9 Sep

RI PT IO N BS C SU THE LEADING INDEPENDENT DAILY IN THE ARABIAN GULF

40 PAGES

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 9, 2010

Wataniya subscribers warned not to send data

RAMADAN 30, 1431 AH

NO: 14846

150 FILS

Syria influence in Lebanon on the rise again

Among Egypt’s Christians, few question Church rule

An important Ryder Cup for Tiger

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Controversy boils over fugitive

By B Izzak KUWAIT: National Assembly speaker Jassem Al-Khorafi yesterday called for restraint and for resolving the dispute over controversial fugitive Shiite activist Yasser Al-Habeeb through the application of the law. Habeeb, who has been living in London since 2004 after fleeing Kuwait to escape a 10-year prison term for insulting some of the Prophet’s com-

Qallaf threatens to grill PM; Khorafi calls for restraint panions and wives, has come under fire for again slandering Prophet Mohammad’s (PBUH) wife Aisha.

Khorafi said what Habeeb did is “unacceptable” but he called for caution against “discord and rift and from those who are attempting to under mine

ramadan kareem

Eid etiquette

By Sheikh Al-Munajjid

P

raise be to Allah, Lord of the Worlds, and peace and blessings be upon our Prophet Muhammad and upon all his family and companions. ‘Eid’ is an Arabic word referring to something habitual, that returns and is repeated. Eids or festivals are symbols to be found in every nation, including those that are based on revealed scriptures and those that are idolatrous, as well as others, because celebrating festivals is something that is an instinctive part of human nature.

All people like to have special occasions to celebrate, where they can come together and express their joy and happiness. The festivals of the kaafir nations may be connected to worldly matters, such as the beginning of the year, the start of an agricultural season, the changing of the weather, the establishment of a state, the accession of a ruler, and so on.

They may also be connected to religious occasions, like many of the festivals belonging exclusively to the Jews and Christians, such as the Thursday on which they claim the table was sent down to Jesus, Continued on Page 14

One in 3 Indians ‘utterly corrupt’ NEW DELHI: Almost one-third of Indians are “utterly corrupt” and half are “borderline”, the outgoing head of the country’s corruption watchdog has said, blaming increased wealth for much of the problem. Pratyush Sinha, who retired as India’s Central Vigilance Commissioner this week, said the worst part of his “thankless job” was observing how corruption had increased as people became more materialistic.

“When we were growing up I remember if somebody was corrupt, they were generally looked down upon,” he said. “There was at least some social stigma attached to it. That is gone. So there is greater social acceptance.” Transparency International, the global anti-graft body, puts India 84th on its corruption perception index with a 3.4-point rating, out of a best possible score of 10. New Zealand ranks first with 9.4 points and Somalia last on 1.1 points.

The campaign group has said that each year millions of poor Indian families have to bribe officials for access to basic public services. Sinha told the Mint newspaper in an interview published on Tuesday that 20 percent of Indians were “honest, regardless of the temptations, because this is how they are.

They have a conscience. “There would be around 30 percent who would be utterly corrupt. But the rest are the people who are on the borderline,” he said, adding that corruption was “palpable”.

Sinha said that in modern India “if somebody has a lot of money, he is respectable. Nobody questions by what means he has got the money.” Recent corruption scandals in India have focused on construction projects for the Commonwealth Games that open in New Delhi next month, and alleged tax evasion in the lucrative Indian Premier League (IPL) cricket tournament.

India is also regarded as a hotbed of illegal betting syndicates, with gamblers and bookmakers involved in “spot-fixing” - the gambling that has engulfed the current Pakistani cricket tour of England. Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has often spoken out against the damaging effect that bribes, extortion and fraud have on all levels of life, and warned that the problem threatens India’s future economic prospects. — AFP

Emsak: Fajer: Shoruk: Dohr: Asr: Maghreb: Eshaa:

03:58 04:08 05:29 11:46 15:18 18:02 19:21

national unity and pour oil on fire”.

Responding to repeated calls by many MPs for the withdrawal of Habeeb’s Kuwaiti citizenship, Khorafi said that such violations “should be dealt with in accordance with the law and we must take every step to comply with the law

Eid begins tomorrow KUWAIT: The Crescent Sighting Authority of Kuwait’s Ministry of Justice announced yesterday evening that today will be the last day of the holy month of Ramadan. Thereby, tomorrow will be the first day of the Eid Al-Fitr holiday in Kuwait, according to a statement issued by the ministry. “As the crescent sighting authority failed to observe the crescent this evening, the first day of the merry Eid Al-Fitr holidays will be Friday,” the statement affirmed. — KUNA

Kuwait appoints its first stock regulator KUWAIT: Kuwait has appointed its first independent regulatory body, the Capital Market Authority, to oversee its stock exchange, Commerce Minister Ahmad Al-Harun said yesterday. The managing director of the Kuwait exchange, Saleh AlFalah, was appointed chairman of the new body which has four other members, the official KUNA agency quoted Harun as saying after a cabinet meeting.

Before becoming bourse boss five years ago, Falah served for some three years as managing director of the Kuwait Investment Authority, the oil-rich State’s sovereign wealth fund. The appointment comes seven months after the Kuwaiti parliament passed legislation to set up the regulatory body with the aim of boosting transparency in the Arab world’s second largest stock market.

Under the law, the main duties of the Authority are to ensure complete transparency

and to prevent insider dealing and other forms of illegal trading and fraud.

Since its foundation as the region’s first bourse in the early 1970s, the Kuwait exchange has been run by governmentappointed administrators who have been criticized by MPs for a lack of transparency. The law also calls for the setting up of a special tribunal for the stock market and stipulates hefty jail terms and fines for an array of offences.

The Kuwait exchange has been the only one in the Gulf without a market authority as the law took many years to secure parliamentary approval.

The market has a capitalization of around 117 billion dollars and lists more than 210 local and foreign companies. The Kuwait and Bahrain exchanges were the only ones in the Gulf to record losses in 2009, with Kuwait dropping 10 percent. So far this year, the market has dipped 3.6 percent. — AFP

and make sure it is not violated”.

Khorafi said that withdrawal of citizenship, especially if they have been gained by birth, “is not an easy thing” because of the regulations stipulated in the Kuwaiti constitution. The speaker however called for taking all possible

legal actions against those who slander religious symbols so they can be an example for others. Khorafi’s statements came after the tit-for-tat arguments over the Shiite activists escalated yesterday between Shiite and Sunni MPs amid threats to grill the prime minister. MP

Waleed Al-Tabtabai said in a statement that the government informed the Islamist Reform and Development Bloc that it will withdraw the citizenship of Habeeb after three weeks if attempts to extradite him through the Interpol fail.

Independent MP Mubarak Al-Waalan confirmed Tabtabai’s statements, saying he has contacted the government and he was informed of the same plan.

Continued on Page 14

Kuwaiti surgeon performs rare gastric band operation KUWAIT: A Kuwaiti surgeon last week successfully conducted a rare form of gastric band operation on a patient weighing approximately 300 kilograms (661 pounds or 47 stone). Dr Walid AlBastaki, a general surgeon and laparoscopic consultant at AlAmiri Hospital said yesterday that the type of gastric band operation he performed on the 39-year-old patient was very rare due to the patient’s weight.

The patient, who left hospital only six days after the operation, was suffering from morbid obesity which endangered his life, causing him difficulties in moving, breathing and sleeping for the past few years, the surgeon explained.

The two-hour operation was ver y successful, said Dr AlBastaki, adding that it would enable the patient to lose weight gradually. He further revealed that such operations can enable patients to lose between 12 and 15 kilograms in the first week after the operation alone. — KUNA

KUWAIT: Kuwait’s surgeons pictured during the operation at the Al-Amiri Hospital. — KUNA

Kuwait eyes nuke energy TOKYO: Japan agreed with Kuwait yesterday to cooperate in capacity building for peaceful use of nuclear energy generation in the Gulf nation, raising the prospect of lucrative deals for Japanese companies. Kuwait, the world’s No 4 oil exporter, is facing rising energy demand and agreed with France in April on cooperation in developing nuclear energy.

Japan, the world’s third-biggest nuclear power generator after the United States and France, is stepping up efforts to tap the nuclear

power development market after a Japan-US consortium lost out to South Korea in a deal to build and operate nuclear reactors for the United Arab Emirates (UAE) in December.

Japan has not yet won a project-based package like the UAE deal in the nuclear energy sector.

Developing and operating nuclear power plants abroad is a growth strategy in Japan, where electricity demand is expected to stay flat or rise slightly at best due to industries shifting abroad and the

graying of society. In July, a consortium of six Japanese utilities and nuclear power machinery makers set up a working group to create a venture this autumn aimed at winning orders to build nuclear power plants overseas.

Japan made a similar government-to-government agreement with Malaysia earlier this month.

The accord with Kuwait on sharing know-how on public acceptance and other expertise brings the total number of such deals since 2007 to 10, including those

with Kazakhstan, Indonesia, Vietnam, UAE and Jordan.

An official at Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) said Kuwait has been slow to come up with detailed plans on nuclear power generation.

“Unlike Vietnam and Jordan, where selection of projects is about to star t, there are few details available from Kuwait on its plans such as when, where and how many reactors they need,” the METI official said. — Reuters

Metro changes Dubai scene Car-lovers stick to the wheel Khagendra Thapa Magar

New tiniest man emerges BOGOTA: It was only this week that Colombia’s pintsized Edward Nino was on top of the world, named the Guinness Book’s smallest man on the planet. Now a tiny Nepalese teen is about to torpedo his low-rise glory. Nino, 24, stands 70.21 cm (27.64 in) small, and lives at home with his mother in a humble house on Bogota’s south end. His ambitions are anything but humble; Nino dreams of traveling to Japan, China, the United States, India and Spain, and of making it big as an actor.

President Juan Manuel

Santos has invited him to a meeting at the presidential palace today-perhaps the high point of his 15 minutes of fame. The looming rub is that next month Nepal’s Khagendra Thapa Magar, who at 56 centimeters (22 inches) is more than 14 cm (5.50 in) shorter, turns 18. That means he will knock Nino out of the top spot as tiniest man.

Nino has a 90-cm (35.4 inch)-long bed, and bathes in a tiny specially-made shower.

He is soft-spoken, but likes being a natty dresser, though he also has to have his clothes Continued on Page 14

DUBAI: Dubai Metro may have altered the commuting scene in this car-loving city, but a year after the first train left the station winning over the hard-core motorists remains an uphill struggle.

Despite Dubai’s severe financial crisis however, the rail authority is determined to complete its second line, delayed for more than a year.

Since September 9, 2009, when the network opened, the number of daily trips has reached 120,000, for more than 30 million riders, says Mattar Al-Tayyer, CEO of the Road and Transport Authority.

Passenger numbers are expected to hit 40 million in 2010, Tayyer said, with the opening of the remaining stations on the Red Line, the first of two lines to enter service in the city of around two million people.

On one recent day, just after 3:00 pm when most employees leave work during the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan, passengers crowded the platforms at several stations of the Red Line.

Continued on Page 14

DUBAI: A Dubai Metro train speeds past Sheikh Zayed road in Dubai yesterday. — AFP

NATIONAL

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

AI turbulence makes headlines

Air India flights frequency reduction ‘temporary’

By Ben Garcia KUWAIT: News reports about Air India’s decision to cancel some flights bound to and from India and other Gulf destinations have been confirmed by the regional office in Kuwait. According to A Rambabu, Country Manager Air India, the air carrier will reduce its frequency of flights to and from Kuwait from five times to twice a week. This measure, however, he said is ‘tempoAir India had announced the cancellation of flights from Sept 7 to end of October to Sharjah, Dubai, Abudhabi, Muscat and Kuwait citing shortage of cabin crew and tough regulations placed by the DGCA following the Mangalore air crash, The Hindu newspaper reported.

But the National Aviation Company of India Ltd (NACIL) announced the cancellation of about 300 flights. Flights that were scheduled for five destinations in the Gulf countries were already restored, the report said.

Outbound passengers and travel agents working with Air India did not express concern over the news.

According to some regular passengers, Air India’s plans

Some schools still short of text books

KUWAIT: The Interior Ministry’s Research and Development Center recently held a ceremony to award the winners of the Ramadan quiz. Prizes were distributed by the Center’s General Manager Maj Gen Yahya Al-Saleh, Brig Gen Ibrahim Hashem. A member of the security library Mrs Iqbal Al-Mutairi was also present at the event.

Co-ops to extend sale period KUWAIT: The Union of Consumer Cooperative Societies (UCCS) announced yesterday that local Co-ops will be extending the period of sale offers on a range of over 100 items for a further three months after receiving approval from the Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

UCCS Chairman Dr. Hussain Al-Duwaihees

said that the sale, which began in July, had originally only been scheduled to last until September 15.

The items on special offer include more than 100 Al-Taawon brand products, he revealed, including rice, frozen food, and cleaning products. —KUNA

KUWAIT: The Ministry of Education committee to follow up on preparations for the new school year held their last meeting before school starts, reported Al-Watan. The meeting will feature a discussion on the steps implemented so far and the obstacles that still need to be addressed.

The meeting was led by Undersecretary Assistant for Public Education Muna AlLughani, who explained to reporters that preparations regarding furnishing, air conditioning, water coolers and textbooks were discussed. Several notes were made on textbook shortages and how best to address the concerns before the start of the school year.

Meanwhile, Al-Lughani indicated that the project to provide all elementary public schools with lunch meals will be fully implemented by October 31.

rary.’ Air India operates 60 flights a week between the Gulf and India including Kuwait. Kuwait alone has regular flights between the two countries that operates five times a week. “By October, flights will be trimmed down to twice a week,” said Rambabu in an interview with the Kuwait Times yesterday. He explained that the reduced number of flights “will be temporary.”

“There are talks going on and nothing is final as far as I know,” Rambabu added.

to cut down on some flights to and from the Gulf region in October is not ‘news.’

“They tend to cancel flights; this is nothing new to passengers who use their services,” an Indian ticket sales agent told Kuwait Times when queried about the cancellation news. He noted that if there are changes in the schedule, for example, Air India sometimes fails to warn passengers on time.

Another Air India regular passenger from the state of Goa noted that given an option, she would be more careful when choosing the airline. Claiming that the airline offers the only regular direct flight to Goa, she is left with fewer options.

Air India commenced its operations in Kuwait back

in October 1960. Since then, Kuwait has already been in the Air India’s flight radar for the last 45 years. For years, the flagship carrier has been the trusted airlines for many Indians and travelers.

With the entry of various budget airline companies and soaring demand, Air India just like other legacy carriers, has been facing several challenges.

A passenger relates some of the challenges to the state-owned status of the airline. To him, privatization of India’s one-time pride is the key to recovery, “That is the only way to restore trust and confidence, and win back passengers. If the government continues to keep a deaf ear to all the comments of regular passengers, it is better to cease all operations,” a sales agent said.

local spotlight

Eid holiday: Don’t get sick

By Muna Al-Fuzai

T

he month of Ramadan is over and while some of us spent the month trying to work and fast at the same time, many took the month off and stayed away from work.

Some even took official leave for the whole month of Ramadan in order to give themselves quality time do nothing but pray and read the Quran.

One of the issues that I wanted to address is the situation of hospitals during official holidays, such as Eid. In government hospitals, outpatient clinics

are usually closed during the day and I can’t figure out why. Should people stop getting sick on these days? Trying to see a consultant is impossible around the holidays.

I agree and understand that doctors, like many others, want to spend the holidays with their families, but what about their obligation to their patients.

What should sick people do during a holiday season? Small clinics are usually busy and overcrowded in areas like Qurain.

The Eid holiday is officially three days long but with the weekend it will feel even longer. I wish everyone a good holiday and urge them to keep their health and mind. You don’t want to lose any in these days off.

Eid Mubarak muna@kuwaittimes.net

Two NBK customers to win car in summer card draw KUWAIT: The National Bank of Kuwait (NBK), the leading bank in Kuwait and the highest rated bank in the Middle East has announced September 14 as the last day to use NBK cards and get chances to win the luxurious SLS AMG Coupe offered under the exciting summer NBK cards promotion. Customers using their cards overseas or in Kuwait earn chances to enter the draw to win. Using NBK cards this summer brings NBK customers closer to owning the dream car.

NBK Consumer Banking Group Deputy General Manager, Abdullah Al-Najran Al-Tuwaijri said, “We are glad that two of our loyal customers won the E63 AMG saloon in the first draw and the G-55L AMG off roader in the second draw.” Use your NBK cards to pay for all of your purchases during this summer whether in Kuwait or abroad, and enter the last draw to win the fantastic SLS AMG Coupe,” added Al-Tuwaijri.

“Every KD 20 spent on your credit card in Kuwait, including cash withdrawals gives you one chance, and every KD 20 spent using your credit or debit cards abroad will give you two chances into the last draw. Keep using your NBK cards to increase your chances of winning,” said AlTuwaijri.

If you are not an NBK customer, this is your opportunity to transfer your salary and earn even more chances into the draw. You can also earn

Abdullah Al-Tuwaijri additional chances by applying for Travel Safe.

“This is a fantastic opportunity to enjoy your summer this year while looking forward to being the lucky winner.”

Kuwait govt insists on ‘audio-visual’ amendment KUWAIT: A top state official asserted the Cabinet’s commitment to go ahead with presenting the amendments they proposed to the audiovisual law, reported Al-Rai. They want to be able to take stricter measures against those that harm national unity.

In a statement made recently to the press, the State Minister for Cabinet Affairs, Roudhan AlRoudhan urged MPs not to overreact to these amendments. He noted that the amendment’s draft law is subject to changes during a discussion with the Parliament’s educational committee.

Furthermore, Al-Roudhan explained that the Cabinet is motivated to introduce the amendments following the disagreement that took place between the Cabinet and the Parliament while discussing the articles of the audiovisual law. The disagreement took place during the Cabinet’s latest meeting with the Committee to study the negative effects of foreign phenomena in Kuwait Committee. They added that these amendments will give the Cabinet more flexibility when confronting offending individuals.

The minister pointed out that the Cabinet has filed 500 cases with authorities against people or firms that have violated the audio-visual law.

Those who oppose this approach fear that it might restrict freedoms.

AlRoudhan and the Minister of Information were invited to the most recent meeting of the negative effects of foreign phenomena committee to discuss the subject, but did not have positive outcomes.

In a statement made to the press following the meeting, MP Faisal AlDuwaisan explained that the undersecretary of the Ministry of Information who attended the meeting on behalf of Minister Sheikh Ahmad Al-Abdullah “couldn’t provide reasonable answers to the questions that were brought up.” He added that Undersecretary Sheikh Faisal Al-Malik gave contradictory answers on numerous occasions and was cornered by MPs’ questions several times as well. AlDuwaisan further indicated that Al-Roudhan failed to provide the Cabinet’s view on the subject and “only listened during the meeting.”

MP Naji Al-Abdulhadi indicated that the meeting failed to reach an agreement after the Cabinet insisted on amending the law.

Committee members and other MPs asserted that the main problem was the failure to implement the law against those who violated the audio visual law fully.

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NATIONAL

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Wataniya subscribers warned not to send data

By Nawara Fattahova KUWAIT: For about a week, some of Wataniya Telecom’s subscribers have received an SMS alert warning them not to respond to suspicious SMSs or calls. The message read: “There was a fraud case where customers received SMS or calls from local or overseas numbers asking for a

recharge PIN number to enter a Wataniya drawing or lottery. Please DO NOT respond to such an SMS or call. Wataniya will never ask you to send out airtime credit.”

This SMS was sent out to subscribers after many were swindled, reported the Wataniya administration. According to an official from Wataniya, for three months several complaints were reported to Wataniya

SMS alert circulates in Kuwait that some subscribers received SMSs informing subscribers that if they buy phone credit and send their scratch card numbers to a given phone number they could win prizes.

“This is not true, how could someone believe such a stupid demand,” a Wataniya

official said. “People should be aware of such swindling. Wataniya never demands any personal information or the numbers of recharge cards. We already have this data and information.” He explained that sending out personal information is the fault of the subscriber. He added that they should be

careful not to provide any personal information.

Such scams come from international numbers. “These scams happen all over the world, even in emails. Only a few cases have originated from local numbers and these numbers often belong to expats who have left the country,” he added.

Advertizing SMSs promoting participa-

tion in different competitions and draws that award prizes is a different case. “It’s not possible to charge a different fee than the one announced by SMS,” the official explained. He related the problem to international phone lines, which Wataniya has no control over. “That is why we always warn people against suspicious SMSs and calls coming from outside Kuwait.”

Attendants preparing water bottles for distribution.

Worshippers pictured during the prayer.

45,000 participate in final Qiam prayer KUWAIT: Around 45,000 worshippers flocked to the Grand Mosque on the night preceding the 29th day of the holy month of Ramadan to perform the late night Qiam prayer on what could be the last night of the holy month.

Sheikh Meshary Al-Afasi led the first part of the prayer, before stepping back to allow Sheikh Khalid Al-Saiedi to lead the

second part, which he did after a brief sermon delivered by Sheikh Ahmad AlQattan during the intermission. In his sermon Sheikh Al-Qattan emphasized the significance of prayer in Islam.

Ibrahim Al-Eid, the general supervisor of the team of 150 Kuwaiti attendants who helped with organizing the work at the Grand Mosque during the busy ten-day

Volunteers collect boxes of food to be distributed to worshippers.

An elderly woman is helped to the mosque.

kuwait digest

The elusive private sector

By Yousuf Othman Al-Mejalhem round 10 years ago, I participated in the Failaka project’s feasibility as a tourist resort. The project divides the island into three sectors: Hotels, chalets and other entertainment areas, provided that each sector bear the costs of infrastructure installation.

The study was weak, and the private sector believed that there was no economic viability unless the government bore the cost of infrastructure. The government agreed to pay KD 400 million, and this way, the private sector slipped out of its role in developing the island. It had viewed the project from a purely commercial angle.

A few days ago, the private sector refused to participate in low-cost homes project unless the government bore the cost of the project’s infrastructure, estimated at more than KD 100 million. Once again, the private sector does not wish to participate in nationbuilding and acts merely as a businessman that thinks about profits at the expense of development.

When the government introduced the development plan idea, the sector rejected it and demanded that funding be provided through local banks without clarifying its role in presenting ideas that would have helped motor more growth.

