but the issue would not be set-

Kuwait Centre for Autism to host World Consultants KUWAIT: Dr Samira Al-Saad, the Director of Kuwait Centre for Autism (KCA), has said that the Centre invites international consultants every year to formulate necessary plans to develop educational and training programmes for autistic children, continue training teachers and specialists, and help parents as required.

Dr Samira Al-Saad This year started with an intensive preparation to receive students, especially those who had not participated in the summer camp and were, therefore, out of the Centre since last June.

This year, the Centre will be hosting the behavioural consultant, Prof.Harvey Bayn, a dean of one of the Colombia University faculties. Also the consultation Centre will be hosting Dr. Abdullah Fido to prepare for a special scientific research with parents. The Centre is also preparing to host the members of the board of directors of World Autism Organization to review the ongoing preparations for the 2014 conference, an event held every four years in any one country globally.

Kuwait was chosen after its case was presented by Dr.Samira who detailed the current potential and explained how Kuwait’s autism programmes took off in the Arab world. The recommendation was accepted in the last conference held in Mexico in 2010.

The preparation committees for 2014 conference started in Kuwait and it is hoped that the event will prove to be a huge success in providing training and proving its usefulness for parents, the autistics, specialists and people who work in this field in the Arab world.

tled “until after the next parliamentary elections and the formation of the new Cabinet.” In preparation for the repossession process, the Cabinet reportedly made a request to the Ministry of Finance to include a portion for this project in their budget for the fiscal year 2012-2013, the sources added.

6

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

LOCAL

Local Spotlight

kuwait digest

A call to Amir over bio-terror threat

With love, to fellow-writers

By Abdullah Abbas Bowair t is very saddening to see how events have turned out lately in our beloved Kuwait. Yet, it is democracy or rather too much of it which made so many parties interfere in Kuwait’s domestic affairs and insult Al-Sabah rulers whose history is full of glorious deeds and accomplishments.

What are even more damaging are the insulting and slanderous statements made every now and then about HH, Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammed, blaming him for the deterioration in Kuwait and accusing him of following foreign agendas.

HH Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammed is one of the most outstanding political figures in Kuwait’s history.

He is known for his knowledge and rich experience.

He has gradually and sure-footedly traversed a long political career both, domestically and internationally.

His unique experiences have made him a first class statesman and have enabled him to steer the nation skillfully and wisely. He was very keen on cooperating with the parliament during his premiership and it was highly appreciated and commended by many lawmakers who described him as a ‘reformist’. The first obstacle he encountered was an attempt to grill him as PM, over the political division concerning the electoral constituencies system, which made HH the Amir Sheikh, Sabah Al-Ahmed Al-Jaber Al-Sabah dissolve the parliament and call for early parliamentary elections in May, 2006.

HH the PM, Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammed skillfully managed to put the train of socio-economic development on the right track without undermining the principles and values that have governed Kuwait’s cultural and democratic march. This could be easily seen ever since he formed his first cabinet. However, the government’s solidarity and its previous experiences enabled it to foil various attempts to create tension and suspicion about the procedures and sources of financing the development plan. So many citizens have reiterated Sheikh Nasser’s role in solving many problems that Kuwait faced as also his role in reinforcing international relations with other countries.

Kuwait is actually fortunate and proud to have someone like HH Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammed. He earned the love and respect of both, the people and the lawmakers, when he took to the National Assembly’s podium to respond to grilling motions which won him MPs’ trust as someone capable and willing to shoulder his office’s responsibilities. He was the right man in the right place.

So, for God’s sake, fear Allah in what you claim about HH Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammed and may Almighty Allah save and protect Kuwait under the wise leadership of HH the Amir, Sheikh Sabah AlAhmed, HH the Crown Prince Sheikh, Nawaf AlAhmed and the government.

I

Muna Al-Fuzai

muna@kuwaittimes.net his article today calls upon HH the Amir of Kuwait, Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah. HH is a pioneer and trusted leader to his people and all residents of Kuwait.

In such time as now, our health is a top priority. The health of our nation is confronting a possible threat; a threat that has consequences that could be the end of many lives.

On Sunday Sept 23, 2012 I published an article entitled ‘The threat of bio-terrorism’. Since then I have received a large number of calls and enquiries on the subject, which has prompted a very interesting discussion. One question put to me over the last few days has been - why are you talking about biological weapons now? The week of July 23, 2012 witnessed the Syrian regime of Bashar Al Assad admitting publicly that it had stockpiles of chemical and biological weapons. They also said that they would use the weapons if Syria was attacked by a foreign power. When I heard this I wanted to understand what this meant, so I started to do some reading and research. What I found out was not only alarming, but scary.

On Monday Aug 20, 2012 US President Barack Obama spoke out. Obama warned Syrian president Bashar Al-Assad not to cross a “red line” by using chemical or biological weapons, and he suggested that such action could prompt the United States to take military action.

Obama said: “We have been very clear to the Assad regime, but also to other players on the ground, that a red line for us is when we start seeing chemical weapons moving around or being utilized,” he said. “That would change my calculus.”

“We cannot have a situation where chemical or biological weapons are falling into the hands of the wrong people,” Obama said at the White House news conference. He acknowledged he was not “absolutely confident” the stockpile of chemical and biological weapons was secure. He went on to say that the issue was of concern, not only to Washington but also to its close allies in the region.

For me, this was the first time I saw a regime publicly admit to having biological and chemical weapons. Not only admitting to have them, but actually threatening to use them! Obviously, this is a very serious matter and something I was determined to understand. When I started reading about chemical and biological weapons, I realised it was important to understand the types of weapons that could be used, as well as the consequences of an attack and the actual possibilities.

What I learnt about chemical weapons was that even though they have been used a number of times throughout history, they are not contagious and protection is widely available (mask and clothing). For me, what I see as the most worrying issue is the use of biological weapons, especially the most dangerous of them all - smallpox.

So why did I focus on smallpox?

Let me give you some hard facts: • Smallpox is the single most dangerous infectious disease that can be used as a weapon • It has a high death rate if contracted of 30% or higher • It is an airborne virus that is highly contagious • If you contract the virus there is no proven treatment • It is difficult to detect once contracted (fever, universal rash ) • Even though the virus was eradicated - in the right lab and by the right bio scientists, smallpox can be synthetically manufactured and used as a weapon. Once I realised that smallpox is the most lethal virus that can be recreated and used as a weapon - I looked into the details of what it takes to be prepared for such an attack.

The public information that is available is fascinating.

Did you know: • The small pox vaccine is the only protection against the virus • In 2001 the USA had only 6 to 7 million doses of the smallpox vaccine. Today the USA has over 300 million vaccines • The USA, UK, Germany, Singapore and South Korea are some of the countries that have enough vaccines for 100% of their populations • In the last 10 years the USA has invested over $2 billion USD in buying vaccines and building a national bioterrorism preparedness plan • The British government vaccinated a ‘preparedness’ team with a smallpox vaccine before the London 2012 Olympics • Most US military and navy personal posted to work in the Gulf are given a smallpox vaccine All these facts made me ask a few of my own questions: why have the world’s leading counties invested so much in bioterrorism preparedness, especially smallpox, and what has Kuwait or the GCC in place to be prepared? Does the GCC have an emergency plan or any small pox vaccines?

What I found out is that no country in the GCC has any vaccine and it was hard to find any data on whether countries had a detailed plan in place to handle such a biological attack. The only Middle East country that has a confirmed smallpox vaccine stock pile is Israel. It is public knowledge that Israel has a stock pile of smallpox vaccines for every single resident - 100% coverage. Israel also has a national readiness plan that is well rehearsed and co-ordinates with all hospitals, police and military for any biological attack.

This lead me to the most important question I have on this subject....

Why in today’s very unstable Middle East, where there is a public discussion about biological weapons, do we have no vaccine and no plan ?

We have the right to be protected and the right to know we are safe.

In my reading, I found some vague points that even Iran may have its own vaccine for some of the population and military personnel, but this is hard to verify; even so the discussion is there.

So I now have some of my own questions for the Kuwaiti government and the rest of the GCC: • Why do we have no vaccines and no plan?

• Why has the US and EU spent billions on buying vaccines and the GCC has spent zero?

• Why is Israel so well prepared and we are not?

• Who is responsible for this?

We hope that such a horrible attack will never happen, but in my view its better to have a plan in place to manage such a crisis then have nothing!

All the above facts, are my testimony to history, unless new facts should arise. That is why I addressed this article today to HH the Amir, I believe in him and his ability to handle this serious matter quickly and correctly.

T kuwait digest

Justice and equality

By Riyadh Al-Adasani ast Tuesday, the Constitutional Court rejected to 2002. And how can we claim equality when a the request made by the Cabinet challenging state official is sent overseas for treatment as soon the constitutionality of the constituencies’ dis- as he feels sick, while a common citizen has to go tribution based on allegations of breach of princi- through prolonged treatment process at outdated ples of justice and equality. In this regard, I hope local hospitals even if he is diagnosed with cancer. that the government understands that precious Even education is suffering with high school gradutime is being wasted without any development tak- ates struggling every year to find a place at the state’s only overcrowded ing place, and that justice public university. and equality are not Justice and equality achieved by changing the Social justice is protected by mean that the government parliament’s formation but the constitution. Is it fair that in pays attention to the counby utilizing financial surplusa community of around 1.5 miltry’s situation and stops the es to boost Kuwait ’s deterioration in the health, progress. lion people, a Kuwaiti waits for education, housing, ecoSocial justice is protected more than two years before he nomic and sports sectors by the constitution. Is it fair finds a job? Equality also means caused due to its neglithat in a community of gence. It makes little sense around 1.5 million people, a a free economy where monopthat during the past twenty Kuwaiti waits for more than oly has no place, something the years, we have failed to two years before he finds a constitution proclaims. overcome these problems job? Equality also means a despite the financial surplus free economy where monopoly has no place, something the constitution that Kuwait has. Even the Jaber Stadium which cost proclaims. Unfortunately however, the thriving tens of millions of dinars to be built is out of service. monopoly is the main reason behind rising prices, The problems we face are clear, and the solutions and the fact that young citizens cannot start their are clearer, especially since the Kuwaiti government own businesses since land monopoly has forced real made donations that helped build many foreign estate prices to increase by 300 percent compared cities. — Al-Qabas

L

kuwait digest

Lessons from court ruling

By Dr Hassan Abbas hat can we conclude from the Constitutional Court’s ruling and the happy mood among the opposition afterwards? Many things. First, we understand that when the opposition demonstrated at the Iradah Square on the eve of the ruling, it was not trying to put pressure on the government. Their repeated threats to “take Kuwait into a dark tunnel if the ruling came in line with the government ’s requirements to amend the constituencies” were clearly directed at the court. Warning the court that “the stability of the country lies in the hands of its judges” was a message for all of us about the political approach adopted by the opposition.

From this, we can conclude that criticizing the judiciary is acceptable only when it comes from the opposition, which adapts the term ‘constitutional states’ as per its own interests.

To clarify, imagine if the court’s ruling had

W

Imagine if the court’s ruling had come against the opposition’s wish and had found the distribution of constituencies to be unconstitutional and that it needed to be changed. What would have been the oppositionís reaction? come against the opposition’s wish and had found the distribution of constituencies to be unconstitutional and that it needed to be changed. What would have been the opposition’s reaction? Would they have recognized the impartiality of the legal system, accepted the ruling and announced that they agree to follow it once it is enforced?

Or would they have taken to the streets and demonstrated? Isn’t it called double standards when the opposition speaks of the court’s integrity and protection of the constitution once its ruling is in line with their demands, but makes accusations of politicization when the ruling is against what they ask for?

Last Tuesday’s ruling was welcomed by all and once again proved that Kuwait’s judiciary was independent.

The opposition, which also welcomed the ruling, should also understand that the government no longer fears going to the Constitutional Court.

In my opinion, the government will come up with its own interpretations for the ruling which might not necessarily please the opposition. — Al-Rai

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Traitor or whistle-blower? Pope’s butler goes on trial Page 10

Architect of India foreign policy Mishra dies Page 11

AZAZ: Syrians line up to buy bread outside a bakery in the northern town of Azaz, on the border with Turkey yesterday. More than 30,000 people have died in violence since the outbreak of a revolt against President Bashar Al-Assad in March last year that grew into an insurgency.—AFP

Ancient souk burns as Syria fighting rages News

in brief

Beating ‘just for fun’ CHESTER: Six teenagers were in custody Friday on charges they brutally beat a neighbor on her stoop “just for fun” and then posted cellphone video of the attack on Facebook, authorities said. Four 16- and 17-year-old girls were charged as adults in the attack on the 48-year-old woman, a crime that has shaken this struggling city of about 30,000 residents just outside Philadelphia. The girls were charged with aggravated assault, reckless endangerment, burglary and harassment. Another teen girl and a 19-year-old woman were also arrested later Friday afternoon. The woman, whom police described as “mentally challenged,” was punched, kicked and hit with a shoe and chair, and suffered cuts and bruises but no broken bones, authorities said. Her name was not released. The attack occurred Tuesday at a two-story stucco house, where the woman lived, down the block from a small grocery.

Mayas ‘prophesized’ MEXICO CITY: As the clock winds down to Dec 21, experts on the Mayan calendar have been racing to convince people that the Mayas didn’t predict an apocalypse for the end of this year. Some experts are now saying the Mayas may indeed have made prophecies, just not about the end of the world.

Archaeologists, anthropologists and other experts met Friday in the southern Mexico city of Merida to discuss the implications of the Mayan Long Count calendar, which is made up of 394-year periods called baktuns. Experts estimate the system starts counting at 3114 BC, and will have run through 13 baktuns, or 5,125 years, around Dec 21. Experts say 13 was a significant number for the Mayans, and the end of that cycle would be a milestone - but not an end. Fears that the calendar does point to the end have circulated in recent years.

Teacher kills masked ‘son’ NEW FAIRFIELD: A small town was sent reeling in grief and confusion Friday after a popular fifth-grade teacher shot and killed a knife-wielding prowler in a black ski mask, only to discover it was his 15-year-old son. No immediate charges were brought against the father, Jeffrey Giuliano, in the slaying of his son, Tyler, who was gunned down in his aunt’s driveway next door to his own home around 1 a.m. Thursday.

“It’s something out of a Hollywood script,” said John Hodge, the first selectman, or top elected official, in the town of nearly 14,000 people about 50 miles from New York City. He said he couldn’t recall another killing in his eight years on the job. State police spokesman Lt J Paul Vance said the boy had never been in trouble with the law, and some of those who knew him described him as a good kid with an easygoing personality.

Islamists destroy tomb BAMAKO: Islamists destroyed yesterday another tomb of a Muslim saint in a northern Mali region under their control, witnesses said. “I saw the Islamists in Goundam destroy the mausoleum of Alfa Mobo, beside the cemetery,” local municipal councilor Mamadou Cisse said. Another witness, who declined to be identified, said, “They smashed the mausoleum down to the level of the tomb.” He added that “there were 11 of them and someone was filming it.” The witnesses said the Islamists were armed with axes and other tools. Goundam, 90 kilometers from Timbuktu, is in the hands of the Islamist group Ansar Dine (Defenders of Faith), which with other radicals has been destroying local Muslim shrines since seizing northern Mali in April. The Islamists say the shrines, venerated by local people and declared part of the world’s heritage by the United Nations, are “haram”, or forbidden in Islam.

40 killed; UN inaction gives Assad ‘green light’: Saudi BEIRUT: Hundreds of shops were burning in the ancient covered market of the Old City of Aleppo yesterday as fighting between rebels and state forces in Syria’s largest city threatened to destroy a UNESCO world heritage site. The uprising-turned-civil war that is now raging across Syria has killed more than 30,000 people, according to activist groups like the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. But beyond the dramatic human cost, many of Syria’s historic treasures have also fallen victim to an 18-month-old conflict that has reduced parts of some cities to ruins.

Rebels fighting to topple President Bashar Al-Assad announced a new offensive in Aleppo, Syria’s commercial hub of 2.5 million people, on Thursday, but neither side has appeared to make significant gains. In Aleppo, activists speaking via Skype said army snipers were making it difficult to approach the Souk Al-Madina, the medieval market of vaulted stone alleyways and carved wooden facades that was once a major tourist attraction. Videos uploaded to YouTube showed dark black clouds hanging over the city skyline.

Activists said the fire might have been started by heavy shelling and gunfire on Friday and estimated that 700 to 1,000 shops had been destroyed so far. The accounts are difficult to verify because the government restricts access to foreign media. Aleppo’s Old City is one of several locations in Syria declared world heritage sites by UNESCO, the United Nations cultural agency, that are now at risk from the fighting. UNESCO believes five of Syria’s six heritage sites - which also include the ancient desert city of Palmyra, the Crac des Chevaliers crusader fortress and parts of old Damascus - have been affected. The British-based Observatory, which has a network of activists across Syria, said Assad’s forces and rebels were blaming each other for the blaze.

Activists also reported heavy clashes at Bab Antakya,

a stone gateway to Aleppo’s old city, which sits on ancient trade routes and has survived a parade of rulers throughout its construction between the 12th and 17th century. Rebels said they had taken control of the gate, but some activists said the fighting there was continuing and neither side was truly in control. “No one is actually making gains here, it is just fighting and more fighting, and terrified people are fleeing,” said an activist contacted by telephone who declined to be named.

He said bodies were lying in the streets and residents were not going out to collect them for fear of snipers.

By noon yesterday, 40 people had been killed in fighting across Syria, according to the Observatory. The bloodshed in Syria has escalated since rebels took their fight to the major cities. Activists reported fresh clashes in the capital Damascus and surrounding suburbs and said security forces were torching homes as helicopters buzzed overhead. The revolt, which began in March 2011 as peaceful protests, has become an armed insurgency that is now able to hold ground in Aleppo and rural towns of northern Syria, close to the Turkish border, but can do little to fend off Assad’s air force and ar tiller y. The Saudi Arabian deputy foreign minister said Friday that Security Council inaction on the Syrian civil war gave the Bashar Assad regime “a green light” to attack his own people.

Abdulaziz bin Abdullah told the UN General Assembly on Friday that the Assad regime was “in a race against time to

accomplish its objectives using the most advanced means of killing and destruction.” Opposition groups say more than 30,000 people have been killed since the uprising began with street demonstrations 18 months ago. Egypt has sought to engage the Saudis along with Turkey and Iran in finding a path to end the fighting. So far, the Saudis have not participated and Iranian leaders claim they are trying to put together a working group of non-aligned countries. The Security Council, meanwhile, has been deadlocked, with Russia and China blocking three attempts to pass resolutions that would sanction Syria. “We regret that this regime continues to believe that it can proceed with its suppressive procedures to control the situation without any due regard to the high humanitarian losses,” Abdullah said.

“The Security Council, which is entrusted with the responsibility of keeping peace and security, has failed so far to take a decision about the Syrian crisis and to stop the bloodshed therein. This matter gave the Syrian regime a green light to proceed with its crimes against the Syrian people, in a race against time, to accomplish its objectives using the most advanced means of killing and destruction.”— Agencies

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

I N T E R N AT I O N A L

Lack of answers over Libya attack fuels criticism NEW YORK: The Obama administration has faced mounting criticism as top US officials revise on an almost daily basis their account of what happened in a deadly assault on a US mission in Libya. With 40 days left until presidential elections pitting the Democratic incumbent Barack Obama against Republican rival Mitt Romney, the dramatic events of September 11, 2012 are pulsating through the campaign. At its core are allegations that the State Department, and by implication the Obama administration, failed to protect its diplomats caught up in an hours-long siege of the US consulate in Benghazi.

In the latest twist to the evolving story, the US intelligence community said Friday that the deadly assault was an organized attack linked to Al-Qaeda. But it stressed that “many unanswered questions” remained.

“We do assess that some of those involved were linked to groups affiliated with, or sympathetic to Al-Qaeda,” Shawn Turner, spokesman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, said in a statement. But he said it was “unclear if any group or person exercised overall command and control of the attack.”

Initially, State Department officials spoke of a “complex attack” triggered by anger at an anti-Islam Internet video, although they cautioned that the full facts of what had happened were not known. The diplomatic corps was in shock after the loss of US ambassador Chris Stevens in the attack-the first serving ambassador killed on duty since the late 1970s-and three other American personnel working for the mission. Within hours, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said it was the work of “a small and savage group” and denounced the video said to have sparked a demonstration outside the mission, which then turned into a full-scale attack. The US ambassador to the United Nations, Susan Rice, that weekend described it as a “spontaneous attack”-that occurred on the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 attacks on America. As more questions were raised

about the attack-in which the US compound was set ablaze and a nearby annex to which most of the staff had been evacuated came under sustained fire-officials spoke of a “coordinated” assault. Libya for its part pointed the finger at foreigners from Al-Qaeda who were mixing with loyalists of Muammar Gaddafi, the longreigning dictator overthrown and killed last year. The initial version of events laid out in Washington began

TRIPOLI: A Libyan man waits in line with his children to hand over his weapon during a ceremony at Martyrs’ Square in Tripoli yesterday. Hundreds of Libyans handed over their weapons at collection points in the capital and the eastern city of Benghazi in the wake of rallies calling for the disarmament and disbanding of militias. — AFP

Irish police on alert as Protestants march BELFAST: Northern Irish police were on high alert yesterday as tens of thousands of Protestants marched through Belfast to mark 100 years since a landmark event in the history of Ireland’s partition.

An estimated 30,000 people joined the pro-British parade to commemorate the centenary of the Ulster Covenant, a landmark declaration signed by nearly half a million Protestants who vowed to defend themselves against rule from Dublin. The covenant laid the foundations for the partition of Ireland and the creation of Northern Ireland as a British province in 1921.The early stages of the march-one of the biggest loyalist parades ever held in Belfast-passed peacefully despite fears of clashes with the Catholic minority.

The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) has mounted its biggest operation in 20 years for the march, the BBC reported.”Today there’s been an overwhelming mood of dignity and respect and enjoyment and mutual co-operation,” the force’s Chief Constable Matt Baggott told the broadcaster. The sixmile (10-kilometre) march set off from central Belfast just after 10:00 am (0900 GMT) and headed east towards a cultural festival being held in the grounds of Northern Ireland’s parliament at Stormont. The parade was due to finish at 6:00 pm.

crumbling, even as the State Department said the consulate was now an FBI crime scene and it could not answer any more questions relating to the investigation. Clinton has also opened an official review, headed by veteran diplomat Thomas Pickering, to determine whether security measures were fully implemented.

State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland on September 17 refused to characterize it as a terrorist

For Protestants, the marches-in which participants wave banners and bands play traditional music-are an important expression of Northern Ireland’s continued union with Britain, but Catholics see them as intimidating. Under a heavy police presence, the march peacefully passed a Catholic church in north Belfast that had been seen as a potential flashpoint after it was the scene of sectarian scuffles last month. Marchers had agreed to sing only hymns as they passed St Patrick’s Church, refraining from singing any sectarian songs.

But some residents said bands defied the agreement and played the most famous Unionist anthem, “The Sash”, before reaching the end of the stretch outside the church. “Some of the bands, yes, they did stick by it, there’s no problem there,” said Frank Dempsey, chairman of the local Carrick Hill Residents Association. “But a number of them bands broke that.”

Belfast was hit by three nights of rioting earlier this month, injuring more than 60 police officers, after Protestants attempted to disrupt a march by Catholic republicans. Around 3,500 people died in the three decades of sectarian violence between Northern Ireland’s Catholics and Protestants that largely ended with a 1998 peace agreement, though sporadic unrest and bomb threats continue. — AFP

attack, saying “I don’t think we know enough.”

But two days later, the director of the US government’s National Counterterrorism Center, Matthew Olsen, told lawmakers that, despite many unanswered questions, he was prepared to call the killings “a terrorist attack.” He cautiously evoked a link with Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), while Fox News suggested former Guantanamo detainee Sufyan Ben Qumu, transferred to his native Libya in 2007 and freed a year later, was involved. Questions emerged whether Stevens himself had suggested he was on an Al-Qaeda hit list, and whether intelligence of a threat against the Benghazi mission had been ignored.

Both suggestions were dismissed by Clinton, who said there had been no such indications in the days prior to the attack. With questions lingering, and after new revelations that Stevens’s diary was found in the ruins of the Benghazi compound, White House spokesman Jay Carney this week reiterated Obama’s view that the assault was a terrorist attack. In a speech to a high-level meeting on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly, Clinton also appeared to suggest for the first time that AQIM, Al-Qaeda’s affiliate in North Africa, was linked to the attack. State Department officials were quick to push back, cautioning reporters not to read more into what Clinton said “than she actually said.” The contrasting versions of what took place and who was responsible have provided fodder for Romney’s campaign, which on Thursday accused Obama’s administration of trying to “mislead the American people.” Veteran Republican Senator John McCain turned on Obama, who had said Al-Qaeda was on the run following the May 2011 killing of Osama bin Laden. “They were either incredibly naive or willfully deceiving the American people,” McCain said on Twitter. In response, the White House has accused the Republicans of turning a tragedy into a partisan political affair in an election year. —AFP

Muslim world questions West freedom of speech Muslims call for rules on blasphemy UNITED NATIONS: Muslim leaders were in unison at the United Nations this week arguing that the West was hiding behind its defense of freedom of speech and ignoring cultural sensitivities in the aftermath of antiIslam slurs that have raised fears of a widening East-West cultural divide. A video made in California depicting the Prophet Mohammad (PBUH) sparked the storming of US and other Western embassies in many Islamic countries and a deadly suicide bombing in Afghanistan this month. The crisis deepened when a French magazine published caricatures of the Prophet (PBUH).

Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said it was time to put an end to the protection of Islamophobia masquerading as the freedom to speak freely. “Unfortunately, Islamophobia has also become a new form of racism like anti-Semitism. It can no longer be tolerated under the guise of freedom of expression. Freedom does not mean anarchy,” he told the 193-nation UN General Assembly on Friday. Egypt’s newly elected Islamist president, Mohamed Mursi, voiced similar sentiments in his speech on Wednesday.

“Egypt respects freedom of expression, freedom of expression that is not used to incite hatred against anyone,” he said. “We expect from others, as they expect from us, that they respect our cultural specifics and religious references, and not impose concepts or cultures that are unacceptable to us.”

Morsi was one of the first leaders to be democratically elected after Arab Spring r evolutions that led to changes in the governments of Tunisia, Egypt, Libya and Yemen last year. Western states that backed the uprisings have urged these countries to quickly foster democratic reforms and adhere stringently to human rights principles and basic freedoms.

They fear a more austere version of Islam could hijack the protest movements. Most Western speakers at the United Nation defended freedom of speech, but shied away from calls by Muslim leaders for an international ban on blasphemy.

While repeating his condemnations of the video, US President Barack Obama staunchly defended free speech, riling some of those leaders. “The strongest weapon against hateful speech is not repression, it is more speech - the voices of tolerance that rally against bigotry and blasphemy,” Obama said in a 30minute speech dominated by this theme.

‘CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS’ Speaking after Obama, President Asif Ali Zardari of Pakistan, where more than a dozen people were killed in protests against the anti-Islam film, demanded insults to religion be criminalized.

“The international community must not become silent observers and should criminalize such acts that destroy the peace of the

NEW YORK: Ahmet Davutoglu, Foreign Minister of Turkey, addresses the 67th session of the United Nations General Assembly at UN headquarters. — AP

world and endanger world security by misusing freedom of expression,” he said.

Highlighting the anger of some, about 150 protesters demanded “justice” and chanted “there is no god but Allah” outside the UN building on Thursday. One placard read: “Blaspheming my Prophet must be made a crime at the UN.” Foreign ministers from the 57-member Organization of Islamic Cooperation met on Friday. The film topped the agenda. “This incident demonstrates the serious consequences of abusing the principle of freedom of expression on one side and the freedom of demonstration on the other side,” OIC Secretary-General Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu told reporters.

Human Rights First and Muslim Public Affairs Council, two US-based advocacy groups, warned of the risks of regulating such freedoms. “Countless incidents show that when governments or religious movements seek to punish offences in the name of combating religious bigotry, violence then ensues and real violations of human rights are perpetrated against targeted individuals,” they said

in a joint statement. The 47-member UN Human Rights Council, dominated by developing states, has passed non-binding resolutions against defamation of religion for over a decade. Similar ones were endorsed in the UN General Assembly.

European countries, the United States and several Latin American nations in the council opposed the resolutions, arguing that while individual people have human rights, religions do not, and that existing UN pacts - if enforced - were sufficient to curb incitement to hatred and violence. German Foreign M inister Guido Wester welle attempted to dampen talk of a clash of civilizations on Thursday.

“Some would have us believe that the burning embassy buildings are proof of a clash of civilizations,” Westerwelle said in his UN address. “We must not allow ourselves to be deluded by such arguments. This is not a clash of civilizations. It is a clash within civilizations. It is also a struggle for the soul of the movement for change in the Arab world.” — Reuters

Suicide bomber dies ADEN: A suicide bomber killed himself and wounded four others in south Yemen yesterday in an attempt to assassinate a government official who had targeted Al-Qaeda militants, a security source said. The attacker walked up to the parked car of Mohammed Aidarous, who heads a “popular committee” of tribal volunteers who helped the army oust militants from the town of Lawdar in Abyan province this year. Aidarous, now the local government official in charge of Lawdar, was not in the vehicle but two people in the car and two passers-by were hurt in the blast, the source said.

Yemen has been in turmoil since an upris-

ing against Ali Abdullah Saleh, who finally stepped down as president in February. The Arabian Peninsula state borders top oil exporter Saudi Arabia and lies on major world shipping lanes. The army has expelled militants from Abyan towns occupied last year. But al Qaeda has struck back with assassination attempts against officials, some successful, and a suicide bombing of a military parade in May that killed 100. Four members of Saleh’s General People’s Congress (GPC) were killed in an ambush outside Sanaa on Friday night, the party said on its website. Eight were wounded.

It was not clear if the group was targeted

because of its party affiliation. A tribal source in al-Jawf where some of the men worked said the ambush could have been a tribal vendetta.

Saleh remains head of the GPC, which retains half the seats in cabinet. His relatives control key military and security units. Saleh was succeeded by his deputy Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi, who has US backing for a transition process that tries to balance the interests of groups including a Shiite Islamist movement in north Yemen, southern secessionists and tribal and Sunni Islamist groups who benefitted under Saleh’s rule. — Reuters

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

I N T E R N AT I O N A L

Anti-Islam filmmaker held at high-rise jail Federal officials mum on conditions of confinement

DERRY: Republican Vice Presidential candidate Paul Ryan and his wife Janna wave as they arrive to a campaign event yesterday in Derry, NH. — AP

Ryan - Romney’s rapidly shrinking running mate BOSTON: From the moment Mitt Romney mistakenly introduced his running mate Paul Ryan to the world as “the next president of the United States,” one word has routinely described the pairing: awkward. Cringe-worthy as that highly anticipated launch was in Virginia in early August, the Republican ticket has since lurched from one stumble to the next as it seeks to lay out the case for ousting President Barack Obama from the White House in November. Some experts, strategists and even conservative luminaries are beginning to worry that Ryan is not having the effect Romney was aiming for when he plucked the 42-year-old, congressman from Wisconsin to be his political wingman.

The benefits of a Romney-Ryan ticket seemed clear: the ex-governor of Massachusetts picked a budget hawk whose grand plan about lassoing runaway federal spending appeared to ensure the campaign would be about big ideas. Would Americans expand government and saddle future generations with endless debt, or embrace transformational reforms that would save entitlements like Medicare from going bust? But with polls showing Obama leading Romney nationally and in just about all battleground states, the Republican challenges are vast.

Ryan is architect of a budget blueprint that is deeply controversial. And his plans to convert Medicare, the government health insurance program that serves 50 million retirees and disabled Americans, into a voucher scheme aimed at saving money but which could expose seniors to rising health care costs, have proven unpopular. “We have not, in recent times, had a VP candidate who was so identified as the leader on a controversial position on a central issue of the campaign,” Joel Goldstein, a renowned vice presidential scholar at St. Louis University said.

“The Ryan plan, or parts of it, will prove harmful with important blocs-eg seniors-in swing states. Poll results in Friday’s Washington Post bore that out. They showed senior voters in the election’s three biggest battlegroundsFlorida, Ohio and Virginia-favor Obama’s position on Medicare more than the overhaul proposed by Romney-Ryan. Seniors in those states, by majorities surpassing 70 percent, said they prefer the guaranteed benefits of Medicare rather than shifting it to a system of fixed government payments to recipients who can then purchase health coverage from private insurers or traditional Medicare, as Ryan has advocated. Among the states’ registered voters who say Medicare is “extremely important,” 59 percent support Obama, with 36 supporting Romney.

Ryan got an earful of the hostility this month when he addressed the AARP, which represents 37 million seniors and retirees.

They booed when Ryan laid out his plans and called for the repeal of “Obamacare,” the president’s health care reform law. He heard it from his boss on Sunday, when Romney appeared on CBS news show “60 Minutes” and distanced himself from Ryan’s Medicare position. “I’m the guy running for president, not him,” Romney said. Ryan has hosted dozens of rallies, but with the duo appearing together at public events only twice in September, accusations have swirled that Ryan has been ordered to tone down the Medicare talk.

“No, not at all,” Ryan insisted to the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel when asked if he felt muzzled. “I’m learning how a national campaign works.” He said he prefers the interactive town hall setting, where Ryan can be his wonkish best. But on the trail he has largely hewed to a script crafted by the Romney campaign. —AFP

LOS ANGELES: The California man behind an anti-Islam film that stoked violent protests across the Muslim world was being held at a federal high-rise jail in downtown Los Angeles on Friday over possible probation violations, a prison official said. Federal officials, citing safety concerns, were tight-lipped about the conditions of Nakoula Basseley Nakoula’s confinement, including whether he was being held with the general population or was isolated from other inmates. “He is at Metropolitan Detention Center,” said Chris Burke, a spokesman for the federal Bureau of Prisons, adding that the facility holds 969 inmates.

Nakoula has been described as the producer of a crudely made 13-minute video filmed in California and circulated online under several titles including “Innocence of Muslims.” It portrays the Prophet Mohammad as a fool and a sexual deviant. The clip sparked a torrent of anti-American unrest in Egypt, Libya and many other Muslim countries over the past two weeks. The violence coincided with an attack on US diplomatic facilities in Benghazi that killed four Americans, including the US ambassador to Libya. Nakoula, who has kept out of the public eye for much of the past two weeks amid outrage over the film, was arrested and ordered jailed on Thursday over accusations he violated the terms of his 2011 release from prison on a bank fraud conviction.

Nakoula’s attorney, Steve Seiden, citing threats against the makers of the film, had argued unsuccessfully in court that holding Nakoula at Metropolitan Detention Center would be dangerous “due to the large Muslim population there.” But US Magistrate Judge Suzanne Segal ruled that the Coptic Christian man, originally from Egypt, was a flight risk and had “engaged in a lengthy pattern of deception.” His attorneys declined to comment through a spokesman on Friday about Nakoula’s detention, other than to say they remained concerned about his safety. In Pakistan, railways minister Ghulam Ahmad Bilour offered $100,000 last week to anyone who killed the maker of the video, although the country’s prime minister’s office later distanced itself from that statement.

PRISON HOUSES A SECURE AREA US Attorney Robert Dugdale said on Thursday that the warden at the facility was

5 Florida counties detect registration irregularities Republicans dump voter registration firm after fraud reports MIAMI: Election officials in Florida were scouring their records for fraudulent voter registration forms on Friday after the Republican Party said it had fired a company hired to gather new voters because of reports its employees may have submitted bogus forms. The Palm Beach County elections office first reported finding 106 potentially fraudulent registration forms earlier this week that had been submitted by Strategic Allied Consulting (SAC), a Virginia firm hired by Florida’s Republican party.

Since then scores more suspicious forms have been detected in at least five other Florida counties where election officials say SAC worked to register voters. Federal Election Commission reports from the state Republican party show it paid SAC more than $1.3 million this summer for voter registration services.

SAC was also hired to do voter registration work for the Republican party in four other key swing states - Nevada, Virginia, Colorado, and North Carolina for a total of $2.9 million, according to the Republican National Committee

(RNC). “When we learned on Tuesday about the instances of potential voter registration fraud that occurred in Palm Beach County, we immediately informed the Republican National Committee that we were terminating the contract with the voter registration vendor we hired at their request because there is no place for voter registration fraud in Florida,” state Republican Party Executive Director Mike Grissom said in a statement. The RNC also severed ties with SAC. “We have zero tolerance for any threat to the integrity of elections,” RNC spokesman Sean Spicer said in a statement.

SAC did not respond to requests for comment. The company was formed in June by Nathan Sproul, a conservative Arizona political consultant and a former executive director for the Republican Party, according to The Los Angeles Times. In 2008, ACORN - the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now - registered more than 1 million mostly low-income voters, who tend to vote Democratic. Thousands of those

Man kills himself on live television PHOENIX: A suspected carjacker shot himself to death after a police chase in Arizona on Friday in a grim spectacle aired on live television sparking a quick on-air apology and waves of outrage across social media.

The man was seen on the Fox News Channel stumbling from a dark red vehicle into the desert near Phoenix, stopping a short distance away and then apparently pulling the trigger of a gun pointed to the right side of his head. He then crumpled face-forward into the ground.

Anchor Shepard Smith shouted, “Get off it!” repeatedly, apparently asking his control room to cut away from the shot. The network quickly cut to a commercial and when Smith returned, he apologized for the incident. “We really messed up and we’re all very sorry,” Smith told viewers.

“That didn’t belong on TV. We took every precaution we knew how to take to keep that from being on TV. And I personally apologize to you that happened.” Social media erupted quickly with reaction to the televised incident, much of it negative. “Cannot believe FOX let a live suicide air over their network, my heart literally sank watching that.. #appalled,” said a

Twitter user who identified herself as Kelcey Brand.

The Columbia Journalism Review asked in a tweet: “Who’s worse? @FoxNews for airing the suicide, or @Buzzfeed for re-posting the video just in case you missed it the first time?” Andrew Kaczynski, a reporter for BuzzFeed Politics, tweeted back to Columbia Journalism Review: “I prefer your whiny usually incorrect long form analysis pieces over your instant judgment.” Phoenix police spokesman Sergeant Tommy Thompson said the man, who was not immediately identified, was being pursued by officers after carjacking a 2008 Dodge Caliber, apparently the vehicle seen in the television broadcast.

Thompson said the man had taken the car at gunpoint from two people in west Phoenix about 11 am local time and was chased by police through city streets and a state highway before ending up on a dirt road.

The man fired at officers and a police helicopter at one point during the pursuit, but there were no other injuries, Thompson said. He said the man died at the scene from a selfinflicted gunshot wound.—Reuters

registrations ended up being fake, submitted by ACORN-hired workers who were paid based on how many names they registered. The scandal led to the demise of ACORN and inspired some of the anti-fraud laws impacting registration drives this year.

‘EQUAL OPPORTUNITY OFFENDERS’ The alarm over the latest potential fraud was first raised by Palm Beach County Elections Supervisor Susan Bucher, who flagged 106 “questionable” registration applications turned in by SAC this month. Bucher said her staff had raised questions about suspiciously similar signatures and incorrect addresses and dates of birth on the forms.

Some of the applications were for new voters while others were for changes to address or party affiliation, Bucher told Reuters. While the 106 application forms all bore the Republican Party of Florida’s identification number, there did not appear to be an overwhelming partisan bias in the forms.

“They were equal opportunity offenders.

They were being paid an hourly wage so I think that was the motivation,” she said.

In a few cases the party affiliation was changed from Democrat to Republican and in some cases the addresses of real people were altered, potentially affecting their ability to vote.

Bucher, who was elected on a nonpartisan platform but supports the Democratic party, said she turned over copies of the applications to the State Attorney’s office earlier this week.

Officials have not said if an investigation of the company’s actions is underway.

Election supervisors in at least five Florida counties were checking forms submitted by the Florida Republican Party for similar problems, she said. Paul Lux, supervisor of elections in Okaloosa County, located in the northwest Florida Panhandle, wrote an email on Thursday to other state election supervisors warning them “to be on the look out,” for bogus forms.

More than 2,600 registration forms were submitted to his office by SAC, said Lux. He said dozens of forms contained suspicious data including fake-looking signatures and phony addresses, and had been turned over to the State Attorney’s office. Others were still being reviewed. About 100 suspect forms also showed up in nearby Santa Rosa County, he said. Submitting deliberately false voter registration information, or altering information on an application without consent, is a third degree felony, punishable by up to five years in prison and a $5,000 fine. — Reuters

CERRITOS: In this file image from video, Nakoula Basseley Nakoula, the man behind a crudely produced anti-Islamic video that has inflamed parts of the Middle East, is escorted by Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies from his home in Cerritos, Calif. —AP

aware of the situation. “He could be protected in custody,” Dugdale said. Authorities have stressed they were not investigating the making of the film itself, and prosecutors said Nakoula was in custody facing eight probation violation accusations. They did not list the violations but said he had used aliases and could face up to 24 months behind bars if he is found at a later hearing to have violated terms of his release. Under those terms, Nakoula is barred from accessing the Internet or using aliases without permission from a probation officer, court records show.

Experts familiar with the jail nestled close to a major freeway called the facility’s secure area, where they said Nakoula, 55, was likely to be held, an isolated place where he would be cut off from the world, except for the ability to make phone calls and perhaps listen to the radio. Jail rules at Metropolitan posted online allow inmates to have 10 books and magazines in their cells, in addition to legal, religious and school books, and require inmates to clean the floors of their cell daily.

“He’s going to be confined in a special unit where he’d be in a solitary cell, locked up alone and in maddening isolation,” said attorney Mark Werksman, who is not representing Nakoula but has represented other inmates held at the same jail.

A spokeswoman for the Marshals Service, which is responsible for Nakoula, said the agency’s policy is to not discuss inmate security measures.

Larry Jay Levine, a former federal convict once held at Metropolitan and founder and director of Wall Street Prison Consultants, said Nakoula was likely held in an area called the special housing unit and that he would be kept safe there.

“It’s basically a ‘ground hog day’ kind of existence, because he’s not getting out of his cell,” Levine said. Metropolitan, which holds both male and female inmates, opened in the 1980s and is mainly used to house inmates whose cases are being heard at the nearby federal courthouse, as well those serving short sentences. — Reuters

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

I N T E R N AT I O N A L

Mali prepares for war despite reticent neighbors BAMAKO: Mali’s rulers are preparing for war to free the north from armed Islamist groups: this was the message from Bamako after a UN meeting, despite the reservations of some of its neighbors to an international taskforce. “We felt a commitment from the international community at our side, a solidarity with Mali” a source close to President Dioncounda Traore said.

He was speaking a meeting Wednesday in New York, on the sidelines of the General Assembly, which was devoted to discussion of the Sahel crisis. Mali’s authorities knew that neighbors Algeria were trying to make common cause with Mauritania and Niger to oppose the deployment of foreign forces in Mali, said the source.

“But Paris will do all it can to bring about the convening of the Security Council and a resolution authorizing intervention,” the official source added. In Bamako, “people don’t ask ‘When is the war going to begin?’ but ‘How do we set up all the conditions necessary to do it?’ For us, the intervention isn’t far off, it is being prepared,” the source concluded.

For Madou Diallo, a professor of international law at the University of

Bamako, the response from the international community had been “mitigated” and “reserved”. “We understand the recommendation of ‘extreme caution’ on the part of the Secretar y General of the UN, Ban Ki-moon, because this war could lead to humanitarian disasters,” Diallo said. “But the Malian population is generally really in favor of intervention in the north” he added. “That’s what you hear in the streets.” Mali’s newspapers on Thursday however were preoccupied by other matters.

They gave over their main headlines not to the UN debate but to clashes in Bamako between rival factions of the police force that left two people wounded. Such violence is a symptom of tensions that subsist months after a March coup that ousted president Amadou Toumani Toure, who had been in power for 10 years.

“In Bamako, there is currently a very fragile link between the politicians and the military,” pointed out Gille Yabi, the Dakar representative of the International Crisis Group (ICG). “The Malian army is a post-coup army, that needs to be recognized, (by) giving a role to the ex-junta, which represents

an important clan within this army.”

A national commission for negotiations-Talks are planned for October in the capital so that all the players-political parties, civic associations, religious bodies and the army-can agree on how the political transition should be handled, said a source in the president’s office. The creation of a High Council of State has been proposed, with two vice -presidents, one of whom would be responsible for defense.

That post might even go to the coup leader Captain Amadou Haya Sanogo. “We can doubt this, however, given the opposition of certain international parties and notably the United States to this appointment,” Yabi said. Finally, a special committee could be set up to hold talks with the armed groups now running the north of the country.

But the word from the presidency is that if there are to be talks, then it should be with the Tuareg separatists of the National Movement for the Liberation of the Azawad (MNLA); perhaps even with Ansar Dine (Defenders of the Faith) the Islamist group led by former Tuareg rebel leader Iyad Ag

TIMBUKU: Fighters from Islamist group Ansar Dine stand guard in this file photo during a hostage handover in the desert outside Timbuktu, Mali. —AP

Ghaly. But they are not prepared to sit down with the Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa (MUJAO) nor with Al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

The MNLA’s European spokesman Mossa Ag Attaher wrote to the UN chief Ban that their group was “the

only objective, credible and unavoidable ally in the struggle against the dark forces implanted” in northern Mali. The problem is that the MNLA has been largely sidelined by the Islamist forces now in control of the north.—AFP

Traitor or whistle-blower?

Pope’s butler goes on trial Butler accused of stealing and leaking info

KHARKIV: In this image, Ukraine’s jailed former Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko addresses Ukrainians.—AP

Tymoshenko calls on Ukraine to rise up against ‘mafia-rule’ KIEV: Jailed opposition leader Yulia Tymoshenko called on Ukrainians yesterday to “rise up” at a parliamentary election next month and end President Viktor Yanukovich’s “criminal rule”. In a shaky twominute video filmed at the hospital where she is being held, the former prime minister said she was enduring “a hell”, created

by Yanukovich, as she serves a seven-year sentence for abuse of office.

Banned from running in the Oct 28 election due to her imprisonment, Tymoshenko’s video showed the 51-yearold’s determination to reach her supporters and rally her Batkivshchyna (Fatherland) party, demoralized by the loss of her leadership. Yanukovich’s Party of the Regions and its allies are expected to retain a majority in the election, but they are closely trailed, according to some opinion polls, by a bloc that includes Tymoshenko’s party.

In the video, posted on her party’s website http://byut.com.ua/news.html, Tymoshenko, who has said the election results have already been rigged, accuses Yanukovich of building a corrupt state aimed at enriching a small group of people in a “single mafia criminal band”. “Today the whole country, sadly, is living under criminal authority. The more they allow this and the further it goes, the more every person will feel this criminal rule weighing on his life,” she says, calling on Ukrainians to “rise up at these elections and throw out this criminal gang”.

The shaky video shows a man, presumably a member of the prison staff, attempting to block the camera from filming Tymoshenko and asking for the recording to stop. A woman prison guard holds a hand over her face to prevent herself being identified. With her hair in a single plaited tress across one shoulder rather than styled

in the circular braid that became her trademark as the popular heroine of the 2004 Orange Revolution, a seated Tymoshenko complains about her living conditions.

“Every day, there is not just physical and psychological pressure. Every day here is simply transformed into a hell (for me) completely consciously and intentionally.

This is a direct plan by Yanukovich,” she says. Imprisoned since October 2011, Tymoshenko has been receiving hospital treatment in Kharkiv for back trouble which has prevented a second trial on charges of embezzlement and tax evasion going ahead. She denies all charges and says they are part of a vendetta by Yanukovich who beat her narrowly for the presidency in a run-off vote in February 2010. Her prosecution has seriously strained Ukraine’s ties with the United States and the European Union which say it is politically motivated and smacks of “selective justice”. Shortly after her conviction, the EU shelved landmark agreements on political association and free trade with Ukraine, deals Yanukovich hopes will be unblocked once international monitors give the election a clean bill of health. But EU and US officials have cautioned that Tymoshenko’s continued imprisonment and biased media coverage might weigh on any final judgment of the election by monitoring groups.

Tymoshenko became Yanukovich’s nemesis when she helped lead the “Orange Revolution” protests which derailed his first bid for the presidency. She went on to serve twice as prime minister before losing the 2010 presidential vote. Because of her imprisonment, her party has formed a bloc with another opposition movement, Front Zmin (The Front of Change), led by proWestern liberal politician Arseny Yatsenyuk, to contest the election. — Reuters

Steinbrueck urges SPD unity to unseat Merkel MUENSTER: Peer Steinbrueck, the man chosen to lead Germany’s opposition Social Democrats into an election next year as its candidate for chancellor, called for party unity yesterday, saying it would otherwise be difficult to unseat Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Steinbrueck, a feisty former finance minister distrusted by Social Democrat (SPD) leftwingers for his centrist economic views, also repeated his opposition to serving under Merkel, a conservative, in a future coalition government.

“This federal election can only be won with the mobilization of our supporters ...

Unity is important,” Steinbrueck told a party rally in Muenster in the western region of North-Rhine Westphalia, where he once served as state premier. “An SPD candidate for chancellor must reach 62 million voters,” he added, signalling a pitch for the middle ground where he hopes to lure supporters of Merkel’s conservatives.

In power since 2005 and buoyed by her calm and resolute handling of the three-yearold euro debt crisis, Merkel enjoys higher approval ratings than Steinbrueck, while opinion polls put her party comfortably ahead of the SPD. A snap poll conducted by

ARD-DeutschlandTrends on Friday showed Merkel had 50 percent personal backing against 36 percent for Steinbrueck. Poll participants considered Merkel more likeable and credible than Steinbrueck and also more likely to overcome the euro crisis.

But 58 percent of respondents also thought that Steinbrueck, who was named as the SPD’s “chancellor candidate” on Friday, would be a good candidate for his party and he was considered stronger on the theme of social justice than Merkel. Despite their lead in the polls, Merkel’s conservatives may struggle to form a government if their current coalition ally, the liberal Free Democrats, do badly in the 2013 election. She may then have to consider a coalition with the SPD like the one she led in 2005-09 when Steinbrueck ran the finance ministry.

Yesterday, Steinbrueck repeated his preference for a coalition with the Greens and his unwillingness to cut a deal with Merkel. “I will not be won over to (serve in) a Merkel cabinet ... We want to throw out all three from this government,” he said, referring to Merkel’s Christian Democrats, their Bavaria-based sister party the Christian Social Union and the FDP. —Reuters

VATICAN CITY: Pope Benedict’s former butler went on trial yesterday for using his intimate access to the pope’s desk to steal and leak explosive documents in what he said was an attempt to clean up corruption in the Vatican. The 46-year-old Paolo Gabriele, who served the pope his meals and helped him dress, was being tried along with a Vatican computer expert in the city state’s littleused tribunal, a small, wood-panelled room with a papal emblem on its ceiling. Gabriele was arrested in May after police found confidential documents in his apartment inside the Vatican, throwing a global media spotlight on an institution battling to defend its reputation from allegations of graft.