The water treatment project is considered

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to be among the most successful development projects. The government will set up plants in both Wafra and Abdaly. The state is committed to buying treated water, and this way, the company did not have to bear a part of the cost.

The profits garnered from two private fuel companies are a result of purchasing gasoline - a liter for 55 fils from the government. It is sold for 65 fils.

Does this mean that the private sector benefits from state revenues? This way, it is clear that it is not among the private sector’s priorities to participate in development.

Rather, it benefits from development to compensate for losses that are incurred from financial crises.

The Minister of Public Works(MPW) Dr Fadhel Safar says that the population will touch five million in 2025, with a total expatriate population of 3.5 million. So, the number of people in Kuwait now touches 2.5 million. According to the plan, one million job opportunities will be created for expatriates.

This will pave the way or the presence of more marginal labor in the country.

The state builds more hospitals, roads and the latest government services to absorb new labor. This is not a development plan, rather, it is a service plan that aims to build service projects that compensate for the deficits in health sector, roads, education and transportation. — Al-Qabas

KSHR addresses laborers’ issue KUWAIT: The Kuwait Society for Human Rights (KSHR) recently urged state authorities to enforce more effective supervision to ensure that all employers adhere to regulations.

A ban is in place that forbids laborers from working outdoors during the day in the months of July, August and September. In

a statement made to the press, the KSHR stated that it had raised the issue previously, in a similarly worded statement that was issued a year ago.

However, the KSHR observed that these recommendations have not been fully implemented. They pointed out that a number of photographs

published in Al-Qabas on September 6, 2010 showed workers toiling in the sun during day time.

The KSHR warned that violations of workers’ rights continue to take place in light of lack of proper monitoring as part of the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor (MSAL).

An activity held for children.

Briton facing fraud charges released

By Hanan Al-Saadoun KUWAIT: Police have released a British expatriate on his own guarantee after his lawyer insisted that fraud charges against him were false.

The man’s lawyer, Moshen Al-Qattan, explained that the case arose after his client, who runs a business in Kuwait selling top of the range vehicles at discounted prices, had concluded a deal online with an Italian customer, agreeing to sell him two Ferrari cars for KD 50,000.

After sending a down payment for the vehicles, the customer was taken aback to see the same cars being advertised on another website. Rather than contacting the businessman to enquire about the apparent discrepancy, the buyer immediately arranged a flight to Kuwait where he engaged a lawyer to take legal action against the seller, accusing him of fraud.

Al-Qattan explained, however, that the pictures of the cars on the other website that had upset the buyer were being displayed by another individual, for whom the British businessman acted an intermediary. AlQattan said that his client was selling the cars on behalf of the person on whose site they were pictured, claiming a small percentage of the sale price as commission.

The lawyer stated that it was clear that his client was innocent of any attempt at fraud, adding that his client had refunded the money sent by the Italian buyer in full.

Drug user freed The Criminal Court has rejected a case against a Kuwaiti man who was found in possession of drugs after his lawyer proved that police had searched him without first obtaining the proper warrant, thus invalidating the search process and arrest.

The accused had been caught red-handed with a quantity of drugs, along with a friend who he bought them from, who was also taken into custody where both men admitted to using drugs and the other man confessed to dealing in them.

Due to the flawed search and arrest process, the charges against the first man were reduced to a KD 300 fine and being bound over to observe good conduct for the next two years.

Bodies found Mubarak Al-Kabeer authorities received a report on the identity of the decomposing body found near the Al-Qurain markets. It was determined that the deceased was a 27-year-old citizen wanted for questioning regarding a series of thefts in 2002. The report indicated that the man’s death may have been the result of foul play or drug related.

In an unrelated incident, the Ministry of Interior received a report yesterday informing them that the decaying body of an Asian expat was found behind the Al-Qurain markets.

Road accident An Egyptian expat was killed when his car flipped over during a car accident on Wafra Road.

period, revealed that this year’s team had included 15 female attendants.

Meanwhile, Al-Anoud Al-Batti, the head of the women’s volunteers committee, indicated that more than 251 female volunteers had worked on facilitating the necessary activities to organize the prayers during the last ten days of the holy month.

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NATIONAL

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Making plans to spend Eid in Kuwait

By Hussain Al-Qatari

Here are KT’s top seven suggestions

nswering the question of ‘What can I do in Kuwait during Eid’ is just as difficult as answering the general version of the question: What can anyone do in Kuwait? Surprisingly, you can do quite a lot here. If you’re staying in Kuwait during the Eid holiday, then this article is for you. The following list will include suggestions of things you can enjoy doing in Kuwait during this holiday and any other day. I hope that it helps you plan a fun holiday.

ideal for picnics. There are a number of public beaches in Messilah, Oqaila and near the City suitable for sunbathing. Theaters might be an interesting option to consider. Eid is considered a high season for a lot of theater shows performed for both children and adults. Newspapers and TV ads would have information about the titles of the plays and the box office number to reserve tickets.

1. Theme parks, et al.

The Kuwait Touristic Enterprises Company has a decent number of facilities you can visit during the holiday. If you enjoy water sports, head to the Aqua Park located near the Kuwait Towers on the beach. For arcade games and rollercoaster rides, try AlShaab Park or the Entertainment City.

There is also an ice skating rink right off the First Ring Road. There are public parks

2. Chalets Take your family to a beach house in Khairan or Benaider. I have friends who swear that the weather in areas where chalets are located is much cooler than it ever gets in the City and the residential suburbs. Around the chalet areas you can rent all-terrain vehicles, ride bicycles, swim, enjoy the accessible beach. With the help of a few equipment which you can find for sale

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in stores located near the chalets, you can enjoy a delicious barbecue. It would be ideal to take your family and spend a couple of nights in a chalet. Some chalets are fully-furnished and are offered for rent, some even offer butler service. Do your research; if you’re lucky, you might find a good deal.

Keep your eyes open for the classifieds.

There are a few excellent resorts in the area, too, if you’re in the mood to pamper yourself.

3. Dining out Kuwait boasts a big number of trendy eateries. From funky Asian fusion to mini burger joints, you can always find a nice dining experience in Kuwait. If you’re looking for hip eateries, head to the Bida or the coast line near Al-Seif Palace. You will find coffee shops and restaurants lined up next to

each other. You can also find traditional Kuwait food at several restaurants. Fereej Suwaileh, a restaurant we featured in the Friday Times months after its launch a few years ago, is located in Salmiya and still serves delicious Kuwaiti food. The ambience fits the olden days of Kuwait. There are also a lot of good-quality Lebanese, Indian, and Japanese restaurants. They are scattered across the country, and you will definitely find one that is close to where you live.

4. Hotels and resorts The hotels and resorts on the coastline of Bidaa usually have excellent family holiday offers. They boast of international restaurants, coffee shops. You can enjoy a nice weekend with your family there. You may need to provide a marriage certificate in

order to stay in any of Kuwait’s hotels and resorts.

5. The Kuwait Towers, museums, etc.

Visit Kuwait’s touristic destinations.

Lunch at the Kuwait Towers restaurant might be an excellent idea, or an early morning visit to the souk in Sharq where fresh produce is brought from local farms. One can visit the Souk Al-Mubarakiya, where you can buy traditional Kuwaiti Eid dessert.

Or, to feed your culture vulture, visit the Kuwait Museum of Modern Arts located across the street from Souk Sharq. The museum, although located at a derelict area, offers a big collection of modern and contemporary art by local and regional artists.

6. Malls, cinema A classic option you can always resort to

if all your plans fail is to join the crowds and head to the nearest mall. Be it the Avenues, 360, Al-Kout, Marina Mall, or any other mall, you can enjoy a movie and a meal, and probably bump into friends and acquaintances while at the mall. My only advice is to go early and leave late to avoid the terrible traffic jams.

7. Relax! Sleep!

If all your plans fail, stay home. Sleep.

Watch TV. Order food. Invite friends over and stay home.

You’ve had a long exhausting month, and you need the rest. If you’re a student, enjoy the holiday by pulling all-nighters and doing movie marathons - this is your last holiday before school starts again. If you’re an employee, seize the opportunity to smash your snooze button if you forget to turn off the alarm. Relax, catch up on sleep, and enjoy the holiday.

Eid Mubarak!

KUWAIT: The Kuwait Journalists Association (KJA) recently held its annual ghabqa at its headquarters building to commemorate the holy month of Ramadan. Several prominent local figures attended the event, including a number of Kuwaiti TV personalities, while various special activities for children were organized especially for the occasion. — Photos by Fouad Al-Shaikh

Thursday, September 9, 2010

5

NATIONAL

Crisp new notes: The commercialization of Eid

By Hussain Al-Qatari KUWAIT: New banknotes are in demand now that Eid is approaching. The Central Bank of Kuwait prints new notes to coincide with this period as it is a tradition to give new banknotes as Eidiyyas on the occasion of both Eid Al-Fitr and Eid AlAdha. An Eidiyya is a gift of money given to children by parents and family elders for Eid so that they can buy sweets and toys.

Down the years, however, this tradition has changed. While Eid used to be an occasion for family and friends to visit each

other, it has now become more commercialized, like everything else. These days, Eid is an hour or two during the day of Eid during which families gather to have lunch, kids collect money, and everybody goes out to spend as much as they can in the malls and everywhere else.

People have become very meticulous about getting crisp banknotes from the bank for the occasion. One bank teller told the Kuwait Times that new notes are quite a big deal to some people.

“We get clients, especially older folks, who ask us to give them thousands of KDs

in new notes so they can use them for Eidiyya,” he explained. “Whether they spend the entire amount or not is honestly beyond me, but they certainly come in ahead of time and form a queue in order to get crisp new cash.”

Another teller revealed that the average amount withdrawn by an individual during this period is between KD 300 and KD 500. This is then distributed among all the kids in the family according to their ages. Some young men and women in their early twenties still get Eidiyyas from their parents, although generally the

Eidiyyas stop as soon as one gets a job.

“It depends on the family,” says Humoud, 37. “Some parents still give their sons and daughters who are well into their thirties and forties an Eidiyya. I have a friend my age who receives his KD 300 Eidiyya in his bank account from his father, even though he has a job and has kids to whom he gives Eidiyyas himself.”

Speaking about how this tradition has changed, 63-year-old Abu Ghanim said that new banknotes didn’t matter in the old days. “When I was an kid, parents gave a quarter of a dinar as an Eidiyya. A quar-

ter was quite generous since everything was cheap. If you got one dinar as an Eidyya you were lucky. Nowadays, one dinar is never enough. I give my grandchildren KD 5, and they make me feel like that is not enough!”

During Eid people celebrate everything new they have. Abu Ghanim muses: “You are supposed to look your best. Men and boys used to get new haircuts and wear their newest and best clothes for Eid. Housewives also used the most expensive and newest cutlery and plates they have in the household for the occasion. Our par-

ents used the best fabrics they had to sew Eid clothes.”

Today, this has turned into a trend for going to the most expensive stores to buy clothes. Thirty-year-old Bashayer told the Kuwait Times, “Buying new clothes for Eid is pretty important for someone like me. I try to get a complete wardrobe change before Eid. Nowadays you can find some good sales during Ramadan, so it’s a pretty good opportunity to start to do some major shopping, if you think you can manage to do so with all the crowds and the packed stores.”

KUWAIT: The Lothan Youth Achievements Center (LOYAC) recently held a ghabqa at the Baitlothan, reprising the annual tradition held during the holy month of Ramadan. The event was attended by several LOYAC staff members and volunteers, and featured various special activities prepared specially for the ghabqa. — Photos by Yasser Al-Zayyat

Fasting helps boost physical, spiritual health of people

By Hassan Taha asting is not a new practice that only Muslims observe. It is also found in Judaism and Christianity. The Quran says: “O ye who believe!

Fasting is prescribed to you as it was prescribed to those before you that you may achieve piety.”

(2: 183) If fasting in the first place is without spiritual significance, then it is like an empty shell without a kernel.

Muslims consider Ramadan not as a burden but as a blessing. They fast — first and foremost — because God has enjoined it upon them. It comes as a blessing from God from which they enjoy many medical benefits.

In 1994 the first International Conference on “Health and Ramadan,” held in Casablanca, entered 50 research papers from all over the world, from Muslim and non-Muslim researchers who had done extensive studies on the medical aspects of fasting.

Researchers reported that while improvement in many medical conditions was noted, in no way did fasting worsen patients’ baseline health conditions. Following are some of the medical benefits of fasting: 1. Abstinence from water for several hours causes concentration of all fluids within the body, producing slight dehydration and activating the body’s water conservation mechanism. It has been shown that slight dehydration and water conservation, at least in the life of plant, improve longevity.

2. Fasting lowers the systolic blood pressure.

3. It stimulates the body to replace destroyed body cells - it acts like lancets in cleaning the body and ridding it of damaged cells as well as the unneeded ones.

4. In giving the pancreas gland a chance to rest, fasting helps to lower and regulate the glucose in the body.

5. Treatment for obesity fasting helps in reducing weight if moderation during meals is observed, especially during breaking the fast.

6. It helps in cutting down the percentage of fats and cholesterol in the body. Many Muslim and

F

non-Muslim medical researches have confirmed that owing to the fact that fasting reduces fats in the body, it then cuts down the percentage of cholesterol.

7. It mitigates arthritis - This is a disease that leads to an unabated swelling of the affected areas that is followed by severe pain.

8. When a person overeats, the digestive system becomes tired. Therefore, fasting brings a wholesome physiological rest for the digestive tract and central nervous system and normalizes metabolism.

9. Fasting can also be fundamental to healing various addictions, such as coffee-drinking, cigarette-smoking, drugs, alcohol, etc. The medical community has long accepted that addiction can be cured by breaking the addict’s habitual cycle. The principle of fasting is taught in almost all major religions, albeit differently in Islam, as a means of developing a higher level of selfmastery and self-control.

There are many medical benefits of fasting that the space does not allow me to enumerate. God says: “... and it is better for you to fast, if ye only knew.” (2:184) — Courtesy, the AWARE Center

6

NATIONAL

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Nobody will be allowed to offend Islamic belief

Kuwait govt warns of decisive action KUWAIT: The government of Kuw ait underlined that it w ould decisively take appropriate measures against anyone offending Islamic belief, w ives of Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him) and his companions, w hile appreciating solid rejection of all sects against these attempts, w hich arouse discord and undermine national unity. The cabinet, in its w eekly meeting Acting Prime Minister and Defense Minister Sheikh J aber Al-Hamad Al-Sabah, asserted that recent statements by Yasser Habeeb in w hich he offended w ives and companions of Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him) w ere blatant violations of Islamic teachings “w ith all its sects and cannot be accepted by any Kuw aiti or Muslim.”

Furor over Al-Habeeb’s citizenship

By Al-Saleh KUWAIT: MP Hussein Al-Qallaf queried with the Minister of Interior Sheikh Jaber Al-Khalid Al-Sabah about Kuwait’s stance on the Security Council’s declaration that Kuwaiti individuals were involved with a group of 480 terrorists. This query coincides with other MPs’ refusal to demand that Yasser Al-Habeeb’s citizenship be rescinded. MP Mubarak Al-Khurainij said that withdrawing the citizenship means that assistance cannot be sought from the Interpol to arrest him. MP Adan Al-Mattawa emphasized on the importance of respecting authorities’ work. He expressed astonish-

ment at the parliamentary seminar that was held at Al-Andalus where it was demanded that Al-Habeeb’s citizenship be rescinded.

The demands put forward by the Growth and Reform Bloc through MPs Faisal AlMislem, Waleed Al-Tabtabae, Jumaan AlHarbash and Faleh Al-Sawwagh to rescind the citizenship of Shiite fugitive Justice Yasser Al-Habeeb, and the Cabinet’s approval met with another call from MP Saleh Ashour who was visibly surprised at what some members had to say. Ashour said that the government would enforce laws equally and close all the websites that attack the belief of Kuwaitis and their religious sects so that necessary action can be taken

against them and be referred to the Public Prosecution Department.

The government decided to shut down Al-Habeeb’s webpage after offensive messages were posted on ‘Umm AlMumeneen’ Aysha. MP Faisal Al-Mislem reinstated that the Kuwaiti people are not honored to see that the Prophet Mohammad’s wife being insulted. The Council of Minister should penalize AlHabeeb by strpping him of his citizenship.

His colleague Waleed Al-Tabtabae said that government should comply with the demand to rescind Al-Habeeb’s citizenship and that the public was awaiting its decision on the matter.

Employee at Rumaithiya polyclinic harassed KUWAIT: A female employee at the Rumaithiya polyclinic was harassed by a patient who gave her his phone number.

The patient flirted with the employee but did not take her warning to leave her alone seriously. She filed a complaint against the patient at the Rumaithiya police station.

Body found An investigation of the decomposing body of a young man found in Mubarak AlKabeer revealed that the body belonged to an ex-convict. It was discovered that the man was wanted for charges of theft when he lived in the Jaber Al-Ali area.

Store thieves Ahmadi detectives arrested three young men for robbing grocery stores and stabbing employees in the Fintas and Abu Halaifa areas. The number of victims referred to intensive care units because of the robberies prompted the Director General of the Detectives Department, Brig Sheikh Mazen Al-Jarrah, to instruct the formation of a special team to follow up on the case.

An investigation revealed the license plate of the car used by the assailant and detectives were able to determine the identity of the vehicle’s owner. He denied being connected to the robberies but grocery store victims were able to identify him as their assailant. He confessed to the crimes and informed police of the whereabouts of his two accomplices who reside in Rigga. The other two were arrested and referred to the proper authorities.

Road accidents Two women and a man were killed when their vehicle flipped over on Salmy road.

An investigation was launched to determine the cause of the accident.

CBK visits children home KUWAIT: Representatives from the public relations and advertisement department of the Commercial Bank of Kuwait recently visited the ‘children home’ at the family nursing administration, to share the joy of the Eid Al-Fitr ceremonies with the children there.

“This gesture comes as part of the bank’s commitment to its social duties and humanitari-

an responsibility towards children”, said the general manager of the department Amani Al-Waraa, who explained that they have provided the center with educational toys.

The team was welcomed by Haifa’a AlNakkas and other staff members at the center, who acknowledged the bank’s humanitarian gesture.

Asian mugged Eight thieves stabbed and robbed an Asian expat of KD 680 in Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh, reported Al-Rai-. The Asian explained that he was walking through the area one night when he was confronted by a group of eight men. They demanded his money and stabbed him seven times when he refused to give it to them. Passersby brought the man to Farwaniya Hospital.

An investigation was launched.

The cabinet, while appreciating the solid stance of all sects of Kuwait in rejecting any attempt that undermine their national unity, underscored that it would take all “decisive” measures against anyone attacking “our Islamic belief” or offend wives of Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him) or his companions, as well as causing discord within the Kuwaiti community, Minister of State for Cabinet Affairs Roudhan Al-Roudhan said in a statement after the cabinet meeting.

He said the cabinet assigned relevant authorities to take appropriate measures regarding the Habeeb issue.

Meanwhile, the cabinet praised the recent interview by His Highness the Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Mohammad Al-Ahmad AlSabah with Kuwait TV, during which he affirmed commitment and respect with the constitution and law, and keenness to strengthen principles of transparency and protection of public funds.

Sheikh Nasser, in the interview, called for collaboration of efforts to facing numerous challenges to achieve the development objectives set by the gov-

ernment.

The cabinet also took note of the phone calls by Sheikh Nasser, and Deputy Premier and Foreign Minister Sheikh Dr. Mohammad Sabah AlSalem Al-Sabah, with Bahrain Prime Minister Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al-Khalifa and foreign minister Sheikh Khaled bin Ahmad Al-Khalifa respectively.

The Kuwaiti top officials strongly condemned the “terrorist plots” against the security and stability of Bahrain, and expressed firm support with the Kingdom to thwarting the “criminal acts,” said AlRoudhan.

Sheikh Nasser and Sheikh Mohammad also expressed Kuwait’s support with Bahrain’s policies to preserving security, sovereignty and stability of the Gulf island.

The cabinet, on the other hand, reviewed content of the speech of His Highness the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah to the Kuwaiti people on the occasion of the last 10 days of Ramadan in which he asserted the need to preserve the homeland and its national unity as well as achieving more prosperity.

Al-Roudhan said the cabinet

extended congratulations to HH the Amir and HH the Crown Prince on the advent of Eid AlFitr wishing more prosperity for Kuwait, asking Allah Almighty to accept the good deeds and to return this blessed occasion while the Arab and Muslim nations are blessed with more prosperity and pride.

Al-Roudhan said the cabinet also expressed its deepeset appreciation and pride of the noble directives uttered by HH the Amir, affirming its full abidance by such directives during these blessed days for the sake of homeland and people.

The cabinet then reviewed the letter addressed to HH the Amir from Pakistani President Asef Zardari in which he praised the supportive stances adopted by the state of Kuwait towards Pakistan as a result of the devastating floods that hit the country recently.

The cabinet then reviewed the letter addressed to HH the Amir from Mexican president Felipe Calderon which included an invitation to Sheikh Sabah to attend the centennial anniversary of Mexico’s independence.

HH the Amir deputized HH the Premier to represent him. The cabinet then reviewed the two letters addressed to HH the

Amir from President of Djibouti Ismael Omar Guelleh in which he hailed the support extended by the state of Kuwait to his country in the field of economic and social development, in addition to a letter from President of Kosovo Fatmir Sejdiu tackiling bilateral relations and means of fostering them.

The cabinet took note of the prospective visit to the US

by HH the Premier representing HH the Amir to heading Kuwait’s delegation to the 65th session of the UN General Assembly on September 15-30. HH the Premier will be accompanied

by Adviser at HH the Amir’s office Abdulrahman Al-Ateeqi, Foreign Minister Sheikh Dr. Mohammad Al-Sabah, Adviser at the Amiri Diwan Mohammad Abulhassan, Foreign Underscretary Khaled Al-Jarallah, Kuwait’s ambassador to the US Sheikh Salem Abdullah Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, Kuwait’s permanent representative to the UN Ambassador Mansour Al-Otaibi, Secretary General of the supreme council for planning and development Dr. Adel Al-Woqayyan and Director General of the Environment Public Authority Dr. Salah Al-Mudhi. — KUNA

kuwait digest

Negative practices of govt officials

By Mohammad Al-Muqatea nfortunately, there are several top state officials, including ministers, that intentionally break the law and the regulations of the constitution.