A three -judge panel will decide the fate of Gabriele, whom the pope used to call “Paoletto” (little Paul), now described in Vatican documents as “the defendant”. The self-styled whistleblower, who says he was trying to expose graft at the headquarters of the Roman Catholic Church, is charged with aggravated theft for stealing and leaking the pontiff’s personal papers, and could be jailed for four years. Only eight journalists were allowed into the courtroom, and these were due to brief other reporters after the end of the first session, which was expected to last up to three hours.

According to an indictment last August, Gabriele told investigators he had acted because he saw “evil and corruption everywhere in the Church” and wanted to help root it out “because the pope was not sufficiently informed”. The documents pointed to a power struggle at the Church’s highest levels. Gabriele, who said he saw himself as an

VATICAN: Handout photo shows Pope Benedict XVI’s former butler Paolo Gabriele (right) sitting in a courtroom for the start of a closely-watched case that could see him receive up to four years in prison for aggravated theft. —AFP “agent of the Holy Spirit”, is widely expected to be found guilty because he has confessed. “He has done harm by leaking this information because there will always be somebody who will take advantage of these things to denigrate the Church,” said Rome resident Sergio Caldari in Saint Peter’s Square.

Another local onlooker, Giovanni Maisto, said he was hopeful that the trial could mark “a new dimension of openness and transparency” in the Church’s affairs. The trial will be based on a 19th-century Italian penal code.

Claudio Sciarpelletti, the computer expert charged with aiding and abetting Gabriele, could be jailed for up to a year.

It is not clear how long the trial might last. Gabriele, a father of three who lived a simple but comfortable life in the city-state, told investigators after his arrest in May that he believed a shock “could be a healthy thing to bring the Church back on the right track”. His arrest capped nearly five months of intrigue and suspense after a string of documents and private letters found their way into the Italian media. The most notorious of the letters were written to the pope by Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, currently the Vatican’s ambassador to Washington, who was deputy governor of the Vatican City at the time.

In one, Vigano complains that

when he took office in 2009, he discovered corruption, nepotism and cronyism linked to the awarding of contracts to outside companies at inflated prices.

Vigano later wrote to the pope about a smear campaign against him by other Vatican officials who were upset that he had taken drastic steps to clean up the purchasing procedures. Despite begging not to be moved away, Vigano was later transferred to Washington by Secretary of State Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, effectively the Vatican’s prime minister.

Since the papal state has no prison, Gabriele would serve time in an Italian jail, though the pope is widely expected to pardon him.— Reuters

Georgian poll haunted by conflict with Russia ERGNETI: In the Georgian frontline village of Ergneti, an elderly farmer stood next to the ruins of his home that was bombed during the 2008 Georgia-Russia war, and raised his glass for an emotional toast. “To peace! Peace everywhere, in every country, in Georgia and in Russia and across the whole world,” 72-yearold Tariel Kasradze said. As he spoke, the Russian flag was flying just a few hundred metres away across the fortified ‘border’ guarded by Moscow’s security forces, in the Kremlin-backed breakaway region of South Ossetia which was the focus of the war and where Russian troops are now permanently stationed.

“Russia is still a direct threat to us,” Kasradze’s nephew Nikoloz added. The role of enemy Russia has inevitably been a major issue in the bitter struggle for power between President Mikheil Saakashvili’s ruling party and an opposition coalition led by billionaire tycoon Bidzina Ivanishvili in Georgia’s parliamentary polls on Monday. Saakashvili claims his rival is doing the Kremlin’s work by trying to destabilize this ex-Soviet but Western-oriented country; Ivanishvili accuses Georgia’s leader of having provoked the conflict which saw the loss of two Moscow-sponsored breakaway provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Ivanishvili told AFP earlier this month that he would not criticize Russian President

Vladimir Putin, who many Georgians see as a brutal invader. Saakashvili says Moscow wants to reassert its influence over its former colony, oust its government and end its ambitions to join NATO, which have infuriated the Kremlin.

“Our enemy wants to achieve what it failed to achieve in 2008,” he said in a recent speech, alleging that Ivanishvili’s challenge was aiding Russian attempts to “throw Georgia back to the past”. Allegations by EU peace monitors of a Russian military build-up in South Ossetia this month have increased public unease.

‘For Russia, Saakashvili is a pariah’ The five-day war in 2008 saw the Russian army push deep into the country to crush Saakashvili’s military attempt to regain control over South Ossetia. Thousands of Russian troops were then deployed at bases in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which the Kremlin has recognized as independent states, giving Moscow a strategic foothold in Georgia and casting a shadow over its long-term security.

The Kremlin says it is protecting the regions from Georgian “aggression” but Saakshvili and his closest Western allies say this was an occupation. Moscow and Tbilisi have had no diplomatic relations since then and the Kremlin says it will not talk to Saakashvili, whom Putin once reportedly threatened to hang “by the balls”. “If the (Georgian) ruling party remains in

power, I find it hard to believe that relations could improve much,” Lawrence Sheets, Caucasus project director at the International Crisis Group think tank said.

“It could take a change of power in Russia” for Georgia to fulfill its dream of regaining its lost territories, he said. After NATO SecretaryGeneral Anders Fogh Rasmussen promised Georgia this month that it had “a future home in NATO”, Russia’s foreign ministry said that the Western military alliance had “not learned the lessons of the tragic events of 2008”. This was interpreted by officials in Tbilisi as a threat of further military action if NATO membership gets closer, but Russian analyst Felix Stanevsky said such claims were attempts to blame Saakashvili’s internal problems on a foreign bogeyman. An opposition win in Monday’s vote would not transform relations between the neighbors but would be “more convenient for Russia”, said Stanevsky, Moscow’s former ambassador to Tbilisi. “For Russian officials, Saakashvili is a pariah,” he said. Opinion polls have suggested that although many Georgians want to improve relations with Russia, most also favor Western integration and never again want to be under the Kremlin’s control. In the rocket-scarred village of Ergneti, Nikoloz Kasradze said: “All we want to do is live in peace on our own land.”— AFP

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

N Korea govt plans agriculture reforms Farmers to keep up to 50% of output

KABUL: Afghan women walk by the ancient Bala Hissar fortress in Kabul. — AP

Violence stalks women workers in Afghanistan KABUL: Muzhgan Masoomi’s attacker stabbed her 14 times with a thick blade used to slaughter animals, tearing wide gashes in her flesh before leaving the government worker for dead on the outskirts of the Afghan capital. With a severe limp and no control over her bladder caused by the blade scraping her spinal cord - the 22-year-old can no longer work at the Ministry of Public Works, where she was a financial assistant before the assault. Women who pursue careers in ultra-conservative Afghanistan often face opposition in a society where often they are ostracized - or worse, brutalised - for mixing with men other than husbands or relatives.

Despite commitments to better the rights of women 11 years into the NATO-led war, some say the authorities need to do more to prevent violence against women who work, particularly in government roles. There are now fears that as the 2014 deadline looms for most foreign troops to leave, opportunities for women in the public sphere could shrink as confidence weakens in the face of continuing violence. “I have no enemies, no links to gangs, and look what has happened to me. The situation for women in this country is getting worse day by day,” Masoomi said in her brightly lit home, a few minutes’ walk from where she was stabbed.

Shaking her long black ponytail, Masoomi said of her assailant: “He didn’t like women working out of the house”.

He threatened her with menacing phone calls and text messages in the months leading up to the attack. Her parents said the attacker, a relative who worked as a policeman, was now behind bars over the stabbing. The security concerns of male government workers are taken more seriously than those of women, said Colonel Sayed Omar Saboor, deputy director for gender and human rights at the Interior Ministry. “Women who work are much bigger targets than men and the government needs to acknowledge this,” Saboor said.

How well female government workers are protected was called into question in July when a suicide bomber targeted and killed Hanifa Safi, regional head of women’s affairs in eastern Laghman province. Authorities ignored repeated requests for protection, her family said afterwards. Laghman officials declined to comment. “She was so worried about her future. The only time someone in the police even addressed

the issue of her security was once the Taleban had killed her,” said her son, Mohammad Tabriz Safi, 30.

NO SUPPORT Officially the government must provide security - usually two bodyguards for ministers, members of parliament and tribal elders, said Interior Ministry spokesman Sediq Sediqqi. But women not in those senior roles, such as Safi or Masoomi, are in dire need of protection simply because of their gender, Saboor said. But Sediqqi said it would be “very difficult” for the police to provide security and guards for everyone who works in government. There area about 74,000 women out of 363,000 state employees.

Muzhgan has only recently gathered enough strength to talk about her ordeal, which happened in late March.

With a degree in accounting and some English, Masoomi was a valuable asset to her ministry, where she worked on a UNfunded Afghanistan Peace and Reintegration Program, bringing former Taleban fighters from the battlefield back into jobs.

But she said not a single person from her ministry came to help her, or gave encouragement after the attack. “They didn’t even come to see me. Financially, morally, I got nothing,” she said, adding that members of NATO’s International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) took her to the hospital. If she does not soon go abroad for surgery, she may never be able to work again. The ministr y ’s deputy, Ahmad Farhad Waheed, said it had asked ISAF to look after her treatment, but the force said it was not down to them. Afghan women have won back basic rights in education, voting and employment since the Taleban were ousted from power in 2001, but there is concern such freedoms will not be protected and may even be traded away as K abul seeks a peace deal with the group.

“If a political solution between the Taleban and the government is reached, there is no doubt that women will need to be better protected,” said Maria Bashir, the chief prosecutor for Herat province bordering Iran. The only female prosecutor general in the country, Bashir has been threatened repeatedly and come under attack twice, when her house was set alight and another one firebombed.

Eight bodyguards escort Bashir to work each day, and six live in her house. All are paid for by the international community, she said. — Reuters

Architect of India foreign policy Brajesh Mishra dies NEW DELHI: India’s first national security advisor Brajesh Mishra, who played an instrumental role in shaping the South Asian giant’s foreign policy, has died, officials said yesterday. Mishra, who died late Friday, served as national security advisor and principal secretary to former Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee during his government from 1998 to 2004, acting as troubleshooter.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh paid tribute to Mishra, calling him “one of the most able and influential public servants

Brajesh Mishra

of his generation” who brought “a sense of India’s destiny and place in global affairs”.

The death of Mishra came a day before his 84th birthday. Officials gave no cause of death but Indian media reports said Mishra had been suffering from a heart ailment. Mishra, a career diplomat, sought to fashion a broad vision of India’s foreign policy under Vajpayee, who was prime minister of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, now sitting in opposition. He was closely involved in the planning for India’s 1998 nuclear tests that effectively made India a nuclear-weapons power, pushed for stronger relations with the United States and sought warmer ties with rival Pakistan and China.

The underground nuclear tests conducted in the Indian desert won huge domestic support and fired up national pride but sparked an international outcry and trade sanctions along with titfor-tat nuclear explosions by Pakistan.

“He will be remembered for his masterly handling of the aftermath of the (Indian) nuclear tests in 1998 and for guiding Vajpayee’s peace initiatives in the neighborhood,” Singh said in a statement. But New Delhi’s nuclear isolation lasted until 2008 when the United States struck a deal with India giving it access to civilian nuclear technology. During his diplomatic career, Mishra served as an ambassador and as India’s permanent representative to the United Nations. — AFP

BEIJING: North Korea plans to allow farmers to keep more of their produce in an attempt to boost agricultural output, a source with close ties to Pyongyang and Beijing said, in a move that could boost supplies, help cap rising food prices and ease malnutrition. The move to liberalize agriculture under new leader Kim Jong-un, who took office in December 2011 after the death of his father, would reverse a crackdown on private production that started in 2005. It comes amid talk that the youngest Kim to rule the impoverished North is considering reforms to boost the economy. “Peasants will have incentive to grow more food. They can keep and sell in the market about 30-50 percent of their harvest depending on the region,” said the source.

At present, most farm output is sold to the government at a state auction price that has diverged from the market rate. It was impossible to verify the plan independently in North Korea, one of the world’s most closed states, although the source has proved reliable in the past, predicting the ascent of Kim’s uncle, Jang Song-thaek.

Also, after North Korea announced it would carry out its first nuclear test in 2006, the source gave Reuters exclusive details of the preparations for that test before it was conducted.

The plans come as some websites run by North Korean defector groups have said the price of rice - a staple food - more than doubled at the end of August from the start of June. The surge in rice prices, cited by DailyNK, a North Korean defector website (www.dailynk.com), was driven by a fear of economic reforms that could in fact be punitive, like a 2009 currency revaluation that confiscated most peoples’ savings. This report also could not be independently verified.

North Korea experienced a devastating famine in the 1990s from which its economy has not recovered, and a third of its population is malnourished, according to UN estimates. The

country needs about 5 million tons of grain and potatoes to feed its people and since the early 1990s its annual harvest has been 3.5-4.7 million tons, according to most observers. Experts in South Korea believe the North desperately needs fertilizer to boost yields in a country where soil has been degraded by erosion due to poor farming techniques.

LOST IN TRANSLATION A recent visit to Beijing, North Korea’s sole major economic and diplomatic ally, by the youngest Kim’s uncle Jang appeared to be aimed at economic reforms in North Korea, whose centrally planned economy is smaller than it was 20 years ago. North Korea wants to attract Chinese investment to help it overcome tough sanctions imposed in retaliation for its nuclear tests. Kim also aims to deliver on a promise to make the North a “prosperous” nation by 2012 and to banish memories of his father’s austere 17-year rule.

But it is unclear how far Kim Jong-un can go in liberalizing the economy without losing his family’s firm grip on power, most independent analysts say. The source said a Sept. 25 meeting of the Supreme People’s Assembly, the North’s rubber-stamp parliament, was likely to discuss “economic adjustment”, but was unlikely to result in any major steps forward. The phrase “economic adjustment” has been chosen carefully, the source added, noting the North’s decision not to use the old catchcry of its key ally, China - “reform and opening up” - should not be misinterpreted as a lack of reformist will.

Instead, the source said, North Korea was indeed trying to follow in the footsteps of China but was avoiding the phrase coined by Beijing because of an unfortunate quirk of the Korean language. “It won’t be called ‘reform and opening up’ because it sounds like ‘dog fart’ in Korean,” the source said. This is the second time

this year that the parliament, which rarely meets, has been assembled this year, triggering speculation in the North Korea-watching community that it could be a forum for announcing major reforms. The source said North Korea also planned to make its 1.2 million-strong military one of the largest armed forces in the world food self-reliant by modeling its production model on China’s armed forces.

“The food (shortage) problem will hopefully be resolved by learning from the Xinjiang Construction and Production Corps,” the source said, referring to the sprawling quasi-military network of state farms and factories in northwestern China intended to secure stability in the restive region by developing the economy and helping control borderlands. The Xinjiang corps was founded in 1954 by late vice president Wang Zhen. As of March 2011, more than 2.6 million people lived in the corps’ 14 divisions, which cover a combined area of more than 70,000 sq km (27,000 sq miles). The corps owns 179 farms, 1,400 enterprises, 13 listed companies, universities, media outlets and medical institutions, and its output was worth 75 billion yuan ($11.9 billion) in 2010.

North Korea’s military also has significant economic interests and its armed forces are required in part to feed themselves as transport and a central distribution system have broken down, while fuel is in short supply. The armed forces also have little to do, experts say, to occupy their time, and so farming is encouraged and praised in visits by Kim Jong-un and by his father Kim Jong-il, whose “field guidance” advice trips were a staple of North Korean state media reports. The source said boosting the army’s food self-reliance would not be a major change in North Korea’s “military first” policy. “Hopefully, the military will become (food) self-reliant. It will be given land to grow its own rice and vegetables.” — Reuters

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

I N T E R N AT I O N A L

Pilot error likely cause of Nepal plane crash KATHMANDU: Nepal said yesterday an error by a “panic-stricken” pilot likely caused the crash of an Everest-bound plane that killed all 19 on board moments after it hit a large bird. The twin-propeller Sita Air plane had just taken off on Friday from Kathmandu and was headed to the town of Lukla, the gateway to Mount Everest, when it plunged into the banks of a river near the

city’s airport around daybreak. Its right engine had burst into flames after a birdof-prey thought to be an eagle flew into it and the pilot banked back towards the airport.

But senior aviation ministry official Suresh Acharya said the plane had then turned too sharply because it had not gained enough altitude. “The preliminary finding of the Civil Aviation Authority

MANOHARA: The mangled tail section of the crashed Sita Air Dornier Do 228 aircraft is seen in Manohara, Bhaktapur on the outskirts of Kathmandu yesterday. — AFP

notices unusual maneuvering during the takeoff and the pilot communicated to air traffic control the aircraft was hit by a bird,” Acharya added. “But a plane crash does not occur simply just because its engine was hit by a bird,” he said, noting incidents when one engine of a twinengine aircraft had failed and the plane was still able to land safely.

“The pilot may have been panic-stricken,” he added, and “made a steep narrow turn instead of forming a wider radius required to bring the malfunctioning aircraft back to the runway”. Acharya, a member of a government commission due to report on the cause of the crash within three months, said the pilot should have gained more height before trying to return to the airport. The foreign victims had arrived in Nepal on Wednesday and had been slated to begin trekking towards Everest Base Camp on Saturday accompanied by local guides on an expedition organized by English firm Explore Worldwide.

Student Wu Hui, 27, of California, was initially named among five Chinese dead in the crash, which also killed seven Britons, but Sita Air said his passport recovered at the crash site revealed he

was an American of Chinese origin. “One American citizen of Chinese origin was among the 12 foreigners who died in the Sita Air crash yesterday. Seven Britons, four Chinese and seven Nepalis including three crew members are the other deceased in the crash,” spokesman Deependra Shahi said. “The trekking agency is in touch with us and some relatives have arrived Kathmandu to collect the body of the deceased Britons. We are expecting to be in touch with the Chinese side too for the handover of the bodies.”

Police said the victims were piled up at the cockpit end of the wreckage, the Kathmandu Post reported, indicating they had either failed to fasten their safety belts or took them off before hitting the ground. “We have taken out the data recorder and handed it over to the civil aviation authorities. The rescue work at the site has ended,” national police spokesman Binod Singh said. “It has been difficult to identify the bodies and DNA tests may be carried out before they are handed over to the relatives.” The youngest British victim was Ben Ogden, a 27-year-old Oxford University graduate who recently qualified as a solicitor and

was a rising star at a London law firm.

His father Andrew was quoted in Britain’s Daily Telegraph as saying his son wanted the trip to be “his big adventure” before he “knuckled down to some serious work” and life with his girlfriend of eight years. Other victims include Timothy Oakes, a 57-year-old secondary school adviser, and his friend Stephen Holding, a 60-year-old retired science teacher. Building contractor Vincent Kelly, 50, and his brother, property developer Darren, 45, were also killed along with Chris Davey, 52, an electronics engineer, and Ray Eagle, 60, a marathon runner.

It was the sixth fatal crash in Nepal in two years and has raised fresh questions about air safety in the impoverished Himalayan country, home to challenging weather, treacherous landing strips and lax safety standards. The crashes have claimed the lives of close to 100 people, according to an AFP tally. British Prime Minister David Cameron on Friday called the crash “a horrific incident” and said: “I feel for the families concerned.” Nepal has a poor road network, meaning many tourists, pilgrims and climbers rely on the country’s 16 domestic airlines and 49 airports to reach remote areas. — AFP

US, Israel leaders seek to get past Iran differences Officials in damage control after backlash WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu presented a show of unity on Friday on preventing a nucleararmed Iran, seeking to tone down the acrimony between the two leaders that has become an issue in the final stretch of the US presidential race.

Obama, widely seen as having snubbed Netanyahu by not meeting face to face with him during his US visit, spoke instead by phone to the Israeli prime minister amid signs of movement toward a truce in their war of words over how to confront Tehran.

Netanyahu used his UN speech a day earlier to keep pressure on Washington to set a “red line” for Tehran, something Obama has refused to do. But in a softening of his approach, the hawkish Israeli premier signaled that no attack on Iran was imminent before the Nov 6 US presidential election. With an eye to the close presidential contest, Netanyahu also fielded a call during his New York visit from Obama’s Republican rival, Mitt Romney, who has accused the president of being too hard on a close ally and not tough enough on Iran.

Romney has sought to use Obama’s differences with Netanyahu to raise doubts with JewishAmerican voters about Obama’s commitment to Israel’s security. Obama’s aides believe, however, that he has played his cards right with Netanyahu, with whom the president has had a notoriously testy relationship. Netanyahu’s strident complaints about US policy on Iran in mid-September plunged US-Israeli relations into crisis, but also spurred a backlash at home and in the US media for seeming to meddle in American politics.

In recent days, the Israelis have sought to dial

down the rhetoric, culminating in Netanyahu’s speech to the General Assembly, which was seen as sending a message that Israel would not blindside Washington with a unilateral attack on Iran any time soon. “The two leaders underscored that they are in full agreement on the shared goal of preventing Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon,” the White House said in a summary of their 20-minute phone conversation.

The White House said the two agreed to continue their cooperation, b ut it stopped short of saying Obama had given any ground on his resistance to issuing an ultimatum to Tehran, as Netanyahu has repeatedly demanded. “I had a very good conversation with President Obama,” Netanyahu told Israel television. “Our teams are talking.” An Obama aide went further, saying, “The temperature is lower than it had been.”

TONING DOWN DIFFERENCES Netanyahu dramatically ramped up pressure on Obama earlier this month when he insisted the United States did not have a “moral right” to hold Israel back from taking action against Iran because Washington had not set its own limits on Tehran.

That was followed by word that Obama would not meet Netanyahu during the Israeli leader’s visit to address the United Nations. Obama later said pointedly that he would ignore the “noise that’s out there” on the Iran issue. Obama’s aides were furious that Netanyahu was trying to put pressure on the president in the midst of the election campaign and refused to budge on the red-line issue, despite the risk of alienating pro-Israel voters in election battle-

DENVER: Combo photo shows Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney (left) and President Barack Obama during an intense campaign in competitive states. — AP

ground states like Florida and Ohio.

At the same time, Israeli officials - mindful of the danger of antagonizing the Jewish state’s main ally and of poisoning relations with the man who could occupy the White House for another four years moved into damage-control mode. Michael Oren, Israeli ambassador to the United States, flew back to Jerusalem last weekend, during which he urged Netanyahu to tone down public statements that could be construed as interfering in the US election or supporting Romney, according to sources in the Jewish community in Washington.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak visited Chicago and met privately on Sept 20 with Mayor Rahm Emanuel, a former close Obama aide, raising speculation that Emanuel might be used as a backchannel conduit to mend ties with the president.

The Israeli desire to defuse the crisis may also have reflected an interpretation of recent US opinion polls showing a widening of Obama’s lead over Romney, who has suffered a series of political stumbles.

Romney, speaking to reporters on his campaign plane, said he and Netanyahu agreed Iran must be denied nuclear capabilities but did not agree on specific “red lines” to confront Tehran. “I do not believe in the final analysis we will have to use military action,” Romney said. “I certainly hope we don’t have to. I can’t take that action off the table.”

In his UN speech, Netanyahu held up a cartoonlike drawing of a bomb with a fuse and literally drew a red line just below a label reading “final stage,” in which Iran would supposedly be 90 percent along the path to having weapons-grade material. Nevertheless, his warning that Iran would be on the brink of developing a nuclear weapon in less than a year was widely interpreted as some giving breathing space to Obama, who has urged more time for sanctions and diplomacy to work.

By referring to a spring or summer 2013 time frame for Iran to complete the next stage of uranium enrichment, the Israeli leader seemed to dispel fears that Israel might strike Iran before the US election. Iran denies it is seeking to build nuclear weaponry. Netanyahu’s praise for Obama’s stern words for Iran in his own UN speech on Tuesday although it lacked any specific ultimatum - was also seen as a sign that the Israeli leader wanted to quell the unusually public dispute with Washington.

“I think we are moving in a direction where the differences that were there, which were always tactical and not strategic, are in fact being managed at this point,” Dennis Ross, Obama’s former Middle East adviser, told MSNBC. Still, White House officials were pleased at avoiding an encounter with Netanyahu, who used an Oval Office meeting in 2011 to lecture Obama on Jewish history. Obama instead kept a lower-thanusual profile at this year’s UN gathering, making a campaign-style appearance on the popular talk show “The View” and then quickly returning to electioneering. — Reuters

China leaders stage show of unity after expelling Bo BEIJING: China’s leaders put on a show of unity yesterday after their damning accusations against disgraced politician Bo Xilai, whose expulsion from the Communist Party drew an outcry from leftist supporters in a sign of the rifts his prosecution could inflame. Once a charismatic yet divisive star who stood out on China’s stolid political stage, Bo is almost sure to face trial and jail after the ruling Communist Party announced his expulsion on Friday and issued a list of allegations: bending the law to hush up a murder, taking huge bribes and engaging in “improper sexual relations with multiple women”.

The party buried Bo under the accusations at the same time that it announced a Nov. 8 date for a congress that will anoint a new generation of top leaders - a lineup that Bo held barely disguised ambitions to join. Yesterday evening, top leaders gathered in the cavernous national parliament building for a National Day reception, their first public appearance since the revelation of the accusations against Bo. Premier Wen Jiabao did not mention Bo or any other controversies in his remarks to hundreds of diplomats, officials and other guests. “Looking ahead, we are full of confidence,” Wen told them, adding that “no hardship will prevent us from forging ahead”. The eight other members of the Politburo Standing Committee the party’s innermost core of power - also attended. Bo’s downfall has unsettled their preparations for the

leadership succession, and exposed high-level abuse of power after his former police chief briefly took refuge in a US consulate and revealed that Bo’s wife, Gu Kailai, had murdered a British businessman. State media tried to draw a clear line between Bo and the party elite he once belonged to, casting his fall as a victory for the party’s determination to fight corruption.

“No matter how high a position, no matter how influential, anyone who violates party discipline and state law will be sternly pursued and punished,” the official Xinhua news agency said in a commentary on the case. “As a senior party official, Bo Xilai should have been a model of obedience to party discipline,” the news agency said in the commentary, widely distributed by state media websites. “But instead he monopolized power and behaved recklessly, doing as he pleased and gravely violating discipline.” “His misdeeds deserve their punishment.” Earlier yesterday, the partyrun parliament confirmed that Bo had been removed as a delegate, following his expulsion from the party and its governing councils, Xinhua news agency reported. The party could face trouble, however, convincing sceptics that it has only recently awoken to Bo’s crimes, which it traced back to his years as a city official in northeast China. Bo’s leftist supporters have already revived charges that Bo is the victim of a plot to eradicate him and his populist policies.—Reuters

JIUQUAN: A rocket carrying Venezuelan satellite VRSS-1, a remote sensing satellite, lifts off at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in Jiuquan, northwest China’s Gansu Province yesterday. China launched the second satellite built for Venezuela’s government.— AP

Satellite launch stirs passions ahead of Venezuelan election CARACAS: President Hugo Chavez said the launch of Venezuela’s second satellite showed the achievements of his self-styled revolution just days before he seeks re-election, but his rival said it symbolized his neglect of problems closer to home. “We’re seeing history ... .

Venezuela has been with China at the forefront of history,” Chavez said after standing to applaud during a video link-up between the presidential palace, a launch center in China’s Gobi Desert and a Caracas street party.

As campaigning in the close election race approaches its final week in South America’s biggest oil exporter, both political camps are planning their last huge rallies while making last-minute efforts to win over undecided voters. Opposition candidate Henrique Capriles has mocked Chavez, who he says is focused on spreading his socialist project around the world but has done little to address the daily problems of voters such as crime, power cuts and inflation. A dozen Venezuelan officials were at China’s Jiuquan launch center, near the Mongolian border, to watch the rocket carrying the “Miranda” satellite blast off into a clear blue sky.

Venezuelan state TV had broadcast hours of build-up alongside the headline “Space Revolution ... a Sovereign View.” For Capriles, it was a prime example of what he calls grandiose plans that prove Chavez is out of touch with voters. “How many Venezuelans sleep in a refuge tonight? How many towns without an ambulance? Another satellite for the candidate of continuity. On Oct 7 this will change,” he said on Twitter. In 2008 China launched Venezuela’s first satellite - the Venesat-1, or “Simon Bolivar” - to carry communications gear.

The second spacecraft will take photographs that Chavez’s government says will help it protect the environment, improve urban planning and crack down on illegal mining and drug cultivation. Both satellites were

named after 19th-century South American independence heroes. The launch was beamed to big screens at a street party in Caracas’s museum district, where Chavez was mobbed by supporters when he arrived earlier in the evening to make a short speech. In the run-up to previous elections, the president has often unveiled many projects in an effort to impress voters. This time, his campaigning has been much less intense, partly because he has suffered two bouts of cancer since June 2011.

YOUR FUTURE Chavez, 58, says his “bourgeois” foe will scrap his social welfare programs, such as subsidized food stores and programs that make cash payments to poor families with children.

“It’s your future, young people, not mine. I’ve lived,” he told thousands of red-clad supporters at a rally on Friday. “Some people might be unhappy because of failures by our government. ‘They didn’t fix the road. The power went off. The water went off. I couldn’t find a job.’

“Well, that may be true in some cases and I take the responsibility ... . One of my pledges is for greater efficiency in the management of the government.” Capriles wants to tap into that frustration over day-to-day issues. He says Chavez’s government should have done much more, given the record oil revenue it has been spending. “Don’t you think 14 years is enough? Don’t you think the time has come to move forward?” he asked at a rally on Friday.

“The skinny one is here to make you a commitment and keep to it,” he shouted, using the nickname given to him by some supporters.

Most of the best-known polls show Chavez ahead, but Capriles’ numbers have been inching up and he has a small lead in two surveys.

Polls are notoriously controversial in Venezuela and public opinion shifts quickly. Investors expect Capriles to end a five-year nationalization drive if he wins, and reduce state intervention in the economy. —Reuters

Congo city suffers upsurge in violence GOMA: Five people were killed this week in shootouts linked to the Congolese army in Goma, eastern Congo, say local authorities. “There are a lot of soldiers in the area at the moment and it is creating problems,” said Naasson Kubuya Ndoole, Goma’s mayor. “We have to manage them.” Since the beginning of May, the Congolese army has been fighting a new group of rebels called M23 in the Rutshuru territory, north of Goma.

The M23 are largely Congolese Tutsi who defected from the army and are now fighting against both the army and Rwandan Hutu rebels for control of the mineral-rich eastern part of Congo. Congo President Joseph Kabila has sent thousands of troops to reinforce the Congolese army forces fighting the M23 rebels. But in July, the rebels gained ground and the Congolese army’s lines were pushed back to Kibumba, 30 kilometers away from Goma, the provincial capital.

Despite all the troops deployed around Goma, insecurity has increased. Many blame the undisciplined Congo army troops. “Every night since the end of July we hear gunfire in this quarter of town”, says Passy Nabintu who lives in Virunga, a neighborhood in northern Goma. In the past week several people were killed, spreading fear throughout the city. Local authorities have instructed people to stay home after dark and the usually lively streets of Goma have become eerily quiet after 7 pm. On Monday, a

shootout killed three people including a captain of the presidential guard, an elite unit of the Congolese army reputed for its ruthlessness.

The following day, other soldiers from the presidential guard started shooting in the air at night to show their anger at their comrade’s death, terrorizing residents of several quarters. “We don’t dare go out at night anymore,” says FaÔda Kakule, a shopkeeper in the Mabanga quarter.

The Congolese army spokesperson, Colonel Oliver Hamuli, says two presidential guards have been arrested in relation to the incident. According to him, soldiers are not responsible for the rising insecurity. “It is only an upsurge in ordinary crime,” he asserted. “The police must move to arrest the criminals and reestablish order.”

Rumors have been circulating in Goma that the increasing number of attacks is part of a campaign by the M23 to destabilize Goma and the army’s hold on the key city. But local authorities say it has nothing to with the rebellion. “It is an internal problem. It has nothing to do with the M23”, said Goma’s Mayor Naasson Kubuya Ndoole. On Thursday, two other people were shot to death. One man died after he was hit by seven bullets because he refused to give his mobile phone to unknown armed men. After murdering him, his assailants left his body lying on the street without taking his phone, said residents. — AP

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

NEWS

BUCHAREST, Romania: Cats are seen during an international feline beauty competition yesterday. — AP

Israel already passed own nuke red line: Iran TEHRAN: Israel has already breached its own red line set by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu by acquiring “dozens of nuclear warheads,” Iranian Defence Minister Ahmad Vahidi said yesterday. “If having the atomic bomb is passing the red line, the Zionist regime, that possesses dozens of nuclear warheads and weapons of mass destruction, has passed the red line years ago, and it has to be stopped,” he said, according to the ISNA news agency.

Vahidi was responding to a speech by Netanyahu to the UN General Assembly this week in which - using a cartoon bomb diagram the Israeli leader called for a “clear red line” to be applied to Iran’s nuclear activities, which he charged are aimed at developing atomic weapons. “Is the occupying and aggressor Zionist regime that possesses nuclear weapons

more dangerous? Or an Iran that doesn’t have nuclear weapons and which insists more than anybody on nuclear disarmament, and seeks only to have peaceful nuclear energy abiding by international rules,” Vahidi asked.

Israel is the Middle East’s sole, though undeclared, nuclear weapons state. Analysts estimate it has more than 200 nuclear warheads. It is a member of the International Atomic Energy Agency but has never signed the nuclear NonProliferation Treaty. Iran insists its nuclear program is entirely peaceful and rejects Israel’s accusations of military intent. Israel has had serious differences with Washington over how to respond to what it regards an “existential” threat from Tehran. US intelligence agencies estimate that Iran has taken no decision to acquire a nuclear weapon but is merely seeking a so-

called breakout capability to develop one in the future if it so decides. It says there is more time for diplomacy and sanctions to work out.

Netanyahu said Friday that his stern warning to stop Iran from going nuclear “reverberates” around the world and could ultimately prevent the Islamic Republic from getting a nuclear bomb. Speaking ahead of a meeting with his Canadian counterpart, Netanyahu said Iran’s uranium enrichment was the “only discernible and vulnerable part of their nuclear program” and his demand before the United Nations to draw a red line on its process could force Iran to back down.

“I tried to say something yesterday that I think reverberates now around the world,” he said, “and that is to translate the agreement and principle of stopping Iran from developing nuclear weapons to practice”. — Agencies

Shabab rebels abandon last urban bastion Continued from Page 1 “Kismayo shall be transformed from a peaceful city governed by Islamic sharia into a battle-zone between Muslims” and invaders.

The fall of the port is the latest in a string of major losses of territory for the militia. Residents confirmed that the Islamist fighters seemed to have moved outside city lines and that their radio station, Radio Andalus, had fallen silent. “We don’t know where they went to... but early this morning the last military vehicle left the town,” said Hassan Ali, a resident. “Even their radio station is off air,” he added. Shabab fighters on the ground also confirmed what they said was a tactical retreat from the port, which has been a key source of revenue for the insurgents from exports of charcoal. “We got orders from our superiors to withdraw from the city.... This is part of broader military tactics we have set for the enemy,” Sheikh Mohamed Abu-Fatma, a Shabab commander, told AFP by telephone.

The Kenyan army said it would move into the city soon. “Our air wing has been targeting suspected pockets of Shabab. Two key regional commanders of the group, Hassan Yakub and Abdikarim Adow were killed

by KDF air strikes,” said Kenya Defence Forces spokesman Cyrus Oguna. He added that the ground forces were “consolidating” in order “to move to take the rest of the city.” He said the northern part of Kismayo was under the complete control of the allied forces but as of Friday night “some parts of the south were still under the Shabab.”

Rage said that the Shabab withdrawal was “done in an orderly manner after five years of proper Islamic sharia law in Kismayo,” and that his troops moved away “to prevent civilian deaths”. Residents said that the withdrawing Shabab bust open the gates of the main prison in Kismayo and the police station. “Last night they released the prisoners from the jail and I saw three civil-

ians shot dead by Shabab after being accused of spying.

“They left and not one of them is here today,” resident Abdikarim Hussein said.

Eye-witnesses said that a few Kismayo inhabitants were undertaking sporadic looting of former Shabab administrative offices. The Shabab seized Kismayo, estimated population between 160,000 and 190,000, from Somalia’s weak central government in 2008. It had been a vital lifeline for the Shabab since the African Union force in Somalia (AMISOM) reconquered most of Mogadishu last year and Ethiopian troops stripped them of other key cities in the west. The looming assault on Kismayo which had been on the cards for the past four weeks caused an estimated 12,000 people to flee the city.

The Kenyan military has been aiming to take Kismayo ever since it rolled troops and tanks across the border to fight the Islamist extremists almost a year ago in retaliation for attacks inside Kenya. The recapture of Kismayo is seen as a major boost to the newly-established central administration in Mogadishu and would pave the way for government troops backed by regional forces to reclaim much of southern Somalia. Observers have consistently said that the loss of Kismayo would leave the Shabab, who once controlled 80 percent of the country, unable to retain large swathes of territory.

The other key Shabab-held towns of Afgoye, Baidoa and the port of Marka have all fallen in recent months.

But in places where the Shabab have abandoned fixed positions, most notably in the capital Mogadishu, they have switched to guerrilla tactics and remain a threat.

Analysts have warned that the Shabab - who implement sharia law in the areas they control, amputating hands of thieves and stoning “adulterous” women - can sow just as much chaos with guerrilla tactics. Shabab spokesman Rage warned that: “We are still in the outskirts of Kismayo and it will remain a battle zone... the enemy will not sleep peacefully.” — AFP

Bahraini teen killed in clash with police Continued from Page 1 In mid-August a 16-year-old protester was killed in a similar incident, when police opened fire with birdshot during clashes after a demonstration, opposition activists said. The opposition says more than 45 people have been killed in protests since martial law was lifted in June 2011. The Interior Ministry says protesters have injured more than 700 police officers and that the authorities have exercised restraint. Al-Wefaq distributed photographs show a body covered in blood and flecked with birdshot wounds. The pictures could not be independently verified.

Bahrain and Saudi Arabia accuse Iran of fomenting the unrest in the island kingdom and among Saudi Arabia’s Shiite minority, who mostly live in a province situated next to Bahrain. Iran denies the accusations.

The death comes a day after the UN Human Rights Council appointed a Bahraini as the Asia representative to its advisory committee.

Separately, a Saudi teenager has died of wounds sustained four days ago in a police raid that killed a wanted Shiite man and a companion in oil-rich Eastern Province, relatives said yesterday. Saudi authorities informed the family of Hasan Zahiri, 16, that he suc-

cumbed to injuries, the relatives said, raising the death toll of the attack on a house in the Shiite village of AlAwamiya to three. Security forces had tracked down Khalid Al-Labad to a house in Al-Awamiya, in the Qatif district, the interior ministry said on Wednesday. It said a gun battle erupted when police attempted to arrest the man who figured on a list of 23 Shiites wanted in connection with unrest.

Labad and a comrade were shot dead, while “two of the gunmen with him were wounded and a third was arrested”, the ministry said. Since early 2011, mainly Shiite towns in Eastern Province have seen sporadic protests and confrontations between police and marginalised Shiites who are estimated to number some two million in the Sunni-dominated kingdom. Unrest erupted after an outbreak of violence between Shiite pilgrims and religious police in the holy city of Madinah in Feb 2011.

The protests escalated when the kingdom led a force of Gulf troops into neighbouring Bahrain the following month to help crush Shiite-led pro-democracy protests against its Sunni-minority monarchy. Human rights groups say more than 600 people have been arrested since spring 2011, most of them in Qatif. The majority have since been released. — AFP

TEHRAN: An Iranian woman walks past a mural showing a clergyman holding the Holy Quran yesterday. — AP

Iran condemns US for delisting MEK Continued from Page 1 US considered the MEK “good terrorists” and claims Washington is using the group to work against Tehran.

State radio said the move highlights President Barack Obama’s anti-Iranian sentiments.

“There are numerous evidence of the group being involved in terrorist activities. Delisting them shows America’s double standard policy on terrorism,” State TV said. The US distinguishes between “good and bad terrorists” and the MEK are now “good terrorists because the US is using them against Iran,” the report also said, adding that Washington and Israel use the group to spy on Iran’s nuclear program. The US and its allies accuse Iran of using its civilian nuclear program as a cover to develop nuclear weapons. Iran has denied the claims, saying its nuclear program is peaceful and is intended for electricity generation and scientific research.

The State Department said the MEK hasn’t committed terror for more than a decade. The group has also complied with demands that more than 3,000 of its once-armed members abandon their base in Iraq near

the Iranian border for a camp outside Baghdad, an essential step to ending their decades-long presence in Iraq. The group claims it is seeking regime change in Iran through peaceful means with an aim to replace the clerical rule in Tehran with a secular government.

However, a senior State Department official suggested that removing MEK from the US terrorist list does not translate into a shared common front against the Islamic Republic of Iran. The official said Washington does not view MEK as an opposition movement that can promote democratic values in Iran. Iran says MEK is responsible for the deaths of more than 12,000 Iranians over the past three decades, including senior government officials.

The MEK spent huge sums of money over years lobbying for removal from the US terror list, holding rallies in European capitals and elsewhere that featured luminaries like former Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge from the administration of George W Bush.

Former House Speaker and presidential candidate Newt Gingrich was among those recently welcomed by the MEK to Paris. — AP

Last Western detainee at Gitmo returns...

Continued from Page 1 has committed and ensure the safety of Canadians is protected during incarceration,” Toews said. Toews said that Omar Khadr’s mother and sister “have openly applauded” his father’s “crimes and terrorist activities” and noted that Omar has had “little contact with Canadian society and will require substantial management in order to ensure safe integration in Canada”.

Khadr’s family and lawyer did not immediately respond to messages seeking comment about his release.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper ’s Conservative government had long refused to request the return of Khadr, the youngest detainee held at Guantanamo. The reluctance is partly due to suspicions about the Khadr family, which has been called “the first family of terrorism”. Defense attorneys have said Khadr was pushed into fighting the Americans in Afghanistan by his father, Ahmed Said Khadr, an alleged Al-Qaida financier whose family stayed with Osama bin Laden briefly when Omar Khadr was a boy. The Egyptian-born father was killed in 2003 when a Pakistani military helicopter shelled the house where he was staying with senior AlQaeda operatives.

US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta signed off on

Khadr’s transfer in April. Panetta said in Ottawa earlier this year that sending Khadr back to Canada would be an important step because it would serve as an example to other detainees who are looking to return to their home countries or other places. Some Guantanamo detainees have been reluctant to agree to plea deals after noting that Khadr had remained in Guantanamo despite being eligible to leave since last October. The US Defense Department confirmed the transfer in a statement and said 166 detainees remain in detention at Guantanamo Bay. Suzanne Nossel, Amnesty International USA Executive Director, said the Guantanamo prison should finally be closed. She said Canada now has a chance to right what she called the many wrongs against Khadr and called for an investigation into Khadr’s allegations of torture. “Given the Obama administration’s glacial pace towards closing the US-controlled detention center, little and late though it is, today’s news represents progress,” Nossell said in a statement. “Khadr was imprisoned at the age of 15, subjected to ill-treatment and then prosecuted in a military commissions system that does not meet international fair trial standards. Growing up in Guantanamo and facing more prison time in Canada, his future remains uncertain.” — Agencies

US pushes Gulf over missile defense plans Continnued from Page 1 maritime exercise held which involved 12 navies and some 30 countries. “I think that the important thing to understand is that if they are buying US missile defense equipment, it’ll make it easier to knit that together, because by its nature, it’ll be more interoperable,” the US official said. “So we want to encourage them to buy equipment that can be knitted together.” Asked whether the plan was also to protect against any missile threat from Iran, he said “our aim is to help our Gulf

partners with their defense needs. And so there is a missile threat that they face. We want to help them face that threat as best as we can”.

A second US administration official added that the “focus is to ensure the free flow of commerce in the straits overall, which is in all countries’ interests.

Obviously, the GCC countries have been concerned about Iran’s statements ... that would threaten the free flow of commerce of the area.” The United States was “concerned about any disruption of shipping in the region by Iran or its surrogates”, he added. — AFP

14

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

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Issues

Kismayo falls, but Shabab far from over

By Daniel Wesangula he Al-Qaeda-linked Al Shabab, regarded by the West as a credible threat to global peace, may have pulled out of their last Somali stronghold of Kismayo, but the new national government must move quickly to make their defeat more than a minor setback.

Analysts however warn that despite the fact that Shabab have withdrawn from the port city, peace is still elusive in the war-ravaged nation. For almost one year, Kenyan Army and African Union forces have waged a slow but consistent campaign against the Shabab.

After days of threatening an invasion, the troops launched a beach assault Friday on the southern Somali port city of Kismayo. A day later, the rebel group’s spokesman Ali Mohamud Rage announced their abandoning of Kismayo, explaining the “tactical retreat” with the need “to prevent civilian casualties” brought by an allout confrontation. Analysts agree that the loss of Kismayo was the biggest military and political setback the Shabab have faced since the war against the Islamist organization was launched.

“The fall of Kismayo is a game changer because a key source of revenue for the Shabab has been stifled,” Joakim Gundel, a Nairobi-based academic with local think-tank Bridges Analytics told AFP. “This represents an end to Shabab as an insurgent group with ambitions for territorial control,” he added. Many believe that Shabab will be hardest hit financially by the fall of the key port city, the latest to have gone into the hands of African Union and Somali forces. “They rely on the port for financial support, benefiting from the charcoal and sugar trade,” Laura Hammond, a senior lecturer at London’s School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), told AFP. Gundel said that the fall will take Shabab outside their comfort zone and force them to seek financial support elsewhere. “They will have to be dependent on external resources... In a world in which regimes supporting groups such as Shabab are falling, this will not be an easy task,” he said. He added that the financial pressures may also cause fault lines among the smaller militias that came together to form the Al-Qaeda linked group.

The odds may be firmly stacked against them, but it is emerging that Kismayo’s fall does not spell the end of Shabab. “They still control large areas of the countryside in southern Somalia, as well as some secondary towns,” said Hammond. “There have been reports of Shabab members fleeing to remote mountainous areas in the contested territory between Somaliland and Puntland. “I would expect them to lie low for a while, carrying out indiscriminate attacks like those seen in Mogadishu in recent weeks,” she added.

The change of tactic by Shabab from open military warfare to guerrilla attacks will not only pose a problem for the forces fighting them, but for the new Somali government too. Gundel said “Shabab gained a lot of support by playing into the historic rivalries among Somalia’s clans... these differences are still strong, and if the new government fails to address them, the Shabab might find a way back.” All major clans in Somalia - such as the Harti, Ogaden, Marehan, Rahanwein and Galjel - have major interests in the Lower Juba region, whose commercial capital is Kismayo. “The only way out of this will be for the new government to invite all these clans into the postShabab peace process,” Gundel said.

Former Kenyan ambassador to Somalia, Mohamed Abdi Affey, agrees that inclusion would be the key to prevent a possible return to violence. “I am sure the government, together with the Inter Governmental Authority on Development, will put in place an inclusive arrangement because in Somalia, governance can never be left to only one, two or three groups. “It must be inclusive for sustainable peace to be achieved,” said Affey. Kismayo had long been a target for the allied forces, and its fall has raised questions on the issue of an exit plan for the foreign armies. “Foreign troops should leave Somalia soon, but if they leave before the Somali military is strong enough to take over, Shabab will jump at the opportunity and try to regain territory,” said Hammond.

Before they pull out of Somalia some differences amongst the individual armies might first need to be ironed out. “Almost all foreign governments involved in the liberation of Somalia have their own interests at heart,” Gundel said. “Ethiopia waged war in western Somalia because it was against a strong Ogaden influence in that part of the country... on the other hand the Kenyans are supporting Ogaden factions. “—AFP

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Dramatic Hamilton move shifts F1 landscape

By Tim Collings ne of the worst-kept secrets in motor racing was finally made official on Friday when Lewis Hamilton confirmed he was leaving McLaren for Mercedes. In a move that had been openly discussed since the end of July, the British driver will retain his huge salary - reportedly more than £15 million ($24 million) - and have greater freedom in enhancing his earnings through personal sponsorship in a three-year deal that will take him past his 30th birthday. Hamilton’s departure from McLaren after six years as their leading Formula One driver and an association that started when he was 13 years old immediately triggered a series of other moves.

The 27-year-old will replace the legendary seven-time drivers champion Michael Schumacher, now 43, at Mercedes and be replaced at McLaren by the highly-rated young Mexican Sergio Perez, 22. This leaves a vacancy at Perez’s former team Sauber, the only Swiss outfit in the sport, and a question mark hanging over the future of the most suc-

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cessful driver F1 driver of all time, Schumacher. It also leaves Ferrari reconsidering the identity of their favoured driver to replace struggling Brazilian Felipe Massa as Spaniard Fernando Alonso’s partner in the future, if and when Massa is released.

For Schumacher, the options will be plentiful. Mercedes may wish to retain him to provide continuity as Hamilton beds in alongside another German Nico Rosberg, whom he knows well from their Formula A karting days in the Mercedes junior system in 2000. Mixedrace Hamilton’s upbringing on a social housing scheme is a world apart from flaxen-haired Rosberg’s gilded life in Monte Carlo as the son of a multi-millionaire F1 champion, sometimes causing tensions. But both have done a lot of growing up in the last decade and their close friendship has survived to be re-born as a racing partnership pregnant with potential.

Rosberg tweeted on Friday: “Very cool that Lewis will be my new team-mate! Going to be another great challenge.”

Hamilton, certainly, will believe he can not only challenge for the drivers’ title again with

Mercedes but win it. If not, he would not have made the move. Schumacher’s other options will be to continue racing in F1 - in which he has shown some thrilling form, fitfully, this year - and he could be a target for Sauber, with team owner Peter Sauber a close friend.

Indeed, Sauber was seen deep in conversation with Schumacher’s agent Sabine Kahm at the Italian Grand Prix earlier this month.

Schumacher, however, has also been linked with a return to Ferrari. But with his family home in Switzerland, a final hurrah at Sauber, if not a move into Mercedes management team, seems more likely. Hamilton has spoken of the “new challenge” in joining Mercedes and in many respects he is giving himself a chance to repeat Schumacher’s great success at Ferrari in creating a new era, virtually a dynasty of success, under the guidance of one of F1’s wisest owls, fellow Englishman Ross Brawn. Brawn designed all seven of Schumacher’s title successes, two with Benetton and five with Ferrari, before he moved on to supply Briton Jenson Button with a title-winning season in his eponymous

team in 2009. He has also brought in Niki Lauda as non-executive director in a sign of wanting to build for the future.

Significantly, 2013, will be the last year in which F1 runs with its current technical rules before the introduction in 2014 of V6 turbocharged engines. Mercedes, as a manufacturer team, will have a clear advantage over their rivals, like McLaren, who are customers, as they work on developments. This, like the rest, leaves Hamilton apparently poised to be part of the Silver Arrows’ big push for glory in the post-Schumacher era, with the former Red Baron set to be 45 when the new rules arrived.

Schumacher has been generous in welcoming Hamilton and vowed to try his best in the closing six races of this season, an ambition shared by McLaren who want to see Hamilton lift his second drivers’ title with them this season before he leaves. Whether Button, whose relations with Hamilton have cooled notably this year, lends his support also remains to be seen as what was once seen as a British ‘dream team’ works to avoid experiencing a nightmare break-up. — AFP

Debate challenge: Handling the off-script moment

By John Whitesides f history is a guide, Democrat Barack Obama will have a tough time in the first presidential debate on Wednesday, Republican Mitt Romney will be particularly aggressive, and both will risk committing a damaging gaffe if they wander off their talking points. The 90-minute showdown in Denver - the first of three televised ObamaRomney encounters in October that will set the tone for the final month of the presidential campaign - will feature two experienced and competent debaters who are at their best in scripted settings. Neither the Democratic president nor his Republican rival has ever seemed to enjoy the more freewheeling aspects of a candidates’ debate, and both have said things during debates that became headaches for their campaigns.

Obama, known for soaring rhetoric and inspirational generalities in his speeches, suffered in some 2008 Democratic primary debates from a diffident and nuanced style that could make him seem flat and uncertain. His most pointed responses often seemed condescending or flippant.

Romney, who survived a grueling series of debates in this year’s Republican race, often displayed an efficient and feisty style in rolling over his challengers. But Romney also can seem stiff and awkward when challenged. When frustrated, he can also make mistakes - like his offer to bet Texas Governor Rick Perry $10,000 over a disputed point during one Republican primary debate, a scene that was a reminder of critics’ charges that Romney is an out-of-touch rich guy. “ They are pretty evenly matched as debaters,” said Alan Schroeder of Northeastern University in Boston, who has written a history of presidential debates.

“They both tend to be more intellectual than emotional, and they are both articulate and comfortable on camera. But they would both prefer to be in a more controlled setting.” The high-stakes debates particularly the one on Wednesday, which will be moderated by PBS’ Jim Lehrer and focus on domestic policy - could be the last chance for Romney to reclaim momentum from Obama.

The president leads his Republican rival in most national polls and in the politically divided “swing” states likely to decide the Nov 6 election. Romney has taken frequent breaks from the campaign trail to practice for the debates, which could draw a televi-

I

sion audience dwarfing the 30 million who watched his speech on the last night of the Republican National Convention last month. The first of the three debates in the 2008 presidential race between Obama and Republican John McCain drew 52 million television viewers.

Debates rarely make a big difference in the final results of presidential races, but a strong performance can give a candidate a bump of a few percentage points in polls, said Mitchell McKinney, a political communications specialist at the University of Missouri. “You don’t normally see gamechanger type moments in a presidential debate,” he said. “But now the game is almost over, and this is Romney’s chance.

Can he take advantage?” Both candidates are proven debaters, but have weaknesses that can be exploited, analysts said.

“If you are Romney, you want to figure out a way to get under Obama’s skin, you want to see him get prickly,” said Dan Schnur, an aide to McCain’s 2000 presidential campaign. “If you’re Obama, you want to be a little unpredictable and throw Romney off his script.” Recent presidential debates suggest the first debate could be Obama’s toughest. Three of the last four incumbent presidents to seek a second four-year term - Ronald Reagan in 1984, George H W Bush in 1992 and his son George W Bush in 2004 - suffered difficult

first debates, although Reagan and the younger Bush won re-election. The exception was Bill Clinton, a natural debater, in 1996. Clinton had defeated the elder Bush in 1992, and was a much sharper communicator than Kansas Senator Bob Dole, Clinton’s Republican opponent in 1996.

“An incumbent president is used to having his way and being deferred to. He is not as used to being challenged,” McKinney said. As a result, “they may come across as perturbed. Their job is to defend their record without becoming defensive”. That could prove tricky for Obama, who also will have to walk a fine line in acknowledging the nation’s high unemployment rate and the economic difficulties faced by most Americans, while offering a more hopeful vision for the future.

During the 2008 debates, Obama sometimes sounded like the constitutional law professor he once was, exploring every angle of an issue in a rambling style. His staff says it is trying to curb those tendencies in debate preparations. Obama was reminded of the danger of straying off message earlier this year when he punctuated a speech about the government help that business owners receive with the line, “You didn’t build that.” Romney’s Republicans called it an insult to business owners and made “We Did Build That” a theme not only of campaign commercials but the

US President Barack Obama and Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney campaign in the battleground state of Ohio in these Sept 26, 2012 file photos. — AP

Republican convention. Obama’s most memorable 2008 debate gaffe came in what was widely viewed as an insensitive putdown of Democratic rival Hillary Clinton after a moderator questioned her likability.

“You’re likable enough, Hillary,” said Obama, who after his election appointed her as secretary of state. Romney faces his own challenges on likability, and the trick for the former private equity executive will be to mount an aggressive attack on Obama without coming off as too cold, calculating or desperate. “His problem is that people don’t believe what he says,” said Democrat Doug Hattaway, an aide in the presidential campaigns of Al Gore in 2000 and Hillary Clinton in 2008. “He delivers the lines fine, but the punches don’t land the way they would if he was trusted more, so he comes off as more scripted.”

During the primary debates, his offer of a $10,000 bet to Perry was not Romney’s only out-of-touch moment. During a debate in Nevada, he countered an attack on his use of a lawn service that employed illegal immigrants by saying that he had told the company, “I’m running for office, for Pete’s sake, I can’t have illegals.” On the campaign trail, Romney has unintentionally reminded voters of his wealth and privilege with comments about his friendship with NASCAR owners and his wife Ann’s Cadillacs. In what could be a turning point in the campaign, Romney was secretly recorded at a private fundraiser telling wealthy donors that the “47 percent” of Americans who do not pay taxes are “victims” who depend on the government for handouts and probably would never vote for him. “Romney has shown a greater facility for gaffes and missteps, obviously,” McKinney said. Even so, Romney who participated in more than 20 debates in the 2012 primaries and more than 15 during his unsuccessful run for the White House in 2008 - will be the most experienced presidential campaign debater ever to appear in a general election debate, McKinney said. Romney will have far more camera time and a much bigger audience in a one-on-one debate with Obama than he did during the crowded primary debates.

Analysts said he would need to articulate a sharper vision for the nation and avoid looking like he is merely trying to score debate points at every turn. Gore learned that lesson the hard way in 2000, when he seemed to win the verbal jousting with George W Bush but turned off viewers with his impatient demeanor and exasperated sighs when Bush was talking.— Reuters

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

sp orts Hodgson knighted in Finland

Sharks hold off Bulls JOHANNESBURG: Sharks went top of the Currie Cup table Friday with a 1312 home win over Blue Bulls in wet Durban despite playing the final 10 minutes a man short.

Hooker Pieter Dixon was given a harsh red card by referee Mark Lawrence when his stray foot accidentally struck an opponent in the face with his side holding a four-point advantage.

But all the Bulls could manage with a numerical advantage was a penalty from fly-half Louis Fouche as the 23-time South African champions slumped to a fifth loss in eight outings that kept them second last in the table. Fouche kicked two penalties and a drop goal in the opening half

LONDON: England’s globetrotting coach Roy Hodgson has been knighted in Finland for helping the minnows put their name on the football map.

Hodgson, appointed England coach in May, managed the Nordic nation from January 2006 to November 2007 when they came agonisingly close to qualification for a first major tournament at Euro 2008. “Roy’s time as the manager of Finland lifted the level of Finnish football culture and made Finland internationally better known as a football nation,” Finnish ambassador to Britain Pekka Huhtaniemi said on the English FA’s website (www.thefa.com) yesterday. Finland reached their highest ever FIFA ranking of 33 and were just one goal away from qualifying for Euro 2008 under Hodgson, when a victory over Portugal in their last qualifier rather than a 0-0 draw would have put them through.

“I enjoyed my life (in Finland) very much. Not only in football, but outside of it as well. I hope that my relationship with Finland, which is already great, becomes even greater,” said the 65-year-old Hodgson. —Reuters

on a pitch made treacherous by torrential rain while wing Paul Jordaan darted down the blindside for a try to leave the Sharks trailing 9-5 at the break.

Discarded Springbok loose forward Keegan Daniel scored a second Sharks try five minutes into the second half after a break by scrum-half Cobus Reinach and centre Meyer Bosman stretched the lead with a penalty.

Sharks have 25 points, defending champions Golden Lions 24, Western Province 20, Griquas 15, Bulls 14 and Free State Cheetahs 12 with the top four advancing to the semi-finals while the bottom team go into a twoleg relegation play-off. — AFP

Rodriguez wins Tour of Lombardy MILAN: Katusha’s Joaquim Rodriguez won a rain-lashed 106th edition of the Tour of Lombardy yesterday to become the first Spanish winner of the ‘Race of the Falling Leaves’. Rodriguez, who has won stages in all three Grand Tours, launched a solo attack on the final climb 9km from the finish and despite being chased down went on to finish the 251km classic in triumph.

Fellow Spaniard Samuel Sanchez claimed second place after getting the jump on Olympic silver medallist Rigoberto Uran of Colombia at the line as a number of pre-race favourite fell out of contention in the treacherous conditions. Although well-deserved, his win came in the absence of Belgium’s former two-time winner and new world champion Philippe Gilbert, who crashed out around 80 km from the finish. Another contender, Italian Vincenzo Nibali, came down on a descent shortly after and despite latching back on to the lead peloton the Liquigas leader was among those caught out when Rodriguez launched his decisive attack.—AFP

Yankees thrash Blue Jays

PHOENIX: Chicago Cubs’ Starlin Castro can’t throw out Arizona Diamondbacks’ Chad Eaton during the eighth inning.—AP

Reds see off Pirates PITTSBURGH: Homer Bailey of the Cincinnati Reds threw the season’s seventh no-hitter, beating the Pittsburgh Pirates 1-0 on Friday night. The seven nohitters matches the modern record for most in a season, tying 1990 and 1991. There were eight nohitters in 1884. The last no-hitter for the Reds was a perfect game by Tom Browning on Sept. 16, 1988.

This was the 15th no-hitter in Reds history. Bailey (13-10) walked one and struck out 10. He threw 115 pitches and retired the side in order in the ninth, striking out pinch-hitter Brock Holt then getting pinch-hitter Michael McKenry and Alex Presley to both pop out. When Presley’s popup was caught by second baseman Brandon Phillips, Bailey was mobbed near the mound by teammates who doused him with water. The 26-year-old Bailey improved to 5-0 in his six career starts with a 1.19 ERA at PNC Park. All four of his complete games and both his shutouts have come against Pittsburgh.

Mets 3, Braves 1 In Atlanta, Lucas Duda’s three-run homer in the seventh gave New York the lead, Jonathon Niese pitched seven strong innings for his third straight win and the Mets beat Tim Hudson and the Braves.

The Braves, who have wrapped up at least a wildcard berth, began the night four games behind the Nationals in the NL East. Atlanta has only five games remaining in the regular season. Chipper Jones, starting his final regular-season home series before retirement, was 0-for-4 with four groundouts. Jones was honored by the Braves in a pregame ceremony that included former Atlanta manager Bobby Cox and Hall of Famer Hank Aaron.

The tribute helped draw a sellout crowd of 51,910.

Niese (13-9) allowed one run on four hits in seven innings for his third straight win. Freddie Freeman gave Atlanta a 1-0 lead with his 23rd homer off Niese in the fourth. Bobby Parnell pitched a perfect ninth for his sixth save. Hudson (16-7) took the loss.

Marlins 2, Phillies 1 In Miami, Carlos Lee’s game-winning single in the bottom of the ninth inning lifted the Marlins to a win over Philadelphia and eliminated the Phillies from playoff contention. The Phillies overcame a horrible first half and came from way behind to get within three games of St. Louis for the second wild card spot. But they lost five of the next six to fall out of the chase. Bryan Petersen began the ninth with a double to right field off Josh Lindblom (3-4). Jose Reyes grounded out and Giancarlo Stanton was intentionally walked setting up the at-bat with Lee. Lee lined a single to left-center field scoring Petersen from second as Laynce Nix’s throw to home was off-line. Steve Cishek (5-2) pitched one inning in relief for the win.

Cardinals 12, Nationals 2 In St. Louis, Allen Craig matched his career best with four hits to go with two RBIs, Yadier Molina hit a two-run home run and the Cardinals punished Edwin Jackson and the Nationals early to win a matchup of teams on the cusp of clinchers. Roger Bernadina homered for Washington, which had its magic number for wrapping up the NL East reduced to two when Atlanta lost to the Mets. The Nationals, who secured the first postseason berth for Washington, D.C., since 1933 a week earlier, lead the Braves by four games with five to play and could wrap up the division title Saturday night.

Adam Wainwright (14-13) halted a string of four so-so starts with six solid innings for the Cardinals, whose magic number is three for securing the second NL wild card.

Astros 7, Brewers 6 In Milwaukee, Edgar Gonzalez allowed one hit before tiring in the sixth and Brett Wallace, Jason Castro and Jose Altuve all homered and the Astros beat Yovani Gallardo for the first time in three seasons, dousing the Brewers’ faint playoff hopes. The win helped Houston avoid matching their franchise-worst loss total set last season (56-106). It was their first victory since Bo Porter was named as the 17th manager in franchise history on Thursday. His role with Houston begins immediately following his service as the third base coach for the playoffbound Washington Nationals. The loss practically eliminated the Brewers from contention as Milwaukee fell five games behind St. Louis for the NL’s second wild card with five games left for both teams. The Cardinals beat the Nationals 12-2.

Dodgers 8, Rockies 0 In Los Angeles, Clayton Kershaw pitched eight strong innings, Shane Victorino hit a three-run homer and the Dodgers beat the Rockies to remain three games behind St. Louis for the second NL

wild card with five games to play.

The Dodgers’ third victory in a row clinched a winning season for the second straight year under manager Don Mattingly. Kershaw (13-9) allowed five hits, struck out 10 and walked two. He helped himself in the seventh, starting a double play when he turned around and fielded Andrew Brown’s comebacker between his legs with his back to the plate and fired to second for the first out. The Dodgers provided Kershaw with early run support, taking a 4-0 lead in the second off Jeff Francis (5-7).

Andre Ethier’s RBI double scored the first run and Victorino followed with his 11th homer.

D’backs 8, Cubs 3 In Phoenix, Justin Upton and Cody Ransom homered to power the Diamondbacks past the slumping Cubs. The Diamondbacks snapped a twogame losing streak but still were eliminated from the NL wild card midway through the game when St. Louis beat Washington.

Arizona starter Ian Kennedy (15-11) was uncharacteristically wild, walking six in 5 1-3 innings but held the Cubs to three runs and four hits. The righthander struck out five. Aaron Hill and AJ Pollock had RBI doubles and Adam Eaton added a runscoring single for Arizona. Dave Sappelt homered and Travis Wood (6-13) allowed five runs and five hits over five innings for the Cubs, who have lost six straight and 10 of 11. Wood struck out three and walked two in his second straight loss.

Giants 3, Padres 1 In San Diego, Ryan Vogelsong pitched six strong innings and Buster Posey increased his lead in the NL batting race, but not before giving the Giants a big scare in a win over the Padres. Posey took a wild pitch off his neck in the second inning with Everth Cabrera batting. Vogelsong’s pitch bounced in the dirt, ricocheted up and hit right underneath Posey’s hockey-style catcher’s mask.

The slugger was on his knees for a few minutes and was attended to by a trainer before staying in the game. Posey went 2 for 4 with a triple and a double to increase his average to .334, four points better than Andrew McCutchen of Pittsburgh. —AP

MLB results/standings Cincinnati 1, Pittsburgh 0; Baltimore 9, Boston 1; Cleveland 8, Kansas City 5; NY Yankees 11, Toronto 4; Miami 2, Philadelphia 1; NY Mets 3, Atlanta 1; LA Angels 7, Texas 4; Houston 7, Milwaukee 6; Chicago White Sox 3, Tampa Bay 1; Minnesota 4, Detroit 2; St. Louis 12, Washington 2; Arizona 8, Chicago Cubs 3; LA Dodgers 8, Colorado 0.

American League Eastern Division PCT W L NY Yankees 91 66 .580 90 67 .573 Baltimore Tampa Bay 86 71 .548 Boston 69 88 .439 Toronto 69 88 .439 Central Division Detroit 84 73 .535 Chicago White Sox 83 74 .529 Kansas City 70 87 .446 Cleveland 66 91 .420 Minnesota 66 91 .420 Western Division Texas 92 65 .586 89 68 .567 Oakland LA Angels 87 70 .554 Seattle 73 84 .465 National League Eastern Division Washington 95 62 .605 91 66 .580 Atlanta Philadelphia 78 79 .497 NY Mets 73 84 .465 Miami 67 90 .427 Central Division Cincinnati 95 62 .605 85 72 .541 St. Louis Milwaukee 80 77 .510 Pittsburgh 76 81 .484 Chicago Cubs 59 98 .376 Houston 52 105 .331 Western Division San Francisco 92 65 .586 82 75 .522 LA Dodgers Arizona 79 78 .503 San Diego 74 83 .471 Colorado 62 95 .395

GB 1 5 22 22 1 14 18 18 3 5 19 4 17 22 28 10 15 19 36 43 10 13 18 30

TORONTO: Russell Martin hit a three-run homer, Eric Chavez added a two-run shot and the New York Yankees maintained their one-game lead atop the AL East by beating the Toronto Blue Jays 11-4 on Friday night.

The victory let New York keep its slim lead over second-place Baltimore, which used six firstinning runs to beat Boston 9-1.

Nick Swisher had two hits and two RBIs for the Yankees, who have not lost consecutive games since a three-game skid from Sept. 2-4.

Hiroki Kuroda (15-11) won for the third time in five starts despite matching a season-high by allowing 10 hits in 5 1-3 innings. He gave up two runs, walked two and struck out four.

David Phelps worked 1 2-3 innings and David Robertson pitched the eighth. Cody Eppley got two outs in the ninth and Rafael Soriano finished for the Yankees.

Orioles 9, Red Sox 1 In Baltimore, Chris Tillman pitched eight innings of one-hit ball, Ryan Flaherty hit his first career grand slam and the Orioles beat the Red Sox to secure their grip on the top AL wild-card spot.

Chris Davis also homered for the Orioles, who remained one game behind the first-place Yankees in the AL East. Tillman (9-2) gave up a bunt single to leadoff hitter Scott Podsednik, then allowed only two walks the rest of the way in his longest outing since July 4. The right-hander retired the final 14 batters he faced, and the only run he allowed was unearned.

Troy Patton worked the ninth to complete the one-hitter. Boston has lost 14 of 20. Starter Aaron Cook (4-11) was knocked out in the second inning after allowing six runs, five hits and three walks.

Indians 8, Royals 5 In Cleveland, Sandy Alomar Jr. won his first game as Indians manager as Jason Kipnis drove in three runs and Cleveland beat Kansas City, handing the Royals their sixth straight loss.

Alomar, one of the most popular players in franchise history, went from bench coach to interim manager when Manny Acta was fired Thursday.

David Huff (3-0) gave up three runs over six innings as Cleveland got its first three-game winning streak since July 3-5. Chris Perez closed Cleveland’s fourth win in five games for his 39th save in 43 chances.

Cleveland had 16 hits, including a string of five straight with one out to score three runs off Will Smith (6-9) in the second inning.

Twins 4, Tigers 2 In Minneapolis, Ryan Doumit had four RBIs for Minnesota, including the go-ahead two-run double in the eighth inning to help the Twins beat Detroit and keep the Tigers from moving any closer to the AL Central title.

The Tigers’ lead dropped to one game over Chicago, which beat Tampa Bay 3-1. Rookie Drew Smyly struck out five over 5 1-3 scoreless innings, but Brayan Villarreal (3-5) walked three to load the bases in the eighth before Doumit’s one-out hit put the Twins in front.

Omar Infante’s two-run homer after an error spoiled Scott Diamond’s shutout in the eighth, tying the game at 2, and Glen Perkins picked up his 16th save with a perfect ninth inning.

White Sox 3, Rays 1 In Chicago, Alex Rios hit his career-high 25th homer and the White Sox gave their fading playoff hopes a boost, beating Tampa Bay to end the Rays’ eight-game winning streak.

The White Sox got a bit of a reprieve after dropping eight of nine and moved within a game of first-place Detroit in the AL Central. The Tigers lost to Minnesota 4-2.

The Rays began the night two games behind Oakland for the second AL wild-card spot. But they came up short in this one, ending a streak that launched them back into playoff contention.

Both teams have five games remaining, including two against each other.

Angels 7, Rangers 4 In Arlington , Jered Weaver became the American League’s first 20-game winner, Mike Trout hit a leadoff homer and the Angels beat Texas to prevent the Rangers from clinching a playoff berth.

Los Angeles trails Oakland by two games for the last wild-card spot. Texas’ magic number remains at three to clinch its third straight division crown. The Rangers need one more victory to lock up a postseason spot. Weaver (20-4) allowed five hits and two runs in seven innings to beat Texas for the fourth straight time this season.

Trout homered off Ryan Dempster (12-8), his fifth starting off a game since Aug. 18. The Angels rookie also set a club record by scoring his 125th run on that homer.

Athletics 8, Mariners 2 In Oakland, Stephen Drew hit a two-run homer, Coco Crisp added a solo shot and the Oakland Athletics gained ground on the firstplace Rangers in the AL West with a win against the Mariners.

TORONTO: New York Yankees’ Ichiro Suzuki advances to third as Toronto Blue Jays’ Brett Lawrie collects the ball during the eighth inning of a baseball game. — AP The A’s trail the two-time defending AL champions by three games with five to play. The Rangers lost 7-4 at home to the Los Angeles Angels. Texas finishes the season with three games in Oakland starting Monday. Josh Donaldson had a two-run single in

a four-run seventh and A.J. Griffin (7-1) received ample support as the A’s stayed two games ahead of the Angels in the race for the second wild card.

Tampa Bay fell three back after losing to the Chicago White Sox. — AP

NHL and players meet again NEW YORK: The NHL and the players association started meetings for the second consecutive day in an attempt to end the ongoing lockout. The sides were not expected to discuss the core economic issues on Saturday that are at the root of the dispute that threatens the start of the regular season.

Some progress was made on Friday on secondary issues related to player safety and drug testing, areas that weren’t expected to be contentious. On Friday, the league and union held two sessions that totaled about five hours and included a private meeting between Commissioner Gary Bettman and NHLPA Executive Director Donald Fehr.

“I wish we had spent today on what we consider to be the more meaningful issues, but it is what it is,” NHL Deputy Commissioner Bill Daly said on Friday.

“We really need to hear from the players’ association on those. We need some kind of sign that they are prepared to compromise their economic position because we haven’t had that since Aug. 14. “We’ll see if we get there.”

At least they got back to talking - which hadn’t happened since a few days before the NHL locked out its players on Sept. 16.

“It was a good day,” Daly said. “We went through a lot of the areas we’d covered over the summer. We started closing off some agreements in some areas, and some continued areas of disagreements in others. It’s part of the process.”

All of the issues, big and small, must be ironed out before hockey can get out of the board room and back on the ice. So while the divisive topics still need to be tackled, the smaller ones have to be worked on, too. That was the goal on Friday, and will continue to be this weekend when talks continued at the league’s New York office. “I don’t want to use the adjective optimistic, but it was a productive discussion,” NHL Players’ Association special counsel Steve Fehr said on Friday. “We had a good session, and hopefully it will continue and build momentum.” A handful of players also took part in Friday’s talks. When the sides talk this weekend, they still aren’t expected to dive into the splitting up of hockey-related revenue.

Players received 57 percent of the net hockeyrelated revenues in the previous collective bargaining agreement, and owners want to bring that number down under 50 percent.

The sides aren’t moving closer to a compromise while they talk about other issues. And that is where the frustration lies. The NHL is waiting for the players’ association to make a counterproposal to one the league made in the previous bargaining session more than two weeks ago. “We can’t make them

talk about what they don’t want to talk about,” Daly said. “In fairness, we do have to cover these issues if we’re going to reach an agreement. What we’re doing today is important, it’s just not the most important things we can be doing.

“We’ve made at least two consecutive moves in significant dollars in their direction, and they haven’t moved a single dollar in our direction since Aug. 4.” Former player Mathieu Schneider, now an NHLPA special assistant to the executive director, said Friday morning that there were agreements on more rigorous drug testing, expanding it to parts of the year during which testing is not currently done.

Neither side sees the use of performance-enhancing drugs as a problem in the NHL. “We’re in agreement that it’s not an issue in our sport,” Schneider said. “I think it’s in the players’ best interest as well as the sport to close off any possible time during the year where players could use.”

Monetary issues are not expected to come up for discussion in this round of talks. Neither side has indicated it is prepared to make a new offer now regarding how to split up the more than $3 billion annual pot of hockey-related revenue.

“In general, when you’re dealing with collective bargaining, when you start to have agreements on smaller issues, it can lead to bigger issues,” Schneider said, “but it’s still too early to say.” The lockout was put in place on Sept. 16 and Saturday’s talks come two days after the league canceled the remaining preseason games. The regular season is to start Oct. 11.

If a deal isn’t reached soon, regular-season games will be in danger of being lost. The NHL canceled the entire 2004-05 season because of a lockout that eventually led to the collective bargaining agreement that expired this month.

“The calendar continues to tick along,” Daly said.

“My guess is as time goes on, regular-season games are at risk. I don’t think it can be any more urgent than where we are now. We’ve had that level of urgency for a long time. In some respects you can meet all you want, but if there is no compromise or no movement or no new proposals I am not sure at the end of the day what you’re meeting over. “There is a very high degree of urgency certainly on our side. I can’t speak for their side, but I am sure they would tell you there is a degree of urgency there, too.” Steve Fehr contended that the players’ association is willing to discuss any issues at any time to try to make a deal soon. “We can discuss the core issues whenever they want to do it,” he said. “Bargaining is not ping pong. There are no rules on who has to serve.”— AP

NEW YORK: Matthew Schneider (left) special assistant to NHL Players Association executive director Donald Fehr, Winnipeg Jets’ Ron Hainsey (center) and Steve Fehr, players union special counsel, arrive at NHL headquarters. — AP

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

sp orts

NFL refs approve deal, scramble for return IRVING: NFL referees voted and approved a new eight-year deal with the league yesterday. Now they all can get back to the business of calling games. Referees approved the contract by a 112-5 vote, officially ending a lockout that led to a rising chorus of complaints from players, coaches, fans and politicians. The next stop for the refs who gathered in Irving, Texas, was the airport, where most were to hop on planes taking them straight to their Sunday game sites.

The deal came quickly after three weeks of escalating difficulties for league-hired replacement refs, culminating in a disputed touchdown call that decided Monday night’s PackersSeahawks game. With a tentative deal in place, league referees returned to cheers at Thursday night’s game between Cleveland and Baltimore.

The tentative contract called for refs’ salaries to increase from an average of $149,000 a year in 2011 to $173,000 in 2013, rising to $205,000 by 2019. The current defined benefit pension plan will remain in place for current officials through

the 2016 season or until the official earns 20 years’ service.

The defined benefit plan will then be frozen.

Retirement benefits will be provided for new hires, and for all officials beginning in 2017, through a defined contribution arrangement.

Beginning with the 2013 season, the NFL will have the option to hire a number of officials to work year-round. The NFL also will be able to retain additional officials for training and development and can assign those officials to work games. The number of additional officials will be determined by the league. Monday night’s game ended in chaos after replacement refs called a touchdown catch for the Seahawks instead of a Packers interception. Many fans and commentators - and players in the league - thought the call was botched. Criticism of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and the league kept escalating, and the labor dispute drew public comments from both President Barack Obama and his Republican challenger, Mitt Romney. By late

Wednesday, both sides had a deal.

“It’s all history now,” head linesman Tom Stabile said Friday. “For us, it was a benefit. It may have been the straw that broke the camel’s back.”

Line judge Jeff Bergman said he could see Monday night’s play coming as he watched at home. He noticed that players were starting to take advantage of replacement officials struggling to keep control of the game.

“The last play of the game was something that was going to happen sooner or later,” Bergman said. “It gave us and the league an opportunity to get together and hammer out a deal that was going to get hammered out anyway.”

Referee Ed Hochuli, who led weekly tests and conference calls for officials to stay sharp during the lockout, declined to say whether the replacements made the right call.

“You really don’t want to see that,” Hochuli said. “You don’t want to see the controversy. You don’t want to see teams lose games that they shouldn’t have lost, if indeed that’s what hap-

pened. We’re not making a judgment on that.”

Now, the refs have to get used to being fan favorites.

The officials that worked Thursday night’s Ravens-Browns game were cheered from the moment they walked onto the field. The difference between the regular crew and replacements was clear. The officials kept the game in control, curtailing the chippy play and choppy pace that had marred the first three weeks of the regular season. Officials on Friday said they were ready for applause - and ready for when it inevitably disappears.

“After the euphoria of the moment wears off, probably sometime early in the second quarter, it’ll be back to regular NFL football mode,” said referee Gene Steratore, who will head to Green Bay for Sunday’s game, one week after Packers players ripped the replacements over Monday’s disputed touchdown. “Players will be questioning our judgment, our ancestry. Coaches will be screaming at us. And it’ll be life as back to normal today.” —AP

USA charge ahead of Europe in Ryder Cup

Sheikh Salman opening the meeting.

Sheikh Salman opens AGC meet KUWAIT: President of Kuwait and Asian Shooting Federation Sheikh Salman Sabah AlSalem Al-Humoud Al-Sabah opened the meetings of the AGC technical and judges committee yesterday at Sheikh Sabah AlAhmad Olympic shooting complex.

Sheikh Salman welcomed members of the committee along with secretary general of the Arab and Kuwait Shooting Federation Obeid Munahi Al-Osaimi and ASC Director General Engr Mohammad Misfer Al-Ghurba.

In his opening speech Sheikh Salman stressed that the meetings are very important because the changes on the ISSF rules will have a significant impact on future competition, and all involved, whether they are administrators, coaches, judges and shooters all must understand them well.

Sheikh Salman thanked the Kuwait Shooting Club for hosting the meeting as well as the organizing committee and its efforts to prepare for the meeting and providing all means to ensure its success, with positive results to reflect on the Asian shooting sport.

Sheikh Salman thanked the Public Authority for Youth and Sports for its continued support to the sport of shooting. He wished all the guests a pleasant stay in Kuwait. Meanwhile shooting expert John Dayson said the meetings take place at a pivotal time, as Asia shooting is making big strides and has made significant achievements regionally and internationally. He said the sport is at an important phase in its history especially after the Asian achievements in Asia, and that of Kuwaiti Olympian Fuhaid AlDaihani winning the bronze medal at the London 2012, is something significant for an

Asian shooter.

The meetings of the technical committee which is headed by Kim Ill Hwan began with the participation of chairman of the shotgun committee Bhattakarka Bunnag, and members Ahmad Reza Haghighat and Sushi Chowdhary, Chariman of the Rifle Committee Chung Ming Ramsey Pul, and members Santi Athaphaisal and Isteaque Ahmed along with members of the pistol committee Razi Ahmed Khan and Lim Check Kwang Eddie.

The planning and development committee began its meeting with the participation of its chairman Vanchigdorj Otgondemberel and members Ghasan Sahban Anthony Charles Sunarjo and Zahid Noori Qaeta.

Member of Iraq’s executive council at Iraqi Olympic Committee Zahid Noori said contacts between Asian shooting federations are very important for the development of the sport at all levels.

He said planning and development committee gives special attention to countries with limited capabilities, so to support and help them develop the sport as some of them have skilled shooters but cannot support them and take them to new levels. He said that there should be training courses for coaches and judges to keep them updated with all what is new to serve noble sport.

Noori said that competition creates champions, so more competitions should be held, and special emphasis should be given to age groups, as it is easy to polish their skills and prepare them for major events. Zahid Noori thanked Kuwait Shooting Federation for hosting the meeting in Kuwait and appreciated the good hospitality.

Group photo of participants in the ASC Technical committee meeting

Mutai aims for world record Berlin Marathon BERLIN: Geoffrey Mutai returns to the flat course of the Berlin Marathon seeking to break the world record and prove Kenyan athletics officials were wrong in leaving him off the Olympic team for London.

The relatively unchallenging course in the German capital has produced seven world records in the past 15 years. The most recent was last year when Patrick Makau ran 2 hours, 3 minutes, 38 seconds in a race that effectively ended the great career of Haile Gebrselassie.

“I can’t promise a world record, but I’ll try my best,” Mutai said ahead of today’s race. Makau, who was also dropped from the Kenyan Olympic team, is skipping the Berlin race this year and will instead run the Frankfurt Marathon on Oct. 28.

“I know that they are capable of setting the fastest time over the flat Berlin course,” Makau said of Mutai and the other Kenyans in Berlin. “We have been training together in Eldoret and they are geared up for the event”. Mutai finished second in Berlin behind Makau two years ago, clocking 2:05.10 in a rain-soaked race.

The next year, he ran the fastest

marathon in history, winning in Boston in 2:03.02 and then also took New York in 2:05.06. Because of Boston’s up-and-down course, his time is not recognized as a world record. But this year has been anything but good for Mutai.

He struggled in hot conditions and had to abandon the Boston race, one of the factors that prompted Kenyan officials to drop him from the Olympic team. The London gold medal went to Stephen Kiprotich of Uganda.

“I was disappointed not to finish Boston, and the selection was Athletics Kenya’s decision,” Mutai said. “But it has given me motivation to run well here. ... Because of the hills in Boston you cannot go with the same speed. But the Berlin course is flat, so you can maintain the same speed.”

Mutai’s training partner and marathon rookie Dennis Kimetto could be another contender, along with another Kenyan, Jonathan Maiyo, who ran 2:04.56 in Dubai in January. In the women’s race, Aberu Kebede of Ethiopia is targeting a sub-2:20 time. She won in Berlin two years ago by running 2:23.58 in driving rain. —AP

CHICAGO: The United States clamped a stranglehold on the 39th Ryder Cup yesterday taking the second session of foursomes 3-1 for an overall lead of 8-4. It could have been even worse for the Europeans as at one stage they appeared to be heading for a humiliating clean sweep against them before Ian Poulter and Justin Rose hit back to grab a point. Davis Love’s men opened the second day’s play with a good lead of 5-3 after Friday’ two opening sessions and with Tiger Woods benched for the first time in his Ryder Cup career.

Once again it was the red-hot pairing of nine-cap veteran Phil Mickelson and pumpedup rookie Keegan Bradley who led the charge, lashing top European pair of Luke Donald and Lee Westwood by 7 and 6. That equalled the highest 18-hole winning margin in Ryder Cup history and was the first time that such a drubbing had been handed out since 1991. It was a huge blow to Europe captain Jose Maria Olazabal who had put the two English former world No.1s together in a bid to underpin a fight back.

“This is the most exhilarating experience of all my Ryder Cups,” said Mickelson, who won three straight team points for the first time in his Ryder Cup career.

“I’ve played now in a number of events and to see his (Bradley’s) youthful excitement gets me excited. He’s just got me fired up and it’s been really fun for both of us.”

There was some respite for Europe as Rose and Poulter held firm at the last to defeat Bubba Watson and Webb Simpson 1 up, with Simpson watching a 10-footer to win the hole and halve the contest slip narrowly past.

But the last two of the morning foursomes went the US way as their momentum gained

MEDINAH: USA’s Bubba Watson hits a shot on the 12th hole during a foursomes match at the Ryder Cup PGA golf tournament . — AP

strength. Jason Dufner and Zach Johnson made it 7-4 when Nicolas Colsaerts, playing with Sergio Garcia, hit his tee shot into the water at the spectacular par-three 17th. The Americans took the full point 2 and 1.

And then Jim Furyk and Brandt Snedeker turned the tables on Northern Irish duo Rory McIlroy and Graeme McDowell, who beat them in the lead match on Friday morning.

Leading from the first hole, the Americans

managed to keep their noses in front and they secured the win when McIlroy’s putt from the edge of the 18th green slipped an inch past.

Olazabal was left with the task of regrouping his players for the four afternoon fourballs, knowing that they would need to at least regain some ground to have any chance of retaining the cup in Sunday’s closing singles. —AFP

Lorenzo takes pole position ALCANIZ: Championship leader Jorge Lorenzo will star t from pole position in today ’s Aragon MotoGP after qualifying fastest yesterday.

The Spanish Yamaha rider, grabbing the 23rd pole of his career, edged out his compatriot, Honda rider Dani Pedrosa, by 88 thousandths of a second. Briton Cal Crutchlow came in third for Yamaha to complete the front row line-up.

Lorenzo waited until towards the end of the session to deprive Pedrosa, placed second in the riders’ standings, of pole. Pedrosa had to pick himself up after parting company with his bike earlier in the day. “The pole position is really important,” said Lorenzo, who leads Pedrosa by 38 points in the world title chase.

“It was difficult at the beginning and the track was very scary because it was very slippery and cold - there were so many crashes.

“At the beginning we were four or so seconds slower than in the test a few weeks ago but in the end, on the qualifying tyre, we were able to push 100 percent. So we’re happy but Sunday is another day.”

Pedrosa was one of a number of fallers in the session with Ducati riders Valentino Rossi and Nicky Hayden also came to grief. “It was hard in the beginning because I actually wanted to stay on the track for longer,” said Pedrosa, who is celebrating his 27th birthday.

“Somehow, I lost the front so I lost a lot of time and had to go back to the pits. When I took the second bike it was hard because I knew it was the only bike remaining for me, so I had to settle for a while just to make sure I would be at the front of the grid.

“In the end I was able to forget more about it and push hard. The front row is always good so I hope to push more in the race.”

Occupying the second row are American Ben Spies, who had topped the free practice times, Germany’s Stefan Bradl and Italian Andrea Dovizioso. —AFP

SPAIN: Spain’s Jorge Lorenzo does a wheelie after clocking the fastest time to claim pole position for today’s Aragon MotoGP Grand Prix. — AP

Lynx see off Storm MINNEAPOLIS: Minnesota Lynx beat the Seattle Storm and Atlanta Dream downed Indiana Fever on Friday to take 1-0 leads in their WNBA conference semifinal series.

Minnesota’s Lindsay Whalen scored 20 points and Seimone Augustus had 19 as the defending champion finally shook off a persistent Seattle 78-70. Seattle twice got within six points in the final 12 minutes, but Minnesota - 16-1 at home

in the regular season - pulled away again each time. Moore and Augustus made clutch shots in the final two minutes and the Lynx made 5 of 6 free throws in the last 32 seconds to seal the win.

Rookie reserve Shekinna Stricklen had 13 points to lead Seattle. In Indianapolis, Lindsey Harding scored 23 points to give Atlanta a key 75-66 road win over Indiana. WNBA scoring leader Angel McCoughtry added 16 points and nine rebounds

for Atlanta, which beat Indiana in three games in the East finals a year ago.

Katie Douglas scored 13 points for the Fever.

The Dream jumped out to a 25-15 lead in the first quarter and were up by nine at the break.

Atlanta scored 11 points off 11 Indiana turnovers in the first half. Indiana went on a 13-0 run late in the fourth quarter to close the gap, but it wasn’t enough. — AP

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

sp orts

Wright, Finn star in England Victory over New Zealand

His Highness the Crown Prince (center), Minister Althaina (far left), Shooter Al-Daihani, Sheikh Salman and Faisal Al-Jazaf.

Kuwait geared up for new shooting season

By Abdellatif Sharaa KUWAIT: The new season of Kuwait shooting Sport Club will start with a major championship on Thursday October 4, 2012.

The tournament of HH the Crown Prince Sheikh Nawaf Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah launches the season with competition in the Olympic disciplines of skeet, trap, double trap, 10m pistol and rifle, 50m rifle, men’s 50m free pistol and 25m women’s pistol, in addition to Olympic archery.

President of Kuwait and Asian Shooting Federations, Vice -president of the International Shooting Federation (ISSF) expressed his pleasure as the local season started with a distinguished championship which carries the name of HH the Crown Prince Sheikh Nawaf Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-

Sabah. Sheikh Salman said that HH the Crown Prince has major contributions to Kuwait’s shooting sport since its beginning as he gave it material and moral support, bearing in mind that it is the sport of our forefathers and it is part of the original Arab heritage. HH the Crown Prince support of shooting is one of the strong motives to keep it going, and an encouragement to shooters to keep winning at the Olympic, international regional and Arab levels.

Sheikh Salman thanked HH the Crown Prince for his care of the sport of shooting and lauded the efforts of the organizing committee to bring out this event the way it should be. Sheikh Salman invited the public to come to the club and follow the events, and wished all success.

PALLEKELE: Steven Finn took 3-16 and Luke Wright notched an aggressive 76 to help England beat New Zealand by six wickets in the Super Eights group one match in the World Twenty20 here yesterday.

Wright smashed five sixes and as many boundaries off 43 balls and added 89 for the third wicket with Eoin Morgan (30) as England comfortably chased down a modest target of 149 in 18.5 overs at Pallekele stadium.

Wright and Morgan, who hit a four and a six, made sure the defending champions cross the line after losing openers Craig Kieswetter (four) and Alex Hales (22) by the seventh over.

Wright hit two sixes off Tim Southee to reach his halfcentury off just 33 balls and then smashed two more off part-timer Rob Nicol to bring England within 23 runs of victory. Even after Morgan and Wright fell in quick succession, the target was never out of reach.

The victory gives England, who lost to the West Indies in their opening match by 15 runs, a chance to stay in the tournament. New Zealand, who lost to Sri Lanka will be out if West Indies beat the hosts later yesterday.

England captain Stuart Broad expressed delight at his team’s win. “It’s nice to bounce back. Finn set the tone with the new ball. The wicket was a lot drier and it did turn a bit. We now have a huge game tomorrow,” said Broad of the game against Sri Lanka which will decide their semi-final fate. Taylor felt the target was not enough.

“I thought it was a decent score but no enough at the end of the day. We had our moments but we couldn’t capitalise on them,” said Taylor.

Earlier, James Franklin scored 50 before he was run out in the final over to help New Zealand, who won the toss, to 148-6 in their 20 overs. Franklin hit four boundaries and two sixes off 33 deliveries.

New Zealand were in a spot of bother at 67-4 in the 12th over before skipper Ross Taylor (22)and Franklin lifted them with a 40-run stand.

Finn provided a double breakthrough, dismissing Martin Guptill (five) in the second over of the innings before having dangerman Brendon McCullum in his next, caught at third man off a miscued shot for ten. It became 43-3 when Nicol was caught at deep square leg, trying to lift off-spinner Graeme Swann who finished with 1-20 off his four overs.

Kane Williamson (17) added 25 with Taylor before he edged left-arm spinner Danny Briggs to wicket-keeper Kieswetter.

Finn returned for a second spell to dismissed Taylor, caught at deep mid-wicket. Finn’s previous best of 3-22 were against India in 2011.—AFP

SCOREBOARD Scoreboard from the World Twenty20 Super Eight match between England and New Zealand at Pallekele yesterday.

TOKYO: Nadia Petrova of Russia holds her winner’s plate during an award ceremony after beating Agnieszka Radwanska of Poland in their final match at the Japan Pan Pacific Open.—AP

Petrova wins Tokyo title TOKYO: Russia’s Nadia Petrova upset defending champion Agnieszk a Radwanska 6-0 1-6 6-3 in the Pan Pacific Open final yesterday to complete a sensational run through the Tokyo tournament.

It was the 30-year-old’s second title of the year and the 12th of her career. “It feels amazing,” Petrova told reporters after winning the WTA premier five event, which featured nine of the world’s top 10 women. “It’s the biggest tournament I’ve ever won. I never expected I would be in

this position.” Petrova inflicted the dreaded ‘bagel’ on third seed Radwanska in the first set, taking it with an ace down the middle to rub salt in the wounds.

Radwanska quickly turned the tables but Petrova produced some superb tennis in the decider, closing out proceedings with a drive volley before sinking to her knees in delight. Petrova, who beat top 10 players Sara Errani and Samantha Stosur on her way to the final, enjoyed her best season in 2006 when she won five tournaments.—Reuters

Kvitova marches in Beijing BEIJING: Fourth seed Petra Kvitova sent out a message of intent yesterday, convincingly defeating Slovakia’s Daniela Hantuchova in straight sets to progress to the second round of the China Open in Beijing. The world number five from the Czech Republic was in full control throughout almost all of her first round match at the capital’s National Tennis Stadium, powerfully overcoming her opponent, ranked 33 in the WTA standings, 6-2, 6-3.

Kvitova, last year’s Wimbledon champion, broke Hantuchova’s serve in the fifth game of the first set to take a 3-2 lead and never looked back, winning the set without further reply before quickly racing ahead 30 in the second.

A couple of dropped games in quick succession momentarily stemmed Kvitova’s momentum but her big-hitting ultimately proved too much for Hantuchova who appeared tired and started to make unforced errors with increasing regularity.

Kvitova credited her win to “some good returns” and an improvement in her service game, something that has disappointed her of late, adding that she was happy to have won in straight sets.

“It’s good I didn’t spend plenty of time on the court in the night and in the cold.

It’s better to play only two sets and win,” she said after the convincing victory that will have been noticed by the event’s other top seeds.

Earlier, former world number one Ana Ivanovic eased into the second round, defeating American Christina McHale in straight sets 6-3, 6-2.

The 24-year-old Serbian played aggressively from the start, hitting big first serves and power ful forehand drives which McHale, ranked 28 in the world, was unable to match. Ivanovic’s returns from McHale’s service game were also too good for the

20-year-old, with the French Open champion of four years ago breaking the American in the eighth game of the first set and twice in the second.

“I think that was the best service game I have ever had,” said the eleventh seed, who wrapped up victory within an hour, agreeing that it had been a “perfect” start to the tournament.

“The last match I played, in Tokyo, I served terribly. It was probably the worst I served in a very long time, so I was really determined to do better today,” she said.

“I really took more time and focused on that because I knew I could serve well and I did it in practice. So I had attention to serve well today, and it worked well and I’m very pleased.” The world number 12 will play American Varvara Lepchenko, who defeated Tsvetana Pironkova of Bulgaria, in the second round. Ivanovic admitted she didn’t know much about her next opponent but was aware that “she serves big” and has “a powerful game”.

“She’s been playing much better lately, and she had some really good results,” Ivanovic said of Lepchenko. “It’s going to be a tough match.” Also in the first round yesterday Taiwan’s Hsieh Su-Wei, winner of the Guangzhou Open this month, defeated Zheng Saisai of China 6-2, 6-3 while in an all-Chinese clash Zhang Shuai beat Wang Qiang 6-3, 6-2.

Romina Oprandi of Switzerland and Spain’s Carla Suarez Navarro also progressed to the second round, as did Yaroslava Shvedova from Kazakhstan who was 6-4, 4-1 up when her opponent and 12th seed Dominika Cibulkova retired due to an injury. In the final match of the day Tamira Paszek of Austria and Olga Govortsova of Belarus played out a threeset thriller with the former finally triumphing 7-5, 0-6, 7-6 (8/6).—AFP

New Zealand won the toss and opted to bat.

New Zealand innings M. Guptill lbw b Finn 5 R. Nicol c Bairstow b Swann 11 B. McCullum c Wright b Finn 10 K. Williamson c Kieswetter b Briggs 17 R. Taylor c Hales b Finn 22 J. Franklin run out 50 N. McCullum not out 16 D. Bracewell not out 2 Extras (b-3, lb-7, w-4, nb-1) 15 Total (six wickets; 20 overs) 148 Did not bat: D. Vettori, T. Southee, K. Mills Fall of wickets: 1-7 2-20 3-42 4-67 5-107 6-146 Bowling: Briggs 4-0-36-1, Finn 4-0-16-3 (1w), Bresnan 40-29-0 (1w), Swann 4-0-20-1, Broad 4-0-37-0 (1nb, 2w) England innings C. Kieswetter b Vettori 4 A. Hales b N. McCullum 22 L. Wright c Taylor b Bracewell 76 E. Morgan c Bracewell b Mills 30 J. Buttler not out 5 J. Bairstow not out 5 Extras (lb-3, w-4) 7 Total (four wickets; 18.5 overs) 149 Did not bat: T. Bresnan, S. Broad, G. Swann, D. Briggs, S. Finn Fall of wickets: 1-21 2-38 3-127 4-142 Bowling: Mills 4-0-23-1 (1w), Southee 2-0-32-0, Vettori 4-0-20-1, N. McCullum 4-0-22-1 (1w), Nicol 3-0-29-0 (1w), Franklin 1-0-12-0, Bracewell 0.5-0-8-1 (1w) England won by six wickets.

PALLEKELE: England’s batsman Luke Wright (top in blue) plays a shot during the ICC Twenty20 Cricket World Cup Super Eight match against New Zealand. —AP

Sri Lanka thump West Indies PALLEKELE: Hosts Sri Lanka outsmarted the West Indies by nine wickets to move one step closer to a semi-final berth after winning their Super Eights group one match at Pallekele stadium yesterday.

Sri Lankan spinners kept the West Indian big hitters to 129-5 in 20 overs before chasing the modest target in the 16th over for the loss of only one wicket to record their second win in the round of eight teams.

Mahela Jayawardene led the Sri Lankan reply with an unbeaten 65, sharing an unbroken 108-run stand for the second wicket with Kumar Sangakkara (39 not out) after Tillakaratne Dilshan fell for 13. Sri Lanka must avoid defeat in their last match against England while the West Indies need to beat the Black Caps with a superior net run-rate-both games here on Monday-to reach the last four.

In case Sri Lanka lose to England and West Indies beat New Zealand-it will come down to net run-rate to decide the semifinalists, with three teams on four points.

New Zealand’s slim chance of reaching the semi-finals hinges on Sri Lanka winning their last match and they convincingly beat the West Indies.

The West Indian bowlers failed to worry any of the two great Sri Lankan batsmen, with Jayawardene hitting 10 boundaries and a six off 49 deliveries while Sangakkara hit five boundaries during his 34-ball knock. “Overall it was a very good team

effort,” said Jayawardene. “When they were going after our bowlers I just kept changing the bowlers and it worked well to keep them down.” Jayawardene’s counterpart Darren Sammy praised the Sri Lankan bowling, saying: “They bowled really well to us. We are always a boundary-hitting team but the Sri Lankan bowlers bowled fuller and we didn’t do that enough. “Now the New Zealand game is a must-win for us.”

Earlier, Ajantha Mendis took 2-12 in his four overs while Jeeven Mendis claimed 112 as the West Indies, who won the toss and opted to bat, found it hard to score freely in their 20 overs after batting first.

Marlon Samuels (50) and Dwayne Bravo (40) were the main run-getters, lifting their team through a 65-run third wicket partnership after West Indies lost Chris Gayle (two) and Johnson Charles (12) at the same score of 16.

Samuels hit two sixes and four boundaries during his 35-ball knock before he holed out in the last over. Mendis, who came on to bowl the fifth over of the innings, had Charles stumped off the fifth ball of the over which was a maiden. Bravo hit four boundaries and two sixes during his 34-ball knock before he holed out to Jeevan Mendis.