This disregard and carelessness is committed as soon as they realize that their actions will most likely be overlooked.

Groups of officials continue to break the law because they have never been held accountable by a higher authority.

Whether it’s the ministers or His

U

Highness the Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Al-Muhammad Al-Sabah, officials say not following up on their illegal action is an excuse for them to continue with their irresponsible behavior.

When officials in positions of authority overlook violations carried out by ministries they get the impression that the silence of their superiors is an implication to continue with similar - if not more serious - violations.

Officials explain that the reason they refuse to appoint candidates to certain

vacant posts in their ministries is because of directions from their superiors. They commit to the instruction of their superiors, even if it requires breaking the law.

The same excuse is used by officials who appoint people to certain posts or paid medical treatment programs abroad without going through the proper legal procedures.

In light of this serious situation, I urge HH the Prime Minister to address these negative practices. — Al-Qa ba s

Degree course for Kuwait Science Fair contest winners fully paid KUWAIT: The Kuwait Science Fair, the largest science competition in Kuwait, yesterday announced that the American University of Kuwait (AUK) will grant the first place winner(s) of the best science project in the competition a scholarship in their desired field of study.

AUK joins the founders of the competition, ExxonMobil Exploration & Production Kuwait Limited and Kuwait Energy in their efforts to empower young students in public and private schools across Kuwait to explore and innovate in the fields of math and science.

The competition, endorsed by the Minister of Oil and of Information and the Chairman of the Kuwait Petroleum Corporation, His Excellency Sheikh Ahmed Al-Abdullah AlSabah, will launch its third consecutive year in October 2010, inspiring students to pursue future careers in related professions.

AUK President, Dr. Winfred Thompson said: “We are very pleased to have joined the Kuwait Science Fair competition this year. This competition is one of the - if not the only competition that engages all students across the country in an educational experience outside school parameters. We are delighted to take part in the Kuwait Science Fair to support Kuwait’s young minds in their pursuit of scientific innovation.

We look forward to welcoming young winners into our classrooms.”

Kuwait Science Fair Managing Director, Ms. Aseel Al-Turkait said: “The American University of Kuwait is one of the most renowned universities in Kuwait, set apart by its science programs such as Computer Science, Computer

Aseel Al-Turkait Engineering, and Information Systems. For that, we extend our deepest gratitude to AUK for providing the first place winner of the Kuwait Science Fair with a full scholarship and an opportunity to continue their education at a reputed university.” The Kuwait Science Fair competition extends over five months and will be divided into two phases. The first phase, lasting two months, consists of daily visits by the KSF team to public and private schools across Kuwait and a permanent KSF booth at the Marina Mall to encourage students to take part in the competition and help them submit their applications.

In its second phase, the ‘Best 100’ projects will continue in the competition and will start developing their ideas into experimental projects, which will be showcased for a panel of judges and experts.

In its second year, which ended in March 2009, more than 220 students from 46 public and private schools in Kuwait competed in the Kuwait Science

Fair. The first place winner received a scholarship in the discipline of her choice from the Gulf University for Science and Technology (GUST), in addition to KD750 in cash, as well as an internship with Schlumberger.

The winner’s school also received a computer lab from Schlumberger, as well as being admitted into Schlumberger’s Excellence in Educational Development program (SEED), which works to educate students on global issues influencing their future.

AUK is an independent, private, equal opportunity, and coeducational liberal arts institution of higher education. The educational, cultural and administrative structure, methods and standards of AUK are based on the American model of higher learning. AUK and its Ivy League partner, Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire (USA), have worked closely together since 2003, when the two institutions signed a Memorandum of Understanding.

New proposals to amend citizenship law KUWAIT: Several MPs are reportedly working on proposals to amend the current citizenship law, which would enable the interior minister to seek an Amiri accord to revoke the citizenship of any Kuwaiti citizen found guilty of offending the country’s religious and social principles.

Islamist MPs are apparently calling for such an amendment to be introduced immediately after the inauguration of the upcoming parliamentary term.

In other news, MP Faisal AlDuwaisan has reportedly submitted a parliamentary question to justice minister Rashid Al-Hamad concerning the measures taken by the Ministry of Justice in implementing court orders, primarily those related to the dismissal of public sector employees. The MP raised the matter after a court order was issued relieving the sales and marketing director of the Kuwait Airways Corporation while he was still in his post.

On a separate issue, MP Hussein Mazyed has urged Kuwait Municipality to reexamine the tenders for large-scale street cleaning projects across Kuwait and in particular to review those under which cleaning workers are paid salaries as low as KD 20 per month.

On another political issue, the head of the parliamentary environmental affairs committee Dr. Ali Al-Omair explained that 25 percent of the compensation received by Kuwait for the environmental damage suffered during the 1990-91 Iraqi invasion and occupation is currently deposited with the United Nations, pending research to ensure that Kuwait’s environmental rehabilitation efforts are being carried out in accordance with the UN Environment Program’s recommendations.

INTERNATIONAL

Thursday, September 9, 2010

7

Israel eyes impound of ships breaking Gaza blockade JERUSALEM/LONDON: Anticipating fresh bids by pro-Palestinian activists to sail against its Gaza Strip blockade, and hoping to avoid a repeat of its bloody boarding of a Turkish aid ship in May, Israel has turned to maritime law. Israeli officials say vessels will be warned in advance that they face costly impoundment and the possible detainment of crews - a strategy first floated in July when the threat of such action helped turn a Libyan-chartered ship away from Gaza. “The legal approach proved effective as a deterrent, and we’re prepared to see it through as a punishment,” said one senior government official, declining to be named. “If we are to pay a price for defending the blockade, the other side will pay a price for challenging it.”

Israel triggered world outcry in May

after its forces killed 9 Turks in brawls aboard the Mavi Marmara, a converted cruise liner that tried to lead an aid flotilla to impoverished Gaza, whose 1.5 million Palestinians are ruled by Hamas Islamists.

Israel says its blockade is needed to prevent weapons from reaching Hamas, which refuses to recognise Israel. Maritime specialists say international law allows a sovereign nation to seize a vessel that runs a declared blockade.

That could discourage firms renting out ships to pro-Palestinian campaigners but, arguably, less so in cases like the Mavi Marmara, where the activists buy the ship outright.

“Many ship owners will look at the possibility or likelihood that their vessel will be impounded or fined or seized outright,”

Tehran suspends woman’s stoning TEHRAN: Iranian authorities have suspended the sentence of death by stoning for a woman convicted of adultery, the foreign ministry said on Wednesday, after weeks of condemnation from around the world. “The verdict regarding the extramarital affairs has stopped and it’s being reviewed,” Foreign Ministry Ramin Mehmanparast told Iran’s state-run English-language Press TV. The statement came a day after European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso called the sentence “barbaric beyond words”, the latest in a string of criticisms by foreign powers.

Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani was convicted of adultery - a capital crime in the Islamic Republic - in 2006. She also has been charged with involvement in her husband’s murder. In a live telephone interview, Mehmanparast said the murder charge was “being investigated for the final verdict to be issued”. Iranian media have suggested that the stoning sentence - imposed for certain crimes under sharia law which Iran adopted after the 1979 Islamic revolution -would not be carried out, but that Ashtiani might still be executed by hanging. “We think that this is a very normal case,” Mehmanparast

Sakineh Ashtiani said. “This dossier looks like many other dossiers that exist in other countries.”

At no point in the interview, which was in the Farsi language but was dubbed over by a simultaneous translation into English, did he mention “stoning”, referring merely to Ashtiani’s “death sentence”.

Mehmanparast blamed the United States for stirring the furore to hurt Iran’s international image as it faces sanctions aimed at curbing its nuclear program. “It looks like they are playing a political game,” he said. According to Amnesty International, Iran is second only to China in the number of people it executes. It put to death at least 346 people in 2008. Murder, adultery, rape, armed robbery, apostasy and drug trafficking are all punishable by death in Iran. — Reuters

said J Peter Pham, a strategic adviser to the U.S. and European governments. “Those are losses for which they are not insured and for which the non-governmental groups are not going to make good on for them.”

In July a charity belonging to one of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s sons chartered the cargo ship Amalthea for a Gaza aid run. Israeli media aired recordings of the navy warning the captain he would be held responsible for any showdown at sea. According to Israeli and Libyan officials, a dispute ensued aboard the ship over where to dock.

The captain and crew prevailed, taking the Amalthea to El Arish in nearby Egypt.

“Israeli authorities, through the navy, threatened legal action against the ship,”

said Alex Angelopoulos of Greece’s ACA Shipping Corp, which owns the Amalthea.

“The threats were taken into consideration, but the decision (to change course) was taken after long talks with the ship’s charterers,” he said, adding that were the ship impounded it would mean losses of some 5,000 euros ($6,350) a day.

Another Israeli official said permanent confiscation of ships was “out of the question”. “It would simply be untenable both legally and practically. But we can exert pressure by virtue of the fact that a ship owner stands to lose a lot of money for each day of temporary impoundment in Israel, not to mention the long-term cost of the vessel going rusty and neglected,” the official said.

The Israelis say they are bracing for

possible new Gaza flotillas by groups from Lebanon, Europe and the United States.

Activists might be willing to lose their ships if they thought their actions would bring them global publicity or dent Israeli prestige - as happened with the May flotilla. But some shipping experts doubt whether impoundment could be a feasible long-term solution for Israel. “The real question should be: how long can Israel detain the ship? My guess is not long without positive proof that there was something more than humanitarian aid on board,” said John Dalby, chief executive of maritime asset recovery firm MRM. Daniel Reisner, a former commander of the Israeli military’s international law department, said he knew of no legal basis to try foreigners specifically for violating

the Gaza blockade. “In general, the more innocent the cargo, the more this diminishes the chances of a prosecution,” he said.

Of the seven ships in the Mavi Marmara flotilla, four remain berthed in Israel after the three Turkish-owned vessels were returned unconditionally as a fence-mending gesture to Ankara.

Israel’s Defence Ministry said unspecified “private entities” had sought to reclaim two of the impounded ships but had yet to furnish proof of ownership. The remaining two ships have gone unclaimed while Israel tries to locate their owners.

“It’s a double-edged sword: if you have no hope of recovering the actual impound fees then you are stuck with a boat that you neither want nor will be able to get rid of easily,” said Pham. —Reuters

Baghdad bans motorcycles Gunmen kill Iraqi TV journalist in Mosul BAGHDAD: A spate of bomb attacks and shootings in Iraq yesterday killed five people, including a television presenter, as Baghdad imposed a ban on motorcycles ahead of the Muslim holiday of Eid Al-Fitr. The violence, which left dozens wounded, came three days after a coordinated suicide attack on an Iraqi military complex in Baghdad killed 12 people and injured 36. In the main northern city of Mosul, Sabah Al-Khayat was shot dead in front of his house while departing for work at the AlMosuliyah satellite television station, where he presented a programme on mosques and shrines in the city.

“Armed men shot the journalist Sabah Al-Khayat in front of his house in central Mosul while he was leaving for work,” a police official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. His killing was the second such murder of a television journalist in Iraq in as many days, with Riad Al-Saray, a prominent anchorman who presented political and religious programs fo state broadcaster Al-Iraqiyah, killed on Tuesday in west Baghdad. Media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) condemned Saray’s killing on Tuesday, and in a new report said the conflict in Iraq had resulted in the most deaths of journalists and media staff of any war since World War II. Meanwhile, in yesterday’s dead-

liest attack, a vehicle packed with explosives was detonated and quickly followed by a roadside bomb near a bus terminal in the south Baghdad neighbourhood of Bayaa, killing two people. Officials from the ministries of defence and interior, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said more than 20 others were wounded, including 10 members of the Iraqi security forces. And on Al-Sheikh Omar street in the centre of the capital, two nearsimultaneous roadside bombs killed one person and wounded a dozen others, the interior ministry official and a doctor said.

Baghdad Operations Command also said that it was enforcing a ban on motorcycles in the city until further notice, ahead of the three-day Eid AlFitr festivities which could begin Thursday to mark the end of the fasting month of Ramadan. Bans on motorcycles - which have been used in deadly attacks in Iraq - are often implemented around major holidays in the country.

Also yesterday, a farmer was killed in the central Iraqi town of Mayndili when his truck was struck by a roadside bomb inside his farm, said Major Mohammed Al-Karkhi, spokesman for police in Diyala province north of Baghdad. The motives for the attack, which also left his son wounded, was unclear.—AFP

Police arrest brother of US soldiers’ killer KIRKUK, Iraq: Police yesterday detained the brother of an Iraqi soldier killed after gunning down two American troops and wounding nine others, the first US deaths since combat operations were declared over.

Tuesday’s violence, which also saw two US soldiers wounded in a grenade attack, and a firefight in Baghdad two days earlier involving American soldiers, were a stark reminder that despite Washington’s claim of a move to “stability operations,” its forces in Iraq remain at risk.

The gunman, enlisted man Soran Rahman Saleh Wali, opened fire on his US comrades who were visiting the Al-Saadiq Air Base near the town of Tuz Khurmatu in Salaheddin province, killing the two Americans and wounding nine others. Security officials said Wali shot them after an argument erupted, but there were no details on what sparked the row or on his motives. Defence ministry spokesman Major General Mohammed Al-Askari had initially told AFP the quarrel was over a sports match, but he later retracted those remarks and said it was unclear why it occurred.

“Marwan, Soran’s brother, who works as a policeman in Tuz Khurmatu, was arrested yesterday by police forces and is now being held,” a police colonel in the town told AFP, speaking on condition of anonymity.

“Iraqi and US joint forces also raided Soran’s house overnight, but did not find anyone there.” The US military said it was not involved in the raid.

The colonel said Wali’s corpse, which was moved from Kirkuk mortuary to Tuz Khurmatu hospital for further tests, had sustained nine gun shots, including to the head and abdomen.

US and Iraqi military officials said they had opened investigations into the shooting. “A preliminary review of reports from the scene indicates the attack was a deliberate act,” the US military said in a statement. “The detailed investigation will clarify the facts and actions of all involved.”

Brigadier General Jeffrey Buchanan, spokesman for US forces in Iraq, said that while the incident was “tragic”, it did not “affect our strong commitment to the mission of advising and assisting the Iraqi security forces.”

“We stand firmly beside them,” he added.

Tuz Khurmatu police commander

Colonel Hussein Bayati said that on Monday, US and Iraqi forces “began searching houses in the neighbourhood where this soldier was from, because they suspected Ansar AlSunna (insurgent) fighters were hiding there.” It was unclear if Wali might already have been under surveillance or if the sweep had angered him. The shooter’s immediate family declined to speak to AFP. But his cousin and neighbour Abu Shwan said he was “a moderate in his religious views, and he was not strict in his beliefs”.

Also on Tuesday, a grenade attack on a US military convoy in the Salaheddin provincial capital Tikrit wounded two American soldiers and four Iraqi civilians, US Army Lieutenant Colonel Jeffrey Allen said.

“A convoy returning from a PRT (Provincial Reconstruction Team) support mission was attacked by what we believe to be two assailants with hand grenades,” Allen said. “One of the attackers was killed as a result, but the grenades exploded, wounding four Iraqi civilians who were in the area... Two soldiers were also wounded in the attack but both were treated for their wounds.”—AFP

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

Spectre of costly divorce haunts Belgium BRUSSELS: The deepening political rift between Flemish and francophone parties in Belgium has resurrected the ghost of a costly and complex breakup for the kingdom at the heart of Europe.

The spectre of divorce came back to haunt Belgium last weekend when coalition talks between Flemish nationalists and French-speakers collapsed, leaving the country without a new government three months after elections.

That led several francophone leaders, usually staunch supporters of Belgian union, to evoke an alternative “B Plan” that would

see the wealthier Flanders region in the north and French-speaking Wallonia in the south go their separate ways. “We can no longer ignore that among a large part of the Flemish population, it’s their wish,” said French-speaking Socialist Laurette Onkelinx, a potential successor to party chief Elio Di Rupo, who led the failed coalition talks. “So yes, we have to get ready for the break-up of Belgium. Otherwise we’re cooked.”

Across the border in France, lawmaker Nicolas Dupont-Aignan even suggested Monday that his country should “get ready

to welcome its Walloon and Brussels compatriots.” A split could provoke a political earthquake in the European Union.

Belgium, one of the 27-nation bloc’s founding members, holds the rotating presidency of the EU until December and Brussels hosts the headquarters of the EU and NATO. Its aftershocks could also be felt in other countries such as Spain and Britain, which are facing calls for more autonomy or even independence from regions such as Catalonia and Scotland.

But the idea of a split is rejected by 57 percent of Belgians against 14 percent who

favor it, according to a poll published Tuesday by La Libre Belgique newspaper.

In Flanders, only 15 percent favor separation. Dividing the country would also prove costly because of the interdependence between the regions of Flanders, population six million, Wallonia (3.5 million) and Brussels (one million mostly French speakers), experts say. “The Walloons would lose the most because they are the poorest,” said economist Robert Deschamps, although every region would suffer from the consequences of a breakup.

Custody of Brussels would also be a

major sticking point in any divorce talks.

The Belgian capital is 90-percent francophone but sits within Flanders, so the creation of a Wallonia-Brussels state would not be a certainty.

Flanders would also be reluctant to gift Brussels, Belgium’s economic centre, to the francophones. The financing of Brussels and voting rights in its suburbs were already a source of major disagreements between Flemish nationalists and francophone Socialists in the recent failed negotiations.

Money would also be a sensitive topic in a breakup, especially the question of how to

divide a public debt of 330 billion euros (418 billion dollars). And that figure could balloon owing to what would probably be higher interest rates to be imposed on the new states.

Another problem would come with drawing borders around Brussels, as more than 100,000 francophones live in the capital’s Flemish-majority suburbs. Flanders would also need to take steps to join the United Nations, the European Union and the eurozone, a mountain of paperwork that the francophones could avoid if they kept their married name, Belgium. —AFP

4 die as ‘Boko Haram’ storm Nigerian prison 800 inmates escape BAUCHI: About 800 inmates escaped a federal prison holding Muslim extremists in northern Nigeria during a sunset attack by gunmen who are believed to be members of a radical sect, a police official said yesterday. The

attackers went cell by cell at the prison in Bauchi, breaking open locks and setting fire to part of the prison before escaping during the confusion, said Bauchi state police commissioner Danlami Yar’Adua.

WASHINGTON: File photo shows Nigeria’s president Goodluck Jonathan addressing the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington, DC. —AFP

Nigeria presidential vote scheduled for January 22 ABUJA: Nigeria will hold its presidential ballot on January 22, officials said Tuesday, leaving little time to prepare in Africa’s most populous nation, where elections have regularly been plagued by fraud. The electoral commission’s announcement of the date comes with President Goodluck Jonathan yet to say whether he will run, and as officials face a monumental task in compiling a voter list in the oil-rich country.

Voter lists in the 2007 elections were riddled with false entries, and the election was widely viewed as marred by rigging and violence.

Jonathan, who came to power following the death of Umaru Yar’Adua in May, has pledged free and fair elections in the country of 150 million people. Many observers have expressed doubts over the promise, and the president has been accused in recent days of ordering corruption investigations into those opposed to his candidacy. While Jonathan has not said if he will run, he is widely expected to do so soon. His backers are believed to be working intensely behind the scenes to line up the necessary support.

He faces deep disagreement within his ruling Peoples Democratic Party over whether it should abandon Jonathan, a

southern Christian, in favor of a candidate from the country’s mainly Muslim north.

The dispute within the ruling party is linked to an unwritten policy that says it should rotate its candidates between the north and predominately Christian south every two terms. The policy serves as a way of smoothing over ethnic, religious and social divides in the vast West African country.

Since Yar’Adua died before his first term was up, some argue another northern candidate should be chosen.

Two candidates from the north - former military ruler Ibrahim Babangida and exvice president Atiku Abubakar-are seeking the ruling party’s nomination. There had also been intense speculation over the election date, with lawmakers approving a constitutional amendment moving it forward from April to January. Some have argued the president must sign off on the change.

Electoral commission spokesman Solomon Adedeji Soyebi did not address those issues on Tuesday and instead simply read off the list of dates to reporters. He took no questions.

“Dates of elections: national assembly elections, 15th January 2011; presidential elections, 22nd January 2011; governor-

ship/state assembly elections, 29th January 2011,” he said. Party primaries are to be held between September 11 and October 30, while registration of voters is to occur between November 1-14. “Credible elections start with a credible register.

The outcome of the voters registration exercise is going to tell what will happen,” said Tajudeen Akanji of the University of Ibadan’s centre for conflict prevention. The PDP has dominated Nigerian politics since the country returned to civilian rule in 1999.

Jonathan would be the first elected president from the Ijaw ethnic group, mainly spread throughout the Niger Delta, the country’s main oil-producing region. He faces pressure to bring a definitive end to unrest there that has disrupted oil production in recent years.

An amnesty program for militants put forward last year by Yar’Adua has been credited with bringing relative peace to the region, but cracks have shown recently.

The killing a couple weeks ago of a prominent ex-militant accused of helping rig 2007 elections has raised questions over the program and sparked fears that local gangs will again be used to intimidate voters. — AFP

Russia catastrophic wildfires highlight need for reforms MOSCOW: Russia’s catastrophic wildfires this summer have demonstrated the need to reform the nation’s forest protection legislation and the state forestry agency, President Dmitry Medvedev said yesterday. The remarks appeared to reflect Medvedev’s desire to take a higher profile on economic and domestic policy issues presently controlled by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin - though Medvedev stopped short of an open challenge to his powerful predecessor and mentor.

The hottest summer since records began 130 years ago and an accompanying drought sparked tens of thousands of fires in Russia. More than 50 people have died

directly in the fires, and about 2,500 residences across Russia were destroyed. The drought also has cost the country a third of its wheat crop, prompting the government to ban wheat exports through the end of the year. Putin has taken a highly visible lead in efforts to combat the fires, visiting affected areas and even taking a seat in a firefighting plane while Medvedev was chairing dull official meetings. Many political commentators perceived Putin’s action as a sign of his intention to reclaim the presidency in 2012 and a clear warning to Mevedev to stand by.

Putin and Medvedev both have said they would decide later who will run for president. Medvedev indicated yesterday that

the prime minister’s move to take direct control of the forestry agency, Rosleskhoz, could be insufficient to properly protect the nation’s forests in the future. “If it’s more convenient to work that way, you are welcome,” Medvedev told a government meeting focused on forests. “But if it proves insufficient, I reserve the right to radically change those structures.” He said the blazes had shown that the current law and the existing official structures can’t properly protect the forests.