Earlier, defending champions England beat New Zealand by six wickets in another group one match, to remain in contention for a semi-final place.—AFP

England, SL fined for slow over rate in World T-20 PALLEKELE: England and Sri Lanka were fined for slow over rates during their Super Eights group one matches in the World Twenty20 here yesterday.

The International Cricket Council (ICC) said in a press release that England were found one over short during their six-wicket win over New Zealand, while Sri Lanka also fell short by the same margin in their nine-wicket win against the West Indies.

“Match referee Javagal Srinath imposed the fines after both England and Sri Lanka were ruled to be one over short of their targets at the end of the matches when time allowances were taken into consideration,” said the ICC. In accordance with ICC regulations governing minor over-rate offences, players are fined 10 percent of their match fees for every over their side fails to bowl in the allotted time, with the captains fined double that amount. As such, England’s Stuart Broad and Mahela Jayawardene of Sri Lanka were fined 20 percent of their match fees, while their players received 10 percent fines.

The offence is contrary to Article 2.5.1 of the ICC’s code of conduct, which relates to minor over-rate offences. The penalty was accepted by England and Sri Lanka without contest so there was no need for a hearing. They are the first slow over rate offences at the World Twenty20. Australia play South Africa and Pakistan meet arch rivals India to spark up group two in Colombo today.

The top two teams from each group will qualify for the semi-finals. The final is scheduled to take place in Colombo on October 7.—AFP

PALLEKELE: Sri Lanka’s captain Mahela Jayawardene (right) plays a shot during the ICC Twenty20 Cricket World Cup Super Eight match against West Indies. —AP

SCOREBOARD PALLEKELE, Sri Lanka: Scoreboard of the World Twenty20 Super Eights group one match between Sri Lanka and the West Indies at Pallekele stadium yesterday.

West Indies J. Charles st Sangakkara b Mendis 12 C. Gayle c Sangakkara b Kulasekara 2 M. Samuels c Dilshan b Mathews 50 D. Bravo c Dilshan b J. Mendis 40 K. Pollard b Mendis 1 A. Russell not out 19 D. Sammy not out 1 Extras: (b1, lb3) 4 Total: (for five wickets, 20 overs) 129 Fall of wickets: 1-16 (Charles), 2-16 (Gayle), 3-81 (Bravo), 4-90 (Pollard), 5-123 (Samuels) Bowling: Mathews 4-0-31-1, Kulasekara 40-28-1, Malinga 4-0-26-0, Mendis 4-1-12-2,

Herath 2-0-16-0, J. Mendis 2-0-12-1 Sri Lanka M. Jayawardene not out 65 T. Dilshan c Ramdin b Rampaul 13 K. Sangakkara not out 39 Extras: (b2, lb1, w10) 13 Total: (for one wicket, 15.2 overs) 130 Fall of wickets: 1-22 (Dilshan).

Bowling: Rampaul 4-0-39-1 (w4), Edwards 2-0-24-0 (w5), Narine 4-0-23-0, Sammy 4-0-28-0 (w1), Russell 1-0-11-0, Gayle 0.2-0-2-0 Result: Sri Lanka won by nine wickets

18

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

S P ORT S Soccer results/standings English Premier League Arsenal 1 (Gervinho 42) Chelsea 2 (Torres 20, Mata 53); Everton 3 (Osman 25, Jelavic 32, 38) Southampton 1 (Ramirez 6); Fulham 1 (Petric 10-pen) Manchester City 2 (Aguero 43, Dzeko 87); Manchester United 2 (Nani 51, Kagawa 53) Tottenham 3 (Vertonghen 2, Bale 32, Dempsey 52); Norwich 2 (Morison 61, Holt 87) Liverpool 5 (Suarez 2, 38, 57, Sahin 47, Gerrard 68); Reading 2 (Kebe 58, Hunt 62) Newcastle 2 (Ba 59, 83); Stoke 2 (Crouch 12, 36) Swansea 0; Sunderland 1 (Fletcher 51) Wigan 0.

Playing today: Aston Villa v West Brom Playing tomorrow: QPR v West Ham. English Football League results Championship Barnsley 1 Ipswich 1; Bolton 0 Crystal Palace 1; Bristol City 2 Leeds 3; Burnley 2 Millwall 2; Cardiff 3 Blackpool 0; Charlton 1 Blackburn 1; Huddersfield 2 Watford 3; Hull 1 Peterborough 3; Middlesbrough 1 Leicester 2; Wolves 1 Sheffield Wednesday 0.

Playing later: Brighton v Birmingham Playing today: Nottingham Forest v Derby Division One Bournemouth 1 Walsall 2; Carlisle 0 Crawley 2; Colchester 3 Hartlepool 1; Leyton Orient 0 Doncaster 2; Milton Keynes Dons 1 Crewe 0; Oldham 0 Coventry 1; Portsmouth 2 Scunthorpe 1; Preston 3 Yeovil 2; Sheffield Utd 1 Notts County 1; Shrewsbury 0 Swindon 1; Stevenage 2 Bury 2; Tranmere 1 Brentford 1.

English Premier League table English Premier League table after yesterday’s matches (played, won, drawn, lost, goals for, goals against, points): Chelsea 6 5 1 0 11 3 16 Everton 6 4 1 1 12 6 13 Man Utd 6 4 0 2 14 9 12 Man City 6 3 3 0 12 8 12 Tottenham 6 3 2 1 11 8 11 West Brom 5 3 1 1 7 4 10 Arsenal 6 2 3 1 10 4 9 Fulham 6 3 0 3 13 9 9 Newcastle 6 2 3 1 8 8 9 West Ham 5 2 2 1 5 4 8 Swansea 6 2 1 3 10 9 7 Stoke 6 1 4 1 6 5 7 Sunderland 5 1 4 0 5 4 7 Liverpool 6 1 2 3 9 12 5 Aston Villa 5 1 1 3 5 9 4 Wigan 6 1 1 4 5 11 4 Southampton 6 1 0 5 10 18 3 Norwich 6 0 3 3 4 13 3 Reading 5 0 2 3 6 11 2 QPR 5 0 2 3 3 11 2 English Football League tables Championship Brighton 7 5 1 Cardiff 8 5 1 Wolves 8 5 1 Blackburn 8 4 3 Leicester 8 5 0 Huddersfield 8 4 2 Blackpool 8 4 1 Hull 8 4 1 Leeds 8 4 1 Crystal 8 4 1 M’brough 8 4 0 Barnsley 8 3 2 Bristol City 8 3 1 Nottingham 7 2 4 Burnley 8 3 1 Bolton 8 3 1 Watford 8 3 1 Charlton 8 2 3 Derby 7 2 2 Birmingham 7 2 2 Sheffield 8 2 1 Millwall 8 2 1 Ipswich 8 1 3 P’borough 8 1 0

1 2 2 1 3 2 3 3 3 3 4 3 4 1 4 4 4 3 3 3 5 5 4 7

14 15 12 16 13 14 16 13 15 12 12 12 17 10 15 10 12 9 12 8 11 11 6 8

4 9 7 12 9 9 10 11 14 13 14 12 16 9 15 12 15 10 11 14 17 17 16 17

16 16 16 15 15 14 13 13 13 13 12 11 10 10 10 10 10 9 8 8 7 7 6 3

Division One Tranmere Notts County Keynes Dons Swindon Stevenage Walsall Crawley Town Sheffield Utd Preston Doncaster Brentford Carlisle Yeovil Leyton Orient Crewe Shrewsbury Portsmouth Bournemouth Scunthorpe Colchester Oldham Coventry Hartlepool Bury

9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 8 9 9 9 8 9 9 9 9 9 9 8 9 8 9

6 5 5 5 4 5 5 3 4 4 3 3 3 3 2 2 2 1 2 1 1 1 1 0

3 3 2 2 5 2 1 6 2 2 4 3 1 1 4 3 2 5 2 4 3 3 3 4

0 1 2 2 0 2 3 0 3 2 2 3 5 4 3 4 5 3 5 4 4 5 4 5

22 16 12 14 14 13 12 12 17 11 13 11 13 8 8 11 12 11 6 8 5 8 7 8

5 8 5 8 9 12 13 8 11 6 10 14 13 9 12 11 16 17 15 13 9 15 15 18

21 18 17 17 17 17 16 15 14 14 13 12 10 10 10 9 8 8 8 7 6 6 6 4

Division Two Gillingham Port Vale Fleetwood Accrington Exeter Bradford Rochdale Cheltenham Burton Albion Rotherham Southend York Northampton Chesterfield Torquay Plymouth Oxford Utd Morecambe Aldershot Redbridge Bristol Rovers AFC Wimbledon Wycombe Barnet

9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 9 8 9 8 9

7 6 5 5 5 5 4 4 4 4 4 3 3 2 2 2 3 2 2 1 1 2 1 0

1 1 2 2 1 1 3 3 2 2 2 4 4 6 6 4 0 2 2 4 4 1 1 2

1 2 2 2 3 3 2 2 3 3 3 2 2 1 1 3 6 5 5 4 3 6 6 7

18 22 14 14 18 16 14 11 18 17 13 15 13 13 10 10 11 12 7 10 6 9 7 4

6 11 8 10 13 11 12 10 14 13 11 13 11 11 8 13 19 17 12 13 14 20 14 18

22 19 17 17 16 16 15 15 14 14 14 13 13 12 12 10 9 8 8 7 7 7 4 2

Scottish Premier League table Celtic 7 4 2 Motherwell 8 3 4

1 1

13 13

7 14 10 13

Division Two AFC Wimbledon 2 Accrington 1; Aldershot 0 York 1; Bradford 0 Port Vale 1; Burton 3 Northampton 3; Chesterfield 1 Torquay 1; Dagenham and Redbridge 3 Wycombe 0; Exeter 1 Bristol Rovers 2; Fleetwood 2 Barnet 1; Gillingham 1 Rochdale 2; Plymouth 1 Southend 1; Rotherham 3 Oxford 1.

Scottish Premier League Aberdeen 2 (McGinn 4, Rae 71) Hibernian 1 (Doyle 33); Dundee 1 (Conroy 22-pen) St Johnstone 3 (Tade 16, Craig 27, MacLean 52); Hearts 1 (Zaliukas 88) Kilmarnock 3 (Sheridan 32, 51, 62); Inverness CT 4 (Foran 31, 35, Shinnie 70, Roberts 73) Dundee Utd 0; Motherwell 0 Celtic 2 (Hooper 32, Cummins 35-og); St Mirren 5 (Thompson 39, 89, Guy 54-pen, Parkin 59, McLean 64) Ross County 4 (Vigurs 11, Munro 45, Quinn 79, 80).

Scottish Football League results First Division Airdrie 2 Morton 3; Cowdenbeath 1 Falkirk 1; Hamilton 0 Dunfermline 3; Livingston 5 Dumbarton 0; Raith 1 Partick 1.

Second Division Ayr 3 Brechin 0; Forfar 4 Albion 2; Queen of the South 1 Alloa 0; Stenhousemuir 2 Arbroath 2; Stranraer 2 East Fife 6.

German League results Bayer Leverkusen 2 (Sam 50, 62) Furth 0; Werder Bremen 0 Bayern Munich 2 (Luis Gustavo 81, Mandzukic 83); Nuremberg 0 VfB Stuttgart 2 (Ibisevic 1, Harnik 75); Hoffenheim 0 FC Augsburg 0; Hamburg 1 (Rudnevs 20) Hanover 0; Dortmund v M’gladbach.

Spanish La Liga results Valencia 2 (Feghouli 12, Viera 59) Real Zaragoza 0; Malaga 4 (Joaquin 13-pen, Saviola 28, Amaya 73-og, Isco 74) Real Betis 0.

Kilmarnock St Mirren Hibernian Aberdeen St Johnstone Hearts Inverness CT Ross County Dundee Utd Dundee

8 8 8 8 8 8 8 8 7 8

3 3 3 2 3 2 1 1 2 1

3 3 3 5 2 3 5 5 2 1

2 2 2 1 3 3 2 2 3 6

12 14 12 8 9 9 15 7 7 3

8 13 12 7 10 9 16 8 10 13

12 12 12 11 11 9 8 8 8 4

Scottish Football League tables First Division Partick 7 6 1 Dunfermline 7 6 0 Morton 7 4 2 Raith 7 3 2 Cowdenbeath 7 3 1 Livingston 7 2 2 Airdrie Utd 7 2 1 Falkirk 7 1 3 Hamilton 7 0 3 Dumbarton 7 0 1

0 1 1 2 3 3 4 3 4 6

16 18 15 8 12 10 10 7 5 4

4 3 10 5 11 11 12 11 15 23

19 18 14 11 10 8 7 6 3 1

Second Division Queen of the South Forfar Arbroath Alloa Stenhousemuir Ayr Albion Brechin East Fife Stranraer

7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7 7

6 5 3 3 2 2 2 2 1 1

1 1 3 1 4 1 1 0 2 2

0 1 1 3 1 4 4 5 4 4

17 17 13 12 13 13 10 5 11 7

2 7 14 8 13 16 15 14 12 17

19 16 12 10 10 7 7 6 5 5

Spanish La Liga table Barcelona 5 Malaga 6 Atletico 5 Real Mallorca 5 Sevilla 5 Real Betis 6 Valencia 6 Real Madrid 5 Rayo Vallecano 5 Levante 5 Deportivo 5 Celta Vigo 5 Valladolid 5 Real Sociedad 5 Real Zaragoza 6 Athletic Bilbao 5 Getafe 5 Granada 5 Espanyol 5 Osasuna 5

5 4 4 3 3 3 2 2 2 2 1 2 2 2 2 1 1 0 0 0

0 2 1 2 2 0 2 1 1 1 3 0 0 0 0 2 1 2 1 1

0 0 0 0 0 3 2 2 2 2 1 3 3 3 4 2 3 3 4 4

14 10 15 7 6 10 8 7 6 7 7 6 4 6 5 8 6 2 7 3

3 2 7 3 2 13 8 4 7 9 7 6 5 9 8 12 10 8 11 10

15 14 13 11 11 9 8 7 7 7 6 6 6 6 6 5 4 2 1 1

German League table Bayern Munich 6 Eintracht 5 Schalke 6 Hanover 6 Dusseldorf 6 Leverkusen 6 Dortmund 5 Werder Bremen 6 Hoffenheim 6 Hamburg 6 Nuremberg 6 M’gladbach 5 SC Freiburg 5 Wolfsburg 5 Stuttgart 6 Mainz 5 Furth 6 FC Augsburg 6

6 4 3 3 2 3 2 2 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 0

0 1 2 1 4 1 2 1 1 1 1 3 2 2 2 1 1 2

0 0 1 2 0 2 1 3 3 3 3 1 2 2 3 3 4 4

19 14 12 14 6 9 11 9 10 8 7 7 7 2 5 4 2 2

2 7 7 9 2 7 8 10 12 10 11 7 8 8 12 8 10 10

18 13 11 10 10 10 8 7 7 7 7 6 5 5 5 4 4 2

Matches on TV (Local Timings) English Premier League Aston Villa v West Bromwich Abu Dhabi Sports HD 3 Abu Dhabi Sports HD 5

18:00

Spanish League Granada v Celta Aljazeeras Sport +2 Aljazeeras Sport 2 HD

13:00

Valladolid v Rayo Aljazeeras Sport +2 Aljazeeras Sport 2 HD

17:00

Osasuna v Levante Aljazeeras Sport 9

19:00

Real Madrid v Deportivo Aljazeeras Sport +2 Aljazeeras Sport 2 HD

20:50

Espanyol v Atletico Aljazeeras Sport +8

22:30

El Shaarawy shines as Parma hold Milan MILAN: Italy under-21 striker Stephan El Shaarawy scored his fourth goal in six Serie A games as a dominant AC Milan were held 1-1 away to Parma yesterday.

El Shaarawy, who is part Egyptian, gave Massimiliano Allegri’s embattled side a huge boost with two goals in mid-week as the Rossoneri beat Cagliari 2-0 to register their first win of the season at the San Siro. And the 19-year-old forward boosted his growing reputation by opening the scoring against Parma with a fine individual goal in the 50th minute.

It was end-to-end stuff at the Ennio Tardini stadium and Parma, with only one win so far this season, claimed an equaliser when midfielder Daniele Galloppa’s freekick from 20 yards beat Christian Abbiati at his near post.

The result allowed Allegri’s side to move up to ninth ahead of the rest of the weekend’s fixtures. After weeks of waiting, Bojan Krkic was finally handed his Milan debut in the centre of a three-man attack with El Shaarawy and Kevin-Prince Boateng.

Boateng was the first to test Antonio Mirante, although his 20yard shot on the quarter-hour was scooped up by the goalkeeper, who then got down low to save the Ghanaian’s header from Antonio Nocerino’s superb cross.

Parma’s chances until then had been rare and defender Aleandro Rosi was left frustrated when his ambitious volley on the edge of the area swerved wide of Christian Abbiati’s goal.

El Shaarawy then launched a counter-attack and impressed as he muscled his way past three Parma players on the left only for his lay-off to Bojan to go begging.

Moments later his pass to Bojan on the edge of the area allowed the Spaniard a touch before he unleashed a superb right-foot shot that dipped over Mirante’s crossbar.

Five minutes after the restart the pair combined again and this time

Boateng seeing his close-range header go wide of the post.

Parma gave Milan a scare when Greek midfielder Sotiris Ninis’s cross caused panic in the area. It took a deflection and left Abbiati all at sea, only for Massimo Gobbi to

area after being tackled by Riccardo Montolivo. Galloppa’s free-kick from 20 yards out appeared to take a slight deflection in the defensive wall before beating Abbiati at his near post.

Allegri replaced Boateng with

ITALY: Parma’s Massimo Gobbi (right) vies for the ball with AC Milan’s Bojan Krkic Perez of Spain, during their Serie A soccer match.—AP Milan got the goal they deserved; Bojan’s pass to El Shaarawy allowing the ‘Little Pharaoh’ to stride past Cristian Zaccardo and beat Mirante at his near post.

Milan were dominating, with Bojan spurning a chance for a firsttime shot on 51 minutes and then

send his effort wide.

At the other end, Boateng latched on to a poor Parma clearance on the hour mark but his powerful drive was parried by Mirante.

Despite Milan’s protests, Ninis won a free-kick on the edge of the

Brazilian Robinho in the 70th minute, while Bojan made way for Giampaolo Pazzini with nine minutes remaining.

Milan’s last real chance for a winner was a 25-yard free-kick from Montolivo, which forced Mirante into a dramatic diving save. —AFP

Celtic down Motherwell

GERMANY: Bayern’s Xherdan Shaqiri of Switzerland (right) and Bremen’s Theodor Gebre Selassie of Czech Republic challenge for the ball during the German first division Bundesliga soccer match. —AP

Bayern blank Bremen BERLIN: Goals in the final nine minutes from Luis Gustavo and Mario Mandzukic gave Bayern Munich a sixth league win out of six for the new season as the Bavarians cantered to a 2-0 win at Werder Bremen yesterday.

The win took Bayern, seeking to end two years of Borussia Dortmund dominance in the league, five points clear of second-placed Eintracht Frankfurt, who host Freiburg on Sunday. Bayern’s mean machine once again kept a clean sheet — they have conceded just two goals to date — and Gustavo’s 20-metre drive into the top left-hand corner finally broke the deadlock when it looked as if Werder might pinch a point.

Gustavo had come on for Peruvian veteran Claudio Pizarro on the hour and coach Jupp Heynckes pulled off another tactical coup in sending on Swiss Xherdan Shaquiri, who combined with Franck Ribery in orchestrating a move which saw Mandzukic finish from close range for his third goal in two games. Bayern, who Tuesday face BATE Borisov in the Champions League, will expect to keep their run of form going next weekend when they take on midtable Hoffenheim. In third placeseven points off the pace-are Schalke, following a 2-2 draw on Friday at Fortuna Dusseldorf.

Elsewhere yesterday, Hanover lost the chance to go joint second after a 1-0 loss in Hamburg, now moving up the table after a poor start.

Latvian striker Artjoms Rudnevs scored the only goal for the northerners in the 20th minute as the 1983 European champions exited the

drop zone. Bayer Leverkusen thanked two quickfire second-half goals from Sidney Sam, their German-born Nigerian, to see off promoted Furth 2-0.

The win took Leverkusen joint fourth in the table. Bosnian striker Vedad Ibisevic, meanwhile, scored the fastest goal of the Bundesliga season to date as he netted after just 24 seconds for Stuttgart at Nuremberg, nipping onto an underhit backpass from Brazilian defender Marcos Antonio to fire past keeper Raphael Schaefer.

A 75th-minute goal from Martin Harnik clinched the points as Stuttgart won their first match of the campaign. Hoffenheim and Augsburg parted scoreless to leave the latter rooted to the foot of the table with just two points while Dortmund were later hosting Borussia Moenchengladbach.

The match at Hoffenheim went ahead against a difficult backdrop for the home side with their 22-year-old teammate Boris Vukcevic still in a coma and in critical condition following a car crash on Friday afternoon. Hoffenheim said in an earlier statement his situation had not changed sufficiently to give a prognosis on his chances of pulling through and manager Andreas Mueller said “the team were shocked” by the news of his accident.

Mueller revealed the team had at first thought of asking for the match to be called off but decided they should go ahead.

“Boris is a fighter - and we will fight for him,” he said ahead of the encounter. Bild daily quoted Vukcevic’s parents as urging the team to “play for our Boris.” —AFP

GLASGOW: Two goals in three first-half minutes gave Celtic a 2-0 win at Motherwell yesterday that sent the Hoops above their opponents and to the top of the Scottish Premier League for the first time this season. Darren Randolph had already twice denied Gary Hooper, who scored all four goals in Celtic’s win over Raith Rovers in midweek, before the striker latched on to a floated pass from Kris Commons to finish low past the goalkeeper in the 32nd minute. The unfortunate Adam Cummins then fired past his own keeper in the 35th minute as he attempted to clear Scott Brown’s fiercely driven cross from the left.

Cummins’ day got worse in the 55th minute when he was shown a straight red card for hauling down Commons in the box, but Randolph saved Brown’s weak spot-kick.

The win moves Celtic one point above Motherwell and gives them a confidence boost before their Champions League away match against Spartak Moscow on Tuesday. “I thought we were brilliant today from start to finish. That’s the best we have played at Fir Park certainly in my time here as player, coach and manager,” said Celtic manager Neil Lennon. “Psychologically we have gone top of the league so it’s a good marker for us going into the game on Tuesday.” Motherwell manager Stuart McCall was relived to escape with only a 2-0 defeat. “Today you saw a rampant Celtic side. You only had to look at the subs bench - that’s the strongest they’ve been all season,” McCall said. “If Celtic are playing well — and they certainly played well today — then nobody in this league will live with them.”

Georgios Samaras and Joe Ledley took their places on the Celtic bench after returning from injury, while Motherwell made two changes to the side that were knocked out the League Cup by Rangers in mid-week. Celtic carved out the first chance in the 10th minute when James Forrest slipped in Hooper, but the striker’s shot was well blocked by Randolph. Zaine Francis-Angol made a mess of the clearance, allowing Hooper to then pick out Commons, but the Well defender recovered to put the Celtic player off his shot.

Charlie Mulgrew then cleverly teed Brown up from a short freekick at the edge of the box, but Randolph dived to his right to keep out his low drive. Celtic were growing in confidence and when Brown picked out Commons down the inside-left channel, the Scotland international came close to catching out Randolph with an audacious lob that landed on the roof of the net.

Hooper was thwarted by Randolph and then Francis-Angol before the English striker opened the scoring. Shaun Hutchinson completely missed a lofted pass from Commons, allowing Hooper to get in behind the defence and finish low past Randolph. Celtic only had to wait a little over two minutes to double their advantage when Cummins saw his attempted clearance from Brown’s driven ball into the box fly past his own keeper. Cummins was shown a straight red card 10 minutes into the second period when he hauled down Commons just inside the box after the forward had latched on to a through ball from Victor Wanyama. Brown took the resultant penalty but he sent his tame effort straight down the middle, allowing Randolph to stop with his feet. Brown had a chance to make amends 10 minutes later when he got on the end of Emilio Izaguirre’s cutback, but the midfielder’s volley was well saved by Randolph.

Izaguirre then picked out Wanyama with a cross from the left but the Kenyan headed over from six yards. Elsewhere, a late Steven Thompson goal sealed a remarkable 5-4 win for St Mirren over Ross County, Inverness Caledonian Thistle thrashed Dundee United 4-0 and Aberdeen defeated Hibernian 2-1. Cillian Sheridan scored a hattrick as St Johnstone won 3-1 at Tynecastle against Hearts, while St Johnstone defeated Dundee 3-1. —AFP

Malaga take apart Betis MADRID: Malaga maintained their unbeaten start to the season as they cruised to a 4-0 victory over Real Betis with the game turning on an early penalty and the sending off of goalkeeper Casto Espinosa.

Manuel Pellegrini’s side now sit in second place on 14 points, one point behind Barcelona, after another fine display of attacking football where they took full advantage of their man extra from the 10th minute.

Casto was red-carded for a foul on Eliseu Pereira and after Joaquin Sanchez converted the penalty, Malaga never looked back. They had a series of chances with Ignacio Camacho hitting the post with a header and then Javier Saviola slotted home the second after 28 minutes following an exchange with Francisco Portillo. Midway through the second half Antonio Amaya put the ball through his own net as he intercepted a Nacho Monreal cross and

then Isco Alarcon finished clinically to add to Betis’ misery.

Goals from Sofiane Feghouli and Jonathan Viera in either half gave Valencia a 2-0 victory over Zaragoza to ease the strain on under-fire coach Mauricio Pellegrino. Feghouli was dismissed with half an hour to go for his second yellow card. Later Barcelona take on Sevilla looking to extend their winning start to the campaign to six matches and to increase the pressure

on Real Madrid who face Deportivo La Coruna today.

With just a week to go before the top two in Spain go head-to-head in the first ‘El Clasico’ in the league, Barca have built up an eight-point lead over their Madrid rivals whose stuttering start has seen them win just twice.

Barca coach Tito Vilanova admits that it will be a tough test against the Andalusian side who have already beaten Madrid this season. —AFP

19

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

SPORTS

Liverpool roll over Norwich Norwich 2

Liverpool 5

LONDON: Everton’s Marouane Fellani (center) and Southampton’s Steven Davis battle for the ball during the English Premier League soccer match at Goodison Park. —AP

Jelavic brace sinks Saints Everton 3

Southampton 1

LIVERPOOL: Everton striker Nikica Jelavic scored twice to clinch a 3-1 win over Southampton yesterday and maintain his side’s impressive start to the season. David Moyes’ team have equalled their best opening to a Premier League season, when they took 13 from six matches in 2004-05, and the Toffees currently sit in second place in the table, just three points behind leaders Chelsea.

Jelavic was the hero as the Croatian striker scored twice to take his tally to 10 in his last 11 league matches after Leon Osman had cancelled out Gaston Ramirez’s early opener.

Everton have made notoriously slow starts to their seasons in the recent past but they have been quickly into their stride this time and the good run continued against the Saints, despite the shock of an early goal for the visitors.

From Adam Lallana’s corner, Uruguay forward Ramirez was given the freedom of the penalty area to head home in the sixth minute.

It was the Uruguay international’s first goal in English football following his club-record £12 million transfer from Bologna.

But Jay Rodriguez squandered a good chance to increase Southampton’s lead and Everton took full advantage with three goals in 13 minutes.

In the 25th minute Kevin Mirallas swung over a right-wing cross and Jelavic diverted it back to Osman, who smashed the loose ball into the roof of the net from close range.

Seven minutes later Osman’s throughball sent Jelavic clear and he smashed a powerful strike across Saints goalkeeper Paulo Gazzaniga and into the net.

Gazzaniga was powerless again when Everton made it three in the 38th minute. This time Seamus Coleman’s cross to the far post found Jelavic and the Croatian’s header raced in.

Marouane Fellaini hit the crossbar with a header before half-time, but Everton already had enough of a lead to hand Southampton their fifth defeat in six league matches.—AFP

LONDON: Stoke City’s Charlie Adam (left) challenges Swansea City’s Ki SungYung during the English Premier League soccer match.—AP

Crouch steers Stoke past goal-shy Swans Stoke 2

Swansea 0

STOKE: Peter Crouch struck a first-half brace to fire Stoke City to a 2-0 victory over goal-shy Swansea in a mid-table battle in the English Premier League yesterday.

The former England international striker, signed from Tottenham for a club record £10 million, opened the scoring with a close-range header in the 12th minute and doubled up 10 minutes before half-time, striking home from inside the area.

The result was the perfect riposte to Stoke’s 1-0 loss to leaders Chelsea last week and bucked a 11-match run without a victory, although they have only lost three times this season.

It also further cemented the Britannia Stadium as a hard place for visiting teams to win, the home side not having lost here since the first week of February.

Michael Laudrup’s Swans opened the season with 10 goals in their first three games, but have now failed to find the net in three matches while conceding seven.

And although they dominated possession against Stoke, they did not manage a single strike on target, a lack of attacking flair that will doubtless worry Laudrup, the former Denmark, Barcelona and Real Madrid midfielder.

It was 30 minutes before Swansea even threatened the Stoke defence, Spanish striker Miguel Michu going close with a first time shot from the edge of the box.

But for all their possession, the Welsh side invariably lacked a cutting edge, and it was Crouch who went closest at the end, the crossbar denying the giant a hat-trick 10 minutes from time.

Swansea and Stoke now sit in 11 and 12th spots in the 20-team Premier League, both on seven points.—AFP

NORWICH: Luis Suarez scored a hat-trick as Liverpool tasted victory in the Premier League for the first time under manager Brendan Rodgers with a 5-2 win at Norwich yesterday.

Nuri Sahin and Steven Gerrard were also on target at Carrow Road as Liverpool inflicted a second successive defeat upon Norwich, who saw Steve Morison and Grant Holt score their goals.

Victory lifted Liverpool out of the bottom three and left Norwich still searching for a first league win under their new manager, Chris Hughton.

Suarez was outstanding, just as he had been at Carrow Road last season when he scored all three goals in a 3-0 win. Rodgers chose a youthful starting line-up by handing first Premier League starts to 19-year-old Andre Wisdom and 18-year-old Jesus Joaquin Fernandez Saez de la Torre, the Spanish midfielder better known as Suso.

The changes appeared to work instantly as Liverpool took the lead through Suarez after just 67 seconds. Glen Johnson’s pass to Sahin in the Norwich penalty area was intercepted by Michael Turner but Suarez was first to the loose ball and planted it low in the corner of the net.

Pepe Reina, the Liverpool goalkeeper, made a good save at his near post after Simeon Jackson, Norwich’s Canada inter-

NORWICH: Liverpool’s Steven Gerrard (center) celebrates scoring against Norwich City with teammates Luis Suarez and Oussama Assaidi during the English Premier League soccer match.—AP national forward, diverted a wayward shot from Russell Martin.

Suarez felt he should have been awarded a penalty in the 22nd minute when Leon Barnett challenged him from behind as they chased a bouncing ball.

Contact was certainly made on the forward’s shoulders but referee Mike Jones waved play on.

Norwich had goalkeeper John Ruddy to thank for the save that kept out a powerful header from Liverpool and England captain Gerrard. The home side retaliated with a spell of pressure but Liverpool doubled their lead through Suarez in the 38th minute.

The Uruguay forward had wasted a straightforward opportunity seconds earlier by firing across goal and wide after being put clear of the Norwich back-line

by Daniel Agger.

But the resulting goal-kick proved to be Norwich’s undoing as Suarez robbed Turner of possession on the edge of the box, pushed the ball through the unfortunate defender’s legs and then beat Ruddy.

Norwich sent on Holt for Jackson at the break but within two minutes Liverpool were three ahead through Sahin, the on-loan Real Madrid midfielder.

Andrew Surman lost possession in the middle, which allowed Raheem Sterling to run at the Norwich back-line and release Suarez on the left of the box.

Suarez beat a defender skilfully but saw his cross blocked.

Again it was only half-cleared, however, and Suarez set up Sahin for a simple finish from six yards.

Suarez’s third came soon after-

wards in the 58th minute via a shot curled low past Ruddy’s reach from the edge of the box after Sahin had set him up.

Norwich pulled a goal back in the 61st minute through Morison after Martin, the right-back, had charged forward and blasted a shot that rebounded off Reina’s chest.

Liverpool lost little time in restoring their four-goal advantage however, with Sterling, the 17-year-old winger, getting goalside of Javier Garrido to accept a pass and crossing for Gerrard to find the net via a hefty deflection off Barnett in the 68th minute.

Holt pulled another goal back four minutes from time after capitalising on Martin Skrtel’s failure to intercept a pass than allowed the forward to stride forward and plant a shot beyond Reina.—AFP

Ba double hands Newcastle a draw Reading 2

Newcastle 2

READING: Newcastle snatched a controversial 2-2 draw at Reading yesterday as Senegal striker Demba Ba appeared to knock in the late equaliser with his hand.

Alan Pardew’s side were heading for a defeat with seven minutes left at the Madejski Stadium, but Ba rose to meet Shane Fergson’s cross and deflected the ball into the net off his hand after missing with his attempted header.

It was Ba’s second goal of the game after he had earlier produced a stunning strike to cancel out Jimmy Kebe’s second half opener.

Noel Hunt had restored Reading’s lead, but Brian McDermott’s side were denied their first Premier League win of the season thanks to Ba’s late intervention.

Newcastle took the bold step on Thursday of handing Pardew a new eight-year contract and the Magpies boss was back on the touchline at Reading following his recent ban. Yet even Pardew’s presence close to the action couldn’t inspire Newcastle in a dour first half.

Reading had the best chance of the opening period when Pavel Pogrebnyak’s header was palmed over by Steve Harper.

The Royals kept pressing after the break and took the lead in the 58th minute when Kebe was played in by Jobi McAnuff and slotted a low shot inside the near post.

Newcastle were level within a minute as Cheick Tiote clipped a pass towards Ba who unleashed a sublime volley on the run that gave Alex McCarthy no chance.

McDermott’s side hit straight back and McAnuff whipped in a 62nd minute cross which Hunt met with a glancing header that beat Harper at the far post.

But Newcastle salvaged a point seven minutes from time when Ba stooped to meet Ferguson’s cross, missed his header and handled it into the net. Reading were furious and tried to make amends, but McAnuff saw a late shot hit a post.—AFP

LONDON: Reading’s Pavel Pogrebnyak (left) and Newcastle United’s Steven Taylor battle for the ball during the English Premier League soccer match. —AP

Fletcher sinks Wigan Sunderland 1

Wigan 0

SUNDERLAND: Sunderland recorded their first victory of the Premier League season and ended a 12-game winless streak in the English top flight by beating 10-man Wigan Athletic 1-0 yesterday. On a windy afternoon at the Stadium of Light, Steven

Fletcher claimed the only goal of the game in the 51st minute, shortly after Wigan midfielder Jordi Gomez had been sent off for sliding in on Danny Rose.

Despite having registered a first win after four consecutive draws, Martin O’Neill’s Sunderland slipped one place to 13th in the table, while Roberto Martinez’s Wigan remained 15th.

It took a fine, point-blank save from Simon Mignolet to prevent Arouna Kone from giving Wigan the lead after 15 minutes, while at the other end, Ivan Ramis had to clear Sebastian

Larsson’s free-kick off his own goal-line.

Wigan midfielder James McCarthy shot narrowly wide of Mignolet’s goal shortly before half-time but the visitors were dealt a heavy blow two minutes into the second period when Gomez was shown a straight red card for an ugly foul on Rose.

It left the Latics facing over 40 minutes of football with a numerical disadvantage and it took Sunderland just four minutes to capitalise.

After a strong run and cross from Irish winger James McClean, Fletcher applied the

finishing touch to claim his fifth league goal of the season.

The Scot, a reported £15 million ($23 million) summer signing from Wolverhampton Wanderers, remains the only player to have scored for Sunderland since the start of the campaign.

The hosts turned the screw, with Ali Al Habsi saving from Stephane Sessegnon and McClean bending an inviting cross across the face of goal, and Wigan were unable to respond despite the introduction from the bench of striker Franco Di Santo.—AFP

El Shaarawy shines as Parma hold Milan

Sri Lanka thump West Indies

18

17

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Liverpool roll over Norwich in EPL

Page 19

OLD TRAFFORD: Manchester United’s Shinji Kagawa (center right) goes for the ball with Tottenham Hotspur’s Clint Dempsey during their English Premier League soccer match.—AP

Spurs end United hoodoo at Old Trafford Man United 2

Tottenham 3 MANCHESTER: Tottenham Hotspur ended their 23-year wait for an away victory against Manchester United with a spectacular 3-2 Premier League win at Old Trafford yesterday.

Goals from Jan Vertonghen, Gareth Bale and Clint Dempsey marked the high point of manager Andre Villas Boas’s time at Spurs to date.

The Londoners climbed to fifth in the

table on the back of this result while United were left third, four points behind leaders Chelsea.

In a remarkable second half, United scored through Nani and Shinji Kagawa but were unable to produce an equaliser as Spurs ended a run of 26 games, home and away in all competitions, without a win over Alex Ferguson’s side-a sequence dating back to May 2001.

Spurs made an astonishing start, taking the lead inside two minutes.

Vertonghen took a pass from Aaron Lennon and scythed through the United defence, surging past Rio Ferdinand into the United area where his goalbound shot deflected off Jonny Evans and wrongfooted goalkeeper Anders Lindegaard.

The second goal, after 31 minutes, was

similar in its execution and no more than the visitors deserved for a half of domination.

This time Bale was the tormentor of the United defence, collecting a short ball from Mousa Dembele just inside the home half and running away from Ferdinand far too easily before scoring with a clinical right-foot finish beyond Lindegaard’s dive.

But even that surprising half-time scoreline gave no hint of the remarkable three-minute period after the interval which brought three goals.

Ferguson’s move in bringing on Wayne Rooney as a half-time substitute was vindicated after 51 minutes when the England forward crossed from the right and Nani, arriving ahead of William Gallas,

volleyed in from six yards.

Within a minute, however, Spurs had restored their two-goal cushion, as United’s defence suffered yet more embarrassment.

Jermain Defoe’s pass found Bale in far too much space in the United area and the Welshman’s shot was parried by Lindegaard, allowing Dempsey the most routine of tap-ins from six yards.

The drama was not over and, incredibly, less than a minute later United had drawn to within a goal, at 3-2. Michael Carrick’s pass reached Kagawa, back to goal, who turned and buried a shot into the corner of the goal from eight yards.

Rooney almost equalised for the Reds, with the half still only 16 minutes old, as he planted a 20-yard free-kick, awarded

Torres stars as Chelsea stay top Arsenal 1

Chelsea 2 LONDON: Chelsea maintained their unbeaten start to the Premier League campaign after goals from Fernando Torres and Juan Mata secured a 2-1 win away to Arsenal yesterday that took attention away from John Terry.

The Chelsea captain led the league leaders in his first appearance after being found guilty of racially abusing Queens Park Rangers defender Anton Ferdinand by the Football Association.

Centre-half Terry was free to play because the four-game ban imposed as punishment for the offence is suspended pending the outcome of any appeal against the decision.

And Terry did not appear to be distracted as Roberto di Matteo’s side held on at the Emirates in the face of late Arsenal pressure to come out on top in this clash of the London rivals. Torres put the visiting side ahead in the 20th minute but Arsenal found their way back into the game when Gervinho levelled shortly before half time.

But Mata struck in the 53rd minute when his free kick was helped in by scrambling Arsenal defender Laurent Koscielny.

Defeat ended Arsenal’s unbeaten start to the season and manager Arsene Wenger was left to reflect on his side’s poor defensive display and failure to provide a cutting edge in attack in a match he maintained beforehand would be a test of his team’s title credentials.

Di Matteo, however, saw his side produce a resilient performance that suggests the European champions will be tough to shift from the summit of English football.

Wenger opted to restore fit-again Thomas Vermaelen, recalling his captain in place of Per

Mertesacker who had impressed during last week’s 1-1 draw at Premier League champions Manchester City. But the decision to drop the tall German looked questionable when Torres volleyed the visitors ahead after 20 minutes.

The opportunity arose when Vermaelen fouled Eden Hazard, allowing Mata to deliver a floated free kick into the Arsenal area.

Arsenal should have dealt with the danger but the home defence went missing as the ball was allowed to reach Torres, who held off a weak challenge from Koscielny to finish past Vito Mannone from close range. The Gunners’ back four were again exposed three minutes later immediately after the hosts appealed for a penalty following John Mikel Obi’s challenge on Santi Cazorla.

Chelsea broke quickly with Torres finding himself with a clear run on Mannone’s goal as he cut in from the left. The Spain striker opted against taking the shot early, attempting instead to round the keeper only to take an airshot and tumble over as Koscielny raced back to challenge.

Torres was convinced he had been fouled but television replays confirmed referee Martin Atkinson had made the right decision. Arsenal’s Abou Diaby tested Chelsea keeper Petr Cech but that was one of the France midfielder’s few contributions before he limped out of the game after just 17 minutes to be replaced by Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain.

The switch initially unsettled Arsenal and coincided with Chelsea taking charge of the game. But the young England winger played a significant part in helping Arsenal claw their way back into the game immediately before the break. Mikel Arteta’s pass released OxladeChamberlain on the right and the teenager’s excellent low cross flew through the legs of Cole to Gervinho, who took one touch before beating Cech with a powerful shot on the turn.

Chelsea responded immediately with Oscar and Torres both coming close in first half added time before they scored again early in the second half.—AFP

for a foul on Kagawa by Dempsey, around the Spurs wall and Friedel, only to see it strike the post.

It was a drastic improvement from United and needed to be for it was not until the 44th minute that Brad Friedel had a save to make, a routine gather from Nani’s shot on the edge of the Tottenham area.

United could point to two penalty decisions that went against them in the first half. After 11 minutes, a poor defensive header from Dempsey presented Robin van Persie with a shooting opportunity, with Gallas sliding in and seeming to catch the striker after the ball had gone.

Later in the period, Vertonghen appeared to tug back Nani with both hands in the six-yard area although the

Portuguese winger made a meal of the contact, possibly influencing referee Chris Foy in the process.

The penalty theme continued in the second half, with the ball striking the hand of Sandro in the Spurs area but Foy ruling the contact was accidental.

Soon afterwards Rooney fired just wide before van Persie squandered Unuted’s best chance yet of an equaliser as Carrick played him completely clear only for the Dutchman to roll his shot the wrong side of the post after 69 minutes.

Eight minutes from time, Scholes’s saw Friedel parry his 18-yard shot. Rooney then hurriedly blazed high and wide before Carrick’s header across the six-yard box hit the post but Spurs were not to be denied a memorable victory.-AFP

Dzeko rescues win for City Fulham 1

Man City 2

LONDON: Arsenal’s Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain (top) competes for the ball with Chelsea’s John Mikel Obi (rear) during the English Premier League soccer match at the Emirates Stadium.—AP

LONDON: Edin Dzeko proved a super-sub by snatching a win at the death for reigning Premier League champions Manchester City as they edged Fulham 21 at Craven Cottage yesterday.

The Bosnian striker had been on the pitch for less than two minutes when a terrible clearing header from John Arne Riise fell straight to him and Dzeko lashed home to end Fulham’s run of four successive home victories.

It was City’s first win in five matches and came after Roberto Mancini’s side had fallen behind to an early Mladen Petric penalty. But Sergio Aguero’s equaliser and Dzeko’s late intervention ensured their title defence got back on track. Mancini named Aguero and Carlos Tevez in his starting line-up for only the second Premier League match this season, with Matija Nastasic again preferred to Joleon Lescott at the back.

Fulham were without new signing Dimitar Berbatov with a thigh injury and Martin Jol brought Petric and Bryan Ruiz into his side. City had most of the possession in the early exchanges but were guilty of some sloppy passing in the final third. By contrast, Fulham looked dangerous with the ball and the visitors’ defence were given a warning in the eighth minute when Hugo Rodallega just failed to control a lofted through-ball.

Little more than 60 seconds later though, Riise cut in form the left and was impeded by Pablo Zabaleta. The offence

seemed to have taken place outside the box but referee Mark Halsey thought differently and Petric stepped up to slot home from the spot for his third goal of the season.

City looked slightly stunned but Tevez tried to find an immediate response with a shot from distance that was held by goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer.

At the other end, Rodallega make a break down the left flank and his cutback from Petric was perfectly timed but the Croatian blazed way over the bar.

The reigning champions continued to push forward looking for a goal and Aguero should have done better when he headed wide following a corner.

Tevez’s claims for a penalty just after the half-hour mark were waved away, although replays suggested he may have been pulled back by Riise.

City continued to look shaky at the back as captain Vincent Kompany was booked for a foul on Petric and they were denied an equaliser twice in the space of 60 seconds by the brilliant Schwarzer.

But the veteran Australian could do nothing to stop them drawing level two minutes before the break after his save from David Silva’s deflected effort fell straight to Argentina international Aguero to stab home. Fulham fought back in the second half with Brede Hangeland’s header from a Bryan Ruiz free kick going just went wide.

The introduction of Mario Balotelli for Tevez finally gave Mancini’s men some impetus and the Italian saw his effort from outside the box curl agonisingly wide of the post in the 70th minute.

Fulham substitute Alex Kacaniklic also came close to having an immediate impact when his cross was diverted into the path of Ruiz but the Costa Rican saw his powerful shot palmed away by Joe Hart.—AFP

Tunisia plans to issue Islamic bonds, says CB Page 22

Investors eye the ‘cliff’ as Obama gains in polls Page 25

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Free full insurance on BMW X5 models Page 26

AIC implements ‘Beta coefficient’ system for KSE sectors Page 23

PARIS: A overview of the Paris Auto Show yesterday. The Paris Auto show opens to the public today and will run till Oct 14. — AP

Spain debt rises on aid to banks, regions Govt details cuts to health, education MADRID: Spain’s debt level and borrowing needs are set to rise next year, piling pressure on the government to apply for international aid, as it pours funds in to cash-strapped regions and an ailing banking system, its budget showed yesterday.

Spain’s debt as a ratio of gross domestic product will reach 90.5 percent by end 2013, according to the document presented to Parliament for approval, almost three times that registered before the property bubble burst in 2008. The budget aims to make savings of around 13 billion euros ($16.72 billion) next year by cutting spending by the public ministries, education, health and infrastructure investments and freezing public workers’ wages.

“This is an austerity budget, but will serve to help us get over this long economic crisis and once again show that Spain is a trustworthy partner within Europe,” Treasury Minister Cristobal Montoro told journalists after delivering the budget.

Spain is at the centre of the euro-zone debt crisis as nervous investors demand ever higher premiums to hold Spanish debt on

concerns the government cannot control its finances in the midst of a deepening recession. Calls by wealthy northeastern region Catalonia for independence and the rising number of demonstrations on the streets of major cities have fuelled doubts Spain can fix its problems without help. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy has delayed any plea for aid, which would kick-start a European Central Bank plan to buy debt and ease financing costs, though this week has passed reforms and the budget plan in what many see is an effort to pre -empt the likely terms of a bailout.

The budget details spending cuts of 3.1 percent in health, 14.4 percent in education and 6.3 percent in unemployment benefits, as the recession, which began in the first quarter, drags on.

The government would also have to increase its reliance on international markets for funding next year, with gross debt issuance requirements of 207.2 billion euros after budgeting in 2012 for gross issuance of 186.1 billion euros. Spain faces debt redemptions worth 159.2 billion euros in 2013, up

slightly from 153.2 billion euros in 2012, the document showed.

The increase in the debt-to-GDP ratio was due to a greater debt on the back of the economic crisis and the effect of state instruments on public accounts, the Treasury said in the document.

The instruments include the power deficit bond program, FADE, the service provider fund for regional governments, Spain’s part in aid granted to Ireland, Greece and Portugal and the recapitalization loan for the country’s banks, it said.

Brussels on Thursday said the budget was a large step in the right direction. But many economists expressed doubt that Spain’s conservatives would be able to raise the cash the budget demanded as pension and debtservicing costs rise.

“My general view is that this is an optimistic budget, in the sense that predictions for the contraction in 2013 are very optimistic,” said Xavier Vives, economist at business school IESE, adding that he expected the plans to be revised as with every other budget over the last four years.

Spain will meet its 2012 public deficit target as dictated by European guidelines, Montoro said, but the shortfall will jump by more than one percentage point if aid to its struggling banks were taken in to account.

The Spanish deficit this year would be 6.3 percent of GDP, not including these payments to its banks, he said, but would rise to 9.4 percent of GDP last year and 7.4 percent of GDP this year if the aid was considered.

“Everything within the deficit derived from financial operations aren’t included ... they’re considered one-offs,” Montoro said.

Spain has asked for up to 100 billion euros for its crisis-hit banks, though the debate among Spain’s European partners rages over whether that money would go directly to its lenders or first via public coffers.

On Friday, an independent report showed Spanish banks will need up to 59.3 billion euros in extra capital to ride out the economic downturn.

The budget details yesterday showed Spain’s debt ratio included 30 billion euros of the planned 100-billion-euro aid request for the country’s banks.— Reuters

Emaar sells hotel to Abu Dhabi firm DUBAI: Dubai’s Emaar Properties, the builder of the world’s tallest tower, has sold one of its hotel assets to an Abu Dhabi-based real estate firm for an undisclosed amount.

Eshraq Properties said in a statement yesterday that it has acquired Nuran Marina, a serviced hotel apartment owned by Emaar and located in the up-market Dubai Marina area.

Emaar said in a statement it was still focusing on Dubai but looking to strengthen its Address brand of hotels.

“The transaction of Nuran Serviced

Residencies Dubai Marina was completed in the second quarter of 2012.

The transaction is not material to merit an announcement by Emaar,” it said in an emailed statement. Dubai’s largest developer, which is 32 percent owned by the emirate’s government, has looked to shift away from its home market where real estate prices have slumped by more than 60 percent in the aftermath of the debt crisis in 2009.

Emaar ’s chairman, Mohammed Alabbar, had denied reports in October last year that it was looking

to offload its Al-Manzil and Qamaradeen hotels. The developer announced plans this month to build a new hotel in the Dubai’s high-end Downtown area, its first major hotel project since the property crisis.

Eshraq, which has assets of about 1.5 billion dirhams, listed on the Abu Dhabi Securities Market in September last year. It raised 825 million dirhams ($225 million) in an over-subscribed initial public offering (IPO). Eshraq said it would carry on with its strategy to acquire other real estate projects in the country.— Reuters

India PM vows to press ahead with reforms NEW DELHI: Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh vowed yesterday to press ahead with reforms to further liberalize the country’s still inward-looking economy, undeterred by strong political opposition.

Singh’s government announced in September a sudden blitz of reforms designed to open the retail, aviation and broadcasting sectors to more foreign investment and revive an economy in which growth stalled at around three-year lows. “We will do what is good for the country... reforms are not a one-off process,” Singh told reporters in New Delhi. The reforms have prompted a coalition ally to pull out of the Congress-led government and a string of protests nationwide. But they have

been warmly greeted by business and investors, with the Indian currency hitting a five-month high of 52.49 rupees against the dollar Friday as more foreign investment has poured in. Singh, who was speaking on the sidelines of the swearing-in of India’s new chief justice, Altamas Kabir, did not outline what new steps he plans, but analysts expect him also to liberalize the insurance and other sectors. The premier had no comment on a report by a government panel late Friday that warned India faced a “fiscal precipice” and called on New Delhi to phase out fuel, food and fertilizer subsidies to rein in a ballooning deficit. “We cannot over emphasize the need and urgency of fiscal consolidation,” the panel said, warning corrective

moves were an “imperative necessity” as India’s “external payment situation is flashing red lights”. Singh’s left-leaning government is deeply wary of cutting subsidies, especially on food, in the still heavily poor country of 1.2 billion people, fearing a voter backlash in general elections due in 2014. The panel headed by former Indian finance secretary Vijay Kelkar also called for stepping up sales of stakes in state-owned firmed and revamping India’s archaic, patchwork tax system that drives up company costs.

India could find itself in a worse financial state than during 1991 balance-of-payments crisis when the country teetered on the edge of bankruptcy and was forced to seek a bailout by the International Monetary Fund. —AFP

COLUMBIA: Drain plug blanks are fed into a threading machine at Seaway Bolt and Specials Corp in Columbia Station, Ohio.

The era when Goodyear, Firestone and LTV dominated the Ohio landscape is long gone; the state has lost more than 368,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000. But heavy industry still has an enormous presence. — AP

Iran’s rial dives to historic low DUBAI: The Iranian rial slumped yesterday to a historic low against the US dollar, according to Iranian media and currency tracking websites. The rial fell by 3.6 percent and was trading at about 27,900 per dollar, compared with about 26,920 on Thursday and about 26,200 on Wednesday, according to Persianlanguage currency tracking website Mazanex. Another financial site, Mesghal.ir, had the rial at about 27,650 to the dollar yesterday. There was no clear reason for the latest slide in the value of the rial, which is traded in an informal market of money changers, where ordinary Iranians go to access hard currencies.

Previous falls have coincided with new sanctions or diplomatic isolation of Iran over its contested nuclear program, suspected by the US and its allies of being aimed at obtaining a nuclear weapon. Iran denies this, but has faced successive rounds of stricter sanctions in the last two years.

Iranians rush to money changers to convert their savings into dollars, depressing the value of the rial. The rial has seen a steep loss in value against the dollar in the last year. In June 2011, it was trading at about 12,000 to the dollar, or more than twice its value now, according to Mesghal.

Earlier this week the Iranian government established a new three-tiered currency system meant to restore stability to the rial but which does not appear to have allayed market concerns. The system, along with a new “exchange centre,” allows importers of priority goods like meat and grains to buy dollars at the official “reference” rate of 12,260 rials to the dollar. Importers of other basic goods are allowed to buy dollars at a “non-reference” rate 2 percent less than the open market value of the rial on any given day. On Thursday, that rate was 23,927 rials to the dollar, Iran’s central bank said.

The central bank said in a statement on its website that $34 million had been traded in the exchange centre in its first week.

The central bank’s deputy for foreign exchange affairs, Minoo Kiani-Rad, said the exchange centre would in time help stabilise the rial, according to a statement on the central bank’s website yesterday.

“We must allow some time for the activity of this foreign exchange centre to continue so that real demands can be answered and the pressures on the open market can be diminished,” Kiani-Rad said. “In this case, there is no reason for a rise in the exchange rate.” —Reuters

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

BUSINESS

Oil posts 8.5% gain for quarter; gas at $3.79 NEW YORK: Oil ended the third quarter with a slight gain as investors weighed whether the world economy could pull out of the doldrums. Benchmark oil rose 34 cents to $92.19 per barrel in morning trading in New York. In London, Brent crude, which reflects what most U.S. refineries have to pay for oil, rose 38 cents to $112.39.

That marks a quiet finish to a quarter in which oil had a dramatic impact on prices at the gas pump and on some sectors of the stock market. Oil gained 8.5 percent during the third quarter, and is up 18.7 percent from the year low hit on June 28. Gasoline prices rose 14 percent to an average of $3.79 per gallon, a record for late September. Traders will enter the final quarter of the year with many of the same questions that hung over the market for the last three months: Will world oil demand get weaker? Or will stimulus measures from central banks in the US, China, Europe and Japan boost economic growth and oil demand?

And could tensions between Iran and the West lead to a war that could disrupt supplies?

Economies around the globe are using less oil than expected as they struggle to grow. When economies slow, demand for oil falls because people travel less and ship fewer goods. Meanwhile, supply has been

ample thanks to big increases in production from the US and elsewhere. But two factors have kept oil prices relatively high: Economic stimulus programs from the world’s central banks and fears that a military conflict with Iran could disrupt oil supplies. Enthusiasm for stimulus measures briefly pushed oil over $100 for the only time during the quarter in mid-September. But the reality of the world’s economic weakness seemed to settle in and oil fell about $7 per barrel in the past two weeks. “We expect the focus to return to the deterioration in underlying economic and financial conditions that made the additional stimulus necessary in the first place,” said Julian Jessop, chief global economist at Capital Economics in a report Friday.

Conditions in Spain are a reminder that Europe is still in financial crisis. Many think Spain will seek help from the European Central Bank after announcing a round of severe budget cuts on Thursday.

Tensions between Iran and the West over Iran’s nuclear program have been heating up for months.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu suggested this week that Iran could have enough enriched uranium to build a nuclear bomb by next summer. To some analysts, his speech suggested no military action is imminent. “The announcement likely reduces the

Bayt.com weekly report

Motivate to retain the best on your team!

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ideas and the authority to take t is a commonly accepted fact decisions that relate directly to that employee loyalty plays their roles are great boosters for today a central and pivotal both self-esteem and job loyalty. role within the success strategy * Being positively challenged of any organization aiming at everyday: Believing in your long lasting market presence, employees’ capabilities and setregardless of its size and its secting high standards for them to tor of activity. meet is key to elevating motivaSome 20 or 30 years ago, loytion levels and positive feelings alty was not a debatable subject; Lama Ataya about their jobs. the “Job for Life” was the norm of * Receiving proper training and develthe day. However employee attitudes have changed and professionals place today opment: Employees tend to put more greater importance on work-life balance. In effort into their jobs when they feel valufact Bayt.com’s recent “Work-life Balance in able to their company. If you invest in your the MENA” poll (September 2012) shows employees (through trainings, seminars, that 88.3% of professionals in the region skill development courses etc.) and cater to would consider changing jobs in order to their professional needs, they’re most likely to invest right back in their jobs, thereby improve their work-life balance.

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Employee loyalty is an essential comBelonging to a company that is publicly committed to society’s well-being and modity in today’s corporations and a measknowing they are an integral part of a larg- ure of organizational welfare that cannot er goodwill effort, reinforces employees’ be ignored. The good news is that compacommitment to both their jobs and their nies that are attuned to this important barometer of corporate wellbeing and organizations. * Getting fair remuneration packages in gauge and monitor internal loyalty levels light of their job duties: It might be true periodically, putting studied and proactive that money cannot buy loyalty but not programs in place to cultivate and encourpaying your employees what they are age employee loyalty, are able to benefit from increased profitability, reduced worth can definitely chase them away. * Feeling empowered: Having the turnover and higher staff commitment, opportunity to share their thoughts and productivity and morale.

near-term threat of war,” wrote RW Baird analyst Michael Hall in a research note. The effect of high oil prices were reflected in the stock market during the quarter. Energy was the best performer of the 10 sectors in the S&P 500 stock index. Chevron Corp. shares hit an all-time high of $118.53 and Exxon Mobil Corp. shares reached $92.57, the highest level since May of 2008. But airline stocks had a rough quarter because jet fuel prices rose. Shares of United Continental Holdings Inc. and Delta Air Lines Inc., the nation’s two biggest airlines, fell 20 percent and 16 percent, respectively. And higher oil prices made trips to the gas station more expensive as the summer progressed. Drivers saw prices rise nearly 50 cents per gallon from early July to late September.

The national average retail price was $3.79 per gallon Friday, according to AAA, OPIS and Wright Express.

That’s down about a penny for the day, but it’s 32 cents higher than this time last year and highest ever for this time of year. The lowest point for crude oil and retail gasoline prices was at the beginning of the quarter, on July 2, when crude closed at $83.75 per barrel and drivers were paying $3.33 at the pump.

Stimulus programs and refinery closures in the US caused by technical problems and Hurricane Isaac

pushed prices up from there. On Sept 14, oil traded over $100 briefly before settling at its high for the quarter of $99 per barrel. Retail gasoline hit its high for the quarter that day too, at $3.87 per gallon.

The quarterly average prices for oil and gasoline were little changed from last year. The price at the pump averaged $3.64 per gallon, just 2 cents higher than last year’s third quarter. The average was 7 cents lower than during this year’s April to June quarter when gas hit its high for the year of $3.94.

Crude oil averaged $92.09 per gallon, 3 percent higher on average than last year’s third quarter.

Natural gas hit its high for the quarter - and the year on Friday. Earlier in the year traders were concerned that a surplus from last year’s warm winter and increased domestic production would fill up storage facilities and send prices toward zero. But a blistering hot summer increased demand for gas to generate electricity for cooling and forecasters predict a more normal winter. Natural gas rose 2.3 cents to $3.32 per thousand cubic feet Friday. For the quarter, natural gas averaged $2.88 per thousand cubic feet, which was 29 percent lower than the average price for last year’s third quarter, but 23 percent higher than the April-to-June period this year. — AP

Tunisia plans to issue Islamic bonds, says CB Tuni seeks to reform banking sector TUNIS: Tunisia plans to issue Islamic bonds early next year as the North African country seeks to reform its banking sector and diversify sources of funding, the central bank governor said yesterday.

“Tunisia will begin issuing Islamic bonds early next year ... This is part of the draft budget for 2013,” Tunisian central bank governor Chadli Ayari told Reuters on the sidelines of a banking seminar. “There are studies under way for Islamic finance in the country, including issuing Islamic bonds.” Committees set up by the finance ministry, religious affairs ministry and the central bank are currently working on an Islamic finance law in order to establish Islamic banking in Tunisia, where there are only two Islamic banks.

Ayari said the total assets of those two banks was 1.4 billion Tunisian dinars ($893 million), or 2.5 percent of the total assets of Tunisian banks.

Nadia Kamha, Director-General of the Tunisia central bank told Reuters the law would be ready “within weeks” and that it will be presented to the government for approval. The moderate Islamist Ennahda movement is leading Tunisia’s government after winning elections last year that followed the ousting of former President Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali. Tunisia’s budget deficit should narrow to 6 percent next year from 6.6 percent of GDP expected in 2012, Ayari said on Friday, indicating economic recovery in the cradle of Arab Spring revolts may take longer than anticipated. The

Tunisian economy is gradually recovering from last year’s political turmoil but faces problems as a result of the crisis in the euro zone, the main market for its exports and the source of a majority of tourist visitors.

Morocco, also led by a moderate Islamist party, is in a race with Tunisia to become a regional hub for Islamic finance. General Affairs and Governance minister, Najib Boulif, told Reuters in March the government would submit to parliament a draft bill with a set of regulations for the introduction of Islamic finance products in the country. “We are keen to capitalize on the stability we enjoy here to turn Morocco into a regional Islamic finance platform,” Boulif said in March. — Reuters

KFH issues sukuks for Turkey worth $1.5bn KUWAIT: Kuwait Finance House (Beitak) has issued ijara sukuks (Islamic lease bonds) for the Turkish treasury, worth $1.5 billion, valid for five and a half years.

The issue, the first on record for interest of the Turkish Government, was made in collaboration with Citigroup and HSBC banks. Beitak Chairman Mohammed Al-Omar and the Liquidity Management House Company chief executive officer signed the deal. It has already drawn to 250 investors, invest in $7.1 billion-much higher than the sum of issuance.

The issuance is a fruit of cooperation and efforts involving several authorities, namely the Turkish treasury that worked hard for securing the relevant and necessary legislative and bureaucratic regulations and measures, he said, affirming that Turkey now boasts a clear and visible legislative system which makes the Turkish market quite lucrative.

Coupons of the sukuks amount to 2.8 percent per annum, distributed over six months.

The Middle East has the lion’s share, up to 58 percent, compared to 13 percent in Europe, 12 percent in Asia, nine percent for Turkey and eight percent for the United States.

With regard of distribution according to the types of investors, the banks got 59 percent, 22 percent for leading businessmen, international institutions and central banks 10 percent, wealthy figures five percent and funds four percent. — KUNA

SEVILLA: Children wave flags through smoke thrown by firemen and policemen during a demonstration of public service workers against government’s spending cuts in Sevilla yesterday. Spain’s government said it would freeze public sector pay, which has not risen since it was cut by five percent in 2010 and which suffered an effective seven-percent fall this year with the cutting of the end-of-year bonus. — AFP

Iran to export gas to Iraq by mid-2013 DUBAI: Iran expects to begin exporting natural gas to neighboring Iraq by the summer of 2013, an Iranian official was quoted as saying yesterday.

Iran has completed more than 25 percent of a pipeline to Iraq that could carry up to 25 million cubic meters per day of its natural gas to Iraq, Javad Owji, managing director of the National Iranian Gas Co, was quoted as saying by the Mehr news agency. “Currently more than 25 percent of this 48-inch gas transmission pipe has been completed,” Owji said. Iranian contractors would help

build the Iraqi section of the pipeline, Owji said.

Mehr estimated the cost of the pipeline would be $450 million. “With the progress in implementation of the construction of the gas pipeline in the two countries, it is expected that gas injection and the launch of the pipeline could occur by Khordad (May 22 to June 21),” Owji said. Iran has the world’s second-largest gas reserves after Russia, but development of its gas fields has been hampered by international sanctions targeting its energy sector. —Reuters

EXCHANGE RATES Commercial Bank of Kuwait US Dollar/KD GB Pound/KD Euro Swiss francs Canadian Dollar Australian DLR Indian rupees Sri Lanka Rupee UAE dirhams Bahraini dinars Jordanian dinar Saudi riyals Omani riyals Egyptian pounds US Dollar/KD GB Pound/KD Euro Swiss francs Canadian dollars Danish Kroner Swedish Kroner Australian dlr Hong Kong dlr Singapore dlr Japanese yen Indian Rs/KD Sri Lanka rupee Pakistan rupee Bangladesh taka UAE dirhams Bahraini dinars Jordanian dinar Saudi Riyal/KD Omani riyals Philippine Peso

.2740000 .4500000 .3580000 .2960000 .2830000 .2880000 .0040000 .0020000 .0761350 .7417630 .3870000 .0720000 .7271670 .0430000 CUSTOMER TRANSFER RATES .2804500 .4534880 .3610650 .2986370 .2857650 .0484270 .0425940 .2903360 .0361700 .2277120 .0036080 .0000000 .0000000 .0000000 .0000000 .0763860 .7441950 .0000000 .0748070 .7287250 .0000000

.2860000 .4610000 .3650000 .3070000 .2930000 .2990000 .0058500 .0035000 .0769000 .7492180 .4100000 .0780000 .7344750 .0510000 .2825500 .4568830 .3637690 .3008730 .2879050 .0487900 .0429130 .2925100 .0364410 .2394170 .0036350 .0053050 .0021620 .0029950 .0034710 .0769580 .7497680 .3996460 .0753670 .7341820 .0067950

Kuwait Bahrain Intl Exchange Co. Currency US Dollar Pak Rupees

Rate per 1000 (Tran) 281.700 2.977

Indian Rupees Sri Lankan Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Peso UAE Dirhams Saudi Riyals Bahraini Dinars Egyptian Pounds Pound Sterling Indonesian Rupiah Yemeni Riyal Euro Canadian Dollars Nepali rupee

Bangladesh Taka Indian Rupee Sri Lankan Rupee Nepali Rupee Pakistani Rupee UAE Dirhams Bahraini Dinar Egyptian Pound Jordanian Dinar Omani Riyal Qatari Riyal

5.265 2.149 3.443 6.765 76.795 75.275 748.900 46.201 461.100 2.990 1.550 368.500 293.100 3.270

Transfer Rate (Per 1000) 281.200 364.350 457.900 288.400 3.660 5.347 46.200 2.177 3.440 6.740 2.968 748.800 76.600 75.150

UAE Exchange Centre WLL COUNTRY Australian Dollar Canadian Dollar Swiss Franc Euro US Dollar Sterling Pound Japanese Yen

SELL DRAFT 298.18 291.63 305.81 367.39 281.25 458.94 3.70

3.620 5.450 2.290 3.530 3.150 77.350 748.500 47.650 398.100 735.000 78.000

Dollarco Exchange Co. Ltd

Al Mulla Exchange Currency US Dollar Euro Pound Sterling Canadian Dollar Japanese Yen Indian Rupee Egyptian Pound Sri Lankan Rupee Bangladesh Taka Philippines Peso Pakistan Rupee Bahraini Dinar UAE Dirham Saudi Riyal *Rates are subject to change

3.449 5.343 2.173 3.356 2.976 76.64 748.87 46.20 400.69 731.98 77.67

SELL CASH 296.000 291.000 305.000 364.000 282.400 458.500 3.690

Rate for Transfer US Dollar Canadian Dollar Sterling Pound Euro Swiss Frank Bahrain Dinar UAE Dirhams Qatari Riyals Saudi Riyals Jordanian Dinar Egyptian Pound Sri Lankan Rupees Indian Rupees Pakistani Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Pesso Cyprus pound Japanese Yen Thai Bhat Syrian Pound Nepalese Rupees Malaysian Ringgit

Selling Rate 281.350 288.170 457.600 365.965 301.250 744.865 76.580 77.225 74.990 396.605 46.197 2.143 5.258 2.973 3.438 6.744 690.150 4.600 9.215 4.365 3.385 91.705

Canadian dollar Cyprus pound Czek koruna Danish krone Deutsche Mark Egyptian pound Euro Cash Hongkong dollar Indian rupees Indonesia Iranian tuman Iraqi dinar Japanese yen Jordanian dinar Lebanese pound Malaysian ringgit Morocco dirham Nepalese Rupees New Zealand dollar Nigeria Norwegian krone Omani Riyal Pakistani rupees Philippine peso Qatari riyal Saudi riyal Singapore dollar South Africa Sri Lankan rupees Sterling pound Swedish krona Swiss franc Syrian pound Thai bhat Tunisian dollar UAE dirham U.S. dollars Yemeni Riyal

Bahrain Exchange Company

291.000 553.200 45.900 49.800 167.800 48.120 367.200 37.000 5.270 0.032 0.161 0.235 3.720 399.200 0.191 94.180 45.300 4.330 234.700 1.825 50.400 731.720 3.090 7.010 77.920 75.210 230.540 36.370 2.683 459.900 43.900 304.000 4.100 9.450 198.263 76.810 282.100 1.350 GOLD

10 Tola 1,868.740 COUNTRY Australian dollar Bahraini dinar Bangladeshi taka

SELL CASH 297.600 749.160 3.690

SELL DRAFT 294.100 749.160 3.443

Sterling Pound US Dollar

TRAVELLER’S CHEQUE 457.900 281.700

289.500

230.500 46.224 365.700 36.850 5.260 0.031

398.170 0.190 94.180 3.310 233.200

731.540 2.985 6.730 77.490 75.210 231.540 36.370 2.147 457.900 302.500 4.100 9.290 76.710 281.700

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

BUSINESS

Qatar out of deflation risks; property prices recover KCIC WEEKLY REPORT

By FatemaAkashah KUWAIT: Despite Qatar’s impressive growth and increased optimism over its rising economic potential, its economy was not immune to the global financial crisis. Total economic output decelerated; gross domestic product (GDP) slowed from 17% year over year (YoY) growth in 2008 to 12% in 2009, but the sector where the slowdown was most pronounced was the property market. Office space prices fell by rates of more than 25% YoYin 2009 and into 2010,and residential rents fell by more than a third. Occupancy rates were declining steadily and property sales slowed. Investor sentiment was hard-hit by the decline in the global stock markets as their wealth was being eroded, slowing consumption in all sectors in the Qatari economy.

The banking sector was hesitant to lend, and development projects slowed down. The fall in property prices was a major drag on the consumer price index (CPI), a measure of the average consumer’s cost of consumption and living. Food and clothing prices slowed to annual rates of 1.2% and -4.5% YoY, respectively, but rent and housing costs contracted by a staggering 12% in 2009 and again by 12.7% in 2010, even as food prices recovered.

Falling demand and increased supply in the property market drove overall prices into two consecutive years of deflation. Inflation finally returned in 2011 on government stimulus: Qataris in the government sector received significant

salary increases, amplified spending in natural gas infrastructure was implemented to build capacity, and many other development projects took off.

Global commodity prices had also recovered, and immigration improved, both adding to the pickup in prices. The pace of decline in the housing sector slowed and construction activity returned to double-digit growth. Persistent deflation is still a serious risk for Qatar’s economy, but the successful turnaround stimulated by the government has

put the risks to economic stability at bay.

The consumer price index (CPI) - the price of a basket of goods and services, is an index that measures inflation. The CPI basket is based on the spending habits of the residents in the economy.

In Qatar, the CPI basket is divided into eight components: food, beverages & tobacco; clothing & footwear; rent, utilities & related housing service; furniture, textiles & home appliances; medical care & health services; transport & communica-

tion; entertainment, recreation & culture; miscellaneous goods & services. The prices of these items are monitored on a monthly basis. Inflation is the measure of positive change in prices, often expressed in year on year terms. Deflation is the decrease in the price level of these goods and services, essentially a negative inflation rate.

Declining prices can increase the buying price of money, but deflation also decreases profit and wealth if it remains persistent. The ideal condition for an economy would be to have a little inflation, that would not be too high relative to its GDP growth rate. An emerging economy would have a higher “healthy” inflation rate versus a developed economy with a slower growth rate.

Excess supply in the Qatari property housing market has eased on the back of recovering domestic demand, but is this recovery in demand sustainable? The pace of anticipated demand growth in the property sector, driven by immigration rates and income patterns, is projected to be strong. The population of Qatar is expected to grow by more than a third to 2.4 million by 2030, which will boost residential properties, but industrial and commercial property outlooks also look bright. Qatar’s successful bid for the World Cup 2022 has set it on the global radar, and it is expected to attract strong foreign direct investment flows. The pace of project growth is expected to remain robust. The government is keen on increasing its spending on education, transport and health, which would support consumption, hence help keep property prices elevated.

AIC implements ‘Beta Coefficient’ system Reclassified KSE sectors

SEVILLA: A Spanish civil guard with his mouth sealed with tape attends a demonstration of public service workers against government’s spending cuts in Sevilla yesterday. — AFP

Petrobras union gives company deadline RIO DE JANEIRO: Brazil’s national oil workers’ union on Friday gave state-led oil company Petrobras five days to improve a contract offer or face an openended strike that could disrupt oil and fuels output in the world’s sixth-largest economy. If the Wednesday deadline passes without an improved Petrobras wage package, the union will ask workers to approve a strike starting Oct. 11, the union said in a statement.

The deadline was set during a meeting of the board of the national oil workers federation, or FUP. FUP wants a 10 percent wage increase. Petrobras has offered 6.5 percent. Petrobras oil platforms and refineries can handle a strike for about seven days before skeleton staffing starts having an impact on output, a former company manager who planned responses to previous strikes told Reuters. He declined to be named because he still has dealings with Petrobras and its employees. “As workers in other industries have already shown, a fight is the path to advance our conquests, especially with regard to salary increases,” the FUP board said in a statement. “So if Petrobras doesn’t present an offer that contemplates this, its an open-

ended strike starting Oct 11.”

On Wednesday FUP workers walked off the job for 24 hours nationwide. An October strike would not have a pre-set end, the statement said. The demands come as Petrobras embarks on a $237 billion, five-year investment plan, the world’s largest corporate spending program. Petrobras reported a loss in the second quarter, its first in 13 years.

As costs, including wages, at Petrobras have soared, production at the company has stagnated. The Rio de Janeiro based company, which has discovered some of the world’s largest new oil fields in the last five years, has failed to meet a single annual production target for 10 years.

On Friday, Petrobras said output in Brazil and abroad was little changed in August, falling 0.3 percent to an average 2.54 million barrels of oil and natural gas equivalent a day, its lowest in 22 months.

Crude oil output in Brazil, at 2.07 million barrels a day, was the lowest in 3-1/2 years in August. Because the union must provide by law some skeleton staff at highrisk installations, and strikes have been short-lived, few Petrobras strikes in the last decade have resulted in production disruptions. — Reuters

Thousands of Poles protest pro-market reforms WARSAW: Thousands of Poles blew horns, prayed and waved flags in downtown Warsaw yesterday to show their anger over a new law that raises the retirement age and a host of other issues. The protest was organized by the conservative and nationalistic opposition party Law and Justice, led by Jaroslaw Kaczynski, as well as the Solidarity trade union and other groups.

Dubbed “ Wake Up, Poland,” the protest is an expression of the deep anxieties gripping many Poles as the government tries to lower state debt by embracing pro-market reforms that are weakening the social safety net.

Many of the protesters are also conservative Catholics ill at ease in a country that is quickly growing more secular as it grows wealthier and more integrated with the West.

A key source of anger for the protesters is a new law put through by the pro-market government of Prime Minister Donald Tusk which will gradually raise the retirement age to 67 for

all Poles from 60 for women and 65 for men. Participants also expressed anger at a decision by the Polish national broadcasting council to strip a Catholic TV station, TV Trwam, of a free digital TV signal. They argue that it marks a blow to freedom of expression and an attempt to silence their conservative and Catholic world view. The broadcasting council, however, has said the station lost its transmission rights because of a lack of transparency in its funding.

Protesters sang patriotic and religious songs as they gathered at Three Crosses Square in downtown Warsaw, some of them holding rosaries.

“Our presence here is a sign of opposition to the discrimination against Catholic media and T V Trwam,” Zbigniew Ziobro, a leading conservative politician, told protesters, according to the news agency PAP. Police had no estimate yet for the number of protesters, but private broadcaster TVN24 said tens of thousands turned out. — AP

KUWAIT: On May 13, 2012, the Kuwait Stock Exchange changed the classification of shares from 7 sectors to 12 sectors. Yet, no historical sectoral data on the newly classified sectors was made available. This has deprived Kuwait’s financial industry from the necessary means to derive important quantitative analytical tools, chief among which is the beta coefficient which measures each sector’s relative volatility, in other words, it measures the impact of overall change in the market on each sector.

Accordingly, Beta coefficient is particularly important as a risk metric. It is also indispensible for valuing unquoted shares, and for calculating the applicable discount rate in financial feasibility studies depending on which sector the investment belongs to.

Therefore, the research division at Arab Investment Company has taken on the task of deriving the Beta coefficient of reclassified sectors, based on Total Monthly Performances-price, bonus shares and cash distributions, for the last five years. Thomson-Reuter’s database was drawn on to calculate month-on-month share prices and value of bonus shares. Corporate actions for the previous five years, were reviewed for each listed share, to acquire needed data on cash distributions.

Dr Farid Lian, AIC Senior Vice President for Research and Business Development commented, “perhaps the main achievement of AIC

KUWAIT: Dr Farid Lian (left) accompanied by Nejad Al-Suweidi (center) addresses the meeting.

— Photo by Yasser Al-Zayyat research team, has been the development of a fully automated system which, when activated, would autonomously update itself to capture developments in total per formance constituents, detect and indicate the listing of new shares, and recalibrate itself accordingly, so as to

return the updated Beta Coefficient for each of the market’s twelve sectors at any point in time”.

By decision of AIC Management, the extracted Beta Coefficient will be made available on request to any financial or research entity in Kuwait or abroad.

Xstrata haggles as Glencore deadline nears LONDON: Xstrata’s directors, facing a Monday deadline to deliver their verdict on Glencore’s $32 billion offer, are hammering out a deal they hope will ensure the miner retains control of the combined group’s board, even after the exit of its veteran boss.

All sides are working toward completing an agreement and announcing a board decision

by Oct. 1, sources familiar with the deal said on Friday. The struggle to reconcile wide-ranging shareholder views, to ensure the success of the current, last-ditch attempt to merge, mean Xstrata’s board could still ask for more time but several of the sources pointed to a Monday deal.

“I now see an 80 percent chance a deal will be announced early on Monday”, said one source familiar with the talks.

Glencore, the world’s largest diversified commodities trader, bid in February for the shares in Xstrata it did not already own, launching one of the resources sector’s biggest-ever takeover deals. But it was forced earlier this month to raise its price - offering 3.05 new shares for every share held, up from 2.8 - in an effort to rescue the tie-up after opposition from the miner’s No. 2 investor, Qatar. As a condition of the change, however, Glencore imposed its own chief executive and largest-single shareholder - Ivan Glasenberg at the helm of the combined group, at the expense of Xstrata’s mining veteran boss, South African Mick Davis.

As Glasenberg was already due to sit on the board, Davis’s departure within six months of concluding the deal leaves an empty spot and one that is key to the balance of the 11strong board. Under the original deal, Xstrata would have six board seats including the chairman, while Glencore would have five.

Sources familiar with the matter said Xstrata was not necessarily seeking a specific name, but they said the miner wanted “assurances” that a satisfactory mechanism would be set up to allow it to retain the majority of seats.

Without it the deal would be a takeover and arguably require a higher premium.

“I’d be staggered if this didn’t happen now,” one top-50 investor in Xstrata said. “There’s been unexpected give on both sides - Qatar and Glencore.” Xstrata’s board is widely expected to recommend Glencore’s revised, higher

offer, having backed the lower bid. But its independent directors - already under fire from some minority shareholders angry that the board supported a bid many of them opposed - want to ensure the miner holds on to the team at the helm of its operations which is also expected to deliver some 20 projects by 2014, including four major greenfield sites. The board had hoped to link a retention package for Xstrata’s top employees to a vote on the deal itself, thereby keeping the team responsible for its major industrial assets and the bulk of its profits.

But several top shareholders have objected, with some warning they would vote down any such package they consider excessive - and the merger in the event of a combined vote.

In a bid to secure maximum support for the deal, Xstrata’s board could bow to investors and split the two previously connected shareholder votes on the deal - one on pay packages to retain top managers and one on the merger itself - or at least make its recommendation conditional on the retention deals, sources familiar with the talks said.

That would allow shareholders to express their opinions on pay separately from their views on the merger with Glencore.

Two of the sources said a decision had been reached to split the votes, while a third source close to the negotiations said the final structure was still being agreed. “(A split) will give shareholders the ability to choose an alternative. Those who only want a

deal with Xstrata’s managers will be able to do voice that,” said one of the sources.

Another of the sources said Xstrata was still trying to reconcile contradictory views: “There is a lot to balance. It is not as simple as (funds and key owners) Blackrock and L&G against the other shareholders - there are wide-ranging views.” Among other funds, both BlackRock and L&G, which together own 6.5 percent of Xstrata shares, have signaled they do not support elements of the deal.

Qatar, which is not expected to make a public statement until Xstrata lays out its board’s position, is said by some sources to support the retention payment and the new terms, but its ultimate position is still uncertain, leading to what several sources said was a “tense atmosphere” on all sides.

Qatar, with just over 12 percent thanks to regular share buying, has proven an unlikely kingmaker in the deal.

Hedge funds have also found themselves in the spotlight - their support could be critical, in a deal where shareholders representing just 16.5 percent of total shares could block the deal. These funds represent 10 percent of Xstrata at the moment, just enough to outweigh vocal rebels including Knight Vinke, Schroders and others. The Xstrata board’s decision, if ultimately positive, will pave the way for Glencore to file its long-awaited antitrust notification with the European Union, setting the regulatory clock ticking in Brussels, the sources said. — Reuters

Giant stickers become protest tool at auto show PARIS: Workers at a Ford factory in France swarmed the Paris Auto Show with giant stickers, plastering about 20 cars around the hall to protest lost jobs in the automotive industry. About 400 workers, most from a factory in the southwestern city of Blanquefort, joined the protest yesterday.

Eric Gontier, a union official at the protest says “France needs industry.” The auto show, usually a chance for carmakers

to show off new models, has been a gloomier affair as executives prepare for fewer sales. Many say there are too many factories to satisfy dwindling demand.

But Stephane Cesareo, communications chief for Ford in France, said Blanquefort would keep its workers and transition to other projects. “From our point of view we’re investing in the site,” he said. — AP

24

business

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Positive momentum in Kuwait market BAYAN WEEKLY MARKET REPORT KUWAIT: Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE) ended last week in the green zone. The price index ended last week with an increase amounted to 1.88%, and the weighted index advanced by 3.38% compared to the closings of the week before, whereas KSX-15 index gained 4.22%.

Furthermore, last week’s average daily turnover increased by 28.78%, compared to the preceding week, reaching KD 41.30 million, whereas trading volume average was 416.88 million shares, recording increase of 41.84%.

The optimism continued to dominate the market for the second week. The leading stocks were subject to active buying operations, while the small stocks witnessed activity. The traders’ are trying to collect stocks for companies of good operating activities as they expect its stocks to be targets for the national portfolio in the future.

For the annual performance, the price index ended last week recording 3.03% annual gain compared to its closing in 2011, while the weighted index increased by 3.30%, and the KSX-15 recorded 0.51% increase compared to its value when it was launched.

By the end of the week, the price index closed at 5,990.54 points, up by 1.88% from the week before closing, whereas the weighted index registered a 3.38% weekly gain after closing at 419.01 points. Moreover, the KSX-15 index recorded 4.22% weekly gain after closing at 1,005.13 points.

Sectors’ indices Nine of KSE’s sectors ended last week in the green zone, while the other three recorded declines. Last week’s highest gainer was the Real Estate sector, achieving 4.23% growth rate as its index closed at 967.75 points. Whereas, in the second place, the Banks sector’s index closed at 996.41 points recording 2.74% increase. The Telecommunications sector came in third as its index achieved 2.25% growth, ending the week at 947.67 points. The healthcare sector was the least growing as its index closed at 1,011.17 points with a 0.43% increase. On the other hand, the Insurance sector headed the losers list as its index declined by 2% to end the week’s activity at 874.53 points. The Consumer

Services sector was second on the losers’ list, which index declined by 0.50%, closing at 924.74 points, followed by the Consumer Goods sector, as its index closed at 988.88 points at a weekly loss of 0.19%.

Sectors’ activity The Financial Services sector dominated total trade volume during last week with 881.29 million shares changing hands, representing 42.28% of the total market trading volume. The Real Estate sector was second in terms of trading volume as the sector’s traded shares were 26.08% of last week’s total trading volume, with a total of 543.60 million shares. On the other hand, the Banks sector’s stocks where the high-

est traded in terms of value; with a turnover of KD 63.96 million or 30.97% of last week’s total market trading value. The Financial Services sector took the second place as the sector’s last week turnover of KD 55.05 million represented 26.66% of the total market trading value.

Market capitalization KSE total market capitalization grew by 3.36% during last week to reach KD 28.34 billion, as all of KSE’s sectors recorded an increase in their respective market capitalization except for one sec tor. The Industrials sector headed the growing sectors as its total market capitalization reached KD 3.26 billion, increasing by 4.33%. The Real Estate sector was the second in terms of recorded growth with 4.13% increase after the total value of its listed companies reached KD1.50 billion. The third place was for the Telecommunications sector, which total market capitalization reached KD 4.25 billion by the end of the week, recording an increase of 4.05%. The Oil & Gas sector was the least growing with 0.16% recorded growth after its market capitalization amounted to KD 335.33 billion. On the other hand, the Consumer Goods sector was last week’s only decliner as its total market capitalization decreased by 0.02% to reach, by the end of the week, KD 718.62 million.

— Prepared by the Studies & Research Department Bayan Investment Co.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

BUSINESS

Stock bulls eye Spain, Bernanke and jobs WALL STREET WEEKLY OUTLOOK NEW YORK: Wall Street will open October with a busy week, highlighted by low expectations for global manufacturing data and the US jobs report, but that could set the stage for positive surprises that help lift the market. The S&P 500 finished its third positive quarter in the last four on Friday, despite suffering its largest weekly percentage decline since June. For the past three months, the S&P 500 gained 5.9 percent - its best third quarter since 2010. In contrast, the index was down 1.3 percent for the week.

The benchmark S&P 500 earlier this month reached its highest level since late 2007. Yet uncertainty remains over whether stocks can hold their gains against the headwinds of a struggling economy. That explains, in part, the retreat over the last several days.

The S&P 500 hit a high of 1,474.51 in mid-September before pulling back by a bit more than 2 percent. A run at 1,500 seems possible, but the flurry of economic and world events ahead probably will prevent a major advance in the coming week.

Bulls are betting this week’s Spanish budget proposals will be a preamble to a bailout request by Mariano Rajoy’s government. The move would be seen as a first step to get the finances of the euro zone’s fourth-largest economy in

order and would clear some of the market uncertainty regarding the euro zone crisis. Monetary policy is also on the list of market catalysts next week. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is scheduled to speak on Monday and the minutes of the latest FOMC meeting are set for release later in the week. The week’s agenda includes meetings of the European Central Bank, the Bank of England and the Bank of Japan.

“I think we could see a rebound next week if we get some of the stars aligning and have Spain ask for a bailout, the ECB announcing favorable terms for that bailout, and if we see the Bank of Japan announce further monetary intervention,” said Brian Jacobsen, chief portfolio strategist at Wells Fargo Funds Management in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin.

“If Spain and the ECB don’t deliver, we could set ourselves up for a further lateral move in the markets. A negative would be if Rajoy flat-out denies that they need a bailout.”

The ECB and BOJ are set to meet on Thursday, with the Bank of Japan’s meeting extending until Friday. Chinese factory and business conditions data will kick off a numbers-heavy calendar for markets. Manufacturing PMI, due on Monday, is expected to show a second straight month of contraction.

A snapshot of US manufacturing activity will be provided on Monday when the Institute for Supply Management releases its September index. The September ISM reading is expected to show another month of contraction, but at a slightly slower pace than in August. On Wednesday, the ISM will release its US services-sector Purchasing Managers’ Index, which could show a slight deceleration in the pace of growth in the non-manufacturing sector.

“We have Chinese economic data over the weekend, and we’ll see how markets react on Monday,” said Wasif Latif, vice president of equity investments at San Antonio, Texas-based USAA Investment Management.

“It seems like the market is bracing for bad numbers, meaning if they’re not as bad, it could be market-positive,” Latif said.

Non-farm payrolls for September, due on Friday, are seen up 115,000, while the US unemployment rate is seen ticking up 0.1 percent from August to 8.2 percent in September. The jobs data will come on the heels of the first of three US presidential debates, scheduled for Wednesday night. Recent poll numbers point to a strengthening lead

by President Barack Obama, but a weak payrolls reading could give some hope

to Republican challenger Mitt Romney.

“If Romney doesn’t turn the ship with a very strong (debate)performance, the president is going to win,” said Jack de Gan, chief investment officer at Harbor Advisory Corp in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He said the trend in the polls has taken away some of the market uncertainty regarding the presiden-

tial election. He added that an ECB- or Spain-related headline out of Europe on Thursday could overcome almost anything that would happen Wednesday night during the debate.

“I think the market is coming to terms with the fact the president is ahead, and unless something significant changes, (he) will prevail.” — Reuters

Investors eye the ‘cliff’ as Obama gains in polls ‘Come January, it’s gridlock in Washington’

Wall St banks not among Fed borrowers in Q3 2010 WASHINGTON: The US Federal Reserve on Friday named the banks that borrowed at its discount window during the third quarter of 2010 but the period showed limited activity and none of the biggest Wall Street firms had turned to the emergency facility for help.

The disclosure of the once closely guarded information was forced on the Fed by the Dodd-Frank financial reform law.

Some of the decline in borrowing may have reflected banks steering clear of the discount window because they knew their visit would be published, albeit with a twoyear lag.

Lending activity was very modest compared to the peaks reached during the 2007-09 financial crisis, when banks borrowed billions of dollars to stay afloat.

The 360 borrowers were mostly small institutions and were widely spread across the country from Anchorage in Alaska down to Winter Park in Florida. The central bank had strenuously opposed naming banks which accessed the window, arguing it could put them off using it in times of future stress out of fear it might make them look weak, which in turn could weaken the financial system.

The Fed last year had to disclose details on discount window lending during the financial crisis after media organizations sued for access, but Friday’s release was the first quarterly batch of data mandated by Dodd-Frank.

When the law was enacted in July 2010, the Fed began informing borrowers that the loans would eventually become public.

Fed officials, who spoke on a conference call with reporters on condition they not be identified, said it was impossible to know how much this may have reduced loan demand.

The officials noted that market conditions were relatively calm and said some of the borrowers were simply testing their ability to access the discount window, as evidenced by the relatively high number of small loans. More than 100 of the 732 loans taken out during the period were for just $1,000.

Stocks were generally higher during the quarter, although the KBW Bank index edged down slightly. While the economy had been recovering for a year, the pace of growth was moderate and in November the Fed launched a second round of bond purchases to spur a stronger recovery.

The data released on Friday covers a

wide range of the Fed’s activities, including discount window borrowing and foreign exchange transactions, from July 22, 2010, which was the day after the passage of Dodd-Frank, until Sept. 30, 2010.

Gorham Savings Bank of Gorham, Maine, and Commerce Bank of Kansas City, Missouri took out the largest loans.

Gorham borrowed $70 million and Commerce borrowed $60 million. Both loans were overnight credits, like most Fed discount window loans, although Gorham’s loan was the third it had taken out in as many days. The discount window is a Fed lending facility that banks can access in times of stress and it became essential to maintain functioning markets during the financial crisis.

Officials were not immediately available for comment at Gorham Savings Bank, which reported total assets of about $900 million in fiscal 2011 and a profit of just under $5 million.

Commerce Bank Controller Jeffery Aberdeen could not immediately recall why it had accessed the discount window in September 2010, but noted the bank had more than $20 billion in assets and some of the strongest capital ratios in the industry.

Commerce Bank’s latest quarterly financial report showed it had $1.2 billion pledged as collateral for discount window borrowing as of June 30 of this year. A spokesperson for the bank did not respond to a request for comment on this more recent activity.

During the financial crisis, discount window lending peaked at $111 billion on Oct. 29, 2008, a month after the collapse of Lehman Brothers sent markets into free fall.

In contrast, only $254.7 million was outstanding on the heaviest day of borrowing during the third quarter of 2010, which was Sept. 30, the final day of the quarter.

Regular weekly data from the Fed showed discount window activity stood at $219 million on Wednesday. The release on Friday showed that of the 732 loans made in the quarter, some 450 were so-called primary credit and 30 were secondary credit.

The rest were seasonal loans.

Primary credit is for banks deemed to be in good health, while secondary credit is for firms the Fed thinks are not as financially sound. Seasonal credit is aimed at smaller banks which suffer seasonal swings in loans and deposits, such as farm banks. — Reuters

NEW YORK: As President Barack Obama widened his lead over Mitt Romney in polls this month, traders at hedge funds and investment firms began shooting emails to clients with a similar theme: It’s time to start preparing for an Obama victory.

What many in the market worry about isn’t that high earners may pay more in taxes if Obama is reelected.

It’s gridlock in Washington come January, when more than $600 billion in spending cuts and tax hikes could kick in just as the country smacks into its borrowing limit again.

There is reason to expect a deal. If Obama wins, the Republican fight to make him a one-term president will be lost. With the elections over, there will be little reason or room for political posturing. House Republicans could finally decide to be more cooperative.

“They’ll be faced with determining whether we get a recession or not,” says Jeff Kleintop, chief market strategist at LPL Financial.

But investors remember the budget battle in the summer of last year, which ended with the country losing its top credit rating and panicked investors fleeing the stock market.

Investors are fearful of a repeat. In a second term, Obama would likely again be pitted against a Republicancontrolled House of Representatives.

“If you have any kind of gridlock, you run the risk of inaction,” says Tom Simons, a market economist at the investment bank Jefferies. “This is a situation where inaction is the worst outcome.”

The next fight could get just as messy, but most on Wall Street think Congress and Obama would eventually manage to postpone some of the $600-billion-plus “fiscal cliff” before the year is out and avoid tipping the economy into a recession.

The Congressional Budget Office recently laid out the grim consequences of dropping off the fiscal cliff. Starting Jan. 1, tax cuts signed

by President George W. Bush expire as do Obama’s cuts to payroll taxes.

Federal spending on defense and other domestic programs will drop, while emergency unemployment benefits run out. The combined

effect off all these changes would shrink the economy nearly 3 percent at an annual rate in the first half of next year, the CBO estimates, and push unemployment up to 9.1 percent by the fall. Recent surveys of businesses suggest the threat is already weighing on the minds of executives when they’re making hiring and spending plans.

For the world’s biggest money managers, the fiscal cliff now ranks as the greatest hazard to the global economy, according to Bank of America’s most recent fund manager survey. It topped the European debt crisis, a collapse in Chinese real estate and even a war between Israel and Iran. The danger looms so large to most investors that they believe Washington will find a way to escape it. “Ultimately, I think a deal gets done, but it’s just a question of how long it takes to get there,” Kleintop says. “By no means is it going to be an easy process. Gridlock means there’s a greater chance that this drags on into next year.” Analysts at investment firms have kept a close eye on polling numbers and especially on the

Intrade, an online marketplace where members can trade predictions on events like elections. Polls show voters leaning toward Obama in key swing states. On Intrade, the odds have swung strongly in Obama’s direction, jumping to a 76 percent chance of reelection, up from 51 percent at the start of this month.

Democrats are far less likely to take the House from Republicans, who hold a 50-seat majority. Intrade markets put the chance that Republicans will control the House at 74 percent.

If these forecasts prove right, the balance of power in Washington would remain the same. Democrats keep the White House and a slim majority in the Senate, and Republicans keep the House.

What troubles investors is that the same cast of characters who fought over raising the debt ceiling last year could be taking up the same task again while debating how best to maneuver around the fiscal cliff.

Expect to see a replay of the debt-ceiling fight, says Ian Lyngen, a senior government bond strategist at CRT Capital. Except that this time what’s at

TOLEDO: President Barack Obama tours Chrysler Group’s Toledo Supplier Park in Toledo, Ohio. Will voters in Ohio focus on the revitalized auto industry and unemployment below the US average and regard Obama as the architect of a hopeful but not yet robust economy? — AP

IMF okays gold sales profits to help low-income countries WASHINGTON: The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has approved distribution of $2.7 billion in remaining “windfall gold sales profits as part of a strategy to bolster the IMF’s concessional lending vehicle for low-income countries and make it sustainable.”

IMF Managing Director Chrsitine Lagarde considered this a “major step towards putting our important concessional lending operations for low-income members on a sustainable footing.”

Lagarde said in a statement, late on Friday, that “during the 2009 financial crisis, we were able to boost financial assistance to our low-income country members, helping them weather the storm and preserve their hard-fought gains in the battle against poverty.” “The strategy endorsed today by the

Executive Board ensures the IMF is better positioned to help our low-income members absorb future shocks and underpin their effor ts to achieve stronger and sustainable economic growth,” she affirmed. According to the IMF, the resources are in addition to USD 1.1 billion “that have already been approved for a similar but separate operation to support low-income countries during the global financial crisis.”

Lagarde thanked and recognized “all those member countries that have stepped up to enable us to support our low-income members during the crisis, and call on our membership to demonstrate their commitment again by completing this global effort to provide the resources for our continued support in years to come.” — KUWAIT

stake is the country’s borrowing limit and a recession.

“I’m sure it’s going to go just like it did last time - very messy,” Lyngen says. In one dizzying stretch that August, the Dow Jones industrial average dropped 2,000 points in three weeks. “And don’t forget,” Lyngen adds, “that ulimately got resolved.” The widespread belief on Wall Street is that Congress and Obama will start negotiations over raising the debt limit and pushing back the fiscal cliff when they return in late November - the so-called lameduck session, because newly elected members of Congress will not have taken their seats.

Twists in the talks will likely rattle markets as the new year approaches.

But if stocks do fall sharply, investors expect that would push Republicans and Democrats to reach a deal.

“Ugly negotiations in the lameduck session could really throw the market for a loop,” says Kleintop. “It could be a painful process for investors.” In a report out this week, analysts at Goldman Sachs tried to estimate just how painful the process will be. Goldman expects the stock market will start sinking after the elections as people realize the fiscal cliff “will not be solved in a smooth fashion.”

That’s the reason Goldman forecasts that one broad measure of the stock market, the Standard & Poor’s 500 index, will end this year at 1,250 a 13 percent drop from where it closed Thursday.

But all of that mayhem sounds better than the alternative: another recession caused by letting the $600 billion in tax increases and spending cuts through. It’s also why many take solace in the idea that, whatever their political party, nobody wants the economy to shrink.

Dan Greenhaus, chief global strategist at the brokerage BTIG, wonders if that’s placing too much faith in Washington. “Republicans aren’t losing the House,” Greenhaus said. “So as the odds of Obama winning reelection go up, what you have to ask is: How are these two parties going to find middle ground in just a few months? I have no idea.” — AP

Bank failure in Illinois brings 2012 total to 43 WASHINGTON: Regulators shuttered a small bank in Illinois on Friday, bringing to 43 the number of US bank failures this year. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp said it seized First United Bank, based in Crete, Illinois. The bank had about $328.4 million in assets and $316.9 million in deposits as of June 30. Old Plank Trail Community Bank NA, based in New Lenox, Ill., agreed to assume all the deposits and purchase essentially all of the failed lender’s assets.

The FDIC and Old Plank Trail entered into a loss-share transaction on $172.7 million of First United’s assets. The failure of First United Bank, which had five branches, is expected to cost the deposit insurance fund $48.6 million. First United is the seventh FDIC-insured institution in Illinois to fail this year.

US bank closures are running at a slower pace than in 2011. By this time last year, 73 banks had failed. Bank closures peaked in 2010 in the wake of the financial crisis, but have been declining ever since. In 2007, just three banks went under.

That number jumped to 25 in 2008, after the meltdown, and ballooned to 140 in 2009.—AP

26

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

BUSINESS

Free full insurance on BMW X5 models Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive launches promotional campaign KUWAIT: In line with its policy of always providing the best for its customers, Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive, the BMW Group importer in Kuwait, has launched a special offer on the 2013 BMW X5.

Customers who purchase a new 2013 BMW X5 vehicle (from tomorrow 1 till the stock lasts) will receive free warranty up to five years or 150,000 km (whichever comes first) and a fouryear free servicing package, valid up to 84,000km. In addition, all registration costs will

be paid by Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive, giving customers a convenient and hassle-free start to their BMW ownership.

Furthermore, the importer will be providing comprehensive one year insurance free program along with every purchase, to ensure the safety of BMW customers.