“It’s quite obvious that the legal base and the organizational structure that we have don’t fit the purpose,” Medvedev said in televised remarks. —AP

Four people died and six others remain in critical condition. Yar’Adua said police believe Boko Haram sect followers freed by the attack are hiding in the mountains surrounding the pasturelands of the rural region. Members of Boko Haram, which means “Western education is sacrilege” in the local Hausa language - rioted and attacked police stations and private homes in July 2009, triggering a violent police crackdown.

More than 700 people died.

Many of those arrested in the wake of the attacks last were being held at the Bauchi prison pending trial. Yar’Adua said 36 prisoners had returned to the prison on their own by Wednesday morning, hoping to serve out the remainder of their short sentences. The city itself remained calm yesterday, as paramilitary police officers guarded the front of the damaged prison. They refused to allow an Associated Press reporter access the prison grounds. Police and military units added checkpoints along roads heading out of the city in hopes of catching escapees.

Boko Haram has campaigned for the implementation of strict Shariah law.

Nigeria, a nation of 150 million people, is divided between the Christian-dominated south and the Muslim-held north. A dozen states across Nigeria’s north already have Shariah law in place, though the area remains under the control of secular state governments. In recent months, rumors about Boko Haram rearming have spread throughout northern Nigeria. A video recording released in late June showed a Boko Haram leader calling for new violence as the one-year anniversary of their attack neared. Meanwhile, police believe motorcycle-riding members of the sect are killing policemen in the region. - AP

VIENNA: The book ‘3096 Tage’ (3096 days) by Natascha Kampusch, who was kidnapped and imprisoned in a cellar for eight and a half years, are on display in a book shop. — AP

An Austrian kidnap victim details ordeal in new book VIENNA: An Austrian woman kidnapped at age 10 says she was repeatedly beaten, starved and forced to do housework half-naked during her 8 1/2 years at the mercy of a man who admired Hitler and considered himself an Egyptian god. In a new book about her ordeal, Natascha Kampusch also describes how her abductor, Wolfgang Priklopil, shaved off all her hair and shackled her to him on his bed once she turned 14.

Priklopil snatched Kampusch off a Vienna street on her way to school in 1998 and held her prisoner in a dungeon under his suburban home until she fled in August 2006. He committed suicide within hours of her escape. The case horrified Austrians and made headlines around the world.

In “3,096 Days,” penned with the help of two authors, Kampusch describes Priklopil as a paranoid, unpredictable and cleanliness-obsessed man who systematically tormented her physically and verbally.

“In many respects, the kidnapper was a beast and more cruel than can possibly be depicted,” Kampusch wrote, according to an English edition to be released Sept 16 in Britain. Over the years, he attacked her using not only his hands and feet but also a sack of cement, pruning shears and even a crowbar. “Sometimes he beat me so long it felt like hours,” Kampusch wrote. Priklopil found other ways to humiliate her. “In the house I always had to work half-naked, and in the garden I was principally not allowed to wear any knickers,” Kampusch wrote. “It was one of the ways to keep me down.” He also deprived her of food, telling her she was fat and ugly.

“The kidnapper knew precisely which buttons he had to push to land blows to my self esteem, and he pressed them mercilessly,” wrote Kampusch, who weighed a mere 38 kilograms at age 16. Kampusch describes how, as a teenager,

she spent nights in Priklopil’s bed with her wrists tied to his. “The man who beat me, locked me in the cellar and starved me, wanted to cuddle,” she wrote. She also recalled the horror of having her hair shaved off because Priklopil considered every single strand a danger, to be potentially used by police to trace her. “Not even the minutest hair was allowed to remain. Anywhere.”

The now 22-year-old was later allowed to grow out her hair but had to die it “peroxide blond” to conform to her captor’s image of the ideal woman: “obedient, hardworking, blond.” Kampusch describes how, in desperation, she tried to strangle herself several times using pieces of clothing and attempted to commit suicide by setting fire to paper and toilet rolls on a hotplate in her underground cell.

At the last minute, her “will to survive” resurfaced. But there were moments when Kampusch stood up to the man who once told her he was an Egyptian god from the science fiction series “Stargate.” Not only did she refuse to call Priklopil “maestro” or “my lord,” she also resisted kneeling in front of him. At 15, she said she even “punched” him in the stomach.

Although Kampusch wrote that she couldn’t stand a chance against him, “fighting back became vital to my survival.” Kampusch attempts to explain why Priklopil kidnapped her, saying he wanted someone for whom he was “the most important person in the world.” “Today I believe that Wolfgang Priklopil, in committing a terrible crime, wanted to create nothing more than his own little perfect world with a person that could be there just for him,” she wrote. Kampusch will officially launch “3,096 Days” at a book reading in the Austrian capital Thursday. English editions will also be available in Australia, South Africa, New Zealand, Canada and India. — AP

Eight dead as Portuguese tour bus crash in Morocco RABAT: Eight Portuguese tourists were killed when their tour bus plunged into a ravine in northern Morocco yesterday, the interior ministry said. Eleven passengers on the bus were injured in the accident near the border with the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, the ministry said, adding that one of the injured was in a “very serious” condition.

“There are, for now, eight dead, and 11 injured,” the ministry said.

A Spanish government representative in Ceuta said the bus was carrying Portuguese tourists who arrived yesterday morning in Ceuta on a cruise ship.

A witness said the accident happened in heavy fog and rain: “The coach skidded and fell into a ravine.” The injured were ferried to hospitals in Tetouan, Fnideq and M’diq, near Ceuta, the Moroccan police said, adding that the driver of the bus was among them. With its 15th century cathedral and duty-free shopping, Ceuta is a popular destination for cruise ships and day trippers from mainland Spain and neighboring Portugal.

Ceuta, along with twin enclave Melilla, enjoys a status similar to Spain’s other autonomous areas such as the Basque region and Catalonia. — AFP

TETOUAN: Rescuers check the crashed vehicle after a tour bus plunged into a ravine in northern Morocco yesterday. Nine Portuguese tourists were killed and 14 injured. —AFP

Thursday, September 9, 2010

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Colorado seeks help to douse wildfires DENVER: Some 3,500 people were evacuated after a wildfire swept through part of the western US state of Colorado, destroying dozens of homes, officials said. Local emergency authorities drafted in help from neighboring states, as the blaze spread to cover more than 7,120 acres near the picturesque city of Boulder, while officials said more people might have to be evacuated.

“The fire is zero-percent contained,” said fire commander Don Whittemore as the sun set Tuesday on the foothills of the

COLORADO: Residents watch as a firefighting helicopter alights after taking on water to spray over a wildfire in Boulder, Colorado. — AFP

I have served his last term: Chicago Mayor CHICAGO: Mayor Richard M Daley, who wielded more control over Chicago than anyone but his father decades before, said Tuesday he will not seek re-election, bringing a surprising end to a dynasty whose name became synonymous with the city’s legendary political machine. For all but 13 of the last 55 years, a Daley has ruled City Hall with a red-faced temper, garbled syntax and iron fist.

The son’s departure threatens to leave a significant power vacuum in the third largest US city, which he helped transform from a gritty industrial hub into a gleaming modern metropolis.

It also opens the door to months of political jockeying before February’s election. Among the few names of potential successors to surface before Tuesday was Rahm Emanuel, the White House chief of staff, who mused earlier this year that he might like the post some day. Flanked by his smiling wife Maggie, who has been battling cancer for years, and their children, Daley called the announcement “a personal decision, no more, no less,” and said he and his family now begin a “new phase of our lives.” He said he thought about stepping down for several months and became comfortable with his decision during the last several weeks.

“It just feels right,” Daley said at a news conference. “I’ve always believed that every person, especially public officials, must understand when it’s time to move on. For me, that time is now.”

The Democrat is credited with saving a foundering public school system, beautifying downtown and tearing down the public housing high rises that helped give Chicago its well deserved reputation as one of the nation’s most segregated cities. He’s also faced a growing number of challenges and speculation he might decide to quit. Daley’s wife’s health has deteriorated in recent months.

And the mayor’s tenure has been marked by a recent series of high-profile setbacks, from the city’s unsuccessful bid to bring the 2016 Olympic Games to Chicago to the US Supreme Court’s overturning of the city’s handgun ban. His administration also has been dogged by whispers of corruption, including the 2006 felony conviction of a top aide in connection with illegal hiring practices at City Hall and a department head’s conviction this year for illegally handing out city jobs to political campaign workers.

“I described his (tenure) as kind of schizophrenic,” said Don Rose, head of the University of Illinois at Chicago political science department.

“He was a strong administrator with some bent for reform, but also the Rich Daley raised in the old school of politics that believed in patronage.” Like other mayors, Daley watched as the national recession left his city swimming in red ink. He scrambled to find funds, leading efforts to privatize such money making operations as the city’s parking meters to the nearby Chicago Skyway toll bridge.

But with little money coming in, the city is on a pace to empty the accounts created by those multibillion dollar deals years before expected.

Combined with unrelenting national headlines about the city’s gang violence, Daley’s approval rating recently sunk to 37 percent, according to a Chicago Tribune poll in July. “Given his wife’s health and looking down the road where (he sees) ‘All I’m going to do is lay people off and raise people’s taxes,”‘ said Richard Ciccone, a former managing editor of the Chicago Tribune and author of a biography of Daley’s father.

“Do you want to be mayor for that?” President Barack Obama, also a Chicago resident, said “no mayor in America has loved a city more or served a community with greater passion than Rich Daley.” “He helped build Chicago’s image as a world class city, and leaves a legacy of progress that will be appreciated for generations to come,” the president said in a statement.

Political analysts agreed Daley may have faced opposition for re-election, but likely would have won. He was first elected mayor in 1989, following in the footsteps of his father, Richard J Daley, who died of a heart attack in 1976 at age 74 during his 21st year in office. Daley’s decision leaves an open door for Emanuel, who said during an April television interview that “it’s no secret” he’d like to run for mayor of Chicago someday.

Emanuel, a one-time Daley adviser and a Chicago native who was an Illinois congressman until he resigned to take his current White House post, praised Daley Tuesday but refused to say if he would consider a run in February. “While Mayor Daley surprised me today with his decision to not run for re-election, I have never been surprised by his leadership, dedication and tireless work on behalf of the city and the people of Chicago,” Emanuel said in a statement.

Others whose names have surfaced as possible candidates are Democratic US Representatives Jesse Jackson Jr. and Luis Gutierrez, Chicago Alderman Bob Fioretti and Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart. — AP

Landslides kill 50 in Guatemala, Mexico GUATEMALA CITY: The toll from the heaviest rains in living memory in Guatemala and Mexico rose above 50 on Tuesday, as Guatemalan officials called off the search for 15 more corpses over safety fears.

Mexican authorities said three workers cleaning a drainage system in the center of the country had been buried by rocks and mud dislodged from a nearby hill, taking the toll there to at least seven after a week of downpours.

In Guatemala, where at least 45 people died over the weekend, rescuers had just resumed the grim task of digging for bodies in a ravine next to the PanAmerican Highway when officials decided the sodden terrain was unsafe. “The search has been called off because of the condition of the ground,” said David de Leon, a spokesman for the government’s emergency management office CONRED. Many of Guatemala’s dead perished Saturday when dozens of rescuers were buried alive as they tried to find victims of an earlier landslide that swept a bus and five other vehicles off the highway.

Only 25 of the 40 people believed to have been buried at the site have been retrieved.

“We brought shovels and spades and we were starting to help when another landslide came,” said Manuel Sohom, who lost his 15-year-old son. They were only a few meters away from each other but “it all happened so fast

we didn’t have time to do anything,” he said, through tears.

“The mud covered me up to my chest and I was able to get out, but the others were completely buried and my son remained under the earth.”

The rains triggered almost 200 landslides and collapses, causing at least 500 million dollars worth of damage, according to the government, which ordered three days of national mourning and declared a state of emergency. President Alvaro Colom said Sunday that the impact of the heaviest rains in 60 years would be worse due to a shortage of government funds after Tropical Storm Agatha, which killed 165 people and left thousands homeless in May. On Tuesday, he riled against opposition lawmakers for holding up a 163-million-dollar emergency funding bill to rebuild the country after the devastating rains.

Colom called on Guatemalans to “pull together in dealing with the emergency and reconstruction efforts, and later to create a culture respectful of the environment, to reduce the impact of natural catastrophes.”

In Washington, the United States said it has requested 50,000 dollars in emergency aid for floodhit Guatemala and reprogrammed another 4.38 million dollars in economic aid for recovery efforts. The United Nations said it would send 20,000 food rations to help those affected by the floods. —AFP

Rocky Mountains.

Local authorities said 92 structures, including homes, have been destroyed, but that no injuries have been reported. “We’ve literally exhausted our resources,” said Boulder County Sheriff Joe Pelle, adding that federal firefighters were being dispatched to the area from Wyoming and New Mexico. The blaze erupted Monday in Fourmile Canyon in Boulder County north of the state capital Denver, fueled by baking heat and dry conditions.

Pelle, who toured the affected

area with Colorado Governor Bill Ritter during the day Tuesday, said nine volunteer firefighters who were battling the blaze had lost their homes.

Residents already evacuated were not being allowed back in to the area, he added.

“Pray for rain,” Pelle said, according to the Denver Post.

Air tankers dropped fire retardant over the area to help douse the flames, and officials were heartened that light winds were forecast down sharply from the 45 mile per hour winds that whipped up

flames on Monday. Fire activity lessened early in the day when an air inversion laid a blanket on the fire, but once that lifted, the flames grew, Pelle said. Ritter declared a state of emergency for the area and pledged five million dollars to fire fighting activities in what are rugged areas.

Speaking to CNN, Ritter acknowledged that the blaze was unpredictable.

“We have people coming in from around other parts of the country and we’re doing everything we can to commit

resources to it but it’s a pretty volatile situation,” he said.

The cause of the fire has not been determined. Colorado media reported on several people who stayed with their homes despite evacuation orders, or who suddenly found themselves threatened and were lucky to escape with their lives.

“I literally got out a minute before my house was engulfed in flames,” Leif Steiner told Boulder’s daily Camera.

“Embers were landing on me as I left.” — AFP

Imam vows to identify backers of NY mosque Christian president, Jewish mayor ‘support Muslims rights’ NEW YORK: The imam heading a planned mosque near the New York site of the September 11, 2001 terrorist strikes said he has been stunned by the controversy over the project and vowed to “clearly identify” its financial backers.

“We have all been awed by how inflamed and emotional the issue of the proposed community center has become,” Cordoba Initiative chairman Feisal Abdul Rauf, who recently returned from a two-week State Department-sponsored cooperation tour of the Middle East, wrote in an opinion piece in yesterday New York Times.

“The level of attention reflects the degree to which people care about the very American values under debate: recognition of the rights of others, tolerance and freedom of worship.”

An uproar has swelled over the proposed Islamic cultural center two blocks from where the World Trade Center once stood, and Rauf’s words appeared to try and temper some of the concern and vitriol that has been expressed in recent weeks, as well as to make it clear the project was not meant to trample on the memory of 9/11 victims. “I am very sensitive to the feelings of the families of victims of 9/11, as are my fellow leaders of many faiths,” Rauf said, adding that the center will include a multi-faith memorial to the victims of the worst-ever terrorist attacks on US soil.

“Our objective has always been to make this a center for unification and healing.”

Several top political figures have weighed in on the debate, from President Barack Obama, who supported Muslims’ rights to build the center, to prospective 2012 Republican presidential candidate Sarah Palin, who called on Muslims to refute the plan. Rauf, a longtime imam in the city, cited the “wonderful outpouring of support,” including from New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

“It was striking: a Christian president and a Jewish mayor of New York supporting the rights of Muslims,” Rauf wrote in his opinion piece titled “Building on Faith.”

“Their statements sent a powerful message about what America stands for, and will be remembered as a milestone in improving American-Muslim relations.” A late August poll by Quinnipiac University showed New York voters, by a 71-21 percent margin, overwhelmingly do not want a new mosque

He stressed the project in lower Manhattan was continuing and that he was well aware of the challenges in completing the so-called Cordoba House, a 100million-dollar center which has stirred raw emotions in the United States.

Dismembered bodies found

built near the Ground Zero site.

“I do not underestimate the challenges that will be involved in bringing our work to completion. (Construction has not even begun yet.) I know there will be interest in our financing, and so we will clearly identify all of our financial backers,” Rauf wrote. US lawmakers including Republican Representative Peter King of New York and independent US Senator Joseph Lieberman have sought evaluation of the sources of funding for the project, a 13-story glass and metal building that will house a swimming

pool, daycare, lecture hall, and prayer rooms.

The New York municipal council in May approved construction of the Islamic center, setting off a national debate because of its proximity to where Al-Qaeda hijackers brought down the Twin Towers, killing almost 3,000 people nearly nine years ago.

Rauf said he did not speak out about the explosive debate while he was abroad, because “it would be better if I addressed these issues once I returned home to America.” —AFP

ACAPULCO: Pieces of the dismembered bodies of two men were found scattered around a children’s park in the Pacific coast state of Guerrero on Tuesday, authorities said. Guerrero state police said the victims’ two severed heads were left next to each other, along with a handwritten message.

Police did not reveal the text of the message. One of the heads was wrapped in packing tape. Such execution tactics are frequently used by drug gangs in Mexico.

Located in the state capital of Chilpancingo, the park adjoins a museum and contains several large fiberglass models of dinosaurs that were once part of a touring exhibit. Police in another part of Guerrero, closer to the Pacific coast, found the bullet-riddled bodies of two men at separate spots alongside roads. In the northern border city of Ciudad Juarez, across from El Paso, Texas, gunmen attacked a vehicle carrying inmates from the city’s prison, killing two guards and wounding a prisoner.

The gunmen made off with another inmate who was serving a 9-year sentence for drug trafficking and weapons possession. The two inmates were being returned from a visit to a hospital for treatment of unspecified conditions when the attack occurred. — AP

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

Philippine massacre ‘carefully planned’: Witness MANILA: A powerful Muslim clan carefully planned and carried out the killings of 57 people - including 30 journalists - in the Philippines’ worst massacre, a witness said yesterday as the landmark trial began.

Lakmudin Saliao’s testimony directly linked Andal Ampatuan Jnr, the main defendant, to the planning and execution of the killings in the clan’s former fiefdom of Maguindanao, an impoverished province in the troubled south.

The former mayor is accused of carrying out the November 23, 2009 killings of relatives of a rival politician who had challenged him for the post of governor and the 30 journalists, and two drivers, travelling in a convoy.

Saliao, 33, a former trusted aide of the Ampatuan family, said he attended a clan leaders’ meeting at the home of the main defendant’s father and namesake, Andal Ampatuan Snr, six days before the massacre to plan how to stop the rival.

“That’s easy, father. We kill all of them when they come here,” Saliao quoted Ampatuan Jnr as telling his father.

Ampatuan Jnr, in his 40s and heir-apparent to one of the most powerful Muslim political clans in the south, faces life in prison if convicted.

Ampatuan Snr, one of six Ampatuan defendants in the case, had ruled Maguindanao for nearly a decade and wanted to pass on the governor’s post to his son.

Saliao said Ampatuan Snr then explained to his son how the killings should be carried out. “Do not entrust the roadblock to others.

You yourself should stop them at the highway, near the place where a backhoe is conducting some diggings,” the witness quoted the patriarch as saying.

“Many of those in the room laughed and said they all agreed to have them killed,” said Saliao, who told the court he was beside Ampatuan Snr during the meeting and clearly heard the statements.

In all 196 people are facing charges related to the massacre, although more than 100 of the alleged gunmen remain at large.

Saliao said he stayed at the Ampatuan home on the day of the massacre, helping the

father give orders to son over a mobile telephone. He said he later heard the son tell his father over speaker phone how the son had stopped the rival’s convoy and subsequently carried out the killings. The patriarch then told his son to leave the scene of the crime, Saliao said.

Saliao said the father had wanted to spare the journalists in the convoy, but Ampatuan Jnr insisted on killing them all to leave no witnesses alive. “Let us kill all of them.

Some may talk if we spared them,” Ampatuan Jnr told his father, according to Saliao.

“After a few minutes, Unsay (Ampatuan Jnr) called and said ‘Father, it is done. They are all dead,’” he said. “Very happy,” Saliao

said when asked about the elder Ampatuan’s reaction.

Ampatuan Jnr, wearing a yellow prison shirt and flanked by jail guards, sat impassively behind his lawyers as the witness took the stand.

He refused to talk to reporters after the hearing. Nena Santos, a lawyer for some of the victims’ relatives, cautiously welcomed the start of the trial, but added the Ampatuans remained powerful and could intimidate witnesses even from behind bars.

“We started today with a smoking gun as you can see,” Santos said, noting that Saliao’s credibility was unassailable because he practically grew up in the Ampatuan household.

Saliao, she said, also knew about alleged intimidation of witnesses as well as supposed attempts to bribe them. Editha Tiamzon, widow of one of the murdered journalists, sat teary-eyed as Saliao recounted the killings.

“It is painful to hear my husband’s painful ordeal,” she said. “I am satisfied the trial has begun after many delays, but there is a long way to go.”

Journalist’s husband Noemi Parcon, who was also widowed in the attack, said she believed the testimony gave them hope that justice will be served. “It will have a big influence on the case,” she said. Saliao was expected to continue his testimony when the resumes next week. —AFP

China’s president calls for stable ties with US Hu puts upbeat face on relations BEIJING: Trying to smooth over recently rocky relations before a visit to Washington, Chinese President Hu Jintao told American officials yesterday that he wants to see healthy and stable ties between the two countries. The meeting between Hu and a White House economic policy official and deputy

national security adviser was unusual because the Chinese president rarely meets with visitors ranked lower in diplomatic protocol. It underscored Hu’s desire to move ahead in relations after months of discord over trade imbalances, Chinese currency policies and US arms sales and military maneuvers.

BEIJING: Chinese President Hu Jintao (left) and Myanmar’s military junta leader General Than Shwe review the Chinese People’s Liberation Army honor guards during a welcoming ceremony at the Great Hall of the People yesterday. — AFP

Myanmar leader wants better China ties BEIJING: Myanmar’s junta leader Than Shwe said yesterday he wanted to bolster ties with China, his regime’s main trade partner and diplomatic ally, two months ahead of polls decried in the West as a sham. Than Shwe, whose regime has drawn international condemnation for its human rights record and political repression, arrived in China Tuesday for a fourday visit that will also include visits to Shanghai and the country’s south.