Commenting on the promotion, Yousef AlQatami, General Manager of Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive, said: “Customer satisfaction has always been the main focus of Ali Alghanim

& Sons Automotive, and it is the foundation of our enduring success here in Kuwait. This promotional campaign supports this long-term strategy, and ensures our customers’ ownership experience is a joyful and very special one.

“Ensuring the safety of our customers is of utmost importance, through this offer we provide a comprehensive insurance program, for one year, which we hope will provide added value to our customers, and help us maintain their satisfaction,” he added.

New version of Axis camera management launched in ME Axis Communications, the world leader in network video, has launched an improved version of AXIS Camera Management in the Middle East, a powerful tool for installation and management of Axis network video products.

The tool supports central management of

AXIS Camera Management is designed for efficient management of network video installations that use Axis network video products. The tool can be scaled to handle thousands of Axis network cameras and video encoders and by implementing the tool at multiple sites, all cameras can be managed

Baraa Al-Akkad Axis cameras in a single or multi-site system, enabling both easy distribution of applications to multiple cameras and efficient management of network video cameras for security installers and system administrators.

from one central location. Based on standard network protocols and methods and with an intuitive user inter face, AXIS Camera Management allows installers and administrators to easily configure, maintain and upgrade

single or multiple video units.

“Efficient management of cameras is key to any large security installation and is an important part of our total camera offering. Being able to offer a powerful tool that provides one central point of management further strengthens our offering to system administrators,” said Baraa Al-Akkad, Regional Sales Manager, Middle East, Axis Communications.

AXIS Camera Management can automatically find cameras and other Axis video devices on the network and set IP addresses, configure multiple devices and show their connection status. To simplify device maintenance, the tool automatically provides information about the latest firmware available and downloads and distributes upgrades to the relevant devices. Users can per form sequential or parallel firmware upgrades for multiple network video products.

In this new version, AXIS Camera Management also supports AXIS Camera Application Platform, an open application platform where third-party developed applications can be easily installed and registered to selected Axis network cameras and video encoders.

AXIS Camera Management 3.10, replaces AXIS Camera Management 2.00. The tool is compatible with all Axis video products with firmware versions of 4.40 or higher.

AXIS Camera Management 3.10 will be available for free download at AXIS Camera Management product page from October 15.

Abdul Aziz Ishkenani and Mohammed Taha

NBK celebrates winners of largest campaigns in mega draw event KUWAIT: National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) announced the winners of its largest campaigns this year during the Mega Draw event that took place at the Avenues Mall on Friday, 28 September 2012. The event witnessed sever-

al surprises and fun activities and received an overwhelming response by both NBK customers and excited shoppers.

Najem Abdulla Abdul Aziz won KD 250,000

Al-Jawhara quarterly prize while Khaled Mohamed Bader won the astonishing McLaren MP4-12C, the grand prize of NBK Summer Campaign.

Fahad Boty Mohammed Al-Ajmi , Hind Abdu

Alaziz, Salem Muhammed Salem Al-Mutairi, Hashem Yousef Abdaal, Ibrahim Rajab IbrahimAl-Kharji and Tareq Abdullmohsen Abdul Aziz Al-Sahli each won cash prizes up to

KD 10,000 in NBK’s Summer Campaign, Mohammed Mokhtar Fitouh Al-Saeedy also won one year’s salary in the ongoing ‘Transfer Your Salary and Win’ campaign that is especially designed to reward new NBK customers.

“NBK is keen to always exceed its customers’ expectations”, said Mazin Saad Al Nahedh NBK General Manager, Consumer Banking Group.

“We want all our account holders to benefit with us. Besides the grand draw prizes of the major draws of the largest NBK campaigns other exciting gifts and prizes were given to our customers”. NBK recently re-launched AlJawhara account, by offering customers more chances to win bigger prizes. By offering a KD 5,000 weekly, KD 125,000 monthly and a grand prize of KD 250,000 quarterly draw. During this summer, NBK had launched its Summer Campaign offering NBK cardholders a chance to win an astonishing 2012 McLaren MP4-12C, being the first bank in Kuwait to give away this car as well as up to KD 180,000 in cash prizes.

NBK offers its new customers “The ‘Transfer Your Salary and Win’ campaign which gives all new customers who set up a salary account at NBK a chance to win one year’s salary every month.

The winner Aiman Abdullah Rashid Al-Harbi

Mohamad Naser Al-Sayer & Sons Co congratulates Boubyan Bank winners of Ramadan promotion KUWAIT: Mohamad Naser Al-Sayer & Sons Co held an electronic draw for its promotion campaign “The Holy Month of Ramadan 2012” in Al-Rai Showroom at 6.00 pm, on the 6th and 10th of September 2012, attended by representatives from the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. Abdul Aziz Ishkenani, and Mohammed Taha - Toyota Al-Rai showroom Manager. The winner of the Toyota Land Cruiser 2012 was Aiman Abdullah Rashid Al-Harbi coupon # 260 a customer

of Boubyan Bank.

The promotion “The Holy Month of Ramadan 2012” carried on through the holy month of Ramadan 2012, which enabled the customers a chance to enter the draw for every car bought through Boubyan Bank, entitling them to win a Toyota FJ Cruiser and a Land Cruiser 2012.

The main reasons behind the remarkable success of this promotions was “The customer’s trust in Toyota flagship”. Al-Sayer congratulates all the winners.

Exciting month end offer at Joyalukkas Lulu showroom!

Joyalukkas had announced an exciting 3-day promotion at Joyalukkas Lulu Al-Rai showroom in Kuwait on S eptember 27, 28 and 29, 2012.

Customers received up to 70% off on diamond jewelry. In addition to this, Joyalukkas also offered its customers exquisite precious stone jewelry at cost price for the first time, at this showroom.

The exciting month end promotion at Joyalukkas was valid only at Lulu, Al-Rai showroom. “It was the month end and many of our customers have just returned earlier this month from their vacation, so we have created an exciting promotion

to welcome them back. We offered a large collection of our latest diamond jewelry at up to 70% discount.

In addition to this we will also offer precious stone jewelry at cost price,” said John Paul Joy Alukkas, Executive Director, Joyalukkas Group.

Joyalukkas showroom located in Lulu Hypermarket, Al-Rai is a spacious jewelr y showroom in the Kuwait and offers maximum choice and convenience to shoppers including free parking. The showroom, picked for the special month end promotion, is strategically located to offer customers easy access in the respective catchment.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

TECHNOLOGY

Innovation under the Eiffel Tower PARIS: The new Volkswagen Golf 7 will be one of the showstoppers at the Paris Car Salon from Sept 29 to Oct 14, although it will have to share the limelight with lots of new metal.

Manufacturers are pulling out the stops for the last big auto expo of the year. Compact and midsized cars dominate this year’s edition and they are flanked by some mouth-watering new sports cars.

The show takes place at the Paris Expo in Porte de Versailles.

The VW Golf 7 competes for attention with Toyota’s second-generation Auris. The compact saloon went on sale in Japan just a few weeks ago.

The Auris will not touch down in Germany until the beginning of the new year and customers will have to wait until mid-2012 for a five-door estate version.

New engines developed for the Auris in conjunction with Munich-based BMW will not come on stream until 2014, said company spokesman Thomas Heidbrink. Alongside the Auris, Toyota will be fielding a revised version of the Verso minivan and the GT 86 sports coupe in uprated 300 horsepower trim.

VW’s Spanish subsidiary Seat has the Leon,

which is a child of the company’s MQB modular platform. The chief feature of the platform is the uniform position of engines and transmissions across the marques in a bid to trim production costs. The Leon gets a new engine and fuel-saving start/stop technology as standard. Seat says fuel consumption has been shaved by 22 per cent. The car is slated to enter northern European showrooms from November.

VW’s upmarket arm Audi has a new compact car to show off. The A3 weighs in as a sporting hatch with five doors and a more potent S3 version is waiting in the wings.

The engineers from Ingolstadt have also rejigged the flagship R8 sportscar. The top model is now badged as a R8 V10 and has 550 horsepower.

With automatic transmission fitted as standard the car can bound from a standstill to 100 km/h in 3.5 seconds and has a top speed of 317 km/h.

The new car from Germany’s troubled General Motors subsidiary Opel is called Adam, after the marque’s founder. The company has high hopes for the chic runabout which offers an astonishing range of trim permutations.

Paris visitors will get a preview of the 3.7-metre

compact which Opel badly needs in order to break into the lucrative market for fashionable city cars so far dominated by the best-selling Mini and Fiat’s retro 500.

On the stand of BMW-owned Mini will be the seventh variant of the second-generation babycar.

The two-door Mini Paceman is designed to be a sportier drive than the Countryman while providing more space than the standard Mini hatch. A van concept may be unveiled too, but Mini officials have been tight-lipped about other possible Paris debuts.

Premium maker Mercedes-Benz is playing its cards even closer to its chest. A report in the Auto Bild motoring gazette indicated that another fourdoor coupe codename CLA - a kind of mini CLS could be unveiled in the French capital. The move would be logical since the Stuttgart maker pulled the wraps off a concept coupe along these lines at the China Car Show in Beijing earlier this year. That car was based on the A-class platform.

Porsche has chosen Paris to display the latest four-wheel- drive version of the iconic 911 Carrera and it may be joined by the Macan, the scheduled compact version of the Panamera,

based on Audi’s Q5 SUV. Jaguar’s two-seater F-Type is destined to follow in the footsteps of the legendary E-Type. It comes as a roadster or fixed-head coupe clothed with aluminium bodywork. The elegant shape harks back to the head-turning C-X16 design study seen at last year’s Frankfurt show. The F-Type goes on sale in mid 2012.

Ford’s new Mondeo may break cover for the first time in Paris and the makeover of the best-selling Fiesta will definitely be on hand.

It will need to woe customers away from the new Renault Clio, which gets a three-cylinder, turbocharged 900 cc motor for the first time. Peugeot will be showing the series version of the sporty 208 GTI, while Citroen slices the lid of the DS3 to offer a fresh-air version destined to debut next year in time for northern European spring weather.

German motoring journal auto motor und sport predicted that the high-end electric super sportscar, the fuel-cell SLS E-Cell from in-house tuner AMG, will be on display. Conspicuous by its absence is the so-called Elektro-Golf, the electricdriven Golf version which VW is lining up for a 2013 introduction. — AP

IT provides some answers to world energy problem Inventing the cleanweb

HONG KONG: Apple store employees carry the first customer (red-T-shirt) into the company’s new store in Hong Kong yesterday. Apple opened its second store in the city, part of its plan to extend into the booming China market. — AFP

Apple CEO apologizes for error-ridden new mapping service NEW YORK: Apple CEO Tim Cook apologized yesterday for the company’s error-ridden new mobile mapping service and pledged to improve the application installed on tens of millions of smartphones. In an unusual mea culpa, he invited frustrated consumers to turn to the competition.

Cook said Apple “fell short” of its own expectations. “Everything we do at Apple is aimed at making our products the best in the world. We know that you expect that from us, and we will keep working nonstop until Maps lives up to the same incredibly high standard,” he said in a letter posted online.

Apple released an update to its iPhone and iPad operating system last week that replaced Google Maps with Apple’s own map application. But users quickly complained that the new software offered fewer details, lacked public transit directions and misplaced landmarks, among other problems.

People have been flocking to social media to complain and make fun of the app’s glitches, which include judging landscape features by their names. The hulking Madison Square Garden arena in New York, for instance, shows up as green park space because of the word “garden.”

Until the software is improved, Cook recommended that people use competing map applications to get around - a rare move for the world’s most valuable company, which prides itself on producing industry-leading gadgets that easily surpass rivals.

Apple has made missteps in the past even under founder and CEO Steve Jobs, whose dogged perfectionism was legendary.

“I think they are clearing the air and, more importantly, clarifying why they had to do their own maps,” said Tim Bajarin, a Creative Strategies analyst who’s followed Apple for more than three decades.

He recalled an infamous problem with the iPhone 4’s antenna that interfered with reception when people covered a certain spot with a bare hand. Jobs apologized, though he denied there was an antenna problem that needed fixing. Apple quickly recovered.

But Cook’s remarks went further, saying the company was “extremely sorry” and promising to make swift changes. Contrast that with Jobs’ statement from 2010, when he said the antenna issue had been “blown so out of proportion that it’s incredible.”

Still, Jobs also acknowledged that Apple was “stunned and upset and embarrassed.”

But he insisted the antenna issue was not widespread and only a small number of users complained to Apple’s warranty service. On Friday, Cook said the new version of the mapping app was designed to give users the features they’ve been asking for. It includes turn-by-turn directions, voice integration and a 3-D flyover feature.

Google’s map application for the iPhone did not give turn-by-turn directions or

voice-guided navigation, although its version for Android devices does.

Google, Bajarin said, wouldn’t license the turn-by-turn feature to Apple because Google prefers to give devices running its own Android software an advantage over the iPhone and iPad. Maps and navigation are among the most-used features of smartphones.

Cook said Apple’s maps will get better as more people use the app and provide feedback. That’s true for all digital maps. Google’s system wasn’t perfect when it launched, but it got better over the years as users pointed out mistakes and helped the company collect its vast trove of data.

“Ultimately, what (Apple) discovered early on is that Google had access to 100 million iOS users who helped them build the Google Maps database, Bajarin said. “At some point Apple had to put its foot down.”

It came time, he explained, for Apple to own the users of its mapping service, not Google. But for now, Cook actually recommends that users look at other options including Google maps.

“While we’re improving Maps, you can try alternatives by downloading map apps from the App Store like Bing, MapQuest and Waze, or use Google or Nokia maps by going to their websites and creating an icon on your home screen to their web app,” Cook wrote.

Could Apple have avoided the debacle?

Bajarin thinks so, maybe by acknowledging that the map app was a work in progress.

That’s what the company did when it released Siri, its virtual assistant. Customers understood.

Apple released the iPhone 5 last week and on Monday said it sold more than 5 million of them in three days. Although the number is a record for any phone, it was fewer than analysts expected. —-AFP

HONG KONG: An Apple employee helps a young customer with an iPad inside Apple’s new store in Hong Kong yesterday. — AFP

LAS VEGAS: At the peak of the technology bubble in March of 2000, spending on Internet infrastructure had exploded, Cisco Systems had a market cap of $578 billion, and venture capitalists were pumping millions into anything that ended in “.com.” Over the next three years, 655 telecom companies would go bankrupt, and $5 trillion in market cap would vanish from stock exchanges.

A disaster, right? It felt like one at the time.

Raising money for an Internet startup became nearly impossible on Silicon Valley’s Sand Hill Road. Yet all that investment in the infrastructure of the Internet —the switches, the routers, and the fiber optic cable-drastically reduced the costs of bandwidth and made possible the applications layer, the things we love about the Internet —Twitter, streaming movies, cloud computing. Today we use information technology to do things we didn’t imagine circa 2000, like buying shoes without trying them on first.

All this was accomplished with software and clever ideas for better using the available infrastructure.

We see in this story important analogies with clean energy. Advanced biofuels, electric cars, and solar power are living through their own boom and bust times. The cost of solar panels has fallen from over $4.00 per watt to less than $1.00 in just four years. That’s bad for solar investors, and panel makers are struggling to survive. Some have gone out of business. But at the same time, infrastructure is being built.

Spending on solar, wind, and other forms of renewable energy has exploded, reaching $250 billion per year.

Raising venture capital for capital-intensive clean tech, especially for early-stage companies involved in new types of energy production, has become increasingly difficult. That has investors like us thinking about new ways to apply our dollars to the energy problem. We believe the next opportunity is what we call the “cleanweb”a form of clean tech that takes advantage of the Internet, social media, and mobile communications to alter how we consume resources, relate to the world, interact with each other, and pursue economic growth.

We think that IT and fast-growing Web business models can expand the use of renewable energy. These days the challenges that industries like solar, wind, and biofuels face are often not about fundamental science. Many of the big breakthroughs have already taken place, and in some circumstances, electricity from wind and solar is already cheaper than electricity from fossil fuels. What hampers these industries now is poor sales channels, complex financing and incentives, and a failure to communicate with consumers.

That makes them ripe for disruption by the application of information technologies, which will drive the next phase of cost reduction and implementation, especially for solar. The price of a rooftop solar installation has dropped by half in the last few years, but the reductions in panel prices can’t continue. Now more than half the price of a home solar array is made up of soft costs like site evaluation, customer acquisition, and financing. On average, solar companies spend $2,500 to acquire each new customer.

Imagine the frustration when after sending a truck out to a home, an installer discovers that a tree shading the roof makes the project uneconomical or that the customer doesn’t qualify for financing. That’s a significant waste of time and money. Better information can reduce these inefficiencies. OneRoof Energy, for example, a solar company we’ve invested in, uses satellite imagery to remotely work up a customer’s project, determining its cost and viability long before a truck ever rolls out to the house.

Another company we’re backing, Solar Mosaic, is raising money for solar installations via online crowdsourced loans. We estimate that IT-driven solutions alone can reduce solar costs by another 75 percent; if so, solar could become decisively cheaper than electricity from coal. Eventually it could account for 15 to 20 percent of US electricity needs.

Unlike traditional clean tech, the clean Web doesn’t always have to do with producing energy. Consider peer-to-peer online markets that foster collaborative consumption. Airbnb is an

online service that allows consumers to rent local accommodations in people’s homes instead of hotels. The company probably wasn’t founded with energy efficiency in mind, but given that hotels are three times as energy intensive as the average home, the cumulative impact of reducing hotel use could be significant. The company rents more than 10,000 rooms nightly; while that’s less than a tenth the number of hotel rooms in Las Vegas, keep in mind that these savings are organized almost entirely through a computer program, and Airbnb is growing extremely fast . That’s the idea: obtain clean-technology benefits at the speed and scale the Web can create.

Restructuring markets to save resources isn’t confined to hotels and the built environment.

Car sharing is on a rapid growth curve: the number of shared vehicles rose from a little over 1,400 in 2004 to over 12,000 last year. Car-sharing leader Zipcar claims that every one of its shared vehicles is displacing the need for 15 others. At today’s volume, that’s 190,000 vehicles that don’t need to be built. IT that facilitates videoconferencing and telecommuting cuts down on energy use, too.

Computer programs are only as good as the data we feed them. That is currently a major limitation, but it’s one we see being rapidly overcome. There are currently 2.5 billion sensors connected to the Internet, such as GPS locators on shipping pallets and even volume sensors on trash cans. That number is expected to grow to 100 billion in the next 10 years. With the emer-

gence of this “Internet of things” will come a vast increase in data that can be sliced and diced, creating new opportunities to unearth patterns and possibilities for energy savings.

Utilities across the U.S. had installed 26 million smart meters on homes by the end of last year, and the same is occurring in China and Europe. These meters, combined with sensors in dishwashers or thermostats, will produce much more detailed information about a home’s patterns of energy use. Using this information, consumers will be able to shift energy use to times when it’s least expensive. The White House’s Green Button initiative, which gets utilities to provide customers with their energy-use data, will go a long way in enabling the army of developers out there to create the next great home energy app.

According to the Cleantech Group, venture capitalists invested in 414 cleanweb financing rounds since 2009, representing 18 percent of all clean tech deals. Entrepreneurs, designers, and engineers are coming together in weekend-long hackathon events around the country to see what kinds of apps they can create in 36 hours using public data, like efficiency rankings of refrigerators sold on Amazon.com or the energy profiles of public buildings. We’ve held events in San Francisco and New York City, and a halfdozen more are planned this year. We’re still at the very beginning of this movement. But more people are beginning to understand that the application layer of tomorrow’s energy technology is being written today. —- MCT

Outrage over Philippine cybercrime law MANILA: A new cybercrime law in the Philippines that could see people jailed for 12 years for posting defamatory comments on Facebook or Twitter is generating outrage among netizens and rights groups. The stated aim of the wide-ranging law is to tackle a multiplicity of online crimes, including pornography, hacking, identity theft and spamming, following police complaints that they lacked the legal tools to combat them.

However, the act also includes a provision that puts the country’s criminal libel law into force in cyberspace-but with far tougher penalties for Internet defamation than in traditional print media.

Anyone posting a libellous comment online, be it on Facebook, Twitter or anywhere else, faces a maximum prison sentence of 12 years and a fine of one million pesos ($24,000).

Meanwhile, newspaper editors and other trained professionals working in traditional media face prison terms of just four years and fines of 6,000 pesos for defamation.

The Cybercrime Act also allows authorities to collect data from personal user accounts on social media and listen in on voice/video applications, such as Skype, without a warrant. Prominent Manila blogger Noemi Dado, who edits a citizen media site called Blog Watch, said unwary teenagers retweeting or re-posting libellous material could find themselves facing the full force of the law.

“Not everyone is an expert on what constitutes libel. Imagine a mother like me, or teenagers and kids who love to rant. It really hits our freedoms,” Dado said. While harsh criminal libel remains in force in other parts of Asia, Dado said the new law sent the wrong signal in a country that overthrew the military-backed Ferdinand Marcos dictatorship just 26 years ago.

Dado, a lawyer’s wife known online as the “momblogger”, is among a group of critics campaigning for the libel element of the cybercrime law to be repealed. Bruce Adams, Asia director for New York-based Human Rights Watch, said the law was having a chilling effect in the Philippines, which, with its population of almost 95 million, is one of the world’s biggest users of Facebook and Twitter.

“Anybody using popular social networks or who publishes online is now at risk of a long prison term should a reader-including government officialsbring a libel charge,” Adams said.

Five petitions claiming the law is unconstitutional have been filed with the Supreme Court. The petitions all say the law infringes on freedom of expression, due process, equal protection and privacy of

MANILA: In a file picture taken on May 15, 2012, a logo of social networking facebook is displayed on a laptop screen inside a restaurant in Manila. — AFP communication. The lone opponent when the bill was voted on in the Senate, Senator Teofisto Guingona, filed one of the petitions.

“Without a clear definition of the crime of libel and the persons liable, virtually any person can now be charged with a crime-even if you just re-tweet or comment on an online update or blog post,” Guingona told the Supreme Court. “The questioned provisions... throw us back to the Dark Ages.” The petitions all state that the law infringes on freedom of expression, due process, equal protection and privacy of communication.

Law professor Harry Roque from the University of the Philippines, who filed another, said the country was one of a shrinking number worldwide where defamation remained a crime punishable by prison.

He said the Philippines libel laws-part of a penal code that was drawn up 82 years ago-go against the trend in many advanced democracies, such as the United States and Britain, where defamation is now punished with fines rather than imprisonment.

Amid the public backlash, a number of senators who voted for the Cybercrime Act have started to disassociate themselves from it, with some even saying they did not read the provision on libel.

However presidential spokesman Edwin Lacierda has defended the law.

“The Cybercrime Act sought to attach responsibilities in cyberspace... freedom of expression is always recognised but freedom of expression is not absolute,” he told reporters on Thursday.

Nevertheless, Lacierda said the law could yet be refined. He has called for critics to submit their concerns to a government panel that will issue by the end of the year specific definitions of the law, such as who may be prosecuted. — AFP

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

he a lt h & s c ie n c e

Students, experts recoil at alcohol enema case KNOXVILLE, Tennessee: Before an unruly Tennessee party ended with a student hospitalized for a dangerously high blood alcohol level, most people had probably never heard of alcohol enemas. Thanks to the drunken exploits of a fraternity at the University of Tennessee, the bizarre way of getting drunk is giving parents, administrators and health care workers a new fear. When Alexander “Xander” Broughton, 20, was delivered to the hospital after midnight on Sept 22, his blood alcohol level was measured at 0.448 percent - nearly six times the intoxication that defines drunken driving in the state. Injuries to his rectum led hospital officials to fear he had been sodomized.

Police documents show that when an officer interviewed a fellow fraternity member about what happened, the student said the injuries had been caused by an alcohol enema. “It is believed that members of the fraternity were utilizing rubber tubing inserted into their rectums as a conduit for alcohol,” according to a police report. While Broughton told police he remembered participating in a drinking game with fellow members of the Pi Kappa Alpha chapter, he denied having an alcohol enema. Police concluded otherwise from evi-

dence they found at the frat house, including boxes of Franzia Sunset Blush wine. “He also had no recollection of losing control of his bowels and defecating on himself,” according to a university police report that includes photos of the mess left behind in the fraternity house after the party. Broughton did not respond to a cellphone message seeking comment on Friday.

The university responded with swift investigation and a decision Friday to shutter the fraternity until at least 2015. The national Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity organization also accepted the withdrawal of the campus charter. Alcohol enemas have been the punch lines of YouTube videos, a stunt in a “Jackass” movie and a song by the punk band NOFX called “Party Enema”. But Corey Slovis, chairman of department of emergency medicine and Vanderbilt University Medical Center, said actually going through with the deed can have severe consequences. “It’s something that offers no advantages, while at the same time risking someone’s life,” he said.

The procedure bypasses the stomach, accelerating the absorption rate, Slovis said. Pouring the alcohol through a funnel can increase the amount

of alcohol consumed because it’s hard to gauge how much is going in. “When you’re dumping it into your rectum, often via a funnel, one or two ounces seems like such a minuscule amount,” he said. Ingesting more can create unconsciousness quite quickly, he explained. The effects have been fatal in at least one case. An autopsy performed after the death of a 58-year-old Texas man in 2004 showed he had been given an enema with enough sherry to have a blood alcohol level of 0.47 percent.

Negligent homicide charges were later dropped against his wife, who said she gave him the enema.

Students walking across campus this week generally responded with sighs and eye rolls when asked about the allegations. “It’s like a big joke,” said Erica Davis, a freshman from Hendersonville.

“Because who does that?” Gordon Ray, a senior from Morristown, said the details of the case caught him off guard, but not the fact that fraternity members would be overdoing it with alcohol. “It is definitely over the top,” said Ray. “But it doesn’t surprise me, I don’t guess.” The harm the news has done to the university’s national reputation was on the mind of several students. “If someone wants to be stupid, then they should do it where it won’t

affect anyone else,” said Marlon Alessandra, freshman from Independence, Virginia.

James E Lange, who coordinates alcohol and drug abuse prevention strategies at San Diego State University, said alcohol enemas aren’t a common occurrence on campuses, though normal consumption still contributes to hundreds of student deaths annually. And many of those can be attributed to reckless attitudes about the consequences of heavy drinking, he said. “It’s not unusual to hear that students are drinking to get drunk,” he said. Lange said he hopes students don’t draw the wrong lessons from the University of Tennessee incident.

“Students and people in general are pretty good at denying that they are at risk for whatever happened to someone else,” he said. “So they can look at something like this and say ‘I’m OK because I would never do that.’ “However, they may be drinking heavily, or doing things like mixing alcohol with prescription meds that is putting them at serious risk,” he said. To Tennessee freshman Cody Privett of Sevierville, there’s nothing appealing about the incident on his campus. “It’s stupid, it’s an unfortunate situation,” said Privett, of Sevierville. “I mean there’s partying, and then there’s other things.” — AP

Indian state in grip of a drug epidemic 67% of Punjab households home to at least one addict

BELGRADE: Fisherman Renato Grbic steers his boat under the Pancevo Bridge over the Danube river in this Sept 18, 2012 photo. — AP

Hero fishes desperate from Danube suicide BELGRADE: On a bright autumn day, Renato Grbic was out fishing on the Danube with his brother when he heard a big splash. At first, he thought somebody had thrown something off the bridge. Then he saw a man flailing in the water. “We hurried and pulled the man out,” Grbic recalls. “I remember telling him: Such a glorious day and you want to kill yourself!” It was the first time Grbic saved a life. From that day 15 year ago, his own life would never be the same. The bright-eyed, tattooed restaurant owner from a shabby industrial zone on the outskirts of Belgrade has rescued 25 people who tried to kill themselves by jumping off the tall bridge over the Danube. Always on alert in his little wooden motor boat, the burly 51-year-old has pulled people out of the river’s muddy waters without asking for anything in return. “I couldn’t turn my back on them,” Grbic said. “They are desperate people.” Grbic has been dubbed the “Superman of the Danube” by his admirers and awarded a hero’s plaque by Belgrade city authorities. But even “Superman” can’t save everybody who jumps off the 18-mhigh bridge: At least as many as he had saved have killed themselves at the spot since Grbic’s first rescue. “When I hear that someone has jumped and I wasn’t there I really feel bad,” he said. “My eyes are always on the bridge.”

The Pancevo bridge became a favored suicide spot because it’s Belgrade’s only bridge over the Danube, which is bigger and colder and has stronger underwater currents than the city’s other river, the Sava. The first person Grbic pulled out of the Danube turned out to be mental patient. Grbic took him ashore, gave him dry clothes, hot tea and cigarettes. Later, an ambulance came and took the man away. “That was it,” Grbic says. “He didn’t speak, they never do.” Over the years, Grbic has rescued men and women of all ages and social backgrounds.

Grbic remembers them all, but “they never return or call, they hardly ever say thank you”.

Goran Penev, a researcher with Serbia’s Institute of Social Sciences, said Serbia’s suicide rate is at the upper side of the European average. Penev noted there was a sharp rise in the early 1990s, at the beginning of the wars in the former Yugoslavia, but the situation has been relatively stable ever since. In 2011, nearly 1,300 people in Serbia - a country of 7 million people - took their lives. Grbic has found that some of the people he rescued suffered from cancer or other terminal illnesses, while others cited poverty or unrequited love.

All, he said, felt lonely. “It is a cry for help,” he said. “They often do it in daytime so they would be seen, they want attention, love.”

Only a couple weeks ago, a 22-year-old girl threw herself off the bridge near Grbic’s restaurant. He was there to pick her up and ask: “Why did you do it?” “For my boyfriend,” she replied. “Do you think he would do it for you?” he asked in return. Grbic said the girl was conscious and clear-minded when he plucked her out of the water. In winter, however, it is a question of minutes before people will lose consciousness in the freezing Danube and drown.

On one of those days, in mid-January about seven years ago, Grbic was just preparing to turn his boat to the shore and go home - when he heard a scream. An 18year-old woman going through a mental crisis had burst out of her parents’ car at the bridge, taken off her jacket and jumped, shouting: “Goodbye mom!” Grbic said something had made him stick around: “It was a very windy day, a few minutes later and I would have gone.” The girl, Grbic said, is the only one who has stayed in touch. Every January she comes to his fish restaurant to celebrate her “second birthday”. She is married now and has a child. —AP

NEW DELHI: On a muggy evening in the north Indian city of Amritsar, Sunil Sharma prepares for another heroin hit in a decrepit, abandoned building. Before inhaling the fumes of his brown paste heated on a piece of tinfoil, the 23-yearold explained he had tried heroin for the first time six months ago when his girlfriend left him to marry another man. “I feel bad... why have I become like this? Why have I tied this noose around my neck?” he told AFP, slurring his words.

There are thousands like him across the state of Punjab, which leads the country in drug-related crime with a rate that is nearly ten times the national average, according to police records.

In an affidavit submitted in 2009 to the state high court, the local government estimated that 67 percent of all rural households in Punjab were home to at least one drug addict.

Located on a long-standing smuggling route that sees heroin transported from Afghanistan via neighbouring Pakistan and on to markets elsewhere in the region, Punjab is now increasingly a final destination for the contraband.

When local couriers involved in smuggling “came to know that drugs have a lot of profit then they began to indulge in local selling of these things,” says S Boopathi, assistant inspector general of the state police narcotics cell.

He said it was impossible to estimate the amount of drugs crossing Punjab, but added that “trade is huge”. Rajiv Walia, regional coordinator at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) told AFP that Punjab had “a serious problem because it borders trafficking routes and drug-producing regions.” In the

1970s, Punjab was regarded as India’s “bread basket”, due to its fertile soil, prosperous farmer community and booming agricultural output.

Some, like former addict Navneet Singh, see the growing appetite for drugs as “a problem of abundance”. Singh, a successful restaurant owner who has been clean for 11 years, grew up in a wealthy family.

He believes that Punjab’s relative affluence and its cultural norms, coupled with the easy access to drugs, make addiction a commonplace reality. “Punjab has a very macho culture, very prone to showing off. It’s a ready-made market for drugs,” the 38-year-old told AFP. “What does the Punjabi do when he gets rich? He buys an SUV, a gun and he gets high,” he said. “Then as time passes and you get addicted you will do anything to support the habit,” he added.

Doctor J P S Bhatia has witnessed the problem of addiction in Punjab from close quarters.

When the psychiatrist set up his hospital in 1991, he would see one or two drug-related cases a week. Today, out of the 130 patients he sees every day, some 70 to 80 percent are battling drug addiction, he tells AFP. In response to the expanding scale of the problem, Bhatia set up a rehab centre for recovering addicts in 2003. “I see cases where the son is into addiction, the father is into addiction...the whole family is sick,” he says, comparing the state’s situation to “a ticking time bomb”. Those who are too poor to afford heroin or cocaine take to swallowing or injecting cheap prescription drugs or consuming a locally-produced crude form of opium called “bhukki”, a tea-like drink made from

CT scanners part of Myanmar upgrade YANGON: Myanmar has contracted to buy more than two dozen CT scan machines as an increased budget and easing of Western sanctions allows it to upgrade its ailing public health system. The local agent for General Electric’s health care division, Win Zaw Aung, said Saturday that the health ministry will buy 22 CT scan machines and four CT simulators for training, according to the results of a recent tender. GE announced Thursday that it has contracted to sell seven CT machines for use in public hospitals in Yangon and other cities in a deal worth about $5 million.

Myanmar’s health care system was considered among the region’s worst under the previous military government, whose own leaders would fly to Singapore for critical medical care. A reformist elected government that took power last year has

increased the health budget fourfold for the 2012-13 fiscal year. The political and economic reform measures undertaken by the government of President Thein Sein are intended to revive a moribund economy after five decades of repressive military rule that estranged Myanmar from many Western nations.

Thein Sein’s political reforms, including reconciliation with democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi, have convinced Western nations to lift most of the sanctions they had imposed against the previous military government. In the case of the United States, this allowed companies such as GE that had been banned from doing most business in Myannar to re-enter the market.

GE announced that it has already sold two CT scan units to private hospitals in Myanmar since sanctions were eased. — AP

US approves underskin defibrillator

SAMPOINIET, Indonesia: This photo taken on Sept 27, 2012 shows a ranger inspecting a 10-day-old baby elephant at Sarah Deu conservation response unit in Aceh Jaya. There are fewer than 3,000 Sumatran elephants remaining in the wild, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature, marking a 50 percent drop in numbers since 1985. — AFP

WASHINGTON: US health authorities on Friday approved a a heart defibrillator with leads that can be implanted just under the skin instead of connected directly to the heart. The new subcutaneous device “uses a lead that is implanted just under the skin along the bottom of the rib cage and breast bone,” the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said in a statement. “Because the lead is placed under the skin rather than through a vein into the heart, a physician can implant the device without accessing a patient’s blood vessels or heart and without the need for fluoroscopy,” the FDA said.

Until now defibrillators - small battery-powered devices that monitor a person’s heart rhythm and deliver small electric shocks to restore an irregular rhythm - were connected directly to the heart. The delicate operation to implant traditional defibrillators have potentially grave side effects, such as an infection in an already weak patient. “Some patients with anatomy that makes it challenging to place one of the implantable defibrillators currently on the market may especially benefit from this device,” said FDA official Christy Foreman. The subcutaneous defibrillator is marketed by the US firm Boston Scientific. — AFP

ground poppy husk.

The Amritsar neighbourhood of Maqboolpura has lost so many young men to overdoses or drug-related illnesses, that it is locally known as “the village of widows”.

Schoolmaster Ajit Singh has two cousins who are addicted to crude forms of heroin. Another cousin, whose morphine habit saw him leave home to beg on the streets, died at the age of 31. According to Singh, who grew up in Maqboolpura, the working class community here began to dabble in the sale of opium in the 1960s, when they realised how lucrative the business could be. “First, it was an easy way to make money. Then they developed a taste for the stuff,” he said.

Today, he estimates that each house along the 13 narrow streets that make up this neighbourhood is home to at least one drug addict.

Unlike his older cousins, Singh managed to finish school and he became a teacher of political science and a local community worker. He began by offering evening classes to local children whose fathers had fallen victim to addiction and went on to found a school for more than 600 pupils. Local mother, Kiran Kaur whose two children attend the school, worries for her husband who has struggled to find work as a labourer since developing a prescription drug habit. “I have asked him many times to quit but I don’t think he can do it,” the 32-year-old sighed.

As she waited for her children to finish class, she added: “I can’t see a way out of my life, but things can be different for my children if they study hard.” — AFP

FDA warns of fake online pharmacies WASHINGTON: The US Food and Drug Administration launched a national campaign Friday alerting consumers to the risks of phony web pharmacies. The warning comes as nearly one in four people who shop online say they have bought prescription drugs on the Internet, according to the FDA. “Buying medicines from rogue online pharmacies can be risky because they may sell fake, expired, contaminated, not approved by FDA, or otherwise unsafe products that are dangerous to patients,” FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said in a statement. “Fraudulent and illegal online pharmacies often offer deeply discounted products. If the low prices seem too good to be true, they probably are.”

False online drug stores use sophisticated marketing techniques or fake Web storefronts to make themselves appear legitimate, the FDA said. Drugs bought from such sources may contain the wrong or even harmful ingredients, putting patients’ health at risk, it added. To avoid being scammed, members of the public who choose to buy medication online should pick pharmacies that, among other things, require a valid prescription, are located in the United States and have a licensed pharmacist available for consultation, the FDA recommended. — AFP

H E A LT H & S C I E NC E

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Bayer presents latest innovation in contraception field

By Nawara Fattahova KUWAIT: On the occasion of World Contraception Day, Bayer HealthCare hosted 100 prominent obstetricians and gynecologists in Kuwait for a seminar on the importance of contraception and the latest innovation the company had to share.

Professor Dr Ali Kubba, Consultant/Honorary Senior Lecturer in the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology Guy’s, King’s & St Thomas’ School of Medicine, London, UK, one of the leading experts on the subjected presented the latest innovation in contraception field, mainly the innovative dosing regimen of YAZ24/4 a contraceptive pill which provides higher contraceptive efficacy and additional health benefits.

“The new feature in this oral contraceptive is the shortened hormone-free interval,” said Kubba.

“Conventional oral contraceptives contain 21 active pills followed by a 7-day break. YAZ contains 24 active pills, shortening the pill-free interval to 4 days.” Kubba explained that extending the treatment period of active pills from 21 to 24 days per cycle results in a reduction of hormone fluctuations. “With conventional pills, the seven-day break is the most vulnerable part of the cycle, during which some women experience symptoms

such as headaches or pelvic pain. These women should benefit from a shortened pill-free interval with less hormone fluctuation and accordingly less undesirable symptoms,” he added.

“The shortened hormone-free interval also improves the margin of error and thus the contraceptive efficacy. Taken correctly, all modern pills are very effective. However, forgetting a lowdosed pill, especially after the pill break, may lead to the maturation of a follicle in the ovaries, and in some cases even to ovulation,” stressed Kubba.

About drospirenone Drospirenone, the special progestin contained in YAZ, has both anti-mineralocorticoid and anti-androgenic properties. It counteracts estrogen induced fluid retention, thereby improving typical unpleasant symptoms such as “bloated” feeling or weight gain due to water retention that many women experience especially when starting on the pill. The anti-androgenic properties of drospirenone can lead to clearer skin. Pills containing drospirenone have been clinically proven to be effective for the treatment of mild-to moderate acne, and are approved for use in this indication in many countries including the US.

About PMS/PMDD Many women experience some discomfort before menstruation, mostly a little weight gain with swollen breasts, often accompanied by some irritability or “feeling blue”. PMS (premenstrual syndrome) is more than that. PMS includes physical symptoms such as bloating, headaches, flushes or acne, but also emotional symptoms like mood swings, depression, anxiety, irritability or cravings. These symptoms are severe enough to disrupt a woman’s daily life.

There is an even more severe form of PMS, called PMDD (premenstrual dysphoric disorder).

In PMDD, emotional symptoms are very severe

and overshadow the physical symptoms. Key signs of PMDD include a markedly depressed mood with feelings of hopelessness or self-deprecating thoughts, marked anxiety and tension, marked affective liability, as well as persistent and marked anger and irritability with increased conflicts in the family or in the circle of friends or colleagues.

One sign is very characteristic of PMS and PMDD: It gets better as soon as a woman’s period starts, and it reoccurs after ovulation. Women who suffer from severe PMS/PMDD typically have just one week per month when they feel really well: The week between the end of the

menstrual period and the next ovulation (days 7-14 in a 28-day cycle). To facilitate the intake of the pill for the user, it comes in a 28-day package, with 24 active and 4 in-active (placebo) tablets.YAZ is a prescription drug and should only be used through physicians’ prescription.

Contraception Use One of the earliest forms of contraception in recorded history is the pessary (vaginal suppository) which was often lubricated with honey used by Ancient Egyptian women. Condoms were used by many ancient civilizations and were predominantly made from linen and animal tissue. The first oral contraceptive pills were licensed in the US in 1960 and were used by an estimated half a million women in the first year thereafter. Approximately 85 percent of sexually active women who don’t use any contraception will get pregnant within one year, but in about 45 percent of cases, the reason women are not using a contraceptive method is a perceived lack of risk of pregnancy. The cost of contraception is cited by a further one third of women as a reason for non-use, yet the cost of bringing up a child till the age of 21 in the UK is estimated to be over £186,000.

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

WHAT’S ON

Consular Open House

SEND US YOUR INSTAGRAM PICS

onsular Wing is providing daily service of Open House to Indian citizens on all workings days from 1000 hrs to 1100 hrs and from 1430 hrs to 1530 hrs by the Consular Officer in the Meeting Room of the Consular Hall at the Embassy.

For any unaddressed issues, Second Secretary (Consular) can be contacted. Furthermore, the head of the Consular Wing is also available to redress grievances.

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hat’s more fun than clicking a beautiful picture? Sharing it with others! This summer, let other people see the way you see Kuwait - through your lens. Friday Times will feature snapshots of Kuwait through Instagram feeds. If you want to share your Instagram photos, email us at instagram@kuwaittimes.net

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Indian workers helpline/helpdesk: Indian workers helpline is accessible by toll free telephone number 25674163 from all over Kuwait. It provides information and advice to Indian workers as regards their grievances, immigration and other matters.

The help desk at the Embassy (Open from 9AM to 1PM and 2PM to 4:30PM, Sunday to Thursday) provides guidance to Indian nationals on routine immigration, employment, legal and other issues. It also provides workers assistance in filling up labour complaint forms. For any unaddressed issues, the concerned attache in the Labour section and the head of the Labour Wing can be contacted.

Greetings

American Business Council of Kuwait recommences activity he American Business Council of Kuwait held its monthly membership meeting at the Hilton Kuwait resort last week to recommence the ABCK activity after summer. The members met with senior officials from the MOI and MOD, and a short documentary was run on the role of the Local Coast

T appy returns of the day to Eileen Mariam Ninan who celebrates her birthday today. The wishes go out from Appacha, Ammachy, Ammama, Appa, Amma, Ammuchechi, Chickookutty, Ammachan, Ammayi, Ruhaan & Vivaan, Uncle, Badi Bua, Kunjumanichechi & Kichu Achachan, Nebu Achachan, Bua & Kuttu & all friends.

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Guard, which helped appreciate their service to the community even further. ABCK Chairman, Gregg Stevens, and ABCK Defense Focus Group Head, Angelo Johnson presented the Guests with appreciation. The Executive Director, Muna Al Fuzai, encourages everyone to participate in the ABCK activities.

Upcoming is a full calendar of Focus Groups that include Infrastructure, Health, Oil/Gas, Legal, Environment, Defense, etc. For more inquiries on membership or the ABCK calendar, Please contact americanbusinesscouncil@gmail.com.

angaf based drama activist Babu Chakkola acted as King Mahabali as part of Onam celebrations held at Our Lady of Arabia Church in Ahmadi.

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Kerala’s Excise and Ports Minister K Babu (right) poses with Angamaly Pravasi Association Kuwait (APAK) president Saju Thatchil during his visit to Kuwait last weekend to inaugurate the annual celebration of APAK at United Indian School, Abbassiya.

Send to What’s On upcoming events, birthdays or celebrations by email: local@kuwaittimes.net Fax: 24835619 / 20

Tulukoota Kuwait ‘Merit Scholarship’ pplications are now being invited for “Tulukoota Kuwait Merit Cum Means Scholarship” to be awarded during Tuluparba 2012 scheduled to be held on October 11 and 12, 2012. The objective of this scholarship is to provide financial assistance and support to deserving meritorious students, to enable them to pursue their higher studies. Applications are accepted from minimum one year valid Tulukoota Kuwait member’s children studying either in the State of Kuwait or in India and scoring high grades in Xth and XIIth standard Board Examination held for Academic year 2011-2012.

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Study in Canada exhibition rganized by the Embassy of Canada, the seventh annual Middle East Education Initiative (MEEI) will be visiting Kuwait from Oct 2 to 4, 2012. Representatives of 20 leading Canadian universities and colleges will be available to meet students, parents, teachers and guidance counsellors to present the advantages of studying in Canada. On Wednesday, Oct 3, 2012 a Study in Canada exhibition will be held at the Marina Hotel, Salmiya from 6:00 - 9:00 pm for potential students and their parents to attend. The Canadian institutions will also be visiting local schools to speak to interested students about opportunities to study in Canada.

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he AMIE Winter 2012 examinations will be held between Dec 01-07, 2012 as follows:

Write to us

Audition for ZEE Antakshari or the first time Indian Cultural Society brings you live excitement of ZEE - International Antakshari in Kuwait. Audition & first round will be held in Kuwait, there after followed by semi finals in India & Grand Finale in Dubai. Complete team of Carnival films & Zee TV will be in Kuwait for the final round of selection on Friday 5th October with Jaaved Jaaferi: Celebrity Judge, Akriti Kakkar: Female Bollywood Singer & Host of Antakshari, Manish Paul: Host for Auditions, Sarfaraz Khan: Actor, Director and Producer, Michael Amin: Producer & Director Carnival films world. Musicians, Male Singer & many more for live performances. Final audition at 10 am & music show at 7:30 pm at AIS-Hawally.

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Winter 2012 AMIE examination

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Section A (Diploma) - December 1-4, 2012 Section A (Non-Diploma) - December 1-7, 2012 Section B - December 1-7, 2012 The last date for submission of examination application forms are given hereunder: Candidates not appeared at Summer 2012 Exam: Aug 21 - Sept 21, 2012 Candidates appeared at Summer 2012 Exam: Sept 21 - Oct 19, 2012.

Candidates who intend to appear for the Winter 2012 examination must apply directly to Kolkata by filling the prescribed application form along with requisite amount of demand draft in favour of The Institution of Engineers (India), payable at Kolkata.

‘Leniency of Islam’ n unprecedented initiative of KTV2 (English channel) is the new program by the name ‘Leniency of Islam’ presented by Shaikh Musaad Alsane and directed by Hamid Al-Turkait. The program is mainly meant to address the expatriates living in Kuwait. Religious questions are received through the program email qislam@tv.gov.kw and sms can be sent to- 97822021 and answered by the lecturer and Imam in Awqaf Ministry Shaikh Musaad Alsane - a Master Degree holder in Sharia and fiqih from Kuwait University. So don’t forget to watch the program every Friday at 1:00 pm.

Focus Kuwait 6th annual day s a part of the 6th anniversary celebrations, Forum of Cadd Users (FOCUS Kuwait), a nonpolitical, non-religious organization is set to stage a mega cultural event “Focus Fest-2012”. This mega event will be a blend of traditional and contemporary dance and musical extravaganza by renowned South Indian playback singers Jyotsna and Sudeesh.

Scheduled for the afternoon of Friday, October 12, 2012, at the Al-Jeel Al-Jadeed School Auditorium, Hawally, the mega musical show, is expected to be a super-hit in Kuwait.

Patriotic songs competitions ndo-Kuwait Friendship Society, Kuwait (www.indo-kuwaitfriendshipsociety.com) is planning to conduct competitions in Indian and Kuwaiti Patriotic songs. This is the first time in Kuwait, an Indian Association is organizing contests in “Patriotic Songs” for both Indian and Kuwaiti School students. The first 3 places will be declared separately by Judges who are experts in Indian and Kuwaiti Patriotic songs. Several prizes and awards will be handed over for the winning schools. Pradeep Rajkumar and A K S Abdul Nazar said that IKFS wants let our children learn what they mean as a “Patriotic” to their home country. 4 pages of spot Essay competition related to “Patriotism” also will be held in the same day as a spot registration. 1 girl and 1 boy student from each school can participate in the essay contest.

Dr Mohamed Tareq, Chairman of the First Indian Model School in Kuwait “ Salmiya Indian Model School (SIMS) already confirmed as a Co-Sponsor of the Program.

Conditions apply 1) The competitions are meant for all the Schools located in Kuwait and should be nominated by school authority 2) Each school can select group of 7 students for the ‘patriotic songs’ (Indian and Kuwaiti)” and nominate separately 3) Children of above 12 years till 17 years (VII classes to XII classes) are eligible for the contest. But if School is permitted 4) Musical instruments or KARAOKE mixer should be accompanied by the participating students/Children and the school team should operate and select the mixers 5) Time frame: 7 minutes - Names will be called as “First come” in the Registration The event will be held at the auditorium of “Salmiya Indian Model School” on Saturday, 27th October 2012 from 9:30 am onwards. It will be a full day program with fun and full of entertainments. Food-stalls of different Kuwaiti and Indian tastes will installed.

Dr. Ghalib Al-Mashoor said in a press release that Invitations for all schools located in various parts of Kuwait are already been sent.

Schools under one management but from different locations can also participate in the contest individually. As per the school directory, there 23 Indian schools in Kuwait. The last date of receiving names of the Participants is scheduled on 2nd day of October, 2012 Gandhi Jayanti day. The entry is free to all and due to 2nd day of Eid Al-Adha holidays, a large crowd is expected to attend in addition to, Senior Kuwaiti and Indian citizens will also grace the function.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Kuwait Cricket to organize open tourney for schools

Teachers Day at Carmel ear after year, the students take great pains to felicitate their teachers, in a manner they seem fitting. So it was with the current batch, whose theme this year was “Teaching- A Nature to Nurture.” This was aptly brought to light through a skit wherein a teacher’s hand was most revered for the effect it had on a child’s life. The little ones dedicated a song to the teachers which truly touched their hearts”You will never grow old’ and “Somebody loves you”. Loveleen Allagh and Joyce Peres were felicitated for 25years of selfless service to the institution, after which quite a number of teachers were gratified for full attendance for the academic year 2011-2012.

The day was enjoyable, thanks to the efforts put in by the 11th graders.

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uwait Cricket, the apex body of cricket in Kuwait would like to invite school cricket teams to participate in their tournaments which are planned to be to be held at the turf ground at Sulaibiya. Kuwait Cricket intends to conduct two cricket tournaments for U-15 and U-18 school children who should have valid Kuwait residence and be a student of their respective school. The tournaments will be played on Saturdays at Sulaibiya grounds and the matches will be 30 overs.

Kuwait Cricket’s principal aim is to provide quality cricket to the young school cricketers in Kuwait and guide them to face international exposure which will nurture and develop their sporting skills. Moreover, Kuwait Cricket also aims to make use of sports to strengthen friendship and to bridge the gap between cultures and communities. Kuwait U-16 & U-19 teams have made various successful international tours to countries like Singapore, Malaysia, UAE, Nepal and Pakistan. Participation of school cricket teams will undoubtedly play a pivotal role in ensuring the success of the open cricket tournament and we look forward to your confirmation of attendance. A meeting of school representatives will be arranged shortly.

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WHAT’S ON

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

Embassy Information

The Regency announces winner of first Facebook competition he Regency’s glamorous Silk Road restaurant was the venue for the spectacular media on Tuesday, 25th September 2012 to exclusively preview the extraordinary “China’s culinary Masters” event. On the magnificent evening, the three visiting Master Chefs from China congratulated Wilma Tiburcio Cano who was the winner of the hotel’s first Facebook competition.

Wilma answered correctly three questions placed on the hotel’s Facebook page, as her prize, she and three of her family members will be treated to an amazing Sichuan feast at Silk Road on 27th September, 2012 by Chefs Peng Zi fu, Liu Xue feng and Wang Zao zhu, who were flown specially to Kuwait as guests of The Regency. All chefs have cooked for innumerable Heads of State and celebrities in their native China and in Kuwait will be supervising the Chinese Embassy’s National Day to be held at The Regency Hotel.

The Regency’s Executive Chef, Austen Reid said “We congratulate Wilma Tiburcio Cano and hope she enjoys her culinary journey! I’m delighted with the extraordinary success of this Facebook competition, not forgetting the fact that China celebrates its National Day on 1st October, 2012, it is a fitting tribute to this amazing country to showcase authentic Chinese cuisine from

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EMBASSY OF ARGENTINE The Embassy of Argentina requests all Argentinean citizens in Kuwait to proceed to our official email ekuwa@mrecic.gov.ar in order to register or update contact information. The embassy encourages all citizens to do so, including the ones who have already registered in person at the embassy.

The registration process helps the Argentinean Government to contact and assist Argentineans living abroad in case of any emergency.

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Sichuan cooked by the experts! We wish Chinese Nationals a great day and hope to see many of them enjoying home cooked specialties here at The Regency!”

Director of Marketing, British-born Charlotte Shalgosky added “I lived and worked in China for over two decades and miss the real taste of home cooked Chinese food. This is a real opportunity for Kuwait resi-

dents to get a real taste of China and hope that our gastronomic friends enjoy exploring Sichuan’s superb culinary heritage, its capital Chengdu is, after all, a province recognized by UNESCO for its culinary contributions”.

China’s Culinary Masters will run from 27th to 30th September, 2012 at Silk Road from 7pm onwards.

Introducing the new menu at Luna Restaurant, Hotel Missoni Kuwait una, the popular 18th floor elegant restaurant at Hotel Missoni Kuwait, has introduced a new international inspired menu under the guidance of Ivan Tarrago; Luna Chef de Cuisine. Ivan has worked closely with the Luna team to evolve the restaurant’s menu offering a unique mix of Asian, Mediterranean and Oriental inspired dishes, a first for Kuwait.

The popular restaurant has introduced a sushi bar which will be manned

by Chef Samkhuan Jampanad, an expert in Japanese cuisine with over 18 years experience. Diners will now be able to experience the freshest, homemade sushi, tamaki, sashimi and makimono on a daily basis. Other highlights of the new menu include a range of seafood and meat dishes all inspired by various cuisines of the world. You can enjoy a scrumptious selection of salads and cold appetizers buffet (continental and oriental) alongside a tapas menu fusing together traditional Arabic delicacies with a hint of Asian and Mediterranean influence.

The venue is set to come alive at night where guests will experience a laid back vibe with spectacular views of the city skyline and the glittering Arabian Gulf. Luna has quickly become the place to be and be seen. With its distinctive flavors, comfortable seating and the striking effects of light and dark reflected in the signature Missoni decor, Luna is the perfect place to celebrate, meet with friends or spend a romantic

EMBASSY OF AUSTRALIA The Australian Embassy Kuwait does not have a visa or immigration department. All processing of visas and immigration matters in conducted by The Australian Consulate-General in Dubai. Email: info.ausdxb@vfshelpline.com (VFS) immigration.dubai@dfat.gov.au (Visa Office); Tel: +971 4 355 1958 (VFS) - +971 4 508 7200 (Visa Office); Fax: +971 4 355 0708 (Visa Office). In Kuwait applications can be lodged at the Australian Visa Application Centre 4B 1st Floor, Al-Banwan Building Al-Qibla Area, Ali Al-Salem Street, opposite the Central Bank of Kuwait, Kuwait City, Kuwait. Working hours and days: 09:30 - 17:30; Sunday - Thursday.

Or visit their website www.vfs-au-gcc-com for more information. Kuwait citizens can apply for tourist visas on-line at www.immi.gov.au/e visa/e676.htm.

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EMBASSY OF CYPRUS In its capacity as EU Local Presidency in the State of Kuwait, the Embassy of the Republic of Cyprus, on behalf of the Member States of the EU and associated States participating in the Schengen cooperation, would like to announce that as from 2nd October 2012 all Schengen States’ Consulates in Kuwait will use the Visa Information System (VIS). The VIS is a central database for the exchange of data on short-stay (up to three months) visas between Schengen States. The main objectives of the VIS are to facilitate visa application procedures and checks at external border as well as to enhance security. The VIS will contain all the Schengen visa applications lodged by an applicant over five years and the decisions taken by any Schengen State’s consulate. This will allow applicants to establish more easily the lawful use of previous visas and their bona fide status. For the purpose of the VIS, applicants will be required to provide their biometric data (fingerprints and digital photos) when applying for a Schengen visa. It is a simple and discreet procedure that only takes a few minutes. Biometric data, along with the data provided in the Schengen visa application form, will be recorded in the VIS central database.

Therefore, as from 2nd October 2012, first-time applicants will have to appear in person when lodging the application, in order to provide their fingerprints. For subsequent applications within 5 years the fingerprints can be copied from the previous application file in the VIS. The Cypriot Presidency would like to assure the people of Kuwait and all its permanent citizens that the Member States and associated States participating in the Schengen cooperation, have taken all necessary technical measures to facilitate the rapid examination and the efficient processing of visa applications and to ensure a quick and discreet procedure for the implementation of the new VIS. ■■■■■■■

EMBASSY OF FRANCE The Embassy would like to inform that starting September 2nd, 2012, visa demands for France will be handled by the outsourcing company “Capago - MENA Company”. Capago - MENA’S Call Center will be operational starting Sunday August 26 for setting appointments beginning September 2nd (+965 22270555).

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TEMBASSY OF INDIA The Embassy of India will remain closed on the following days during the month of October 2012: OCT 02, 2012 -TuesdayMahatma Gandhi’s Birthday. OCT 24, 2012 Wednesday-Dussehra (Vijaya Dashami) ■■■■■■■

evening. In addition, Luna is hosting a unique Friday ‘Brunch’, offering an amazing food selection as well as a ded-

icated kid’s playarea. Friday brunch at Luna costs 15 KD per person inclusive of all beverages

Luna International Restaurant is opened 7 days a week.

EMBASSY OF MYANMAR Embassy of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar would like to inform the general public that the Embassy has moved its office to new location at Villa 35, Road 203, Block 2, Al-Salaam Area in South Surra. The Embassy wishes to advice Myanmar citizens and travellers to Myanmar to contact Myanmar Embassy at its new location. Tel. 25240736, 25240290, Fax: 25240749, email:myankuwait11@gmai1.com.

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EMBASSY OF NIGERIA The Nigerian embassy has its new office in Mishref. Block 3, Street 7, House 4. For enquires please call 25379541. Fax25387719. Email- nigeriakuwait@yahoo.com or nigeriankuwait@yahoo.co.uk.

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EMBASSY OF UKRAINE We’d like to inform you that in response to the increasing number of our citizens who work in the state and the need for 24-hour operational telephone in case of emergency the Embassy of Ukraine in the State of Kuwait has opened “hotline telephone number” - (+ 965) 972-79-206.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

TV PROGRAMS

00:45 Great Savannah Race 01:35 Animal Cops Houston 02:25 Natural World 03:15 Shark Attack File 2 04:05 Crocodile Feeding Frenzy 04:55 Killer Whales 05:45 Dogs 101 06:35 Wildlife SOS International 07:00 Animal Crackers 07:25 Meerkat Manor 07:50 Chris Humfrey’s Wildlife 08:15 Weird Creatures With Nick Baker 09:10 Dick ‘n’ Dom Go Wild 09:35 Natural Born Hunters 10:05 Dogs 101 11:00 Crocodile Hunter 11:55 Shark Shrinks 12:50 Mutant Planet 13:45 Mutant Planet 14:40 RSPCA: Have You Got What It Takes?

15:05 RSPCA: Have You Got What It Takes?

15:35 Wild Africa Rescue 16:00 Wild Africa Rescue 16:30 Must Love Cats 17:25 Animal Airport 17:50 Animal Airport 18:20 Austin Stevens Adventures 19:15 Venom Hunter With Donald Schultz 20:10 Squid Invasion 21:05 Shark Fight 22:00 Rogue Sharks 22:55 Swarm Chasers 23:50 Untamed & Uncut

00:40 Extreme Edition 02:05 Extreme Edition 03:25 Extreme Edition 04:10 Extreme Edition 04:50 Extreme Edition 05:35 Extreme Edition 06:15 Extreme Edition 07:00 Extreme Edition 08:15 Extreme Edition 09:40 Extreme Edition 11:00 Extreme Edition 11:40 Extreme Edition 20:05 Extreme Edition 20:50 Extreme Edition 21:35 Extreme Edition 22:55 Extreme Edition

00:00 00:10 01:00 01:30 02:00 02:10 02:30 03:00 03:10 03:30 04:00 04:30 05:00 05:10 06:00 06:30 07:00 07:30 08:00 08:30 09:00

Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home Makeover: Home

BBC World News BBC World News BBC World News BBC World News BBC World News World Features Middle East Business Report BBC World News World Features Talking Movies: Toronto BBC World News Dateline London BBC World News BBC World News BBC World News Click BBC World News Newsnight BBC World News India Business Report BBC World News

09:30 10:00 10:10 10:30 11:00 11:10 11:30 12:00 12:10 12:30 13:00 13:10 13:30 14:00 14:30 15:00 15:10 15:30 16:00 16:15 16:30 17:00 17:30 18:00 18:10 19:00 19:30 20:00 20:30 21:00 21:15 21:30 22:00 22:30 23:00 23:10 23:30

Fast Track BBC World News World Features Talking Movies: Toronto BBC World News World Features Dateline London BBC World News World Features The Ideas Exchange BBC World News World Features BBC World News BBC World News Newsnight BBC World News World Features One Day In BBC World News Sport Today Click BBC World News BBC World News BBC World News BBC World News BBC World News India Business Report BBC World News Our World BBC World News Sport Today One Day In BBC World News Talking Movies: Toronto BBC World News World Features BBC World News

00:10 00:35 01:00 01:25 01:50 02:15 02:40 03:00 03:25 03:50 04:15 04:40 05:00 05:25 05:50 06:00 06:15 06:35 07:00 07:25 07:50 08:15 08:40 08:55 09:15 09:40 10:05 10:30 10:55 11:20 11:45 12:10 12:35 13:00 13:25 13:50 14:15 14:40 15:05 15:30 15:55 16:20 16:45 17:10 17:35 18:00 18:25 18:50 19:15 19:40 20:05 20:30 20:55 21:20 21:45 22:10 22:35 23:00 23:20 23:45

Puppy In My Pocket Tom & Jerry Kids Scooby Doo Where Are You! The Flintstones Pink Panther And Pals Looney Tunes Popeye Classics Dexter’s Laboratory Tom & Jerry Looney Tunes The Scooby Doo Show Johnny Bravo The Flintstones The Jetsons Wacky Races Johnny Bravo Dexter’s Laboratory A Pup Named Scooby-Doo Bananas In Pyjamas Jelly Jamm Baby Looney Tunes Gerald McBoing Boing Ha Ha Hairies Pink Panther And Pals The Garfield Show Tom & Jerry Tales Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals Pink Panther And Pals The Jetsons Duck Dodgers

00:30 Bakugan: New Vestroia 00:55 Bakugan: New Vestroia 01:20 Powerpuff Girls 02:10 Courage The Cowardly Dog 03:00 The Amazing World Of Gumball 03:25 Ben 10 03:50 Adventure Time 04:15 Powerpuff Girls 04:40 Generator Rex 05:05 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 05:30 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 05:55 Angelo Rules 06:00 Ed, Edd n Eddy 06:25 Casper’s Scare School 07:00 The Powerpuff Girls 07:15 Hi Hi Puffy Ami Yumi 07:40 Total Drama: Revenge Of The Island 08:05 The Amazing World Of Gumball 08:30 Adventure Time 08:55 Regular Show 09:20 Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated 10:10 Redakai:conquer The Kairu 10:35 Hero 108 11:00 Adventure Time 11:25 Grim Adventures Of...

12:15 Courage The Cowardly Dog 13:05 Ben 10 13:30 Ben 10 13:55 Powerpuff Girls 14:45 Thundercats 15:10 Green Lantern: The Animated Series 15:35 Hero 108 16:00 Angelo Rules 16:50 The Amazing World Of Gumball 17:15 Adventure Time 17:40 Regular Show 18:05 Total Drama: Revenge Of The Island 18:30 Evil Con Carne 18:55 Courage The Cowardly Dog 19:20 Ben 10/Generator Rex: Heroes...

20:25 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 20:50 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 21:25 Redakai:conquer The Kairu 21:50 Grim Adventures Of...

22:00 Codename: Kids Next Door 22:50 Ben 10 23:15 Ben 10 23:40 Chowder

00:00 00:15 00:30 01:00 01:30 02:00 02:30 03:00 03:15 03:30 04:00 05:00 06:00 06:30 07:00 07:30 08:00 08:15 08:30 09:00 09:15 09:30 10:00 10:30 11:00 11:30 12:00 12:30 13:00 14:00 14:30 14:45 15:00 16:00 17:00 17:30 18:00

Winning Post The Gateway World Sport World Report Talk Asia World Report Amanpour CNN Marketplace Europe CNN Marketplace Africa The Brief CNN Presents CNN Newsroom News Special Inside Africa World Sport News Special World Report CNN Marketplace Middle East Talk Asia World Report CNN Marketplace Europe I Report For CNN World Sport Open Court African Voices The Brief World Report World’s Untold Stories CNN Presents World Report Leading Women Future Cities Fareed Zakaria GPS State Of The Union International Desk Inside Africa Global Exchange

ROAD TO PERDITION ON OSN ACTION HD

18:15 18:30 18:45 19:00 19:30 19:45 20:00 20:30 21:00 21:30 22:00 23:00 23:30

CNN Marketplace Africa Global Exchange CNN Marketplace Middle East World Sport Winning Post The Gateway International Desk African Voices International Desk News Special Fareed Zakaria GPS World Report News Special

19:45 20:00 20:25 20:35 20:50 22:15 22:30 22:55 Cody 23:20 Cody 23:45

00:40 01:35 02:30 03:00 03:25 03:55 04:20 04:50 05:15 05:40 06:05 06:35 07:00 07:25 07:50 08:45 09:10 09:40 10:30 11:25 12:20 12:45 13:15 13:40 14:10 14:35 15:05 15:30 16:00 16:25 16:55 17:20 17:50 18:15 18:45 19:10 20:05 21:00 21:55 22:50 23:45

Hellriders Ultimate Cops How Do They Do It? How It’s Made How Do They Do It? How It’s Made How Do They Do It? How It’s Made How Do They Do It? How It’s Made How Do They Do It? How It’s Made How It’s Made How Do They Do It? X-Machines Crash Course Fifth Gear One Car Too Far Around The World In 80 Ways Deadliest Catch How It’s Made How It’s Made How It’s Made How It’s Made How It’s Made Auction Hunters Auction Hunters Auction Hunters Auction Hunters Auction Hunters Border Security Border Security Border Security Border Security Border Security Mythbusters Mythbusters Superhuman Showdown Chilean Miners Rescue An Idiot Abroad An Idiot Abroad

00:25 Keeping Up With The Kardashians 00:55 Style Star 01:25 E!es 02:20 E! Investigates 04:10 E!es 05:05 Then And Now 05:30 Then And Now 06:00 THS 07:50 Behind The Scenes 08:20 E! News 09:15 Extreme Close-Up 09:45 Extreme Close-Up 10:15 THS 11:10 Ice Loves Coco 11:35 Ice Loves Coco 12:05 E! News 13:05 Style Star 13:35 Style Star 14:05 Kourtney & Kim Take New York 14:30 Kourtney & Kim Take New York 15:00 Kourtney & Kim Take New York 15:55 Kourtney & Kim Take New York 16:55 Behind The Scenes 17:25 Behind The Scenes 17:55 E! News 18:55 Khloe And Lamar 19:25 Keeping Up With The Kardashians 20:25 Keeping Up With The Kardashians 21:25 Keeping Up With The Kardashians 22:25 Opening Act 23:25 Chelsea Lately 23:55 Keeping Up With The Kardashians

00:05 Things That Move 00:35 Bang Goes The Theory 01:00 Bang Goes The Theory 01:25 Wallace & Gromit’s World Of Invention 01:50 Wallace & Gromit’s World Of Invention 02:15 Things That Move 02:45 Prototype This 03:35 Prototype This 04:25 Prototype This 05:15 Prototype This 06:05 Speed Junkie 07:00 Prophets Of Science Fiction 07:50 Weird Or What?

08:40 Head Rush 08:43 Stunt Junkies 09:10 Stunt Junkies 09:40 Mega World 10:30 Wallace & Gromit’s World Of Invention 10:55 Wallace & Gromit’s World Of Invention 11:20 Tech Toys 360 11:45 Tech Toys 360 12:10 Bang Goes The Theory 12:35 Bang Goes The Theory 13:00 Things That Move 13:25 Things That Move 13:50 Race To Mars 14:45 Last Flight Of The Space Shuttle 15:35 Mean Green Machines 16:00 Mean Green Machines 16:25 Head Rush 16:28 The Tech Show 16:55 The Tech Show 17:25 Meteorite Men 18:15 Things That Move 18:40 Bang Goes The Theory 19:05 Bang Goes The Theory 19:30 Brave New World 20:20 Bigger, Better, Faster, Stronger 20:45 Bigger, Better, Faster, Stronger 21:10 Things That Move 21:35 Things That Move 22:00 Brave New World 22:50 Bigger, Better, Faster, Stronger 23:15 Bigger, Better, Faster, Stronger 23:40 Stuck With Hackett

00:10 00:35 01:00 01:25 01:50 02:15 02:40 03:05 03:30 03:55 04:20 04:45 05:10 05:35 06:00 06:25 06:40 07:05 07:30 07:55 08:20 08:45 09:10 09:35 10:00 10:25 11:50 12:05 12:30 12:55 13:05 13:20 13:45 14:10 14:35 15:00 15:25 15:50 16:00 16:15 16:40 17:00 18:20 18:45 19:10 19:35

Fairly Odd Parents Fairly Odd Parents A Kind Of Magic A Kind Of Magic Replacements Replacements Emperor’s New School Emperor’s New School A Kind Of Magic A Kind Of Magic Replacements Replacements Fairly Odd Parents Fairly Odd Parents Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Jake & The Neverland Pirates So Random Shake It Up Jonas Los Angeles Suite Life On Deck Good Luck Charlie A.N.T. Farm Jessie Austin And Ally Shake It Up Minute Men Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Jessie Jessie Good Luck Charlie Good Luck Charlie Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Shake It Up Shake It Up Aladdin & The King Of Thieves A.N.T. Farm Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb

00:30 01:20 02:05 02:55 03:45 04:30 Jones 05:20 06:10 07:00 07:50 08:40 09:30 09:55 10:20 Jones 11:10 12:00 12:50 13:40 14:30 14:55 15:20 Jones 16:10 17:00 17:50 18:40 19:05 Jones 19:55 20:20 21:10 22:00 22:25 22:50 23:15 23:40

Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Phineas And Ferb Minute Men Phineas And Ferb Fish Hooks The Suite Life Of Zack And The Suite Life Of Zack And Sonny With A Chance

A Haunting The Haunted Ghost Lab A Haunting A Haunting True Crime With Aphrodite Mystery Diagnosis Disappeared Forensic Detectives Murder Shift Mystery Diagnosis Real Emergency Calls Who On Earth Did I Marry?

True Crime With Aphrodite Disappeared Forensic Detectives Murder Shift Mystery Diagnosis Real Emergency Calls Who On Earth Did I Marry?

True Crime With Aphrodite Disappeared Forensic Detectives FBI Case Files Who On Earth Did I Marry?

True Crime With Aphrodite Stalked: Someone’s Watching Nightmare Next Door Couples Who Kill Evil, I Evil, I Stalked: Someone’s Watching Stalked: Someone’s Watching Fatal Encounters

00:00 Market Values 00:30 Market Values 01:00 One Man & His Campervan 01:30 One Man & His Campervan 02:00 David Rocco‚Äôs Dolce Vita 3 02:30 David Rocco‚Äôs Dolce Vita 3 03:00 Wheel2Wheel 03:30 Wheel2Wheel 04:00 Danger Beach 04:30 Danger Beach 05:00 One Man & His Campervan 05:30 One Man & His Campervan 06:00 David Rocco‚Äôs Dolce Vita 3 06:30 David Rocco‚Äôs Dolce Vita 3 07:00 First Ascent 07:30 The Ride: Alaska To Patagonia 08:00 The Frankincense Trail 09:00 Long Way Down 10:00 Wheel2Wheel 10:30 Wheel2Wheel 11:00 Treks In A Wild World 12:00 Food School 12:30 Food School 13:00 One Man & His Campervan 13:30 One Man & His Campervan 14:00 David Rocco‚Äôs Dolce Vita 3 14:30 David Rocco‚Äôs Dolce Vita 3 15:00 Wheel2Wheel 16:00 The Frankincense Trail 17:00 City Chase Marrakech 18:00 Market Values 18:30 Market Values 19:00 Food Lover’s Guide To The Planet 19:30 Food Lover’s Guide To The Planet 20:00 Departures 21:00 Travel Oz 21:30 Travel Oz 22:00 Don’t Tell My Mother 22:30 Don’t Tell My Mother 23:00 On The Camino De Santiago 23:30 The Best Job In The World

00:00 01:00 02:00 03:00 04:00 05:00 06:00 07:00 08:00 09:00 10:00 11:00 12:00 13:00 14:00

Caught In The Act Strictly Asian Ballroom The Known Universe Blowdown Alaskan Killer Shark Alaska State Troopers The Border Inside Caught In The Act Strictly Asian Ballroom The Known Universe Clash Of The Continents Shark Nicole Alaska State Troopers Great Migrations

LOVE HURTS ON OSN CINEMA 15:00 Great Migrations 16:00 Animal Impact 17:00 China’s Great Wall 18:00 A Traveler’s Guide To The Planets 19:00 The Known Universe 20:00 Engineering Connections 21:00 Dangerous Encounters With Brady Barr 22:00 Bite Me With Dr. Mike Leahy 23:00 Is It Real? S3 (1 hour)

00:00 Python Hunters 01:00 Caught In The Act 01:55 Hooked 02:50 World’s Weirdest 03:45 Built For The Kill 04:40 Caught In The Act 05:35 Wild Chronicles 06:00 Wild Chronicles 06:30 Swamp Men 07:25 Swamp Men 08:20 Python Hunters 09:15 Snake Paradise 10:10 Wild India (aka Secrets of Wild India) 11:05 Dangerous Encounters With Brady Barr 12:00 Sahara 13:00 America’s Deadly Obsession 14:00 Mother Croc 15:00 Wild India (aka Secrets of Wild India) 16:00 Shark Nicole 17:00 Ultimate Predators GPU 18:00 Squid vs. Whale 19:00 Monster Fish 20:00 America’s Deadly Obsession 21:00 Mother Croc 22:00 Wild India (aka Secrets of Wild India) 23:00 Shark Nicole

00:15 02:00 04:00 06:15 08:00 10:00 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00

01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00

The Running Man-18 Takers-PG15 The Town-18 Hackers-PG15 The Recruit-PG15 The Rocketeer-PG15 Rocky v-PG15 The Recruit-PG15 Aeon Flux-PG15 Rocky v-PG15 Tupac: Resurrection-18 Road To Perdition-18

Love Hurts-PG15 Despicable Me-FAM Helen-PG15 Black Forest-PG15 Love Hurts-PG15 Africa United-PG15 A Trace Of Danger-PG15 Dear John-PG15 According To Greta-PG15 Toast-PG15 Blue Valentine-18 Take Me Home Tonight-18

00:30 The Daily Show With Jon Stewart 01:00 The Colbert Report 04:30 The Tonight Show With Jay Leno 07:00 Late Night With Jimmy Fallon 09:30 The Simpsons 10:00 The Office 11:00 The Tonight Show With Jay Leno 14:30 The Office 15:00 The Simpsons 15:30 The Daily Show With Jon Stewart 17:00 Late Night With Jimmy Fallon 18:30 Last Man Standing 19:30 The Office 21:00 The Daily Show With Jon Stewart 21:30 The Colbert Report

00:00 01:00 02:00 03:00

C.S.I. C.S.I. Miami C.S.I. New York House

04:00 05:00 06:00 08:00 08:30 09:00 10:00 11:00 12:00 13:00 14:00 15:00 17:00 18:00 18:30 19:00 20:00 21:00 22:00 23:00

The Tudors The View Good Morning America Emmerdale Coronation Street The Ellen DeGeneres Show The Tudors The View C.S.I. House C.S.I. Miami Live Good Morning America The Ellen DeGeneres Show Emmerdale Coronation Street House Unforgettable The Killing True Blood The Tudors

00:00 01:00 02:00 03:00 04:00 05:00 06:00 07:00 07:30 08:00 09:00 10:00 11:00 12:00 12:30 13:00 14:00 15:00 16:00 16:30 17:00 18:00 19:00 20:00 21:00 22:00 23:00

Hawthorne C.S.I. New York C.S.I. Miami Greek C.S.I. Miami House Hawthorne Emmerdale Coronation Street The Closer C.S.I. New York C.S.I. House Emmerdale Coronation Street The Ellen DeGeneres Show The Closer Hawthorne Emmerdale Coronation Street The Ellen DeGeneres Show The Closer House Unforgettable The Killing True Blood Greek

01:00 02:45 05:00 07:00 09:00 PG15 11:00 13:00 15:00 PG15 17:00 19:00 21:00

Restitution-PG15 The Town-18 The Net-PG15 Riddles Of The Sphinx-PG15 True Justice: Urban WarfareThe Net-PG15 Men In Black II-PG True Justice: Urban WarfareScott Pilgrim vs. The World-18 Get Rich Or Die Tryin’-18 The Godfather III-18

00:00 Killing Bono-18 02:00 Labor Pains-PG15 04:00 Open Season 3-FAM 06:00 How The Grinch Stole Christmas-PG 08:00 Labor Pains-PG15 10:00 Letters To Juliet-PG15 12:00 Flipped-PG 14:00 Love And Mary-PG15 16:00 Letters To Juliet-PG15 18:00 My Last Five Girlfriends-PG15 20:00 The Men Who Stare At Goats18 22:00 Big Mommas: Like Father, Like Son-PG15

01:15 Chico & Rita-18 03:00 Gigli-18 05:00 Exodus-PG15 07:00 Le Crime Est Notre AffairePG15 09:00 Charlie St. Cloud-PG15 11:00 Eight Below-PG 13:00 Bound By A Secret-PG15 15:00 Charlie St. Cloud-PG15 17:00 Desperate Hours: An Amber Alert-PG15 19:00 Coyote Ugly-PG15 21:00 The Color Of Money-PG15 23:00 Broken Embraces-18

00:15 03:00 05:00 07:00

The Rite-18 Thor-PG15 Zookeeper-PG15 Mean Girls 2-PG15

09:00 Marion Jones: Press Pause-PG15 10:15 Thor-PG15 12:15 Les Miserables 25th Anniversary-PG15 15:15 Justice For Natalee HollowayPG15 17:30 Marion Jones: Press Pause-PG15 19:00 The Adjustment Bureau-PG15 21:00 Oceans-PG15 23:00 Final Destination 5-18

00:00 MSNBC Investigates 01:00 ABC World News Now With David Muir 02:00 ABC World News Now With David Muir 03:00 Live NBC Saturday Today Show 05:00 Live ABC 20/20 06:00 ABC World News Now With David Muir 07:00 ABC World News Now With David Muir 08:00 MSNBC Investigates 09:00 ABC World News Now With David Muir 10:00 MSNBC The Dylan Ratigan Show 11:00 MSNBC Hardball W/ Chris Matthews 12:00 MSNBC The Ed Show 13:00 Live ABC 20/20 14:00 MSNBC Hardball Weekend 14:30 MSNBC Your Business 15:00 Live NBC Sunday Today Show 17:00 ABC This Week With G Stephanopoulos 18:00 MSNBC Melissa Harris-Perry 20:00 ABC This Week With G Stephanopoulos 21:00 MSNBC Hardball W/ Chris Matthews 22:00 MSNBC The Ed Show 23:00 MSNBC The Rachel Maddow Show

02:00 04:00 04:30 06:30 07:00 08:00 10:00 10:30 12:30 13:00 15:00 16:00 20:00 23:00

Live Rugby Union Rugby Matchday Rugby Union Rugby Matchday America’s Cup Highlights Live NRL Premiership PGA European Tour Weekly Ryder Cup 2012 Futbol Mundial Rugby Union Currie Cup Trans World Sport Rugby Union UFC AFL Premiership

00:45 Rugby Matchday 01:15 Super League 03:15 Sailing World Match Racing Tour 05:15 Rugby Union Currie Cup 07:00 ITU World Triathlon Series 09:30 Total Rugby 10:00 Trans World Sport 11:00 Sailing World Match Racing Tour 13:00 Live Sailing World Match Racing Tour 15:00 Total Rugby 15:30 Mobil 1 The Grid 16:00 Trans World Sport 17:00 Live ITU World Triathlon Series 19:30 NRL Premiership 21:30 Sailing World Match Racing Tour 23:30 Rugby Union The Rugby Championship

00:00 02:00 03:00 04:00 07:00 08:00 09:00 10:00 10:30 11:00 14:00 15:00 16:00 18:00 19:00 19:30 21:30 22:00

WWE SmackDown WWE Bottomline UFC The Ultimate Fighter UFC WWE Bottomline WWE NXT WWE Experience This Week in WWE V8 Supercars Extra European Le Mans Series WWE Experience WWE Bottomline WWE SmackDown UFC The Ultimate Fighter V8 Supercars Extra V8 Supercars Highlights Mobil 1 The Grid WWE SmackDown

Classifieds SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

ACCOMMODATION ROOM AVAILABLE A room available in a furnished two bedroom flat for a working class lady in Salmiya — near the bus stop. Please call 99702658 30-9-2012 Sharing Accommodation, room partition for FILIPINO in Farwaniya near Coop main, Contact 66826412 or 66158188 27-9-2012

management job. Call: 65695468. (C 4141) 29-9-2012 Sri Lankan lady looking for house cleaning part time job, English family only. Call 55680045. (C 4149) Sri Lankan driver looking for a job good company or office with good salary, transferable visa 18 (license with pick up permit). Call 97970965. (C 4150) 25-9-2012

MATRIMOIAL Proposals invited for a girl, God-fearing (Marthomite, 30 yrs/160 cm) born and educated in Kuwait and Mangalore, MDS doctor presently working in India, from Post Graduate boys Marthomite/CSI, God-fearing and having good family background. Contact email: mthewjacob201@hotmail.com (C 4153) 29-092012

CHANGE OF NAME FOR SALE

Immediate sharing accommodation available for a decent Indian Christian bachelor or, couple, near by Salmiya garden. Contact: 66884273, 25657832.

(C 4148) 25-9-2012

SITUATION WANTAustralian Project Manager, with two Engineering Degrees and four Master Degrees, with 23 years experience in Gulf and Australia, seeking top

Yuvaraja Dhanapal, son of Dhanapal and Paruvadhavarthani bearing an Indian Passport No: E6580676 having an address 2/59, East Street, Melnariyappanur, Kallakurichi, Villupuram 606 201, Tamil Nadu, India had embraced Islam and changed the name as NASEER AHMAD. (C 4152) 30-9-2012 I, Shaikh Meetela Ahamad, S/O Shaik Mettala Vali, holder of Indian Passport No: F3613218 have changed my name Shaik Meetela Ahmad to Shaik Mettala Imad.

(C 4147) 24-9-2012

Used DSLR Nikon D90 Camera body only for sale with Battery Grip and an extra battery, all with original package. Call or what’s app 66603401 25-9-2012 SITUATION VACANT House driver needed, preferably Philippine nationality, minimum two years with driving experience in Kuwait and transferable residency. Mob: 97162925. (C 4151) 27-9-2012

GOVERNMENT WEB SITES Kuwait Parliament www.majlesalommah.net

The Public Institution for Social Security www.pifss.gov.kw

Ministry of Interior www.moi.gov.kw

Public Authority of Industry www.pai.gov.kw

Public Authority for Civil Information www.paci.gov.kw

Prisoners of War Committee www.pows.org.kw

Kuwait News Agency www.kuna.net.kw

Ministry of Foreign Affairs www.mofa.gov.kw

Ministry of Awqaf and Islamic Affair www.islam.gov.kw

Kuwait Municipality www.municipality.gov.kw

Ministry of Energy (Oil) www.moo.gov.kw

Kuwait Electronic Government www.e.gov.kw

Ministry of Energy (Electricity and Water) www.energy.govt.kw

Ministry of Finance www.mof.gov.kw

Public Authority for Housing Welfare www.housing.gov.kw

Ministry of Commerce and Industry www.moci.gov.kw

Ministry of Justice www.moj.gov.kw

Ministry of Education www.moe.edu.kw

Ministry of Communications www.moc.kw

Ministry of Information www.moinfo.gov.kw

Supreme Council for Planning and Development www.scpd.gov.kw

Kuwait Awqaf Public Foundation www.awqaf.org

REQUIRED Saleslady for fashion multi brand boutique.

• Experience required • Transferable visa • Computer skills ctojob2012@gmail.com

Prayer timings

Fajr:

04:22

Duhr:

11:38

Asr:

15:02

Maghrib:

17:35

Isha:

18:51

Ministry of Interior website: www.moi.gov.kw

112

DIAL 161 FOR AIRPORT INFORMATION

Airlines JZR QTR JZR JZR ETH RJA GFA UAE ETD FDB MSR RBG QTR KAC THY CLX DHX JZR JZR KAC BAW KAC KAC FDB KAC KAC KAC KAC UAE ABY IRA GFA QTR FDB IRA ETD GFA UAE MEA JZR IRC MSR MSC JZR SYR KAC MSR GFA KAC FDB KAC KNE KAC

Arrival Flights on Sunday 30/9/2012 Flt Route 185 DUBAI 148 DOHA 539 CAIRO 267 BEIRUT 620 ADDIS ABABA 642 AMMAN 211 BAHRAIN 853 DUBAI 305 ABU DHABI 67 DUBAI 612 CAIRO 3553 ALEXANDRIA 138 DOHA 544 CAIRO 770 ISTANBUL 792 LUXEMBOURG 170 BAHRAIN 505 LUXOR 555 ALEXANDRIA 412 MANILA 157 LONDON 206 ISLAMABAD 382 DELHI 53 DUBAI 302 MUMBAI 332 TRIVANDRUM 352 COCHIN 284 DHAKA 855 DUBAI 125 SHARJAH 615 SHAHRE KORD 223 BAHRAIN 132 DOHA 55 DUBAI 603 SHIRAZ 301 ABU DHABI 213 BAHRAIN 871 DUBAI 404 BEIRUT 165 DUBAI 6801 AHWAZ 618 ALEXANDRIA 401 ALEXANDRIA 561 SOHAG 341 DAMASCUS 742 DAMMAM 610 CAIRO 219 BAHRAIN 672 DUBAI 57 DUBAI 774 RIYADH 472 JEDDAH 538 SOHAG

Time 0:15 0:20 0:30 0:50 1:45 2:10 2:20 2:25 2:30 3:10 3:20 3:20 3:25 4:10 4:35 4:55 5:00 5:55 6:00 6:15 6:30 7:15 7:30 7:45 7:50 7:55 8:05 8:15 8:25 8:30 8:35 8:40 9:00 9:20 9:25 9:30 10:00 10:45 10:55 11:05 11:10 11:25 12:00 12:25 12:35 13:25 13:30 13:40 13:40 13:45 13:45 14:15 14:20

QTR SVA RJA QTR JZR ETD UAE UAL GFA SVA JZR JZR ABY KAC KAC QTR KAC KAC FDB MSR MSC JZR KAC KAC JAI KAC KAC AXB FDB OMA MEA QTR GFA ALK KAC JZR KLM UAE JZR ETD KAC ABY QTR LMU AIC FDB GFA UAL JZR DLH MSR THY JAI PIA

140 500 640 134 535 303 857 982 215 510 177 777 127 502 542 144 786 166 63 624 405 787 618 674 572 102 562 389 61 647 402 146 221 229 514 481 417 859 135 307 172 129 136 1109 981 59 217 981 239 636 614 772 574 205

DOHA JEDDAH AMMAN DOHA CAIRO ABU DHABI DUBAI WASHINGTON DC DULLES BAHRAIN RIYADH DUBAI JEDDAH SHARJAH BEIRUT CAIRO DOHA JEDDAH PARIS DUBAI SOHAG SOHAG RIYADH DOHA DUBAI MUMBAI NEW YORK AMMAN KOZHIKODE DUBAI MUSCAT BEIRUT DOHA BAHRAIN COLOMBO TEHRAN SABIHA AMSTERDAM DUBAI BAHRAIN ABU DHABI FRANKFURT SHARJAH DOHA ALEXANDRIA CHENNAI DUBAI BAHRAIN BAHRAIN AMMAN FRANKFURT CAIRO ISTANBUL MUMBAI LAHORE

14:25 14:30 14:55 15:15 16:00 16:35 16:55 17:10 17:20 17:20 17:30 17:40 17:45 18:00 18:15 18:20 18:40 18:40 18:45 18:55 19:00 19:10 19:20 19:25 19:35 19:35 19:50 19:55 20:00 20:10 20:15 20:25 20:35 20:55 20:55 20:55 21:05 21:15 21:15 21:25 21:25 21:30 21:35 22:00 22:25 22:30 22:35 22:40 22:55 23:10 23:35 23:40 23:50 23:55

Airlines 976 FDB UAL DLH MSR DHX JAI THY ETH UAE FDB RBG ETD MSR QTR QTR JZR RJA JZR GFA THY KAC CLX BAW FDB KAC ABY JZR KAC GFA IRA UAE QTR KAC FDB ETD IRA KAC KAC GFA KAC MEA KAC IRC JZR UAE MSR KAC MSC KAC JZR JZR SYR

Depature Flights on Sunday 30/9/2012 Flt Route 320 GOA 52 DUBAI 981 WASHINGTON DC DULLES 637 FRANKFURT 615 CAIRO 373 BAHRAIN 573 MUMBAI 773 ISTANBUL 621 ADDIS ABABA 854 DUBAI 68 DUBAI 3554 ALEXANDRIA 306 ABU DHABI 613 CAIRO 139 DOHA 149 DOHA 560 SOHAG 643 AMMAN 164 DUBAI 212 BAHRAIN 771 ISTANBUL 537 SOHAG 792 GIALAM 156 LONDON 54 DUBAI 171 FRANKFURT 126 SHARJAH 534 CAIRO 671 DUBAI 224 BAHRAIN 614 SHAHRE-KORD 856 DUBAI 133 DOHA 117 NEW YORK 56 DUBAI 302 ABU DHABI 602 SHIRAZ 741 DAMMAM 773 RIYADH 214 BAHRAIN 541 CAIRO 405 BEIRUT 501 BEIRUT 6802 AHWAZ 776 JEDDAH 872 DUBAI 623 SOHAG 103 LONDON 406 SOHAG 785 JEDDAH 480 ISTANBUL 176 DUBAI 342 DAMASCUS

Time 0:05 0:10 0:25 0:30 0:35 0:40 0:50 2:15 2:45 3:45 3:50 4:00 4:05 4:20 4:50 5:40 6:00 6:50 6:55 7:05 7:10 8:05 8:15 8:25 8:25 8:55 9:05 9:10 9:20 9:25 9:35 9:40 10:00 10:00 10:05 10:15 10:25 10:25 10:25 10:45 11:30 11:55 12:00 12:10 12:15 12:20 12:25 12:30 13:00 13:10 13:15 13:20 13:35

Directorate General of Civil Aviation Home Page (www.kuwait-airport.com.kw)

GFA FDB MSR KAC KAC KNE SVA KAC JZR RJA QTR KAC ETD JZR JZR QTR UAE GFA JZR ABY UAL SVA JZR QTR FDB MSR MSC JZR KAC JAI FDB KAC KAC OMA MEA GFA JZR DHX ALK KLM ABY ETD UAE KAC QTR KAC KAC JZR LMU QTR AXB FDB GFA KAC KAC

220 58 611 561 673 473 503 617 786 641 135 513 304 238 538 141 858 216 134 128 982 511 266 145 64 621 402 184 361 571 62 283 351 648 403 222 502 171 230 417 120 308 860 343 137 301 205 554 1110 147 390 60 218 411 415

BAHRAIN DUBAI CAIRO AMMAN DUBAI JEDDAH MADINAH DOHA RIYADH AMMAN DOHA TEHRAN ABU DHABI AMMAN CAIRO DOHA DUBAI BAHRAIN BAHRAIN SHARJAH BAHRAIN RIYADH BEIRUT DOHA DUBAI ALEXANDRIA ALEXANDRIA DUBAI COLOMBO MUMBAI DUBAI DHAKA KOCHI MUSCAT BEIRUT BAHRAIN LUXOR BAHRAIN COLOMBO DAMMAM SHARJAH ABU DHABI DUBAI CHENNAI DOHA MUMBAI ISLAMABAD ALEXANDRIA ALEXANDRIA DOHA MANGALORE DUBAI BAHRAIN BANGKOK KUALA LUMPUR

14:25 14:25 14:30 14:40 15:05 15:15 15:45 15:45 15:50 15:50 16:15 16:25 17:20 17:30 17:40 17:45 18:05 18:20 18:20 18:25 18:30 18:35 18:50 19:20 19:25 19:55 20:00 20:05 20:20 20:35 20:40 20:45 21:05 21:10 21:15 21:35 21:45 21:50 21:55 22:05 22:10 22:20 22:25 22:30 22:35 22:40 22:45 23:00 23:05 23:10 23:10 23:15 23:30 23:40 23:50

34

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

s ta rs CROSSWORD 812

STAR TRACK

CALVIN & HOBBES

Aries (March 21-April 19) With mature self-respect you are able to stabilize and handle your responsibilities successfully. You can simplify and organize your duties with administrative authority. Superiors tend to approve of your capabilities and plans. You feel an expanded sense of self-confidence and optimism. You may receive appreciation for the goals you have achieved and will probably broaden your contacts with successful professional people. Put your inventive ambitions to practical use to gain greater control and independence.

This is a good time to improve your education or broaden your experience through travel. A sister company to the one you work for may be located in another country—you could ask to go along on the next work trip to help.

Taurus (April 20-May 20) You may need to communicate more with marriage than business partners today. If you have the choice of whether to go into work or stay at home, you vote for home. Later today you may find yourself enjoying a close association with intellectual or scholarly individuals. This afternoon you may enjoy a social activity related to cultural, religious or educational institutions. You may wish to explore philosophical attitudes concerning marriage, romance and other social relationships. The urge to travel is also strong. You may enjoy relaxing with a walk through a park, walking your dog or arm in arm with your sweetheart.

Students have the passion to study and will do well in studying for upcoming exams. Keep a protein snack on hand.

POOCH CAFE ACROSS 1. A condition (mostly in boys) characterized by behavioral and learning disorders.

4. Having the equatorial diameter greater than the polar diameter.

10. (Irish) Mother of the ancient Irish gods.

13. A constellation in the southern hemisphere near Telescopium and Norma.

14. Of or like a cecum.

15. The act of slowing down or falling behind.

16. Extremely pleasing.

17. (anatomy) A natural hollow or sinus within the body.

19. Small terrestrial lizard of warm regions of the Old World.

21. Genus of western North American low-growing herbs having linear woolly leaves and large pink flowers.

23. Naked freshwater or marine or parasitic protozoa that form temporary pseudopods for feeding and locomotion.

26. A public promotion of some product or service.

27. A woman hired to suckle a child of someone else.

30. A river in north central Switzerland that runs northeast into the Rhine.

31. 100 ngwee equal 1 kwacha.

35. Cubes of meat marinated and cooked on a skewer usually with vegetables.

36. United States swimmer who in 1926 became the first woman to swim the English Channel (1903- ).

37. (folklore) A small grotesque supernatural creature that makes trouble for human beings.

40. The rate at which red blood cells settle out in a tube of blood under standardized conditions.

41. Inspired by a feeling of fearful wonderment or reverence.

43. A compartment in front of a motor vehicle where driver sits.

46. Jordan's port.

47. A soft white precious univalent metallic element having the highest electrical and thermal conductivity of any metal.

48. Someone who works (or provides workers) during a strike.

51. (astronomy) "the nebular hypothesis of the origin of the solar system".

56. An implement used to propel or steer a boat.

59. Type genus of the Alcidae comprising solely the razorbill.

60. The law enforcement agency in the Justice Department.

61. Commodities (goods or services) bought from a foreign country.

63. A large vase that usually has a pedestal or feet.

64. Title for a civil or military leader (especially in Turkey).

65. Suggestive of youth.

66. A doctor's degree in education.

DOWN 1. A Chadic language spoken south of Lake Chad.

2. (informal) Exceptionally good.

3. A Chadic language spoken south of Lake Chad.

4. English scholastic philosopher and assumed author of Occam's Razor (1285-1349).

5. The cry made by sheep.

6. The basic unit of money in Bulgaria.

7. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug (trade names Acular and Toradol) that is administered only intramuscularly.

8. Flat and uninspiring.

9. Angular distance above the horizon (especially of a celestial object).

10. By bad luck.

11. Medium-sized tree having glossy lanceolate leaves.

12. Title for a civil or military leader (especially in Turkey).

18. Minute two-winged mosquito-like fly lacking biting mouthparts.

20. A member of the Siouan people formerly living in the Missouri river valley in NE Nebraska.

22. A baton used by a magician or water diviner.

24. (Akkadian) God of wisdom.

25. African tree having an exceedingly thick trunk and fruit that resembles a gourd and has an edible pulp called monkey bread.

28. The sound made by a cat (or any sound resembling this).

29. A French abbot.

32. English architect who designed more than fifty London churches (1632-1723).

33. Other than what is under consideration or implied.

34. Suggestive of the supernatural.

38. The academic world.

39. The trait of lacking restraint or control.

40. Flat and uninspiring.

42. A light touch or stroke.

44. A workplace for the conduct of scientific research.

45. Largest known toad species.

49. Open-heart surgery in which the rib cage is opened and a section of a blood vessel is grafted from the aorta to the coronary artery to bypass the blocked section of the coronary artery and improve the blood supply to the heart.

50. An elaborate song for solo voice.

52. Long-bodied long-tailed tropical American wildcat.

53. (Welsh) A warrior god.

54. A unit of area (4840 square yards) used in English-speaking countries.

55. The basic unit of money in South Africa.

57. The virus that causes acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).

58. The month following March and preceding May. 59. A colorless and odorless inert gas.

62. A soft gray malleable metallic element that resembles tin but discolors on exposure to air.

Yesterday’s Solution

Gemini (May 21-June 20) You are realistic about your abilities and expectations for success and may find yourself guiding others. Today it is best to engage in work that requires little risk of financial loss or original thought. This is an excellent time to tend to the details that others previously neglected. This is not a particularly good time to invest or gamble. Maternal instincts may surface now. You make every effort to appease any discordance near you. In addition, there is a strong wish to make your surroundings pleasant. Try to see where you can best improve your relations with family and friends in the near future. It may be a time to pull closer to a loved one, or perhaps a time to start anew. A restaurant owner surprises you with a little extra attention tonight.

Cancer (June 21-July 22)

NON SEQUITUR

You are considerate and patient with co-workers, friends and family this day. Companionship with others is most rewarding— you should take every opportunity to allow others to enjoy your friendly self. This is a time when the desire for material success is great. You must be judicious in personal decisions about finances. You have a restlessness today, which may manifest itself as a need to strike out on your own, giving your creative energies free reign.

Consider hopping on a bus and riding around the route just to see where it goes and do a bit of people watching as well. Now is a time when you enjoy good relations with family members and the financial position may improve because of your association with a relative. There is an interest in mystical matters.

Leo (July 23-August 22)

Yesterday’s Solution

You may enjoy social activity related to cultural, religious or educational institutions and plan a future trip to just such a place. This could mean the beginning of some sort of service to others and may call for you to join a volunteer group. You are wonderful with young people and may find that a camp for youth is a fine place for your talents to blossom. You listen well and your advice is always geared to what the person needs; congratulations on your sensitivity. Coaching and sports for a pastime activity floats your boat, so to speak. You may wish to explore philosophical attitudes concerning marriage, romance and other social relationships. When in solitude, you are able to relax in peace and contentment and grow spiritually.

Virgo (August 23-September 22) Those who hold authority over you have the stronger position—avoid confrontations—show respect. Your need to communicate well, take short trips and visit with customers is increased today.

Someone giving you a gift or presenting you with some good information that you have been trying to find may surprise you. You may share in some confidential matter, or be engaged in some form of research or survey. Sexual energy and personal magnetism are high. If you are in a sexual relationship balanced by love, it will be a very nice time. If you are seeking a new love relationship, be aware that you could be leading with your libido—the chances are very high that you may choose someone primarily for physical reasons.

Libra (September 23-October 22) Your ambition is strong; you have the interest to accomplish much. However, there could be opposition through competition. How you handle these tests determine whether you will use this time to your benefit. Make sure projects are completed before going ahead with new ones. Take great pains to respect others and you should be able to achieve your objectives. You can devote more of your energies toward healing, intuitive sensitivity, imagination, fantasy, visualization and compassion for those who are lonely or needy. Your hobby or interests may also turn to art, music therapy, cooking or social work in the evenings. This can be a day of improved communication with friends, groups and organizations—perhaps you will teach.

Scorpio (October 23-November 21) You have a strong urge for freedom and may wish to break with your old relationships or responsibilities. New relationships may be exciting but not enduring. You may be determined to make more money.