Rumours surfaced last month in the isolated state that the 77-year-old junta chief - in power since 1992 - had retired as part of a major military reshuffle, but his trip to China showed he was still leading the army.

Than Shwe told Chinese President Hu Jintao at the start of their talks that he hoped to “further promote the already existing neighbourly friendship, mutual cooperation and trust between the two countries” during his visit. Hu, noting that 2010 marked the 60th anniversary of bilateral relations, said he too hoped the meeting in the Great Hall of the People would help boost ties and “mutual cooperation between neighbours”.

While the West has slapped Myanmar with sanctions and criticised plans for its

first election in 20 years in November, China is the junta’s main trading partner and a top investor in its sizeable natural resources.

On Tuesday, Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu cautioned the world not to meddle in the upcoming polls, which have been dismissed by activists and the West as a charade to solidify the junta’s power.

She said China hopes “the international community can provide constructive help” for the polls and “refrain from any negative impact on the domestic political process of Myanmar and on regional peace and stability”. Jiang called the election an “important step in proceeding with democracy”.

Than Shwe - who rarely travels abroad, apart from trips to Singapore for medical check-ups - was to meet Premier Wen Jiabao and other senior Chinese leaders in Beijing Thursday before heading to Shanghai to visit the World Expo.

The Myanmar strongman was also to visit the southern Chinese boomtown of Shenzhen on the border with Hong Kong before heading home on Saturday. China has long helped to keep Myanmar afloat through trade ties, arms sales, and by

shielding it from UN sanctions over rights abuses as a veto-wielding member of the Security Council.

In return, China is assured of a stable neighbour and access to raw materials such as teak and gems from Myanmar, which has been ruled by the military since 1962.

Ties frayed last year when fighting between junta forces and rebel ethnic armies drove tens of thousands of refugees over the border into China, which issued a rare admonishment to Myanmar.

But in November, China’s top oil producer began construction of a pipeline across Myanmar. And last week two Chinese warships made a rare visit to the Southeast Asian country, which Beijing’s state media said was aimed at promoting ties between the allies’ armed forces.

A senior Chinese army official on Tuesday emphasised the “great importance” of bilateral military ties, according to Xinhua news agency.

Human Rights Watch has urged China to press Myanmar on the election issue, saying Beijing’s policy towards the junta is “inconsistent with its claims to be a responsible power”. —AFP

Aftershocks plague New Zealand city CHRISTCHURCH, New Zealand: A strong aftershock rocked terrified residents of New Zealand’s earthquakestricken city of Christchurch yesterday, as officials doubled their estimate for repairing the damage following nearly 300 temblors in five days. The latest quake, which registered magnitude 5.1, was centered just six kilometers below the Earth’s surface and 10 km southeast of the city. No one was reported injured, but it was felt by residents as the strongest since Saturday’s magnitude-7.1 earthquake wrecked hundreds of buildings.

“My guts are just churning up here. When will this thing end? It is like living in a maelstrom,” Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker said as workers streamed from the city’s emergency headquarters.

“We were starting to think maybe, just maybe, we are over the worst of this, and now we have had this shocking event,” Parker told NewstalkZB radio. “This is a hammer blow to the spirit of a lot of peo-

ple.” After his second, closer look at the quake damage on Wednesday, Prime Minister John Key said he thought that rebuilding the city would cost more than the initial estimate of 2 billion New Zealand dollars ($1.4 billion), with at least 500 buildings already condemned and about 100,000 of the area’s 160,000 houses damaged. Treasury Secretary John Whitehead later said the full bill for quake damage could reach NZ$4 billion, with the nation’s Earthquake Commission likely to pay half of that. Key has called off a planned nine-day trip to Britain and France, citing what he called the quake zone’s continuing instability.

Civil defense director John Hamilton said the safety status of some buildings would be reassessed after Wednesday’s strong aftershock. Government seismology agency GNS Science reported that more than 280 aftershocks of magnitude 3.0 or greater have struck the region in five days. Seismologist Brian Ferris said

people would have felt about 150 of them.

Saturday’s powerful earthquake struck at 4:35 a.m. near the South Island city of 400,000 people, ripping open a new fault line in the Earth’s surface, smashing buildings and homes, wrecking roads and disrupting the central city. No one was killed and only two people were seriously injured - which authorities attributed to good building codes and the quake’s early morning timing.

The city center remained cordoned off by troops yesterday, as authorities extended a state of civil emergency for another seven days. Only building owners and workers are allowed into the central city to begin clearing up the mess - with much of the center taking on the mantle of a ghost town. New Zealand sits above an area where two tectonic plates collide.

The country records more than 14,000 earthquakes a year - but only about 150 are normally felt by residents. Fewer than 10 a year do any damage. — AP

“China looks positively on the fresh progress made in China-US relations, and we are willing to work together with the United States in promoting the advance of healthy and stable China-US relations,” Hu told director of the US National Economic Council, Lawrence Summers, and Deputy National Security Adviser Thomas Donilon. Addressing the security and economic spats that have dragged down relations was at the heart of Summers’ and Donilon’s three days of meetings in Beijing. With an anemic economy and his Democratic Party under pressure in upcoming congressional elections, President Barack Obama is hoping for concessions from Beijing on exchange rate policies that critics say keep the Chinese currency too low, thereby subsidizing Chinese exports and contributing to high US unemployment.

Hu, in the meantime, is trying to strengthen his political hand ahead of a delicate Communist Party leadership transition and maintain the popularity of his government with people grown used to high rates of economic growth in part buoyed by trade with the United States. The Hong Kong newspaper South China Morning Post reported yesterday, citing unnamed Chinese diplomats, that the governments had agreed to resume military talks that Beijing suspended earlier this year in pique at US weapons sales to Chinese rival Taiwan.

US National Security Council spokesman Mike Hammer said Donilon and Summers had “productive, detailed, and wide-ranging discussions with Chinese officials” and that the visit, which concluded Wednesday, “advanced the goal of strengthening the US-China relationship.”

Hammer said in a statement that the advisers discussed North Korea and Iran, both of which have been sanctioned by the international community for their nuclear programs. As permanent members of the UN Security Council, China and the US have frequently locked horns over how to persuade Iran and North Korea to give up those programs, with Washington tending to favor sanctions and Beijing advocating dialogue and diplomatic means. Other economic and security issues also were raised, Hammer said, but gave no specifics.

US officials have said that Hu is likely to visit Washington in January, though dates are still being discussed. A White House visit - earlier offered by Obama and reiterated by Donilon this week - would be a boost for Hu in the highly symbolic, ceremony-centric world of Chinese politics. In his meeting with the US officials, Hu noted Obama’s trip to Beijing last November and said “relations have on the whole maintained healthy development thanks to the efforts of both sides.” Beyond the positive tone, it was unclear whether substantive compromises were reached during the trip. On Tuesday, the Chinese Foreign Ministry rejected US pressure on China’s currency policies, saying Beijing will set the pace of any reforms. — AP

ISHIGAKI ISLAND, Japan: A Chinese fishing boat (left) accompanied by a Japan Coast Guard boat (right) is led into a port in southwestern Japan yesterday. — AP

Beijing protests as Japan arrests China boat captain TOKYO/BEIJING: Japan has arrested the captain of a Chinese fishing boat that collided with two Japanese coast guard boats near disputed islets in the East China Sea, causing anger in Beijing and reigniting territorial tensions. China’s Foreign Ministry lodged a “strong protest” against the captain’s arrest yesterday, with Assistant Foreign Minister Hu Zhengyue summoning Japan’s ambassador for the second time in two days, Xinhua news agency said. Hu “demanded that the Japanese side immediately release the ship and crew members on board and guarantee their safety”, Xinhua reported.

Tokyo has also lodged protests over the incident but Japan’s top government spokesman called for calm while the prime minister said the matter would be dealt with fairly. “We will deal with this in a fair manner in line with Japanese laws,” Prime Minister Naoto Kan told reporters.

A group of about 30 people carrying Chinese flags held a brief demonstration outside Japan’s embassy in Beijing, demanding Japan “get out” of the islands, but they soon dispersed.

China’s Global Times, a popular tabloid run by the Communist Party, called in an editorial for both sides to act with extreme caution in handling the incident.

“Japan has perhaps lit a fire which could ultimately seriously damage relations and even force a showdown,” it wrote. Despite the ongoing spat over the islands and mutual mistrust about each

others’ military intentions, the two countries’ ever-deepening economic ties mean their governments are keen to keep relations on an even keel.

China has been Japan’s biggest trading partner since 2009. Bilateral trade reached 12.6 trillion yen ($150.4 billion) in value in the first half of this year, an on-year jump of 34.5 percent, according to Japanese statistics.

The incident took place near a group of East China Sea islets - called Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China - over which Tokyo and Beijing as well as Taiwan claim sovereignty. No one, including 14 Chinese crew on the fishing boat, was injured, a spokesman at Japan’s coast guard said.

The captain of the Chinese boat has been transported to the southern Japanese island of Ishigaki for questioning, he added.

It was not clear where the other crew members were being held.

On Tuesday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Jiang Yu reiterated that the Diaoyu islands belong to China, adding that China “reserved the right to take further action” over the fishing boat incident. Tokyo has urged China to strengthen supervision of its fishing boats to avoid a recurrence of the incident. Chan Liu-tak, the Hong Kong head of a committee to “defend” the islands, said they would try to hire a trawler in Taiwan this weekend to sail there, though the owners of previous vessels were fined heavily or stripped of their licenses. — Reuters

Tensions emerge in new Australia minority govt SYDNEY: Australia’s newly elected Prime Minister Julia Gillard pledged to serve a full term after scraping back into power but her fragile coalition was immediately hit by discord over a new tax yesterday. Welsh-born Gillard, who cobbled together a one-seat majority helped by three independents and a Greens MP after inconclusive polls, promised the nation’s first minority government since World War II would be “stable and effective”. “The government’s aim is to go for its full term and deliver stable and effective government for three years,” she told public broadcaster ABC. “You should expect to see me lead, but in a different style than has been done before, understanding that it’s not a question of dictating, but a question of consulting and inspiring,” she added.

Gillard, who seized power in a June party coup, was handed a flimsy mandate on Tuesday when she won the backing of two “kingmaker” independent MPs, finally breaking a 17-day impasse after deadlocked elections.

But less than 24 hours later, independent Tony Windsor was disappointed that a controversial new levy on the mining sector - which brought down Gillard’s predecessor Kevin Rudd - would not be discussed at an upcoming tax summit. “I thought it was going to be included in any discussions in relation to taxation,” he told ABC radio.

Treasurer Wayne Swan said the 30 percent tax would not be raised at the summit because legislation was already being prepared, and said he had smoothed over the issue with Windsor.

However, shadow treasurer Joe Hockey said the incident raised questions about the unity of the coalition, which will also face difficult negotiations over taking action against climate change.

“We’re not going to have stability for the next three years if this is what happens on day one,” Hockey said. “The happy couple haven’t even left the chapel and they’re arguing about the mining tax already.”

Gillard’s Labor party was also torn by internal recriminations after its rebuke at the polls, and the prime minister faces an awkward challenge after promising to include ex-leader Kevin Rudd in her new cabinet. The red-headed industrial lawyer became Australia’s first woman leader by ousting Rudd on June 24 and called polls three weeks later, banking on a wave of support and goodwill over the strong, resource-led economy.

But the anticipated honeymoon period failed to materialise as many voters turned away from the two main parties and handed the environmentfocused Greens a record ballot share. Analysts said the minority government was a difficult arrangement but “workable” as all involved were keen to preserve stability. “It’s delicate but I think it’s workable. The considerable common policy ground between them is capable of being maximised,” said Andrew Scott, a political scientist from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

Meanwhile newspapers accused Gillard of bribing her way back into power by promising the independents US$9.0 billion for rural healthcare.

“The Big Steal,” said Sydney’s Daily Telegraph, while the business-friendly Australian Financial Review’s headline simply read: “Gillard buys power for 10 billion dollars”. “Australians should be concerned at the outcome of the election,” the Review’s editorial said. “It is no recipe for the unpopular reforms that are needed to revive productivity and keep Australia competitive in an increasingly challenging world.”

Share prices closed 0.79 percent lower with major miners BHP Billiton and Rio Tinto down 1.38 and 1.22 percent respectively, while the Australian dollar was little changed at 91.40 US cents. US President Barack Obama offered Gillard his congratulations along with British Prime Minister David Cameron and New Zealand leader John Key, who also head minority governments. — AFP

INTERNATIONAL

Thursday, September 9, 2010

11

‘Non-lethal’ force can be lethal in Kashmir SRINAGAR: Protesters have a new name for the troops: Robots. In Kashmir, troops now dress in high-tech black riot gear, covered head to foot in plastic armor that can make them look decidedly inhuman.

They carry stun grenades, tear gas grenades and shotguns loaded with - they say - nonlethal pellets. They are the vanguard trying to fulfill Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s order last month to staunch the bloodshed in Kashmir by using non-lethal measures to control the violent demonstrations that have shaken the Himalayan region for the past three months.

“We’re now using a range of non-lethal weapons to control crowds,” Shiv Murari Sahai, Kashmir’s new police chief, told AP in an interview in his office in Indian Kashmir’s main city

Srinagar. Outside his fortified office, a fleet of armored vehicles and two brand new vehiclemounted water cannons were lined up, ready to be deployed.

Despite the new orders, protesters were still being killed by security forces using lethal force. Four more were killed Monday when security forces fired live ammunition into crowds of rock-throwing protesters in Palhalan, a village north of Srinagar, police said.

And the non-lethal weapons themselves have also proven lethal.

A separatist insurgency fighting for Kashmir’s independence from Hindu-majority India or its merger with Muslim-majority Pakistan has been active since 1989, and tens of thousands of people have been killed in the conflict over the decades. Resistance has

shifted in recent years from militant attacks to street demonstrations.

At least 69 people have been killed and hundreds wounded since a new round of demonstrations broke out in June. Most of the killings occurred when troops fired directly into the demonstrations. After widespread criticism from security experts and human rights groups, the Indian government changed its tactics.

But the bloodshed hasn’t ended. On Aug 19, the first day paramilitary soldiers used pellets on demonstrators, a 24year-old man died in the town of Sopore after suffering multiple chest perforations. A little over a week later, an 11-year-old boy died of similar injuries after soldiers fired pellets at stone throwers in town of Anantnag.

Dozens more people have been

hospitalized with injuries from these weapons. At least two boys are said to be critical.

Doctors say the pellets inflict multiple wounds that can leave them struggling.

“We were treating a young boy for (pellet) splinters in his kidneys and at the same time he had a few more in his heart as well,” said a doctor in a Srinagar hospital, who spoke on condition of anonymity, because the government has banned medical workers from speaking to the media. The protesters can also be violent, with masses of angry demonstrators launching intense barrages of stones against security forces, sometimes surrounding armored vehicles. Authorities say panicked troops sometimes use the non-lethal weapons improperly causing serious injuries and even deaths.

“We’re facing total defiance on the streets almost every day, and there is little time to use these weapons properly before we’ll be lynched by the crowd,” said Prabhakar Tripathi, a spokesman for the paramilitary forces. Sahai, the police chief, acknowledged that more training was needed - and was being planned - for using the new generation of weapons.

But for now, officials say they are finding it difficult to find the time to pull soldiers from the streets for training. The tactics have spread a new scare among the protesters that many fear as much as death.

“They’re now wounding us so badly by these hunting guns that I’m scared to live the life of a disabled,” said Wasim, who participated in recent protests and declined to give his full name. —AP

SRINAGAR: In this photo taken July 28, 2010, Indian paramilitary soldiers in riot gear stand guard outside a closed market during a strike. — AP

Sri Lankan president wins constitutional power boost Opposition says amendment rushes slide to dictatorship COLOMBO: Sri Lanka’s parliament yesterday passed a constitutional amendment that grants President Mahinda Rajapaksa even more unchecked power, which had prompted opposition cries of a looming dictatorship. Rajapaksa won

SRINAGAR: Stones in hand, a Kashmiri protester dares Indian policemen to shoot him during a protest yesterday. —AP

Top separatist leader arrested in Kashmir SRINAGAR: Police arrested a top separatist leader yesterday for rallying massive anti-India protests that have rocked the Indian portion of Kashmir for months, and supporters reacted by staging fresh demonstrations and hurling stones at troops.

The arrest of hardliner Syed Ali Shah Geelani, 82, at his residence in Srinagar, the region’s main city, came days after he laid out stiff conditions for peace talks with the Indian government. The mostly Muslim Himalayan region has been roiled by anti-government demonstrations and clashes between protesters and government forces for the past three months. At least 69 people, mostly teenage boys and young men in their 20s, have been killed in the civil unrest against rule by predominantly Hindu India.

Police Inspector-General Shiv Murari Sahai said officers arrested Geelani for causing “breach of peace” in the region.

The news of his arrest triggered fresh protests as scores of

young men defied a curfew in a neighborhood in Srinagar and threw stones at government forces. Police and paramilitary soldiers fired tear gas to quell the protesters, said a police officer on condition of anonymity as he was not authorized to speak with media. No injuries were reported. Anti-India sentiment runs deep in Kashmir, which is divided between India and Pakistan, and claimed by both in its entirety. Protesters reject Indian sovereignty over Kashmir and want independence or a merger with predominantly Muslim Pakistan.

Last week, Geelani demanded that India accept Kashmir as a disputed territory, withdraw hundreds of thousands of troops from the region and release all political prisoners as a precondition for peace talks. “Otherwise, the protests would be intensified,” warned Geelani, a key leader of the All Parties Hurriyat Conference, a conglomerate of separatist groups espousing nonviolent means rather than insurgency. There

was no response from the Indian government to Geelani’s demand.

India has fought two wars with neighboring Pakistan over control of the region since the archrivals won independence from Britain in 1947. On Wednesday, the streets of Srinagar and other towns were deserted as armed troops in riot gear enforced a rigid curfew for a second straight day. Armored vehicles patrolled the streets and government forces used steel and barbed wire barricades to seal off public squares and neighborhoods in Srinagar.

Security was further tightened after clashes between government forces and protesters in Srinagar and half a dozen towns and villages injured at least 13 people late Tuesday, a police officer said. The recent unrest in Indian Kashmir is reminiscent of the late 1980s, when protests against New Delhi’s rule sparked an armed conflict that has so far killed more than 68,000 people, mostly civilians. — AP

Syed Ali Shah Geelani speaks before his arrest at his residence yesterday. — AFP

Yesterday’s debate was largely a foregone conclusion as Rajapaksa had already engineered crossovers from opposition parties to boost his commanding parliamentary majority beyond the two-thirds, or 150 votes, required to change the charter. Opposition and rights groups criticised the amendment, rushed through the supreme court and parliament in barely 10 days after the cabinet declared it an urgent matter, as a blow to democracy and a reneging of Rajapaksa’s pledge to trim his powers.

Government supporters and opposition demonstrators both took to their streets during yesterday’s day-long debate. The government argued the change was justified to give Rajapaksa, whose second term ends in 2017, time to build Sri Lanka’s $42 billion economy after leading the Indian Ocean nation to victory over the Tamil Tiger separatists last year. “Political instability is the last thing we want in Sri Lanka today as we seek to derive the fullest benefit for our people from the unique opportunity we have today having eradicated terrorism,” Foreign Minister G L Peiris told parliament. Sri Lanka’s stock market, Asia’s best performer this year, has gained 6.5 percent since the cabinet approved the changes on Aug 29.

Analysts have attributed the recent gains to positive sentiment about Sri Lanka’s often combustible politics.

“This amendment is driving the last nail into the coffin of democracy,” General Sarath Fonseka, who led the army to victory but fell out with Rajapaksa and unsuccessfully challenged him at the ballot box in January, told reporters. Fonseka won a parliamentary seat despite being arrested and court-martialled for what the government said was politicking in uniform and other charges. “The president is trying to take the country towards dictatorship and we will fight against it,” he said.

Rajapaksa has parlayed last year’s victory over the Tamil Tigers into re-election to a second term in January and a landslide for his United Peoples Freedom Alliance party in parliament in April. However, critics accuse him of stifling dissent, jailing opponents and disregarding the rule of law as he holds an office that gives him almost unchecked control of the government. Those presidential powers were put in place in 1978 by President J R Jayawardene, whose UNP then had a five-sixths parliamentary majority. He too argued that he needed the time and singular authority to drive economic reform.

Scholars say Sri Lanka’s constitutional changes have helped fuel all of its post-independence conflicts, including the 1971 and 1988-89 uprisings by the Marxist JVP and the Tamil Tigers’ threedecade separatist war. The JVP, which drew its support from mainly rural and poor members of the Sinhalese majority, took up arms over economic injustice, while the Tamil Tigers initially fought over discrimination against Sri Lanka’s Tamil minority. Fonseka hinted at that past when he warned that the constitution could “suppress the people and the opposition”. —Reuters

161 votes in favour of the 18th amendment that removes a presidential two-term limit and more crucially, unwound an earlier amendment designed to de-politicise appointments to the police, judiciary, public service and electoral commissions.

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan government supporters carry portraits of President Mahinda Rajapaksa as they rally outside parliament yesterday. —AFP

S Korea rains sanctions on Iran SEOUL: South Korea said yesterday it will ban unauthorized financial dealings with Iran and impose other penalties as part of a US-led campaign to enforce sanctions against the country over its disputed nuclear enrichment program. Seoul targeted 102 entities, including the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps and the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines, and 24 individuals for the sanctions, Foreign Ministry spokesman Kim Youngsun said.

The measures prohibit unauthorized foreign exchange transactions with the targets of the measures, halt existing banking relations, and prohibit the opening of new branches or representative offices in South Korea, Kim said. The individuals are also banned from entering South Korea, Kim said. South Korea will also heavily penalize the Seoul branch of Bank Mellat, one of the 15 targeted Iranian banks, for violating laws on foreign exchange transactions, a

government statement said, without elaborating.

The Seoul branch of Bank Mellat has “facilitated hundreds of millions of dollars in transactions for Iranian nuclear, missile and defense entities,” the statement said.