A part-time job would be commendable but do not forget that fun is a part of a balanced life as well—so, leave time for fun. Improved resourcefulness and material values can lead to better financial security. It is a good time to hunt for bargains, store useful goods, pay debts and invest in your future. Use your money wisely; you are apt to spend more on speculation, hobbies, leisure time and children. This evening a social gathering in your home or the home of a friend will teach you something new . . . we learn from our friends.

Sagittarius (November 22-December 21) There is a mild energy available which may be best suited to easygoing pursuits. You may take an intellectual interest in the subconscious mind and psychological healing now. Your imagination and psychic sensitivity is stimulated through communications. You may have a desire to withdraw or escape from mundane duties and work in order to serve higher ideals. You will be smart to persevere through the workday; you will accomplish more than you thought you could. An innocent flirtation, a movie or a stroll through an art gallery are all favorably indicated this evening. Watch your budget, but have fun. Chances are also good that you and your partner may be able to air some things that have been going on under the surface.

Word Search

Yesterday’s Solution Capricorn (December 22-January 19) Your responsibilities toward others may increase. It’s a good time to develop your negotiating skills and ability to coordinate joint or team efforts. Unexpected changes can disrupt the usual order and routine of your life. You may want command over your time and your creative expression in your work—those in control tend to be unsympathetic. You may give or receive advice and you may have sudden intuitive ideas. Friends are generally cooperative, kind and considerate. This afternoon you and your friends may look for constructive outlets for physical energies in exercise, games, cleaning and repairs. Exercise self-control and avoid taking unnecessary risks in unconventional areas. Communication with difficult people improves.

Aquarius (January 20- February 18) This day may be more of a free-flow type of day. Expect interruptions. You or a co-worker friend of yours may revisit a childhood memory—this could be healing. You could be in for trouble if you try to restrict the people close to you, or if they try to contain you now. Enjoy some form of live entertainment after work today! This whole day is positive and has good results in the workplace and at home. You enjoy gardening, cooking, music or specialty techniques this afternoon. Now would be a good time to begin building or creating the plans for the hothouse you wanted for your gardening hobby.

A local charity project brings you in contact with people that are likeminded. You may enjoy some volunteer work this evening.

Pisces (February 19-March 20) It takes great effort to understand others’ points of view. If you do not make this effort, you may have to repeat whatever you are doing today. Do not try to settle arguments just now . . . agree to disagree.

It is best to have some time alone to think and make decisions without interruptions—which may mean you will need to take a break. Work that requires precision, careful planning and patience is favored. You could plan a water or vegetable garden and with your interest, you could make great headway in getting the project underway or even completed. You will be practical and frugal when necessary and even in times of plenty; you will not waste valuable resources— making you a wonderful mentor to the young people around you.

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

i n f o r m at i o n For labor-related inquiries and complaints: Call MSAL hotline 128 GOVERNORATE Sabah Hospital

24812000

Amiri Hospital

22450005

Maternity Hospital

24843100

Mubarak Al-Kabir Hospital

25312700

Chest Hospital

24849400

Farwaniya Hospital

24892010

Adan Hospital

23940620

Ibn Sina Hospital

24840300

Al-Razi Hospital

24846000

Physiotherapy Hospital

24874330/9

Kaizen center

25716707

Roudha

22517733

Adhaliya

22517144

Khaldiya

24848075

Keifan

24849807

Shamiya

24848913

Shuwaikh

24814507

Abdullah Salim

22549134

Al-Nuzha

22526804

Industrial Shuwaikh

24814764

Al-Khadissiya

22515088

Dasmah

22532265

Bneid Al-Ghar

22531908

Al-Shaab

22518752

Al-Kibla

22459381

Ayoun Al-Kibla

PHARMACY

ADDRESS

PHONE

Ahmadi

Sama Safwan Abu Halaifa Danat Al-Sultan

Fahaeel Makka St Abu Halaifa-Coastal Rd Mahboula Block 1, Coastal Rd

23915883 23715414 23726558

Jahra

Modern Jahra Madina Munawara

Jahra-Block 3 Lot 1 Jahra-Block 92

24575518 24566622

Capital

Ahlam Khaldiya Coop

Fahad Al-Salem St Khaldiya Coop

22436184 24833967

Farwaniya

New Shifa Ferdous Coop Modern Safwan

Farwaniya Block 40 Ferdous Coop Old Kheitan Block 11

24734000 24881201 24726638

Tariq Hana Ikhlas Hawally & Rawdha Ghadeer Kindy Ibn Al-Nafis Mishrif Coop Salwa Coop

Salmiya-Hamad Mubarak St Salmiya-Amman St Hawally-Beirut St Hawally & Rawdha Coop Jabriya-Block 1A Jabriya-Block 3B Salmiya-Hamad Mubarak St Mishrif Coop Salwa Coop

25726265 25647075 22625999 22564549 25340559 25326554 25721264 25380581 25628241

Hawally

ST TAT TE OF KUW K WA AIT

el.: 161 Te

DIRECTORA AT TE GENERAL GENE OF CIVIL AV VIA ATION T METEOROLOGICAL DEP PA ARTMENT

Ext.: 2627 262 - 2630

WWW.MET.GOV V..KW

Hot and relatively humid weather especially over coastal areas with light variable wind changing to light to moderate north westerly wind, with speed of 08 - 30 km/h

BY Y NIGHT:

Humid weather especially over coastal areas with light variable wind changing to light to moderate northerly wind, with speed of 08 - 26 km/h No Current Warnings arnin a

WARNING A

38 °C

27 °C

22451082

KUW WA AIT AIRPOR RT

41 °C

23 °C

Al-Mirqab

22456536

NUW WA AISEEB

39 °C

23 °C

Sharq

22465401

WAFRA A

42 °C

25 °C

Salmiya

25746401

SALMI

41 °C

25 °C

ABDAL LY

Jabriya

25316254

43 °C

24 °C

JAL ALIY YA AH

42 °C

25 °C

Maidan Hawally

25623444

FA AILAKA

37 °C

26 °C

Bayan

25388462

AHMADI POR RT

33 °C

30 °C

Mishref

25381200

UMM AL-MARADEM

34 °C

29 °C

W.Hawally

22630786

WARBA A A - BUBY YA AN

33 °C

21 °C

Sabah

24810221

Jahra

24770319

New Jahra

24575755

West Jahra

24772608

ST TATION T

South Jahra

SFC. CHART

29/09/2012 0000 UTC

4 DA AY YS FORECAST Temperatures DA AY

DA ATE T

WEA AT THER

MAX.

MIN.

Wind Direction

Wind Speed

Sunday

30/09

Relatively humid

40 °C

24 °C

VRB-SE

06 - 28 km/h

Monday

01/10

Relatively humid

40 °C

23 °C

VRB-SE

08 - 28 km/h

24775066

Tuesday

02/10

Relatively humid

39 °C

22 °C

VRB-SE

06 - 28 km/h

North Jahra

24775992

Wednesday e

03/10

hot

38 °C

22 °C

VRB-NW

10 - 30 km/h

North Jleeb

24311795

Al-Ardhiya

24884079

24719048

N.Kheitan

24710044

Fintas

23900322

RA AY YER TIMES PRA

AY AT KUW WAIT A AIRPORT RECORDED YESTERDA

Fajr

04:21

MAX. Temp.

41 °C

Sunrise

05:40

MIN. Temp.

24 °C

Zuhr

11:38

MAX. RH

68 %

Asr

15:03

MIN. RH

10 %

Sunset

17:37

MAX. Wiind

S 36 km/h

Isha

18:54

TOT TAL AL RAIINF FA ALL L IN 24 HR.

00 mm

All times are local time unless otherwise stated.

PRIVATE CLINICS Ophthalmologists Dr. Abidallah Al-Mansoor 25622444 Dr. Samy Al-Rabeea 25752222 Dr. Masoma Habeeb 25321171 Dr. Mubarak Al-Ajmy 25739999 Dr. Mohsen Abel 25757700 Dr Adnan Hasan Alwayl 25732223 Dr. Abdallah Al-Baghly 25732223 Ear, Nose & Throat (ENT) Dr. Ahmed Fouad Mouner 24555050 Ext 510 Dr. Abdallah Al-Ali 25644660 Dr. Abd Al-Hameed Al-Taweel 25646478 Dr. Sanad Al-Fathalah 25311996 Dr. Mohammad Al-Daaory 25731988 Dr. Ismail Al-Fodary 22620166 Dr. Mahmoud Al-Booz 25651426 General Practitioners Dr. Mohamme Y Majidi 24555050 Ext 123 Dr. Yousef Al-Omar 24719312 Dr. Tarek Al-Mikhazeem 23926920 Dr. Kathem Maarafi 25730465 Dr. Abdallah Ahmad Eyadah 25655528 Dr. Nabeel Al-Ayoobi 24577781 Dr. Dina Abidallah Al-Refae 25333501 Urologists Dr. Ali Naser Al-Serfy 22641534 Dr. Fawzi Taher Abul 22639955 Dr. Khaleel Abidallah Al-Awadi 22616660 Dr. Adel Al-Hunayan FRCS (C) 25313120 Dr. Leons Joseph 66703427 Psychologists /Psychotherapists

Paediatricians

Plastic Surgeons Dr. Mohammad Al-Khalaf

22547272

Dr. Khaled Hamadi

Dr. Abdal-Redha Lari

22617700

Dr. Abd Al-Aziz Al-Rashed

Dr. Abdel Quttainah

25625030/60

Family Doctor Dr Divya Damodar

23729596/23729581

Psychiatrists Dr. Esam Al-Ansari

22635047

Dr Eisa M. Al-Balhan

22613623/0

Gynaecologists & Obstetricians DrAdrian arbe

23729596/23729581

Dr. Verginia s.Marin

2572-6666 ext 8321

Endocrinologist

25665898 25340300

Dr. Zahra Qabazard

25710444

Dr. Sohail Qamar

22621099

Dr. Snaa Maaroof

25713514

Dr. Pradip Gujare

23713100

Dr. Zacharias Mathew

24334282

(1) Ear, Nose and Throat (2) Plastic Surgeon Dr. Abdul Mohsin Jafar, FRCS (Canada)

25655535

Dentists

Dr. Fozeya Ali Al-Qatan

22655539

Dr. Majeda Khalefa Aliytami

25343406

Dr. Shamah Al-Matar

22641071/2

Dr. Ahmad Al-Khooly

25739272

Dr. Anesah Al-Rasheed

22562226

22618787

Dr. Abidallah Al-Amer

22561444

Dr. Faysal Al-Fozan

22619557

Dr. Abdallateef Al-Katrash

22525888

Dr. Abidallah Al-Duweisan

25653755

Dr. Bader Al-Ansari

25620111

Dr. Salem soso General Surgeons Dr. Amer Zawaz Al-Amer

22610044

Dr. Mohammad Yousef Basher

25327148

Internists, Chest & Heart Dr. Adnan Ebil

22639939

Dr. Mousa Khadada

22666300

Dr. Latefa Al-Duweisan

25728004

Dr. Nadem Al-Ghabra

25355515

Dr. Mobarak Aldoub

24726446

Dr Nasser Behbehani

25654300/3

info@soorcenter.com www.soorcenter.com

Dr. Abd Al-Naser Al-Othman

3729596/3729581

Neurologists Dr. Sohal Najem Al-Shemeri

25633324

Dr. Jasem Mola Hassan

25345875

Gastrologists Dr. Sami Aman

22636464

Dr. Mohammad Al-Shamaly

25322030

Dr. Foad Abidallah Al-Ali

22633135

Kaizen center 25716707

25339330

Dr. Ahmad Al-Ansari 25658888 Dr. Kamal Al-Shomr 25329924 Physiotherapists & VD Dr. Deyaa Shehab

25722291

Dr. Musaed Faraj Khamees

22666288

Rheumatologists: Dr. Adel Al-Awadi

Dr Anil Thomas

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36

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

LIFESTYLE G o s s i p

Duchess Catherine designs her own clothes he duchess wore a yellow broderie anglaise sundress on her recent South Pacific tour, and it has now emerged it was a piece specially-commissioned by Queen Elizabeth’s tailors, based on the royal’s own ideas. A source told Grazia magazine: “This dress was a piece commissioned by Kate. She likes to have a few pieces that are one-offs and that she has had some input in, so she asked the queen’s tailors for some help. “They worked on it together after she went to them with ideas of colour, fabric and style.” Catherine who was known as Kate Middleton before her wedding to Prince William - regularly wins praise for her fashion choices, and was recently named one of the best-dressed royals by Vanity Fair magazine. They said: “The former Kate Middleton is prim, proper, and infuriatingly dazzling, thanks to a year-round tan, bouncing blow-outs, some better version of Bobbi Brown than the rest of us have, and a decidedly un-English smile. For big events, the mice and bluebirds put Kate in the best British designers as befits a future queen of England, including Alexander McQueen, Christopher Kane, Burberry, and country staple Barbour.”

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Gordon Ramsay orders his family to cook for him

he chef believes it is important for his kids to be competent in the kitchen so encourages Megan, 14, twins Jack and Holly, 12, and 10-year-old Matilda his children with wife Tana - to work from his own recipes in the evenings. He said: “When the kids finish their homework in the evening now I say, ‘Right, pick up daddy’s book. Page 227. The North African eggs. Here we go. Megan, page 72, you know, quick lasagne.

Matilda, Caesar salad with grilled chicken. Move it. Tana, page 275 chocolate fondant, now.’ “All of a sudden dinner’s sorted just like that. Bang. Half an hour later they come back, and almost like they’re presenting the dish on Master Chef, it’s quite funny, but they all cook. “I think even if they never follow my footsteps as a chef just learning how to cook for yourself I think it’s really important.” Gordon also revealed his favourite way to bond with his son is to indulge in a “snack attack” of fries with spicy beans. Asked for his perfect snack food, he told Absolute Radio: “Take some French fries, get them really nice and crispy. Grated parmesan cheese, a little touch of Tabasco, and a little dousing of Worcestershire Sauce. Get a can of beans, chop up some chilli, little bit of onion, really roast it, caramelise it.

Add the baked beans in there, and just fit the chips on top of the baked beans.

“I absolutely love it, and that is a snack that Jack and I indulge in on a Sunday night when the girls are getting their hair done and their homework ready. I said, ‘Mate, shall we snack attack?’ He said, ‘Yeah, let’s do it dad’, and course if he does it then he’s not going to get told off by Tana, if I do it I get told off. So I taught him how to make it, it’s perfect.”

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Nicki Minaj blows $70,000 on toy sports car he ‘American Idol’ judge - who is signed to the rapper’s Young Money label bought him a Campagna T-Rex 14R, a toy two-seater motorcycle-car hybrid, that usually costs $50,000 and added some pricey extras, according to TMZ. She then had the gift delivered to Lil Wayne’s birthday bash in Hollywood where he was celebrating turning 30. Wayne and Nicki are close friends and earlier this year he pulled her out of the Summer Jam Concert in the US when radio DJ Peter Rosenberg slated her track ‘Starships’. The furious rapper said: “That’s a female, first and foremost Nicki Minaj is a female. I don’t know what anyone else believes, but I believe females deserve the ultimate respect at all times no matter, when or where or how. “As soon as she called and told me she felt disrespected, I just declined everything. I pulled her from the show because no one that works with me will be disrespected in my presence as long as I’m on this planet.”

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Anne Hathaway is using Natalie Portman’s wedding planner

Malin Akerman expecting her first child he ‘Rock of Ages’ actress and her husband of five years Roberto Zincone - drummer in her former band The Petalstones - are expecting a child together, her representative has confirmed to USMagazine.com. It is not known how far along she is in the pregnancy or what the sex of the baby is. Speaking previously, Malin admitted she and her husband very rarely argued and always worked out their problems. She said: “We rarely bicker. We’ll sort of fume at each other and then we’ll figure it out. We’ve had some really great experiences. When I was shooting ‘Couples Retreat’ in Bora Bora, he came out there and it was like a honeymoon that we never had. “We get really lucky and we make it work.” The Swedish-born actress has a number of big movie roles coming up in the future, including ‘Inferno: A Linda Lovelace Story’ - where she plays the leading character - and films including ‘Breacher’, ‘Trophy Wife’, ‘Wildwood Inn’ and ‘Serpent Girl’.

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he ‘Dark Knight Rises’ actress is rumoured to be marrying partner Adam Shulman at Big Sur, California, and has asked Yifat Oren to plan the nuptials - the same person who helped Natalie Portman plan her wedding to Benjamin Millipied. A source told RadarOnline.com: “Anne will be a beautiful bride.” The ceremony will be a traditional affair and she has purchased all the dresses for the bridesmaids in addition to her own. Speaking recently, Valentino Garavani confirmed he had designed the gown that would be worn by the ‘Les Miserables’ beauty.

However, she claimed the wedding would not take place until 2013 because of her work commitments.

She said: “We’re getting married, probably sometime next year-ish. Not this year, its too big with two films coming out. “I haven’t started planning yet. I was filming ‘Les Mis’ when we decided to do it, and there was no way I could think about anything wedding-related with my head in the space it was in then. I’ve been so busy since then, I’ve not even decided what sort of ceremony I want.”

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Selena Gomez says Justin Bieber has ‘swag’ espite being recognised wherever they go, the actress insist the pair never go out in disguise - because the ‘Boyfriend’ hitmaker always likes to look “cool”. When asked by TV talk show host Jimmy Kimmel whether they wear disguises in public, Selena replied: “No, you can’t - not with him. He likes to look cool. No defeating the swag.” Jimmy also revealed to Selena that she and Justin are one of the top Halloween costume choices for couples - and the brunette beauty thinks those dressed up will be even better looking than herself and her boyfriend. She said: “That’s pretty rad - I love that. That’s cool - they probably look better than we do anyway.”

Despite the fame surrounding the pair since they began dating 18 months ago, they still enjoy the little things in life and don’t let their status stop them from doing what they want.

Selena added: “We don’t look at it like that. We do our own thing. We go have fun.” The 20year-old star also admitted she is still not ready to move in with Justin because she loves the safety of being with her family. She said: “I love my family. I don’t know, I’m not ready yet.

I turned 20 but I love being at home, I feel safe and it’s nice.”

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Hugh Jackman consumed only water for 36 hours he Australian actor has seen his ‘Wolverine’ filming delayed so tried to keep in peak physical condition in preparation for the role - but then needed a dramatic transformation when he had to start work on the musical before the action film. He explained: “We were going to shoot [‘The Wolverine’] last year and from then it was, ‘Are we going to start in July? Are we going to start in August? Are we going to start in November?’ “So for the last year I’ve been staying in the vicinity of where I need to be. Then when I got ‘Les Miserables’, Tom [Hooper, director] said, ‘You know, when we find you you’re straight out of prison, which is effectively a labour camp. I need you to be worryingly thin, sunken cheeks...’ “I was like, ‘Oh my god!’ So I worked my body off for the beginning of that film - I went for the old water diet thing where it’s nothing but water for 36 hours.” These days, Hugh is working on re-gaining the weight he lost as he is finally ready to shoot ‘The Wolverine’. He told Total Film magazine: “I’ve just come back from eating my eighth chicken breast of the day. “I’m 14 kg heavier than I was three months ago, so my body is going to need a break after this one.” —Bangshowbiz

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37

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

LIFESTYLE M u s i c

&

M o v i e s

Writer behind Suri’s Burn Book blog publishes book ruise would never wear denim, is on the Dukan Diet and considers Jay-Z and Beyonce’s daughter, Blue Ivy, a rival. Not the real Suri Cruise, daughter of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, but the one written about in a snarky blog - and now book - “Suri’s Burn Book: WellDressed Commentary From Hollywood’s Little Sweetheart” (Running Press).

Behind this fictional Suri, who is more Blair Waldorf of TV’s “Gossip Girl” than 6-year-old Suri, is Allie Hagan. About 18 months ago, Hagan thought she had an

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idea for a fun hobby: writing a humor blog from Suri’s perspective. “Every once in a while on my personal Twitter account I’d make little jokes about what Shiloh Jolie-Pitt was wearing or what Suri was up to, and a friend suggested I start a Tumblr account with that kind of humor about celebrity families,” the 25-year-old Hagan, who lives in Washington, DC, said in a recent interview.

“I knew that if I wrote it from my own perspective, it would come across as unnecessarily mean, possibly creepy. So I tried to think of a different angle.”

This photo shows author and blogger Allie Hagan in New York. —AP

Typical posts have a fictional Suri commenting on the outfits of other celebrity children or seeming utterly embarrassed by her parents. One topic Hagan ditched the cynicism over was the recent split of Suri’s parents. Her Web site had the highest traffic ever on the day Holmes announced she had filed for divorce from Cruise.

“I felt a lot of pressure because even though I think a lot of people saw it as a humorous kind of huge pop culture event ... I still see (Suri) as a girl whose parents were splitting up and I didn’t

want to make fun of that,” she said. The resulting post, written as Suri, led with, “Please respect my privacy during this difficult time.

(Just mine though - everyone else is fair game.)”

In the past year, Hagan juggled daily blog posts with more timeless musings for her book of the same name. She recently quit her day job as an education policy consultant and is now a fulltime writer. She says with so much attention placed on Hollywood kids, the possibilities about what to write seem endless.

Hagan hopes Britain’s Kate Middleton and actress Diane Kruger will become mothers. She said the fictional Suri longs to be royalty and “will be distraught” if the Duchess of Cambridge has children. And Hagan is a fan of Kruger and her longtime boyfriend (and former Holmes’ co-star and love interest) Joshua Jackson. “I think they are so fashionable and there’s also that ...

Katie Holmes’ old-loves connection. I just think it would be fun to write about and I think they’re just so cool.” —AP

Peru shows off its culinary best ome say that only food and football can unite all Peruvians. But with the nation’s prowess on the pitch on the wane it is cooking that has become a passion. Chicken morsels blended with rice and wrapped in leaves from a fabulously red, spiky Amazon plant called the Lobster Claw.

Welcome to Mistura, Latin America’s largest culinary festival which attracts hundreds of thousands of foodies. Peruvians are nuts about food, be it from the coast, mountains or jungle. Cooking schools are all the rage among young people, with many dreaming of reaching the dizzying heights of Gaston Acurio, the country’s best known chef and culinary ambassador.

French-trained Acurio is a friend and associate of Spain’s Ferran Adria, considered the pioneer of molecular cuisine-the art of taking food and drink apart and putting them back together in unexpected formats. Luis and Virginia Flores and their two children came to the Peru food fair with a hearty appetite, plenty of time and the equivalent of 100 dollars-a lot in this country where the average monthly salary is only twice that.

“We are going to taste a little bit of everything,” said Luis Flores. “We are going to stay all day, eating slowly.” About 150 restaurants were represented at the fair, which took place earlier in September. The festival also illustrates what big business food is in Peru. It provides jobs for 300,000 people in more than 60,000 restaurants, more than half of them in Lima, according to 2010 figures from the Trade Ministry.

Juan Carlos Ventura, 21, studied in one of the hundreds of cooking schools that dot Lima and now works in a restaurant called Tumbes Mar. He said its specialty was a dish cooked with potatoes, a spicy yellow sauce and crab meat, all nestled under a crunchy layer of breadcrumbs. Ventura’s favorite is ceviche, the popular Latin American dish of seafood marinated with lemon or lime juice. “I recommend it for lunch as an option that is always fresh, especially if it is made with sole. It is the perfect fish, tasty, white and firm.”

Isabel Alvarez, a sociologist and culinary researcher, said passion for food in Peru spanned young and old, urbanites and country folk, irrespective of social distinctions. “They are all together on this,” she told AFP, adding that society was otherwise very fragmented, and food-like football-was something people could enjoy together. “Peru has not been in the World Cup for 30 years. In the face of all that frustration that people feel, we find this big success in cuisine, which means a collective achievement that we can show off to the world,” she said. —AFP

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Indian singer, composer and actress Vasundhara Das performs during a music reality show organized by Indian Youth Society, last weekend at Jabriya Dental Clinic Auditorium.

Vasundhara Das is assertive when she talks about her need to stand on her feet to give something unique to music. Her new project, her own composition of 16th century Sufi poet Shah Hussain’s poems will be released on Oct 14.

Vasundhara Das on Sufi path, for now

Saraiki poems, DRUMJAM, the diva s doors are still open

By Sunil Cherian iving what is her own, even at the cost of treading on path unexplored before, is singer, composer and actress Vasundhara Das’ passion and pursuit now. Her tryst with musical destiny takes another turn when her new project, her own composition of the 16th century Sufi poet Shah Hussain’s Saraiki poems, will be released on Oct 14. Recorded at her studio, The Active, in Malleswaram, Bangalore, the eight songs include one penned by Vasundhara. Being a lyricist is ‘one more door open’, the multi-tasker in music said.

Indian music’s high voltage diva was in Kuwait this past weekend to judge Indian Youth Society’s music reality show. The judge, her yet another role, was generously

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smiling and encouraging the participants that ranged between 8- to 58-years-old enthusiasts, at Jabriya Dental Clinic Auditorium on Thursday. She did not look apprehensive when the show was running late or her assistant Michael was missing when she wanted him to play the track for her song. When a participant whistled ‘Sare jahan se acha’, she escalated him by touching upon how emotive the whistling was.

The judge then whistled the tune back, much to the surprise of the man, and the audience.

Surprises are more in hand for the 30plus ‘Shakalakka baby’ who travels with her music band Vasundhara Das. Composing music for films is one of them. But they can’t be revealed now as the films are not released, Das said. Right now she is excited

about her new untitled project which will be launched on Oct 14 at inktalks.com, the Indian version of Ted talk, a web-based conference forum. The unique project - Das prefers project to album - with Rajasthani folk tunes for Shah Hussain’s poems in Multani dialect of southern Punjab will show the world a refreshing face of the Indian music, Das hopes. Rajasthani Sufi singer Neer Mukhtiar Ali is the male voice in the project.

Music not aside, Das is also famously partnered with DRUMJAM, a corporate training solution that offers music therapy.

Led by her husband, Bangalore based drummer Roberto Narain, the rhythmbased activity network runs 90 sessions per year and has 20,000 percussion instruments for their training sessions. In a ses-

Like her TV alter, VanCamp prefers to be a mystery

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hat a difference a year makes. This time last year, Emily VanCamp was hoping and praying her ABC series “Revenge” would be a success. It was - and regularly won its time slot. Now she’s gearing up for the show’s second season, premiering Sunday at 9 pm EDT. “I was wondering what was going to happen with the show and, oh gosh, I remember just trying to repress the stress so much,” VanCamp said in a recent interview. “You just want to focus on the work and not pay too much attention to all that stuff, but you’re putting so much of yourself into it, and the fact that it all paid off and that it did so well has been kind of extraordinary. It’s been a crazy year to say the least.”

VanCamp plays Emily Thorne, a young woman out to get even for her father’s death. She infiltrates a wealthy community in the Hamptons to take down the people who betrayed her family. Like her character, 26-year-old VanCamp is a private person who prefers to remain a bit of a mystery to the public. She doesn’t like to talk about her personal life (although she’s rumored to be dating her “Revenge” co-star Josh Bowman) and says she’s trying to come to terms with the public’s interest in her life now that she has a hit TV show.

“We live in a time where the media is a very difficult thing to navigate because it’s everywhere, and I tend to want to be a lot more private with my life,” she said. “I’ve managed to do that for 10 years in this business. “I’ve found a really nice balance, but this show is a different scale so ... I’m trying to figure all that out at the moment but ... some of the actors that I admire the most do have an element of intrigue. You don’t know everything about them. It’s very important to be able to distinguish the actors from the characters they play.”

One thing VanCamp is getting used to as a leading lady is being sleep deprived. “I’m exhausted almost all the time,” she said. “I keep saying I’m weirdly preparing myself for motherhood because once you can get ahold of this sleep deprivation thing I think you have a leg up. And I’m definitely sleep deprived.” VanCamp also has adjusted to her high-profile role in “Revenge” by seeing herself as part of an “incredible” cast.

“I think it’s really interesting to say ‘my show’ or ‘I’m a lead of it’ because it is such a collaborative thing ... but I am definitely there all the time,” she laughed. “I’m excited by challenging myself physically and mentally every day. That’s what keeps me going and makes me love what I do so I really can’t complain about it.” She pauses then says: “I complain sometimes. I’m not gonna lie.” —AP

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Jay-Z goes back to his roots at Brooklyn stadium launch ap superstar Jay-Z returned to his home borough for a soldout concert on Friday night to open Brooklyn’s new basketball stadium. The rapper who grew up just two miles away from the new Barclays Center arena - now the home court of the Brooklyn Nets basketball team - talked about how far he had come in a show sprinkled with emotional speeches. “I’ve been on many stages all around the world and nothing feels like tonight,” Jay-Z told the cheering audience.

“I’m really overwhelmed by the moment,” he said as he described his humble beginnings in Marcy Houses, a Brooklyn public housing project he noted was just 15 minutes away from the arena. “I can’t believe that this day has come.” Jay-Z, who raps about the time he spent as a drug dealer, released his first album in 1996. He is now one of the most successful rappers in the world, owns a minority stake in the Nets and has businesses including a clothing label.

He encouraged members of the packed crowd to have their own stab at success. “I believe everybody in the world is born with genius level talent ... Apply yourself to whatever you’re genius at and you can do anything in the world,” he said. It was the first of eight Jay-Z concerts planned for the venue in the arena’s first week.

Jay-Z sported the team’s jersey and hat as he sang recent hits like Empire State of Mind and returned to his highly acclaimed debut album Reasonable Doubt. The rapper, whose real name is Shawn Carter, has been heavily involved in the promotion of the 18,000-seat arena, which took years to move from concept to reality partly because it met with legal challenges and opposition from people in nearby residential areas such as Fort Greene and Park Slope.

The stadium, which started construction in 2009, will bring a major professional sports team back to Brooklyn for the first time in 55 years when the Dodgers baseball team moved away from Brooklyn to Los Angeles and became the LA Dodgers.

Jay-Z showed off a jersey worn by Dodgers player Jackie Robinson - also the first African American Major League Baseball player.

He paid tribute to deceased rap star and fellow Brooklyn native Notorious B.I.G. by projecting an image of him on the stage and covering two of his songs. Brooklyn hip-hop pioneer Big Daddy Kane appeared later in the evening. Bob Dylan, Barbara Streisand and the Smashing Pumpkins are all due to appear at the Barclays Center during its first two months. —Reuters

sion called Drumcircles, everyone is required to beat the drum, evoking the fact that everything in nature has a rhythm.

Das talks as refreshing as a new but familiar rhythm. One can sense how she has found her own pace in the field of music. She is not in a hurry to prove what she can give to the world by holding her own fort. But be prepared to be surprised.

She might come with another ‘Time to disco’ in one hand and ‘My heart speaks a thousand words’ in another hand, smiling at both with ease.

(From left to right) Tom Rothman, Suraj Sharma, Ang Lee, Yann Martel, and Elizabeth Gabler attend the 50th annual New York Film Festival Opening Night Gala premiere of “Life Of Pi” at Alice Tully Hall, Lincoln Center. —AFP

Ang Lee breaks every rule in new ‘Life of Pi’ film irector Ang Lee says he broke every rule in “Life of Pi,” which premiered Friday, bringing the best-selling novel into stunning 3D life with a production featuring an unknown Indian actor, four tigers and the world’s biggest wave machine. “There are a few classic advices in movies: never make a movie featuring animals, kids, water or 3D,” the Taiwanese-born American director quipped at the premiere, which was the opening screening of the New York Film Festival in Manhattan. “We ignored all (of them).” The filmmaker, who won Oscars for “Brokeback Mountain” and “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” had to pull out all the stops to get Yann Martel’s 2001 novel of the same name on screen.

The story, centered around a shipwrecked Indian boy called Pi who survives in a life raft with a Bengal tiger, posed obvious casting difficulties. The overriding theme of the search for God was also not standard Hollywood fare. “I remember thinking to myself that no one in their right mind... How do you sell this thing?” Lee recalled. His first solution came in the guise of Suraj Sharma, a hitherto unknown 17year-old from Delhi who tagged along with his brother to the audition, then found himself being picked out of 3,000 others.

“It was my brother. He had to go to the audition and I went with him,” Sharma said at the premiere. For the movie’s other key ingredients, Lee cast his net even wider, creating a Hollywood-financed, but interna-

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tional production that sounds almost as fantastical as the story itself. The first part of the film was filmed on location in Pondicherry, India, the picturesque former French colony where some 5,500 extras were hired for the sumptuous scenes of Indian street life and religious ceremonies.

Then, because the entire second half of the two-hour movie takes place at sea, Lee went to Taichung in his native Taiwan to film in a specially designed wave-generating tank that measures 230 by 100 feet (70 by 30 meters) and contains 1.7 million gallons (6.4 million liters) of water. “We created our own Hollywood,” Lee said. The results are spectacular scenes that lend themselves especially well to the 3D experience, with flying fish shooting out of the screen, and surrealist trips by the camera into a deep populated by luminous jellyfish and whales.

Having secured his human star and a number of backups, including a rude French cook played by Gerard Depardieu, Lee needed only to fill the main supporting role: the tiger. The animal, who goes by the name Richard Parker, is mostly the creation of CG special effects. But the all-important physical references that provide a base for the wizardry were provided by four real tigers.

Animal trainer Thierry Le Portier, a veteran of big cat scenes in “Gladiator,” found three of the animals in France and one in Canada.

According to Lee, a big male named King was the main model for Richard Parker, while two females, also from France, were

used to model the movie tiger’s more aggressive movements. The “more docile” episodes, such as when Richard Parker is seasick, were modeled on the unusually cuddly Canadian tiger, Lee said. Sharma, playing Pi, said the water tank in Taiwan “began to feel like my home” and that his research into being a castaway included consulting with shipwreck survivor and author of “Adrift,” Steve Callahan.

But his portrayal of the intimate connection between his scared character and the hungry tiger was all acted in front an invisible beast. “The boat was pretty empty,” he laughed. “There was no tiger.” Early reviews described the film as Oscar potential thanks to its beauty and artistic use of 3D. “Summoning the most advanced digital filmmaking technology to deliver the most old-fashioned kind of audience satisfaction,” Variety said. But there were thumbs down over what some critics saw as the story’s over-earnestness. “Torpid, preachy, faux high-minded and ‘prestigious,’” said the Village Voice. —AFP

This photo shows actress Emily VanCamp attending the Entertainment Weekly and ABC Upfronts Party in New York. —AP

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

lifestyle F A S H I O N

Models wear creations from Belgian fashion designer Raf Simons for Dior ready to wear Spring-Summer 2013 collection, presented in Paris, Friday, Sept 28, 2012. — AP/AFP photos

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hemlines rise and designers use color, black S

pring signals new beginnings. Not only in statement-making prints and new colors - as the Paris spring-summer 2013 season has shown - but in bold ideas that remap the fashion landscape.

One such revamp came in the form of Raf Simons. The anticipation around the Belgian’s ready-to-wear debut at Dior was palpable: Crowds spilled into the all-white edifice at the Hotel des Invalides and actor

Taking the trend of color spliced with summer black, his pale palette came in yellows, greens, pink and metallic blue.

Brighter hues were served up by Roland Mouret, the master of va-va-voom, and Anne Valerie Hash whose unified collections boasted vibrancy, yet, still, never strayed too far from the black, that’s now a mainstay for 2013. Issey Miyake, meanwhile, picked back up of the popular trend of color-blocking to kaleidoscopic effect.

Saturday’s shows include dutch design duo Viktor & Rolf and the fashion queen of England, Vivienne Westwood.

legged, with the hemlines of the sexual revolution.

It was the same rebellious mood with which Christian Dior founded the house in 1947: His long-length “New Look” shocked the fashion world in its indulgent use of material - a backlash against wartime fabric rationing. “The foundation of the house is a reaction to restrictions,” said Simons. “I wanted to do that too.” Do it, he did - not forgetting to have fun on the way. Cheekily, Simons turned it and other jackets into mini dresses - twinned with black ubershort shorts. Other looks had a dash of

CHRISTIAN DIOR Freedom was at the heart of Raf Simons’ outing for Dior - a confident show that twinned the essence of the 1950’s “New Look,” with the liberated hemlines of the 1960s. Simons - a minimalist - is in many ways the stark opposite of Christian Dior, the exuberant house founder who favored longer ankle -length silhouettes. But Friday’s free, liberating display shows that in spirit - if not perhaps in silhouette - they meet eye to eye. Simons took the “New Look” bar jacket, in black, gray and white and sent it down the catwalk often bare-

Robert de Niro, director Luc Besson and designer Diane Von Furstenberg lined the front row. And the designer did not disappoint - evolving his own minimalist style with whimsical exuberance and also that of the iconic house, whose codes he mastered, then subverted.

show. Where last season the silhouettes were likened to an abbreviated 1950s “New Look,” Friday’s show had tinges of 1980s space-age geometry.

Origami-like folds on belts, straps and sporadically attached large pockets provided a small creative twist on a more structured, fitted collection. Peplums and geometric filets, and one-off pleats provided the creative butter, spread on his breadwinning va va voom silhouettes. They made a comeback as pencil skirts and sheaths this season in deep green, white and on-trend vermillion.

Simons’ own signature architecture.

Simons’ has been swatting up. Where Christian Dior loved garden flowers - here, Raf Simons delved even further into the bushes, bringing back in his jam-jar six sumptuous insect-inspired looks in silk and tulle. One pink and blue loose A-line used tulle and embroidery to create the translucent veins of an insect wing.It was details like this that made this collection fly so freely and so high.

ROLAND MOURET There must be a lot of pressure on

Models wear creations

by French fashion designer Roland Mouret’s Spring-Summer 2013 ready to wear collection.

Roland Mouret to break away from the label of the one-dress wonder. The inventor of the famed cap-sleeved “Galaxy dress,” that’s graced a million red carpets, has, perhaps consciously, been in an experimental mood recently, gently modifying his signature mold. This continued in Friday’s coherent

ANNE VALERIE HASH Anne Valerie Hash hit the right spot with her feminine but edgy show, featuring several looks with the top part sliced completely off. “It was about female self-confidence,” said Hash backstage. And the guillotine effect, too? “Ah, I suppose I also wanted to have some fun.” The guillotined materials’ were suspended to the body thanks to a bustier, which gave the shoulders a curious and imaginative trompe l’oeil effect. High waists and pencil-skirts in many of the 33 ensembles - in indulgent lashings of summer black, power pinks, coral, gold and “electric anise” - gave a structure and confidence to the often super skinny models’ fragile silhouettes. But Hash - a woman’s woman - didn’t forget the sex appeal too: With stretch chiffon, second skin sequins, stretch leather and satin, many of the looks dripped liquid sensuality. — AP

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

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Jane Birkin cheers Yamamoto’s desert princesses

ane Birkin easily made her pick among the spring looks sent out by Yohji Yamamoto at the Paris ready-to-wear shows Friday: a simple black number radiating ease and effortless elegance. Birkin, whose song recordings provided the soundtrack to much of the collection, took a front row seat to watch the veteran Japanese designer’s show, which wrapped up day four of Paris Fashion Week. Does she wear Yamamoto in everyday life? “I have for a very, very long time, usually the boys clothes,” Birkin told AFP backstage afterwards.

This time she singled out half a dozen looks in black, blending suit materials and fine wool, like a

long, hooded cardigan worn over slender cropped pants. “That is what I could wear-and will wear,” she said. “It doesn’t look as if you’ve tried too hard.”

Yamamoto sent out desert princesses with punkish bleached blonde quiffs on their heads, in long sage green tunics, with frayed hems and a long train at the rear.

Asymmetric dresses wound around the body, while others billowed light as parachute silk. Lots of black, but also poppy red, and flashes of blue and orange. Once a band of four aviator girls strode out in military slacks and flight suits, goggles on their heads. Yamamoto said he was “trying to enjoy the

summer” with a collection infused with a traveller’s spirit. “When I was young I travelled a lot, but now I am lazy,” he smiled from under his trademark black hat, champagne glass in hand. The clothes do the travelling for him, in other words. Earlier Friday at the Japanese house Issey Miyake, tropical birds with striped plumage fluttered onto the Paris catwalks as the house sent out a joyously upbeat look for next spring.

The label’s designer Yoshiyuki Miyamae took as starting point the feathers of a bird-first immobile, then flapping its wings as it lands on water-for a collection billed as an exploration of colour. Black and

white was the baseline of the look, worked in fine pleats, wide stripes and geometric panes, on kneelength dresses, tunics and leggings, worn above athletic leather sandals.

But eye-popping colour-lime, orange, purple or blue-was never far away, whether splashed alongside a black and white check, or used on its own in merry collages of three or four hues at a time.

Upbeat was the watchword as the models positively bounced down the catwalk, hair pulled up into big backcombed ponytails, in knit dresses whose light-as-air mesh sprung up and down as they walked. — AFP

Floaty nostalgia in accomplished Nina Ricci show T

here’s been nostalgia in the air at Nina Ricci of late. This was certainly the case in Peter Copping’s deceptively complex springsummer 2013 show at Paris Fashion Week, which floated ethereally by and matched the vintage feeling of last season’s show. Perhaps the mood was set by the millions of falling cherry blossoms - which mark the end of spring - that opened the presentation Thursday.

Or perhaps it was the floaty chiffon tops, the gentle pleated skirts, the halter necks, the flowing fringing or the soft silhouettes that harked to bygone days of the 20’s and 30’s. Although the show opened with black designs, it melted like winter into spring, shifting into dusty colors of silver gray, blush pink, red and pale lavender.

Older women would delight in a beautiful taffeta “summer fur” coat in turquoise with fragile feathering. Touches like zippers kept it modern for an accomplished, commanding show - the most feminine display so far this season in Paris. But Copping needn’t be feeling nostalgic himself - this collection shows he has a bright future with the fashion house. — AP

Tsumori Chisato

Models wear creations from British fashion designer Peter Copping for Nina Ricci ready to wear Spring-Summer 2013 collection. — AP/AFP photos

Models present creations by Tsumori Chisato during the Spring/Summer 2013 ready-to-wear collection show yesterday.

Ang Lee breaks every rule in new ‘Life of Pi’ film

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SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2012

This image is an artist’s rendering of a proposed 625-foot Ferris wheel, billed as the world’s largest, planned as part of a retail and hotel complex along the Staten Island waterfront in New York —AP

NYC Ferris wheel project has big backers he Ferris wheel may be a steam-age invention, but it is back in vogue in New York, which this week joined a long list of cities where urban planners or developers have bet that massive, modern versions of the old ride can serve as economic engines. After the towering London Eye debuted in early 2000, it seemed as if there was no end to the number of cities dreaming about stimulating tourism by building their own giant observation wheel, modeled after the one drawing 3.5 million riders per year in Britain.

Re-creating London’s success has proved to be daunting, with failed or postponed projects in a number of world-class cities. But the concept still has luster. Work is being done on two new massive wheels in Las Vegas. Seattle saw a smaller version open on its waterfront last spring.

Now, the biggest test yet will come in New York, where city officials announced Thursday that a private development group had been given

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approval to build the world’s tallest Ferris wheel, at 625 feet, on the waterfront in Staten Island.

The proposal, with a $230 million price tag, is audacious. Its success would rely on people being willing to travel by miles by ferry across New York Harbor to a remote, mostly suburban part of the city that has always been an afterthought to visitors. Yet the people behind the project, led by a newly formed company, New York Wheel, include some heavy hitters.

The primary financial backers include Lloyd Goldman, a real estate baron who is part of the partnership redeveloping the World Trade Center site, and Joseph Nakash, a co-founder of the Jordache apparel company who now chairs an investment group that also owns airlines and real estate. The third primary investor is The Feil Organization, a real estate powerhouse that owns or manages commercial and residential properties across the country. New York Wheel CEO Richard Marin spent decades as an execu-

tive at Bankers Trust Company, then led a subsidiary at Bear Stearns until some black eyes related to bad bets on mortgage securities led to his departure in 2007. After that, he had a job turning around a distressed real estate portfolio as CEO of Africa Israel Investments.

Now, though those real estate connections, he’s found himself in the carnival business - or at least the venture capital version of it. “It’s a short trip from Wall Street to P.T. Barnum,” Marin joked in a phone interview Friday. Marin said the heft in the investment group shows it isn’t just blindly following a trendy tourism gimmick. While the London wheel was “wildly successful,” he isn’t naive about the challenge in replicating its success. Marin said the company spent a year and a half in discussions with city officials about a possible site before agreeing on Staten Island.

Under the deal announced Thursday, New York Wheel will pay the city $1 million per year on a 99-year lease for a waterfront location with-

in walking distance of the Staten Island Ferry terminal. Simultaneously, another development group will be building a 350,000-square-foot shopping mall and hotel on the opposite side of the terminal. The neighborhood is already home to a minor league baseball stadium. “It’s a location and a site that I have come to love,” Marin said. Having the wheel next to the ferry, which is already ridden by an estimated 2 million tourists annually, will save the developers about $100 million in transportation infrastructure costs, he said. And, despite the distance from other tourist sites, the view of New York harbor will be thrilling and unique enough, he predicted, to draw the millions of riders needed to earn back the ride’s high cost.

Several other giant Ferris wheels built in the past decade have been successful. China’s 525 foot-tall Star of Nanchang and Singapore’s 541foot Singapore Flyer have both been a hit with tourists. In other places, planned wheels never

Mayans prophesized, but not end of world A s the clock winds down to Dec 21, experts on the Mayan calendar have been racing to convince people that the Mayans didn’t predict an apocalypse for the end of this year. Some experts are now saying the Mayans

Mayan Long Count calendar, which is made up of 394-year periods called baktuns. Experts estimate the system starts counting at 3114 BC, and will have run through 13 baktuns, or 5,125 years, around Dec. 21. Experts say 13 was a signif-

A Mayan priestess prays during a ceremony marking the Mayan solar new year in Guatemala City in this file photo.

Archaeologists and experts in Mayan culture are racing against time to prove that despite the approaching end of that civilization's calendar, the end of the world is not coming. —AP may indeed have made prophecies, just not about the end of the world.

Archaeologists, anthropologists and other experts met Friday in the southern Mexico city of Merida to discuss the implications of the

icant number for the Mayans, and the end of that cycle would be a milestone - but not an end.

Fears that the calendar does point to the end have circulated in recent years. People in that camp

believe the Maya may have been privy to impending astronomical disasters that would coincide with 2012, ranging from explosive storms on the surface of the sun that could knock out power grids to a galactic alignment that could trigger a reversal in Earth’s magnetic field.

Mexican government archaeologist Alfredo Barrera said Friday that the Mayans did prophesize, but perhaps about more humdrum events like droughts or disease outbreaks. “The Mayans did make prophecies, but not in a fatalistic sense, but rather about events that, in their cyclical conception of history, could be repeated in the future,” said Barrera, of the National Institute of Anthropology and History.

Experts stressed that the ancient Mayans, whose “classic” culture of writing, astronomy and temple complexes flourished from AD 300 to 900, were extremely interested in future events, far beyond Dec. 21. “There are many ancient Maya monuments that discuss events far into the future from now,” wrote Geoffrey Braswell, an anthropologist at the University of California, San Diego. “The ancient Maya clearly believed things would happen far into the future from now.”

“The king of Palenque, K’inich Hanaab Pakal, believed he would return to the Earth a couple of

thousand years from now in the future,” Braswell wrote in an email to The Associated Press. “Moreover, other monuments discuss events even before the creation in 3114 BC.” Only a couple of references to the 2012 date equivalency have been found carved in stone at Mayan sites, and neither refers to an apocalypse, experts say.

Such apocalyptic visions have been common for more than 1,000 years in Western, Christian thinking, and are not native to Mayan thought. “This is thinking that, in truth, has nothing to do with Mayan culture,” said Alexander Voss, an anthropologist at the University Of Quintana Roo, a state on Mexico’s Caribbean coast. “This thing about looking for end-times is not something that comes from Mayan culture.” Braswell compared the Mayan calendar, with its system of cycles within cycles, to the series of synchronized wheels contained in old, analogue car odometers.

“The Maya long count system is like a car odometer,” Braswell wrote. “My first car (odometer) only had six wheels so it went up to 99,999.9 miles. That didn’t mean the car would explode after reaching 100,000 miles.” —AP

got off the ground. A 682-foot-tall wheel that was supposed to open in Beijing in time for the 2008 Olympics was never completed. An earlier pioneer in the business, the Great Wheel Corp., had projects in the works to build similar wheels in Dubai, Berlin, Orlando, Fla., and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, but all were either suspended or collapsed.

“These are expensive and difficult, big projects,” said Wil Armstrong, the North American representative for Starneth, a new company, formed by veterans of the London Eye design and engineering team, that is providing the designs for the New York wheel. “Every city, it seems, of any size, has thought about it. But wanting to do and actually doing it is a large step.” —AP

Americana revisited: Rockwell’s models reuniting on Trachte’s cowlick has been tamed. Mary Hall is no longer a towhead. Butch Corbett is still thin, but not the beanpole he once was. And Tom Paquin’s carrot top is thinner and grayer. Twenty or so people who were children when they posed in the 1940s and ‘50s for their neighbor Norman Rockwell in the Vermont town of Arlington are reuniting there to share their memories of the great American artist who once lived in their midst.

Rockwell captured scenes of everyday life in his paintings and illustrations for covers of the Saturday Evening Post, for the Boy Scouts and for its publication Boys’ Life, art now considered the very definition of Americana. He would pay his neighbors $5 a pop to appear in Hallmark cards, in calendars and on magazine covers that ended up gracing the coffee tables and littering the tree houses of millions of magazine readers young and old.

“The Saturday Evening Post came out weekly, and we couldn’t wait to get it to see what was on the cover,” said Hall, who posed for Rockwell four times. “You could always recognize who it was.” She appeared as a blond girl wrapped in a quilt and being carried out of a flood by a Boy Scout in an image that became a cover of Boys’ Life, and as a teenager in a skirt, white blouse, bobby socks and loafers on a Post cover from 1948. It was

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called “Christmas Homecoming” and showed people welcoming home a young man who’s carrying a suitcase full of dirty laundry.

An estimated 300 people from the area modeled for Rockwell during his 14 years in the southern Vermont town. Of the 70 or so still living, the oldest is 93 (he can’t make it to the reunion). Many still live in and around Arlington. Among the models planning to join in is Mary Whalen, who posed for the popular image of a rugged-looking school girl with braids and a black eye, waiting outside a principal’s office.

The former models have gotten together before, but this weekend is special. They have been invited to view a new gallery of Rockwell prints and memorabilia that is taking the place of a recently closed Rockwell museum. The new owners are treating them to a turkey lunch in honor of Rockwell’s famous painting of an excited family gathered for Thanksgiving dinner. “I think it’s important that the models keep the tradition of the image that Vermont, Arlington in particular, was important in Norman Rockwell’s biography. That while he lived in Arlington he did his best work, probably ... and his local models were Arlington people,” said James “Buddy” Edgerton, 82, who lived next door to Rockwell, his wife and three sons and modeled for him at least a dozen times. —AP