Kim said the sanctions further reinforce United Nations resolution 1929 against Iran, the latest in a series of measures taken by the international community in an effort to halt Iran’s nuclear program.

“South Korea expects Iran to join international efforts for nuclear nonproliferation and take steps to faithfully implement its obligations under the relevant UN Security Council resolutions,” he said.

The UN approved a fourth round of sanctions against Iran in early June over accusations that it is seeking to develop atomic weapons. Iran denies its nuclear program is militaristic in nature and says it has a right to conduct uranium enrichment for peaceful purposes. The US also inde-

pendently imposed new sanctions against Iran and has urged other countries to follow suit. So far, the European Union, Australia, Canada and Japan have joined the international campaign against Iran.

Seoul has been cautious in taking action against Iran, trying to balance its diplomatic interests with the US, a key ally, and its economic interests with Iran.

Iran is South Korea’s third-largest trading partner in the Middle East, with twoway trade totaling nearly $10 billion last year, according to the Korea International Trade Association. It is also South Korea’s fourth-biggest supplier of crude oil, accounting for 9.8 percent of its oil imports, according to the Korea National Oil Corp. Seoul said it will prohibit new investments and contracts that could enrich Iran’s petroleum and gas industry, and called on South Korean companies to exercise “restraint and caution” in carrying out existing contracts. — AP

‘Human alarm clocks’ rouse Kashmir SRINAGAR: For 30 years, Rashid Malik has walked the narrow lanes of Srinagar before dawn during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, waking up residents for another day of fasting. But being a “human alarm clock” in Indian Kashmir is a nerve-wracking job this year, as the region undergoes almost daily violent protests against rule from New Delhi and the killing of scores of civilians by security forces. “It has been an extremely fearful assignment,” said Malik, 64, who beats a drum and loudly chants “Wakhta-e-Sehar”, meaning “Time for Sehri” - the last meal before fasting begins at sunrise.

“The presence of security forces worries me and I have been avoiding main roads to escape being attacked,” said Malik, who patrols the old town of Srinagar, Indian Kashmir’s summer capital.

“I have performed this religious duty even during the peak of insurgency but this year is

the most frightening,” he said, adding that he gets paid in small donations and food offerings from households. Since a 17-year-old student died after being hit by a police teargas shell on June 11, security forces have been accused of killing 68 more protesters and bystanders, mostly teenagers shot dead during angry demonstrations. Each death has led to more furious protests and further firing by the security forces. The Muslim-majority Kashmir valley has been effectively shut down by curfews and separatist-sponsored strikes. Government troops are out in strength to quell protests and to enforce restrictions on civilian movement.

Anyone out at night attracts the attention of the nervous and often aggressive security forces, so the drum-beaters run the risk of a tough grilling - or even a bullet. “Over the past few years it was fun walking these streets but this year the fear has returned,”

said Syed Rehman Tass, 35, who makes his noisy way through the streets from about 03:00 am to 04:00 am every morning. “I just have to hope the soldiers are aware of the tradition,” said Tass, who was only 15 when he first took up the job of rousing people during Ramadan. “The anxiety increases when I go past an army bunker or see paramilitary groups in the dark. I have been stopped twice recently but was allowed to continue after questioning why I was out at this time.”

The tradition of chanting, banging drums and gongs, and blowing pipes made from sheep horn has survived because residents say the sustained cacophony ensures they get up and eat rather than doze off again. “These poor people ensure we are out of our beds,” said Sofia Jabeen, a government employee.

“They are an essential part of the holy month and we respect them for the high-risk job they do.”—AFP

OPINION

12

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Muslim Americans have a history before Sept 11

By Mona Eltahawy

I

live in Harlem on a street that is home to three churches and a mosque. The mosque is next door to one of those churches and when male congregants mingle on the sidewalk, it’s impossible to tell who had just been in church and who in the mosque. It’s only some of the women’s headscarves that tell you. Muslim Americans were not invented on 11 September 2001.

Our history with New York, and the rest of the country for that matter, far precedes those attacks.

Some of the earliest arrivals were on slave ships that crossed the Atlantic. Yet the antiMuslim hate metastasizing across the United States these days is ferocious in its determination to drive a wedge between the “American” and the “Muslim” of our identities.

In just one week, a cab driver was stabbed in New York by a passenger who asked him if he was Muslim; a drunk burst into a New York mosque and urinated on prayer rugs; a brick was thrown at an Islamic centre in Madera, California; and a fire at the building site of a mosque in Tennessee was being investigated by the FBI. “What’s going to happen to me, our mom, sister-inlaw, and all the women in the States who wear a hijab [headscarf] and don’t need to be asked if they’re Muslim first?” my sister Nora, a graduate student, asked.

It’s not just about Park51, a proposed Islamic centre and mosque in Lower Manhattan, two blocks away from Ground Zero. There are at least four other planned mosques across the country, miles away from “hallowed ground”, facing antiMuslim opposition. Some have tried to blame Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the leader of Park51, for provoking still-hurt feelings over 9/11. But depicting him as the imam who kicked the hornet’s nest would display unforgivable amnesia in the face of the manufacture of “Muslim” as a slur in this country.

Despite an appearance

by US President George W Bush at a mosque after 9/11 to show he didn’t hold all Muslims responsible, his administration proceeded to do exactly that: military trials for civilians, secret prisons, the detention of hundreds of Muslim men without charge, the torture and harsh interrogation of detainees and the invasions of two Muslim-

majority countries. When Republicans “accused” US President Barack Obama of being Muslim during the 2008 presidential campaigns, Democrats didn’t utter a single “So what?”

A one-time strategist to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, suggested she “go negative” on Obama in 2007 when she was campaigning for president - painting him as too foreign and exotic to lead America at war. She did not heed the advice but her campaign did leak photographs of Obama wearing traditional Somali clothes.

Those incidents and others were steps up a ladder of bigotry that is now delivered with the gravitas of political office. When a former vice-presidential candidate and ex-governor (Sarah Palin), a former House Speaker (Newt Gingrich), and various House members peddle in the most lurid caricatures of Muslims it is not difficult to understand the current crescendo of bigotry.

I have not forgotten acts of violence or attempted terrorism by Muslim Americans over the past year.

The Muslim American community has not tiptoed around them. It issued several condemnations but also refused to be held guilty by faith affiliation. And we refuse to disappear. We will not allow the bigots to pick apart the fabric that is America.

Those Muslims mingling outside the mosque on my street are a microcosm of America. We vote - and our votes count, especially in swing states. That taxi driver stabbed in New York is one of the thousands of Muslims who comprise 50 per cent of NYC cabbies.

We’re America’s teachers, comedians and even its current beauty queen, Rima Fakih. And we’re also America’s doctors. My sister-in-law, an obstetrician/gynecologist, and I were watching one of those medical dramas when she told me an anecdote that neatly sums it all up: “I was delivering a baby the other day and the father was watching via Skype cam. He was a soldier in Afghanistan. And I thought, here I am: a Muslim doctor in a headscarf delivering a baby whose father is an American soldier in Afghanistan, a Muslim country.” —CGNews Mona Eltahawy is an award-winning New Yorkbased journalist and commentator, and an international lecturer on Arab and Muslim issues. This article was written for the Common Ground News Service

All articles appearing on these pages are the personal opinion of the writers. Kuwait Times takes no responsibility for views expressed therein. Kuwait Times invites readers to voice their opinions. Please send submissions via email to: opinion@kuwaittimes.net or via snail mail to PO Box 1301 Safat, Kuwait. The editor reserves the right to edit any submission as necessary.

Interfaith dialogue for a globalised world Love in times of conflict I

By Tareq Oubrou

n these times, it is essential to engage in interfaith and intercultural dialogue, given the way our world is evolving. With post-modern globalization there has been a decline in the belief in the philosophy of progress: the secular theory of salvation no longer has the answers to existential concerns of our times.

Humanity is struggling with a deep uncertainty caused by economic globalization, permeable borders, and the mixing of cultures and traditions due to migration and increasingly sophisticated means of communication and transportation.

An environment with these changes favors a reemergence of the irrational in general, and the spiritual and religious in particular.

In fact, our world - as the American sociologist Peter Berger notes - is fiercely religious. I am convinced that in this climate of turbulence, religions offer the potential for generosity, wisdom and an ethical sense of transcendence capable of creating a strong link between people, beyond their differences. We might have different beliefs and dogmas and adhere to different schools of philosophical and metaphysical thought, but I strongly believe that it is possible to share a pragmatic universal system of ethics that would allow us all to live together.

The details may differ from one tradition to another, but we can definitely act together towards a more peaceful future. Religions are not abstractions. And interreligious dialogue is above all an encounter between human beings who may be from different religious traditions but nevertheless share the same humanity, the same world, the same reality and sometimes the same culture, social condition, language, ways of thinking and interests.

An ethic of common action is thus

possible. Intercultural and interfaith dialogue is above all a matter of understanding the “other”. It should be motivated first and foremost by a natural desire to meet the other, who is different but paradoxically alike in many ways. At the end of the day, we all belong to the same big family of human beings. We are different ethnically, linguistically, religiously but these differences are what make us rich.

The Quran tells us to know one other: “We have created you male and female, and have made you nations and tribes that ye may know one another” (49:13). But dialogue is not only about knowing one another.

In today’s tense climate, dialogue must also be part of a geopolitical strategy - what one could call a “geotheological” strategy - that can help build understanding between nations and contribute to peace within societies and between people.

The purpose of interreligious dialogue is to prevent tensions that can arise between and among religious communities. A geo-theological strategy could respond to the threat of uncontrolled de-secularization described above - which is equally a threat to individual religions - by anticipating violent forms of religion nourishing claims of identity which could tear apart the fabric of societies, endanger national unity and launch conflicts between nations.

It is thus very important today that religions do not transform their universalism into totalitarianism - which would jeopardize the very spiritual values that they uphold. All religions should provide reassurance and offer hope for a better, fairer and more egalitarian life. Instead of fighting each other, they should fight, handin-hand, against threats of violence and misunderstandings that endanger humanity. —CGNews Tareq Oubrou is Director of the Bordeaux Mosque and President of the Imams of France Association.

By Khaled Diab

A

s Romeo and Juliet learned the hard way, love and friendship in times of conflict is rarely a simple story of boy meets girl (or whatever other combination suits your orientation). At such times, the personal so often becomes public, and the romantic, political. Although this is a common feature of conflicts, in some ways, the barriers separating Arabs and Israeli-Jews may be especially high owing to the long duration of their conflict and the bitterness of the feud.

In the minds of many Arabs and Israeli-Jews, the idea of normal human contact between the two sides, especially of the intimate physical or emotional variety, is tantamount to a betrayal of their people’s cause. Such relationships do not only suffer from social disapproval, they can sometimes carry legal consequences. Take the case of Saber Kushour, a 30-year-old Palestinian from Jerusalem, who was recently convicted of “rape by deception” for having allegedly lied to an IsraeliJewish woman about his religious identity in order to sleep with her, although he only admits to having lied about his marital status.

Although most would agree that dishonesty is not the best policy, deception is a fairly common tactic in the dating game, and had Kushour been lying about his profession, wealth, education, age, social class, or his longer-term intentions, the incident would have passed into the obscurity of personal disappointment. Instead, because he, at the very least, was not entirely truthful about his religious and ethnic identity it became an issue of public concern with legal repercussions.

“The court is obliged to protect the public interest from sophisticated, smooth-tongued criminals who can deceive innocent victims at an unbearable price - the sanctity of their bodies and souls,” said one of the three judges on the case and, in so doing, set a dangerous precedent. The verdict raises the question of whether such amorous deception is actually an issue of “public interest”, rather than one of individual integrity, and, if so, how far should the state go in protecting citizens from “sophisticated, smooth-tongued criminals”?

For instance, another woman may have found Kushour’s lying about being single far more distressing than his religious affiliation. Would such a woman, had she also submitted a private claim, have had the same reaction from the judge in question? Needless to say, the court case has caused an uproar, not only internationally, but in liberal Israeli circles, and the verdict is already being appealed. “What if this guy had been a Jew who pretended to be a Muslim and had sex with a Muslim woman? Would he have been convicted of

rape? The answer is: of course not,” observed Gideon Levy, a liberal Israeli commentator.

But it is not just Israel which is guilty of double standards when it comes to sleeping with - or falling in love with - the enemy. To many Palestinians and Arabs, the idea that they or someone they know could get intimate with an Israeli-Jew, and sometimes even simply a Jew, is often viewed with anathema.

In some instances, this “social crime” can carry legal consequences, as was recently demonstrated in Egypt. After rejecting a government appeal of an earlier verdict, an Egyptian court ruled in June that all Egyptian men married to Israeli women (however few they may be), and their children, should be stripped of their citizenship.

The verdict has sparked controversy in Egypt, with many applauding the court’s “patriotism”, while Egyptian liberals and human rights activists are up in arms. “Egyptian law says citizenship can only be revoked if the citizen is proven to be spying on his country, [so] this verdict considers marrying an Israeli [to be] an act of spying,” said Negad al-Borai, a Cairobased lawyer and human rights activist.

What these two court cases clearly illustrate is the level of mutual distrust, paranoia and hatred between Arabs and IsraeliJews which has intensified with the worsening situation in recent years. At another level, it is a convenient tool in perpetuating the conflict. Restricting, and even forbidding, interactions with the other side makes it a whole lot easier to hate and demonize your “enemy”.

Seen from this angle, the fact that most Arab countries do not allow or discourage their citizens from travelling to Israel, not to mention the ban on Israelis travelling to Palestinian cities in the West Bank and Gaza, is partly founded on the fear that individual love will undermine collective hate. The tragedy that befell Romeo and Juliet eventually brought their feuding families together, but the tragic cases above are unlikely to have a similar consequence. Despite what romantics may naively believe, love certainly does not conquer all, and it can do little to resolve the very real issues fuelling the conflict.

Nevertheless, all friendships, love affairs and marriages between Israeli-Jews and Arabs challenge the destructive “us” and “them” dichotomy. Though they may at heart be personal affairs, private relationships between Arabs and Israelis demonstrate that people living across supposed enemy lines may share more in common with one another than with their own side, and provide hope for a future of greater understanding. —CGNews Egyptian by birth, Khaled Diab is a Brussels-based journalist and writer.

As Putin hits campaign trail, is Medvedev jealous?

By Anna Smolchenko

A

dangerously close encounter with a 30-ton grey whale.

Dousing fires in the country’s worst ever heatwave. A 2,000- kilometer road trip across remote eastern Siberia. Even for Russia’s tough-guy Prime Minister Vladimir Putin it was a summer out of the ordinary. The prime minister’s unprecedented, actionpacked 10-day tour of Siberia heralded the start of an election marathon whose winner will likely rule Russia for over a decade, Russian observers and media say. “A feeling that Vladimir Putin has started an election campaign is getting stronger not by the day-by the hour,” mass-circulation newspaper Moskovsky Komsomolets said.

But while Putin was wielding a crossbow on the Pacific Ocean or meeting his match in the shape of a wild bear, President Dmitry Medvedev conspicuously got on with the much more dour business of the presidency with little spectacle. Rather than pitting himself against the Russian wilderness, Medvedev was pictured in his shirtsleeves grappling with the problems of farming or industry. His most high-profile stunt was a meeting with U2 singer Bono.

Russia is heading for presidential elections in 2012 and neither 57-year-

IZHEVSK: Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin looks at a water storage basin during his walk in the Ural Mountains city of Izhevsk. —AP old Putin nor his 44-year-old protege Medvedev ruled out standing but they have said they would agree who would run to avoid competing with each other.

Liberal-leaning Nezavisimaya Gazeta, quoting a source close to the Kremlin, said that Putin’s Siberia tour forced Kremlin spin doctors to start revising its public relations strategy. “The main question they tried to find an answer to is-Can you counter an authoritarian charisma with routine work?” the report said. “And do it so that it looks

palatable in the eyes of the electorate?”

While a Kremlin spokesman declined to discuss the report, an analyst who advises the Kremlin on its image strategy hinted that changes would come soon. The reason Medvedev’s daily routine lacks the glamour and glitz of Putin’s political performance is because the president is not-yet-on the campaign trail, Gleb Pavlovsky said. “He conspicuously distances himself from typical pre-election moves. That is why his PR-strategy

may look bleak,” he said. “Obviously some very strong changes are awaiting us soon.” Maria Lipman, analyst at the Carnegie Moscow Centre, said it was hard to hazard a guess about Medvedev’s true feelings but said he likely wanted to run again.

“It’s his legitimate right to stay for another term,” she said. “And it’s hard to imagine he was happy to see what a big-time PR-campaign Putin unleashed.” After two consecutive terms in power Putin stepped down handing over the presidency to his long-time protege Medvedev in a choreographed election in 2008. One of Medvedev’s first steps in his new role was pushing through constitutional changes lengthening presidential terms to six years from four, fuelling speculation about a possible comeback by Putin.

If Putin, who in 2012 will turn 60, indeed returns to the Kremlin, he will likely stay in power for another 12 years, becoming Russia or the Soviet Union’s longest-serving ruler after dictator Stalin. By comparison, Soviet ruler Leonid Brezhnev, who in his late years became the butt of senilitythemed jokes, ran the country for 18 years, while another political veteran Nikita Khrushchev stayed at the helm of the nation for 11 years. Putin however would perhaps be more pleased if

compared to the US president Franklin D. Roosevelt who, the premier noted this week, served four consecutive terms, from 1933 until his death in office in 1945.

While opinion polls and analysts say that the technocratic president has not managed to eclipse his mentor’s popularity, he has clearly acquired a taste for power and made attempts at asserting his independence. Newsweek’s Russia edition said this week that some of Putin’s recent stunts had not been agreed with the Kremlin and when the premier last month personally took controls of an amphibious jet to put out forest fires, the Kremlin considered it an outright violation of the rules of the game.

“They say the president was very angry,” an unnamed Kremlin official told the magazine. Putin’s minders keep a poker face. “It was a routine working trip,” Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, referring to his tour across the Far East and Siberia.

During that voyage Putin personally drove over 2,000 kilometers in a canary-yellow Lada sports car, two identical cars in tow in case the lead vehicle broke down. “Medvedev is ready and wants to run for a second term,” said Newsweek. “Putin is on the fence and they have not yet had a final talk about it.” —AFP

ANALYSIS

Thursday, September 9, 2010

13

Why can’t Afghanistan tackle corruption? intervene and order the release of Mohammed Zia Salehi, a senior National Security Council official arrested in July as part of a corruption investigation. US media later reported Salehi was on the CIA’s payroll, which Karzai denies.

By Sayed Salahuddin

A

fghan President Hamid Karzai might talk tough about dealing with endemic corruption that has weakened his country for so long, but tangible results have been hard to find.

Words, unlike votes, are cheap in Afghanistan, it seems. In the past three months alone there have been accusations of interference in the work of Afghanistan’s major crime taskforce and corruption watchdog, senior officials on the payroll of the US Central Intelligence Agency and graft on a huge scale at the country’s top private bank. “It is a government similar to a corporation, where people are after making themselves rich,” said Waheed Mozhdah, a veteran Afghan political analyst. Corruption costs Afghans $2.5 billion a year, the United Nations has estimated, with European lawmakers also saying graft stops billions of aid dollars from reaching ordinary Afghans.

Mozhdah told Reuters a big part of the problem is that Karzai, consummate politician that he is, has no real power base. That means the man who won last year’s presidential vote must tread carefully for fear of alienating the political, ethnic and even tribal powerbrokers whose loyalty keeps him in office, effectively painting himself into a corner. One of the biggest concerns from last year’s presidential vote-won by Karzai despite having a third of his votes thrown out as fake-is the number of electoral promises he was forced to make to keep some of his more colorful backers happy.

Rights groups, for example, have criticized Karzai’s decision to

KABUL: Afghan women wait to withdraw money from Kabul Bank in Kabul. —AP appoint former militia chief General Abdul Rashid Dostum as his chief of staff. Dostum, an ethnic Uzbek and former communist general, helped swing last year’s election Karzai’s way, returning from exile days before the vote to rally support. Dostum has denied accusations of human rights abuses, which include questions over how 2,000 Taleban fighters suffocated to death in cargo containers

after they surrendered to him.

ONLY SOMALIA IS MORE CORRUPT Observers and analysts like Mozhdah fear the same pattern has emerged this year. Even though he is not running in this month’s parliamentary elections, Karzai must keep as many people as possible happy, or risk facing a hostile legislature that could block

policies and cabinet appointments.

It is little wonder that Afghanistan ranked 179th out of 180 on Transparency International’s 2009 list of the world’s most corrupt countries, ahead of only Somalia. Corruption and cronyism are among the most common complaints of ordinary Afghans.

Washington fears widespread graft is boosting the Taleban-led insurgency and complicating

efforts to strengthen central government control so US and other foreign troops can begin withdrawing from July 2011. Karzai promised that fighting graft would be his top priority when he was sworn in for a second five-year term, echoing demands from US counterpart Barack Obama, but frustration is growing 10 months after Karzai took his oath. It didn’t help when Karzai was seen to

ALL IN THE FAMILY Another big problem for the president is his family, typified by the crisis at the Kabulbank, Afghanistan’s largest private financial institution. The crisis was sparked by unproven media allegations that the bank’s top two directors had been forced to resign and the chairman ordered to hand over $160 million worth of luxury villas bought with bank funds in Dubai.

The central bank has denied it has taken over Kabulbank and assured depositors their money is safe, but the crisis turned violent on Wednesday when angry customers were beaten by security forces as they scrambled to withdraw savings. Karzai’s family is at the centre of the scandal. His brother, Mahmoud Karzai, is a major shareholder at the bank.

Mohammad Haseen, the brother of First Vice President Mohammad Qasim Fahim, is among major shareholders who have had assets frozen.

Some Afghans blame Karzai for the bank’s troubles. “If you can run the government properly, do so. If not, just resign, go away,” one angry customer named Rahim said outside a Kabulbank branch.

And then there is Karzai’s half brother, Ahmad Wali Karzai, a leader in Kandahar province, the birthplace of the Taleban and one of the centers of Afghanistan’s illegal opium trade. —Reuters

German central bank race row puts Merkel in bind

By Dave Graham

T

he Bundesbank’s decision to ask the German president to dismiss a divisive board member has put him and his ally Chancellor Angela Merkel in a jam: they’ll be damned if he does, and damned if he doesn’t. Central banker Thilo Sarrazin has exposed deep rifts in Germany over the integration of immigrants with disparaging remarks about Muslims and theories on Jewish genes, prompting political leaders to pile pressure on the Bundesbank to act.

The central bank last Thursday duly requested that President Christian Wulff remove board member Sarrazin, an unprecedented step for which Merkel said she had “great respect”-though it may have far-reaching consequences that could weaken her hold on power. As the dust settles from the protest kicked up by Sarrazin, Merkel and her allies have become more guarded about criticizing the 65-year-old, reflecting a growing awareness of the support he enjoys among voters and the legal threat he poses. “It’s a lose-lose situation,” said Ulrich von Alemann, a political scientist at the University of Duesseldorf. “The legal foundation for the dismissal appears shaky. But Wulff has been clever to seek the government’s view on the matter first.”

Following Wulff’s request, the chancellery asked the finance ministry to submit a legal assessment of Sarrazin’s conduct. The ministry has yet to signal when its review will be complete. If removed from office, Sarrazin has intimated he will fight the decision, raising the prospect of a bruising court case that may turn the provocative banker into a hero and raise questions over whether Merkel and her ministers acted correctly.

The mass-selling daily Bild on Wednesday urged the public to tell Wulff “what they really think” about Sarrazin, saying polls showed between 50 and 95 percent of Germans did not want him sacked and backed his criticism of immigrants over integration. If Wulff does not fire Sarrazin, who is now under police protection following threats to his life, he will undermine the very politicians who catapulted him to the presidency in June. He also would risk accusations of hypocrisy after he broke with the tradition of presidential impartiality by appearing to pre-empt the bank’s decision a day before it was announced.

COURT BATTLE Bastions of conservative opinion in Germany say the recall of Sarrazinwhose attacks on Muslim culture are part of his new book “Deutschland schafft sich ab” (Germany does away with itself) - is unlikely to bring much peace to the government. “As a martyr of freedom of opinion, and a chief witness to charges made by broad swathes of the population, Sarrazin will haunt them a long time,” leading conservative daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung said after the central bank’s decision.

As a senior member of the Bundesbank, Sarrazin, whose book raced to the top of bestseller lists, has reason to suppose he may be safe from attack, according to legal experts. A custodian of the post-war West German economy, the central bank was created as a bulwark of independence, investing its top appointees with considerable protection against political interference once in office, making them hard to sack.

If the bank cannot prove Sarrazin is guilty of serious misconduct, it is unclear whether other charges will

BERLIN: German Chancellor Angela Merkel attends a news conference at the chancellery in Berlin yesterday. —AP stick. Many analysts believe the bank will try to show he has brought its name into disrepute through a lack of restraint. Even this may not spare the government a drawn-out fight.

Friederike Goebbels, a specialist on German labor law at legal firm Jones Day, said while there were grounds to dismiss Sarrazin, there was enough ambiguity about the limits of his job that

he could still force a lengthy court battle.

“Even among legal experts there are various takes on this. It really depends on your subjective view of the matter, which is what makes this so difficult,” she said. “In the end, whoever decides will have to weigh up the interests at stake.” Perhaps more worrying for Merkel is the fact her own condemnation of Sarrazin has run contrary to the instincts of many voters in her conservative Christian Democrats (CDU).

Though Sarrazin is a member of the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD), polls show his views have support among conservatives, which could turn into a problem for Merkel, said political scientist Gerd Langguth at the University of Bonn.

The SPD is already suffering for moving to expel Sarrazin for his views, according to a new poll Langguth said that given the international standing of the Bundesbank, Merkel had no choice but to rebuke Sarrazin, who has argued that Muslims are lowering the intelligence of German society, exploit the welfare state and refuse to integrate.

“However, she condemned him so unequivocally that a lot of conservative voters don’t agree with her,” Langguth said.

Merkel’s biggest electoral test before 2013 is next March’s vote in Baden-Wuerttemberg, a powerful southwestern state of nearly 11 million people which the CDU have ruled since 1953. Latest polls show the CDU could be unseated by a combination of the SPD and Greens, which would be a major blow for Merkel. “CDU voters won’t forget (Sarrazin),” said Langguth, looking ahead to the vote. “This means the issue has now become about the leadership of the party.” —Reuters

Australia’s ‘Houdini’ PM facing high-wire act

By Amy Coopes

J

ulia Gillard pulled off the “greatest escape” since Houdini by clinging on to power as Australian prime minister, but faces a political high-wire act to keep her shaky coalition intact, analysts said. Gillard snatched the leadership from elected PM Kevin Rudd just 10 weeks ago and failed to win an outright majority at August 21 polls, ultimately relying on an unlikely quartet of minority MPs to get over the line.

Two conservative rural independents joined a lawmaker from the Greens environmental party and an ex-Iraq war whistle-blower to give Gillard the one-seat majority she needed to rule. “I think Julia Gillard is the greatest escape artist since Houdini,” said Monash University political scientist Nick Economou.

“She obviously has excellent negotiating skills and that has allowed her to hang onto the prime ministership, even though she suffered quite a big loss of support and loss of

MELBOURNE: Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard speaking to supporters in Melbourne. —AFP seats at the election. She’s extremely lucky.”

But the “kingmakers” came at a cost - 9.0 billion US dollars in promises for rural electorates alone-and Gillard will have to rely on their sup-

port to pass any legislation, explained Peter van Onselen.

“I think it’s going to be inherently unstable,” van Onselen, a government expert from Edith Cowan University, said.

“It’ll be delicate and it’ll

require the government to take an issue-by-issue approach to its legislation ... (rather) than robust policy development.” The eclectic mix of progressive and conservative views in her coalition

will make it nearly impossible for Gillard to achieve consensus on flagship issues such as a tax on mining profits or imposing a levy on carbon emissions.

“I think balancing the budget’s going to be difficult because the government’s got a whole heap of additional spending that it’s got to do now (on rural promises),” said van Onselen. “But there’s question marks now about whether the mining tax will get through, and it’s hard to see how it’s going to manage to restore the budget to balance at the same time as deliver all its spending commitments.” Gillard will also be faced with an uncommonly strong and unified opposition which has “had a real whiff of government” after falling just short of its own majority, said Flinders University expert Haydon Manning.

“It only takes a big issue like say the carbon tax to see the independents wilt,” Manning said. “Suddenly a big issue for the government doesn’t get through the

(lower) house, the Greens are barking wildly about it and eyes are darting in all directions, and then you just don’t know whether a new election’s around the corner.” It would take the death or resignation of just one MP from the ruling Labor party to trigger another election, meaning Gillard’s government was “massively going to be under the microscope and is on notice”, van Onselen said.

“But I think that can be a potential good thing for this government, because it’s a government that was heavily criticized for over-promising and under-delivering in its first term,” he said. Most experts agreed that Gillard’s rule could last a full three-year term and said the Welsh-born former lawyer was best placed of anyone in the current parliament to make it happen. “She has a new modus operandi to work with which you suspect just might fit her personality type and character,” Manning said. “From the ashes of defeat she might really make something of this.” —AFP

focus

What went wrong at the Kabulbank?

By Tim Gaynor

A

fghanistan’s leading private bank is in turmoil after its top two directors stepped down last week amid unproven media allegations of corruption and property deals gone wrong, triggering a run of withdrawals. Here are some questions and answers about the bank, its troubles and what it means for President Hamid Karzai and his Western backers.

WHAT IS KABULBANK? Kabulbank began operations in 2004, almost three years after US-backed Afghan forces ousted the Taleban, and is Afghanistan’s largest private bank in terms of business volume, number of branches, customer base and employees.

Financial records posted on its website (www.kabulbank.com) show it had total assets of $1.01 billion and liabilities of $991 million in 2009. It has 68 branches, most of them in the capital, and plans to open 11 more elsewhere.

It also has links with international banks in Germany, China, Tajikistan, Saudi Arabia, India, Belgium, Italy and Iran, and is the principal agent for Western Union Money Transfer, handling remittances from Afghans living abroad.

The bank handles payrolls for the state, and its customers include about 250,000 soldiers, police officers and other state employees, whose salaries are funded by the United States and other Western donors. It also lends money to the private sector. Kabulbank has close ties to Afghanistan’s government and ruling elite. One of Karzai’s brothers is a major shareholder, as is a brother of First Vice President Mohammad Qasim Fahim.

HOW DID THE CRISIS UNFOLD? Problems flared last week when the bank’s chairman, Sher Khan Farnood, and chief executive officer Khalilullah

Fruzi, resigned from the bank.

US media reported that the central bank had taken control of Kabulbank, forced the two men out and ordered Farnood to hand over $160 million worth of luxury villas in Dubai that may have been bought with Kabulbank funds. The central bank, Karzai and Finance Minister Omar Zakhilwal all said the pair had resigned to comply with new financial regulations preventing shareholders from holding senior bank management positions. Those regulations were outlined in a June statement by the central bank (www.centralbank.gov.af). The central bank on Monday ordered Farnood and Fruzi’s assets frozen, as well as those of several other leading shareholders and borrowers. The crisis triggered jitters among customers, who staged a run on the bank despite assurances from the central bank and government their money was safe.

On Wednesday, National Security Directorate officers beat people with batons outside one Kabul branch.

HOW SERIOUS IS IT FOR KARZAI, AFGHANISTAN? The United Nations estimates that Afghans spend $2.5 billion a year-a quarter of GDP-on bribes. Washington fears corruption is boosting the Taleban-led insurgency and complicating efforts to strengthen central government control so US and other foreign troops can leave. The crisis has flagged concerns about the handling of funds from Western donor countries, channeled through a nascent commercial banking sector that the United States has encouraged Afghanistan to build and which is tied closely to Karzai’s family and members of his inner circle.

A widespread perception among Afghans that Karzai’s government is corrupt will be a major issue at a Sept. 18 parliamentary election, which the Taleban has vowed to disrupt. —Reuters

China, Japan ties, tensions J

apan yesterday arrested the captain of a Chinese fishing boat that collided with two Japanese coast guard boats near disputed islets in the East China Sea, prompting a protest from Beijing and raising risks of tensions. Here are some facts about the nations’ ties:

ECONOMIC POWERHOUSES, SHIFTING RANKINGS Preliminary statistics indicate China has edged past Japan to become the world’s second biggest economy, with the United States remaining the world’s biggest by far.

Japan’s second-quarter unadjusted GDP totaled $1.2883 trillion on a nominal dollar basis, against China’s secondquarter unadjusted GDP of $1.3369 trillion. The GDP of Japan and China combined account for about 17 percent of the world’s total output.

China-Japan trade rebounded in the first half of 2010 after slumping in the global financial crisis. The two countries’ bilateral trade reached 12.6 trillion yen ($150.4 billion) in value in the first half, a jump of 34.5 percent on the same time last year, according to Japanese statistics. Two-way trade between China and Japan totaled 21.7 trillion yen in 2009. China has been Japan’s biggest trading partner since 2009. China and Japan are the world’s first- and second-biggest holders of foreign reserves. A series of strikes in China have hit Japanese firms in recent months, including suppliers to Toyota Motor Corp and Honda Motor Corp.

HISTORICAL TENSIONS Japan invaded and occupied much of China from 1931 to 1945. Bitterness over Japan’s wartime atrocities has faded as a diplomatic flashpoint, but still underpins widespread Chinese public distrust of Japan. China has decried highprofile visits to Tokyo’s

Yasukuni Shrine for war dead.

Among those honored at the shrine are 14 Class A war criminals convicted by an Allied tribunal after World War Two. Junichiro Koizumi, prime minister from 2001 to 2006, made annual visits to the shrine while in office. His successors have stayed away from the controversial shrine.

TAIWAN, NORTH KOREA China wants Japan to clearly back Beijing’s “one China” policy. Japan says it accepts that, but many politicians and businesses have close ties with Taiwan, a former Japanese colony. China and Japan are both part of stalled six-party talks seeking to end North Korea’s nuclear arms program. But Japan is more critical of the North and joined international condemnation of Pyongyang over the sinking of a South Korean navy ship in March. China, the North’s main diplomatic and economic backer, instead urged restraint from all sides.

TERRITORIAL DISPUTES AND MILITARY TENSIONS The two countries are at odds over China’s exploration for natural gas in the East China Sea. In 2008, they agreed on principles to solve the feud by jointly developing gas fields. Progress has been slow and Japan has accused China of drilling for gas in violation of the deal, though talks are continuing. Tokyo and Beijing claim sovereignty over a group of East China Sea islets, known as Senkaku in Japan and Diaoyu in China.

Japan has been worried by China’s military modernization, especially its doubledigit defense spending and expanding naval reach. In May, Tokyo lodged a protest with Beijing, claiming a Chinese ship had violated Japan’s sovereign rights by approaching a Japanese survey vessel. —Reuters

NEWS

14

Syrian influence in Lebanon on the rise BEIRUT: Five years ago, Lebanese thronged the streets of Beirut to protest Syrian control over their country in a movement that quickly ended decades of military domination. Now, many Lebanese are wondering if much has really changed.

Syria’s soldiers and the posters of its leader are gone but its influence is undeniably back. Western-backed Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri has shuttled to Damascus five times in the last nine months to try to repair relations that frayed after the 2005 Syrian withdrawal.

For many in Lebanon, the trips harken back to times of Syrian dominance when Lebanese leaders used to travel frequently to Damascus to get marching orders. Syria controlled Lebanon for nearly 30 years something the US opposed - and kept about 35,000 troops on its soil. But everything changed in February 2005 when a massive truck bombing killed former Prime Minister Rafiq Hariri, a billionaire businessman and father of the current prime minister.

Lebanon’s anti-Syrian political bloc, which Saad Hariri eventually came to lead, quickly accused Syria in the bombing.

Millions of protesters turned out to demand Syria get out of Lebanon, in what was dubbed the “Cedar Revolution.”

Within months, Damascus pulled its troops out and Lebanese elections that followed swept anti-Syrian parties to power.

Although officials have not said it openly, analysts say the current rapprochement appears to be an acknowledgment that Hariri is too weak to govern Lebanon without the support of his larger, more powerful neighbor.

Steadily rising Syrian influence in Lebanon culminated this week with a stunning reversal by Hariri. He said it was a mistake to blame Damascus for his father’s assassination, adding the accusation had been politically motivated. “Syria had been placed in the docket for the murder of (Hariri’s) father ... and for him to look the world in the eye and say ‘I was wrong’ - it’s an extraordinary about-face,” said Joshua Landis, an American professor and Syria

expert who runs a blog called Syria Comment. “We understand that the Cedar Revolution was a mirage,” he added.

“And so we have returned to the much more cynical but perhaps more realistic world of cutting deals and keeping all the local powers happy.” Since the pullout, Syria has maintained its hand in Lebanon through its ally, the militant group Hezbollah, which has also been steadily gaining power. Hezbollah, also backed by Iran, is the strongest military force in the country and the main representative of its Shiite community, roughly a third of the population of 4 million. The group has gained so much influence in the past few years it now has virtual veto power over government decisions.

Sectarian street clashes in 2008 pitting supporters of Hezbollah against Sunni rivals in Beirut may have helped convince Hariri that he needed Syria’s help. “He tried everything in his power to find a way of isolating Hezbollah and he couldn’t do it,” Landis said. Hariri’s allies have not said much publicly on his new stance regarding a possible Syrian role in his father’s killing - an unusual silence suggesting they are unwilling to publicly criticize the prime minister’s position.

A number of his allies in the US-backed coalition known as March 14, named for a day of massive anti-Syrian demonstrations in 2005, declined to comment when contacted by The Associated Press over the past two days. Dory Chamoun, a March 14 politician, said Hariri’s comments did not absolve Syria but were meant to emphasize that the tribunal must have the final word.

“If such statements ensure a calm situation in Lebanon, then I’m all for it,” he said. In contrast, Syria’s allies in Lebanon came out with rare praise for Hariri.

Qassem Hashem, a legislator with close links to Syria, said his statements “help remove all the stains that prevailed in the past years as a result of unjust political accusations that were based on false witnesses and slander.” In Syria, state-run newspapers ran Hariri’s comments on their front pages and political analysts close to

the Syrian leadership said Syria considered Hariri’s statements to be an apology. “Such an apology is a courageous move by Hariri and we as Syrians regard his statements as restoring some esteem for Syria after years of slandering it,” said analyst Imad Shueibi. “What happened is in fact a positive thing,” he added.

Though Hariri has not explained his dramatic shift, analysts say he appears to be putting aside his deeply personal feud with Syria for the good of his own country as his Western-backed bloc struggles to maintain control. He said as much in an interview with the Saudi-owned newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat published Monday. “The relationship between the two countries, for me, is a strategic relationship. ... As prime minister of Lebanon, I look to the interest of the country,” he told the newspaper.

For Syria, it is also a remarkable transformation from the days when Damascus was isolated, ostracized and widely blamed for Hariri’s assassination and other politically motivated killings in Lebanon. The United States tried under the Bush years to keep Syria out of Lebanon’s politics and largely failed. Now the administration of President Barack Obama has sought to improve ties with Damascus, and Syria’s allies and opponents here say that has given it a freer hand to influence Lebanon.

And there have been signs that the Netherlands-based UN tribunal set up to try those responsible for Hariri’s killing may have shifted attention away from Syria. The tribunal has not yet named any individuals or countries as suspects. But in July, Hezbollah’s leader said he expected the tribunal to indict members of his movement.

He dismissed the allegations and said the tribunal has no credibility. The first UN investigator into the Hariri assassination, Germany’s Detlev Mehlis, said the plot’s complexity suggested a role by the Syrian intelligence services and its pro-Syria Lebanese counterpart. But the two chief investigators who followed Mehlis have worked quietly and have not named any individuals or countries as suspects. — AP

Description of Eid prayer ‘Umar (may Allah be pleased with him) said: “The prayer of Eid and AlAdhaa is two complete rakahs, not shortened. This is according to the words of your Prophet, and the liar is doomed.”

Abu Sa’eed said: “The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) used to come out to the prayer-place on the day of Fitr and AlAdhaa, and the first thing he would do was the prayer.” The Takbeer is repeated seven times in the first rak’ah and five times in the second, the Quran is to be recited after each.

It was reported from ‘Aa’ishah: the Takbeer of al-Fitr and al-Adhaa is seven in the first rakah and five in the second, apart from the takbeer of rukoo’ .

(Reported by Abu Dawood; saheeh by the sum of its isnaads) If a person joining the prayer catches up with the imam during these extra takbeeraat, he should say “Allahu akbar” with the imaam, and he does not have to make up any takbeeraat he may have missed, because they are sunnah, not waajib.

With regard to what should be said between the takbeeraat, Hammaad ibn Salamah reported from Ibraaheem that Waleed ibn ‘Uqbah entered the mosque when Ibn Mas’ood, Hudhayfah and Abu Moosa were there, and said, “Eid is here, what should I do?” Ibn Masood said: “Say ‘Allahu akbar’, praise and thank Allah, send blessings on the Prophet (PBUH) and make duaa’, then say Say ‘Allahu akbar’, praise and thank Allah, send blessings on the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him)...etc.”

(Reported by al-Tabaraani. It is a saheeh hadeeth that is quoted in al-Irwaa’ and elsewhere).

khutbah.” (Musnad Ahmad, 1905. The hadeeth is also in Al-Saheehayn).

Another indication that the khutbah should be after the prayer is the hadeeth of Abu Sa’eed (may Allah be pleased with him): “The Prophet (PBUH) used to go out to the prayer-place on the day of alFitr and al-Adhaa, and the first thing he would do was to pray, then he would stand up facing the people, whilst they were still sitting in their rows, and would advise and instruct them. If he wanted to send out a military expedition, he would decide about the matter then, or if he wanted to issue a command, he would do it then.”

Abu Sa’eed said: “This is what the people continued to do until I came out [to the Eid prayers] with Marwaan, when he was governor of Madeenah, on either Adhaa or Fitr. When we reached the prayer-place, we saw the minbar, which had been built by Katheer ibn al-Salt.

Marwaan wanted to get on the minbar before the prayer. I pulled on his cloak, and he pulled on mine in return, then he got on the minbar and gave the khutbah before the prayer.

I said, ‘You have changed it, by Allah! ‘ He said, ‘O Abu Sa’eed, what you know is gone.’ I said, ‘What I know, by Allah, is better than what I do not know.’ He said, ‘The people will not remain sitting after the prayer, so we made it [the khutbah] before the prayer.’” (Reported by al-Bukhaari, 956). Anyone who wants to leave during the khutbah is allowed to do so ‘Abd-Allaah ibn al-Saa’ib said: “I attended Eid with the Prophet ] (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him), and when he finished the prayer, he said: “We will give the khutbah, so whoever wants to sit (and listen to) the khutbah, let him sit, and whoever wants to leave, let him go.’” (Irwaa’ al-Ghaleel, 3/96)

Eid etiquette Continued from Page 1 Christmas, New Year’s, Thanksgiving, and holidays on which gif ts are exchanged. These are celebrated in all European and North American countries nowadays, and in other countries where Christian influence is prevalent, even if the country is not originally Christian.

Some so-called Muslims may also join in these holidays, out of ignorance or hypocrisy.

The Magians (Zoroastrians) also have their own festivals, such as Mahrajaan, Nowruz and so on. The Baatinis have their own festivals too, such as “Eid AlGhadeer”, when they claim that the Prophet [an error occurred while processing this directive] (PBUH) gave the khilaafah to ‘Ali (may Allah be pleased with him) and to the twelve Imams after him.

Distinguished by festivals The Muslims have no festivals apart from Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adhaa, because of the hadeeth narrated from Anas who said: “The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) came to Madeenah and the people had two days when they would play and have fun. He said, ‘What are these two days?’ They said, ‘We used to play and have fun on these days during the Jaahiliyyah.

The Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) said, ‘Allah has given you something better than them, the day of Adhaa and the day of Fitr.’” (Sunan Abi Dawood, 1134) These two Eids are among the signs or symbols of Allah which we must celebrate and understand the aims and meanings behind them. There follows a discussion of some of the rulings and manners of the two Eids according to Islamic sharee’ah Ahkaam al-Eid (Rulings on Eid) Some of the scholars say that Eid prayers are waajib (obligatory) - this is the view of the Hanafi scholars and of Shaykh al-Islam Ibn Taymiyah (may Allah have mercy on him). They say that the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) always prayed the Eid prayer and never omitted to do it, not even once.

They take as evidence the aayah (interpretation of the meaning),”Therefore turn in prayer to your Lord and sacrifice (to Him only)” [al-Kawthar 108:2], ie, the Eid prayer and the sacrifice after it, which is an instruction, and the fact that the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) ordered that the women should be brought out to attend the Eid prayers, and that a woman who did not have a jilbaab should borrow one from her sister.

Some scholars say that Eid prayer is fard kifaaya. This is the view of the Hanbalis. A third group say that Eid prayer is sunnah mu’akkadah. This is the view of the Maalikis and Shaafa’is. They take as evidence the hadeeth of the Bedouin which says that Allah has not imposed any prayers on His slaves other than the five daily prayers. So the Muslim should be keen to attend Eid prayers, especially since the opinion that it is waajib is based on strong evidence. The goodness, blessings and great reward one gets from attending Eid prayers, and the fact that one is following the example of the Prophet (PBUH) by doing so, should be sufficient motivation.

Recitation of Quran It is recommended (mustahabb) that in the Eid prayers the imam should recite Qaaf [soorah 50] and Aqtarabat al-saa’ah [al-Qamar, soorah 54], as it is reported in Saheeh Muslim that ‘Umar ibn alKhattaab asked Abu Waaqid al-Laythi, “What did the Messenger of Allah (PBUH) used to recite at [Eid] al-Adhaa and al-Fitr?” He said, “He used to recite Qaaf. Wa’l-Qur’aan al-majeed [Qaaf 50:1] and Aqtarabat al-saa’ah wa anshaqq alqamar [al-Qamar 54:1].

Most of the reports indicate that the Prophet (PBUH) used to recite Soorat alA’laa [87] and Soorat al-Ghaashiyah [88], as he used to recite them in the Friday prayer. Al-Nu’maan ibn Bishr said: “The Messenger of Allah (PBUH) used to recite on the two Eids and on Fridays, Sabbih isma rabbika’l-a’laa [al-A’laa 87:1] and Hal ataaka hadeeth al-ghaashiyah [alGhaashiyah 88:1].” (Saheeh Muslim, 878).

Samurah (may Allah be pleased with him) said: “The Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) used to recite on the two Eids, Sabbih isma rabbika’l-a’laa [al-A’ laa 87:1] and Hal ataaka hadeeth alghaashiyah [al-Ghaashiyah 88:1].”

(Reported by Ahmad and others; it is saheeh. Al-Irwaa’, 3/116) Prayer comes before khutbah One of the rulings of Eid is that the prayer should come before the khutbah, as is reported in Musnad Ahmad from the hadeeth of Ibn ‘Abbaas, who testified that the Messenger of Allah (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) prayed before the khutbah on Eid, then he gave the

Not delaying the prayer for too long ‘Abd-Allaah ibn Bishr, the companion of the Prophet [an error occurred while processing this directive] (PBUH), went out with the people on the day of Fitr or alAdhaa, and objected to the fact that the imaam came very late. He said, “At the time of the Prophet (PBUH) we would have finished by now,” and that was at the time of al-Tasbeeh .” (Reported by alBukhaari) Naafil prayers in the prayer-place There are no naafil prayers to be done either before or after the Eid prayer, as Ibn ‘Abbaas reported that the Prophet (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him) used to come out on the day of Eid and pray two rak’ahs, with nothing before or after them.

This is the case if the prayer is offered in a prayer place or public place. If, however, the people pray the Eid prayer in a mosque, then they should pray two rakahs for Tahiyat al-Masjid (“Greeting the mosque”) before sitting down.

Abu ‘Umayr ibn Anas reported from his paternal uncles among the Ansaar who said: “It was cloudy and we could not see the new moon of Shawwaal, so we started the day fasting, then a caravan came at the end of the day and told the Messenger of Allah (PBUH) that they had seen the new moon of Shawwaal the day before, so he told the people to stop fasting, and they went out to pray the Eid prayer the next day.” (Reported by the five. It is saheeh; al-Irwaa’, 3/102). If someone misses the Eid prayer, the most correct view is that he may make it up by praying two rak’ahs. — Islam-qa.Com

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Among Egypt’s Christians, few question Church rule ALEXANDRIA: When Irini Ibrahim, a young Coptic Christian woman, floated the idea of divorce from a husband she said was abusing her, her parents immediately opposed it, reminding her of the Biblical vow, “What God has joined together let no man put asunder.” So the 25year-old Ibrahim entered “reconciliation sessions” with her husband Rizk Kands, moderated by a priest.

In April, the priest anointed Ibrahim and Kands with sacred oil, pronouncing their union healed. Hours later, Ibrahim’s battered body was found in an Alexandria hotel room the couple had booked for a sort of second honeymoon. Kands, an Egyptian who also holds US citizenship, fled to the United States, charged by an Alexandria prosecutor of strangling his wife after slamming her against the wall and toilet.

The case sparked shock and grief among Egypt’s Coptic Christians. But it did not bring much soul-searching over the Coptic Orthodox Church’s almost total ban on divorce. The ban makes divorce such a taboo among Christians that no matter how bad or unbearable the mar riage, ending it is unthinkable in the face of the social shame. That’s a testament to the dominating influence that the deeply conservative Coptic Church has over its followers, estimated at about 10 percent of Egypt’s 80 million people. The Church is one of the oldest in the world, centered in Egypt.

As Egypt’s Muslim majority has grown more religiously conservative over the past three decades, so has its Christian minority, many of whom see the Church as a refuge. As a result, the authority of Coptic leader Pope Shenouda III now goes almost unquestioned. The Church’s grip on Christians’ personal lives will likely only increase with a bill before Egypt’s parliament that would bar civil judges from making rulings that contra-

ALEXANDRIA: In this file photo, Irini Ibrahim and the husband Rizk Kands are seen at their wedding in Alexandria, Egypt. — AP dict church law in personal status cases involving Christians.

Church law cur rently allows divorce only for three causes: adultery, conversion to Islam or change of denomination. As a result, Copts have of ten conver ted to Catholicism or Protestant sects to get out of unhappy mar riages. With Church’s endorsement, the new law would close that door, recognizing inter-denomination unions That, some Christian activists fear, could push more divorce-seeking Copts to conver t to Islam. Such conversions in the past have fueled sectarian tensions even violence - between Muslims and Christians.

In the most recent case, a priest’s wife, Kamellia Zakhir disappeared in July and repor tedly conver ted to break from her husband fueling protests from Christians claiming that Muslims kidnapped her and forced her conversion. After police found Zakhir and returned her home, weekly protests erupted this month, this time by Muslims who claimed Christians were holding her against her will and forced her to renounce Islam.

“I am afraid the situation will be worse than ever and we will witness a mass emigration to Islam with this new law,” said Naguib Gibrail, a prominent Christian lawyer and former judge.

The law would also fortify the virtual state within a state for Christians that the government has allowed the Church to build up in the past 40 years since Pope Shenouda assumed his position. The Church sponsors schools, clinics, job opportunities, and a generous network of social welfare programs to support the needy and the unemployed. It’s part of a general trend in Egypt: As the state withdraws from the lives of people, the more the Church or Islamic groups fill the gaps and provide services on religious bases.

The result, critics warn, is that the civil state and secular laws have diminishing support. “The Copts entered the Church and never left,” said Kamal Zakhir, co-founder of secular movement that advocates for Coptic civil rights.

“And the state is happy since it is a comfortable arrangement for all parties concerned.” The situation for marriage was different in the

first half the 20th century.

Then, rules drawn up by Coptic secularists allowed divorce for range of reasons, including abandonment and mental disorders.

But Shenouda negated the rules as a violation of the Bible. There is no civil marriage in Egypt, so marriages get registered with the government through a priest and to divorce, couples must go through the Church first. If the Church refuses, a couple can turn to the civil courts. Usually, the courts back church law - but not always. The new law would close that option.

The Church allows for annulments, but almost always only in cases where the marriage was not consummated. In most cases, the Church also bans remarriage for divorced couples. The Church has played down the problems posed by the divorce ban. In recent TV interviews, Bishop Bola, the church official authorized to sign divorce or remarriage permits, said the number of marital disputes among Copts don’t exceed 4,000 cases a year, without specifying whether the number refers to divorces granted or those seeking divorce. —AP

Metro changes Dubai scene Continued from Page 1 “Using the train is better than being on the road, to avoid traffic jams,” said Vijay, a 36-year-old Indian who works in customer service at a driving school. He had been using the train for three months, since he got his new job in the upmarket Mall of the Emirates shopping centre, he said.

“It takes me only half an hour to get to work,” said Vijay, compared to spending up to two hours on a bus, or in carpooling. Egyptian Mohammed Ahmed Mohammed, 25, agreed that the train was a great option. “It is comfortable and fast. No traffic congestion,” he said, sitting in a spotless carriage, where eating, drinking and even chewing gum are banned.

In a bid to lure motorists to park and ride, RTA built free multi-storey parking areas at some stations. But few appear to have taken up the offer. “Only the ground floor is open” said a security man at the Nakheel Harbour and Tower station car park, towards the southern end of the line.

While it had a capacity for 3,000 vehicles, less 150 cars were left there during a weekday, he said. But motorists in the Gulf are strongly attached to their car seats. A survey published recently by Regus, a workplace solutions provider, showed that 91 percent of working people in the UAE preferred private transport, with 79 percent using their cars to commute and 12 percent taking taxis.

Dubai and Abu Dhabi have modern bus networks, and the latter has plans underway to develop its own metro.

“Car saves time and effor t,” said Muatassem Al-Qudat, a Jordanian teacher who has been living in Dubai for nine years and does not use the metro.

He complained of the stifling heat during most of the year in the desert emirate, which makes walking to and from stations an unpleasant experience. “It is difficult with the heat,” he said. And the stations were too far from the starting and ending points of a normal journey, he added.

Many Dubai residents have echoed similar complaints about the route of the Dubai Metro, a great part of which runs above the artery of Sheikh Zayed Road along an elevated track. To meet this objection, the RTA created a network of shuttle buses connecting passengers from residential and work areas with the main train line.

“I used the train only once, just to check it out,” said Emirati oil engineer Mohammed Ali who lives in the northern emirate of Ajman - a commuting distance from Dubai. He still would not bother to park and ride the train when visiting Dubai. “Roads are now wider and traffic is less congested,” he argued.

“The car is faster.” Roads are certainly better than a few years ago when Dubai came up with the idea of building a metro network, becoming the vanguard of urban railway in the Arab Gulf region. During a five-year boom, Dubai invested heavily in modernizing and expanding its road network. It is now the best in the Arab Middle East, boosting its claim to be the regional centre for trade and finance.

This is backed by having the busiest

airport in the region, which handled 42 million passengers in 2009, and a new airport that opened in June just for cargo and is touted to become the world largest when completed.

But as the credit crunch hit the ambitious construction projects of Dubai, the metro appeared to be no exception. The cost of the metro had already doubled to 7.6 billion dollars by the time the Red Line was opened.

Meanwhile, a Japanese-led consortium working on the remainder of the network has reportedly slowed down work due to delayed payment, a matter categorically denied by RTA in January.

Only 21 out of 29 stations on the 52-kilometres Red Line have been opened.

The remaining eight are scheduled to open in October. But RTA is reportedly considering keeping some closed as the severe impact of the global financial crisis put nearby urban developments on hold. The construction of the second 23kilometre Green Line has gone slower as well. It is now expected to open next August after it was scheduled to open this spring.

The oil-rich Gulf region has begun to take railway seriously as an important mode of transport, with rail schemes valued at 94.5 billion dollars, out of transportation projects worth 170 billion dollars, the Middle East Business Intelligence (MEED) said in June. These include a GCC rail link of 2,117 kilometers r unning from Oman to Kuwait through the UAE, Qatar, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. But MEED said most of the transport projects are still in the design phase. — AFP

New tiniest man emerges Continued from Page 1 specially made. He has a suit and tie for when he meets with journalists. And he likes ladies average-sized, like his girlfriend Fanny, who is 1.6 m (5.25-ft) tall. “I like brunettes, a little curvy,” said the fleeting title-holder, who also likes to dance, has worked as a spokesmodel for shoe companies and acts in his own TV series.

Meanwhile, the Nepalese teenager set to be declared the planet’s smallest person got big star treatment Tuesday on a

tour of New York. Crowds at Times Square jostled for a glimpse of Khagendra Thapa Magar who at 17 is the size of a baby and has stopped growing. The Nepalese teen was making his first visit to New York as part of a publicity trip organized by the freak-show museum Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Wearing a white shirt and doll-sized pin-striped gray jacket, Magar smiled shyly, blinking at rows of cameras and the vast neon billboards lining Times Square. Ripley’s declares Magar-at 22 inches (56 centimeters) tall and 11 pounds (five kilograms) -

the world’s smallest person.

The Guinness Book of Records this Monday named Colombia’s Nino Hernandez to the title, saying Magar is not yet adult. But next month the Nepali turns 18 and, at two inches (5.08 centimeters) under his rival, will easily grab the undisputed top title of tininess.

Ripley’s, a museum chain celebrating oddities such as a five-legged cow, a bearded lady and two-headed sheep, said Magar suffers primordial dwarfism. The condition typically reduces life expectancy to as little as the 20s. — Agencies

Controversy boils over fugitive Continued from Page 1 But Shiite MP Hussein Al-Qallaf warned the government against withdrawing Habeeb’s citizenship without taking the same

action against Sunni preacher Othman AlKhamees whom he accused of insulting the entire Shiite faith. Qallaf warned that he will file to grill the prime minister if the government withdraws Habeeb’s citizenship alone.

In the meantime, lawyers Adel Abdulhadi and Duwaim Al-Muwaizri filed a lawsuit against Habeeb to the public prosecutor and submitted material in which Habeeb insults the prophet’s wife and other Islamic symbols.

SPORTS

Thursday, September 9, 2010

15

MLB results/standings Results and standings from the MLB games on Tuesday: Baltimore 6, NY Yankees 2; Detroit 9, Chicago White Sox 1; NY Mets 4, Washington 1; Philadelphia 8, Florida 7; Pittsburgh 5, Atlanta 0; Toronto 8, Texas 5; Tampa Bay 14, Boston 5; Houston 7, Chicago Cubs 3; Minnesota 10, Kansas City 3; Milwaukee 4, St Louis 2; Colorado 4, Cincinnati 3; San Francisco 6, Arizona 3; San Diego 2, LA Dodgers 1; Cleveland 6, LA Angels 1; Seattle 7, Oakland 5.

American League Eastern Division W L PCT GB NY Yankees 86 53 .619 Tampa Bay 84 54 .609 1.5 Boston 77 62 .554 9 Toronto 72 66 .522 13.5 Baltimore 53 86 .381 33 Central Division Minnesota 82 57 Chicago White Sox 77 61 Detroit 69 70 Kansas City 57 81 Cleveland 57 82

.590 .558 .496 .413 .410

4.5 13 24.5 25

Texas Oakland LA Angels Seattle

Western Division 75 63 68 70 66 73 55 84

.543 .493 .475 .396

7 9.5 20.5

Philadelphia Atlanta Florida NY Mets Washington

National League Eastern Division 80 60 79 60 70 68 68 71 60 79

.571 .568 .507 .489 .432

0.5 9 11.5 19.5

Cincinnati St. Louis Houston Milwaukee Chicago Cubs Pittsburgh

Central Division 79 59 72 64 65 73 64 74 60 79 47 91

.572 .529 .471 .464 .432 .341

6 14 15 19.5 32

San Diego San Francisco Colorado LA Dodgers Arizona

Western Division 78 59 78 61 74 64 69 70 56 83

.569 .561 .536 .496 .403

1 4.5 10 23

DENVER: Cincinnati Reds’ Orlando Cabrera slides into third on a Joey Votto single, while Colorado Rockies third baseman Melvin Mora cannot make the play in the fifth inning. The Rockies won 4-3.—AP

Price pitches Rays past Red Sox, Orioles win BOSTON: Evan Longoria hit one of five Tampa Bay home runs as David Price pitched the Rays past the Boston Red Sox 14-5 on Tuesday to gain a one game lead in the American League East race. The Rays snapped a three-game losing streak and cut New York’s division lead to 1 1/2 games.

Price (17-6) gave up two runs before retiring a batter but allowed just two more hits, both by Victor Martinez. Boston’s 2-0 lead held up until Ben Zobrist’s two-run homer in the third off Daisuke Matsuzaka (9-5). The Rays added two homers in the fifth, a two-run shot by Jason Bartlett and a three-run drive by Longoria, then got backto-back homers in the sixth from Dan Johnson and B.J. Upton. Boston had not allowed a homer in its previous six games.

Carl Crawford went 4 for 4 in just five innings, including doubles in his first three at-bats. He has 12 hits in his last 19 at-bats.

Tampa Bay fell one homer short of its club record and set a season high for runs.

Orioles 6, Yankees 2

Twins 10, Royals 3

At New York, Jake Arrieta pitched efficiently into the seventh inning and Adam Jones had a two-run single in a three-run first as Baltimore denied nemesis CC Sabathia his 20th victory by beating New York.

Buoyed by five early runs, Arrieta earned his second win in 10 starts, helping Baltimore clinch its second straight series win against the top two teams in the AL East. The Orioles took two of three games from Tampa Bay last weekend. Winners of four in a row, they can complete their first three-game sweep in the Bronx in 24 years on Wednesday.

Last-place Baltimore is 21-13 under Buck Showalter, who managed the Yankees from 1992-95. Sabathia (19-6), who had won six consecutive starts, came in 4-0 this season and 13-1 overall against the Orioles, but the big lefty was off his form from the start in the Yankees’ third straight loss.

At Minneapolis, Jim Thome hit another towering homer, Delmon Young drove in four runs as Minnesota beat Kansas City to take its largest AL Central lead in 10 days.

Francisco Liriano (13-7) raised his second-half record to 7-0 in 10 starts, giving up seven hits and two runs in seven easy innings. J.J. Hardy had three RBIs for the Twins, who scored six times in the third against Brian Bannister (7-12) and moved 4 1/2 games ahead of Chicago in the division race. The Twins have won five straight, 10 of their last 12 and 33 of 45. Thome has four home runs in his last three games. He hit his 22nd of the season, estimated at 452 feet. It tied him with Hall of Famer Frank Robinson for eighth place on the career list with 586.

Tigers 9, White Sox 1 At Detroit, Justin Verlander allowed five hits over seven innings as Detroit ended

Chicago’s seven-game winning streak.

Three players — White Sox starter Freddy Garcia (back), Tigers first baseman Miguel Cabrera (shoulder) and White Sox designated hitter Manny Ramirez (hand) — left the game with injuries, while Chicago’s Gordon Beckham (hand) was a late scratch from the lineup.

The White Sox were trying to win the first eight games of a road trip for the first time since 1951, but they fell behind in the first inning and never caught up.

Blue Jays 8, Rangers 5 At Toronto, Vernon Wells hit two home runs, and Adam Lind and John Buck also connected as Toronto beat Texas for its seventh consecutive victory over the Rangers.

Vladimir Guerrero had a two-run shot for Texas, which has lost five straight and nine of 12. Still, the Rangers began the day with a seven-game lead in the AL West over Oakland. The Blue Jays lead the majors

with 215 home runs this season. Toronto has gone deep in nine straight games, hitting 20 homers during that span.

The crowd of 10,518 was Toronto’s second-smallest of the season. Shaun Marcum (12-7) allowed three runs in seven innings to match his career high for wins. Kevin Gregg got two outs for his 31st save.

Mariners 7, Athletics 5 At Oakland, California, Doug Fister won for the second time in nearly four months and Adam Moore homered as Seattle broke out of a long scoring slump to beat Oakland.

Fister (5-11) scattered five hits over five innings and pitched out of several jams while leading the Mariners to their first win at the Coliseum since opening day. Seattle had lost six straight in Oakland since then.

Seattle scored five runs in the second off Dallas Braden (9-11).

Kurt Suzuki drove in two runs for the Athletics, who missed a chance to gain

Phillies sink Marlins PHILADELPHIA: Placido Polanco hit a tiebreaking single in the eighth inning as the Philadelphia Phillies beat the Florida Marlins 8-7 on Tuesday to move into first place in the National League East.

The Phillies moved a half-game ahead of Atlanta, which lost 5-0 in Pittsburgh. The two-time defending NL champions hadn’t been in first place since May 30. They are seeking their fourth straight division title. Ryan Howard, Raul Ibanez and Shane Victorino hit solo homers for the Phillies, who were seven games behind the Braves on July 22.

After the Marlins rallied to tie it at 7 in the eighth, the Phillies answered with two outs in the bottom half. Victorino blooped a single to center off Jose Veras (2-2).

He stole second and scored on Polanco’s liner to right. Mike Stanton homered for the third straight game for Florida.

Brewers 4, Cardinals 2 At Milwaukee, Trevor Hoffman added another milestone to his illustrious career, earning his 600th save by closing out Milwaukee’s win.

Four people were ejected by plate umpire Bob Davidson, including a fan, on a night that ended with Hoffman being carried off the field by his teammates. The 42-year-old reliever, baseball’s career saves leader, lost his job as the Brewers’ closer in May after a string of bad outings. But he’s pitched better of late and has been getting ninthinning work as the team tried to get him to No. 600. The right-hander entered in the ninth and gave up a bloop single to Colby Rasmus.

Pinch-hitter Randy Winn grounded into a double play. Hoffman got pinch-hitter Aaron Miles to ground out and raised his arms in triumph as teammates rushed to mob him near the mound.

Rockies 4, Reds 3 At Denver, Carlos Gonzalez hit a

Indians 6, Angels 1 At Anaheim, California, Travis Hafner hit a go-ahead homer that was upheld by video replay and No. 9 batter Lou Marson broke the game open later in the sixth inning with his first career grand slam as Cleveland beat fast-fading Los Angeles.

The Angels lost for the 11th time in 15 games, keeping the three-time defending AL West champions 9 1/2 games behind division-leading Texas with 23 remaining.

Torii Hunter homered for the Angels, who have lost five straight home games for the first time since 2006 - the last time they missed the playoffs.

Justin Masterson (6-12) allowed a run and six hits over seven innings. Trevor Bell (2-5) yielded two runs and four hits over 5 13 innings.—AP

Now Maier aims for Pole position

three-run homer and Jhoulys Chacin pitched six strong innings in Colorado’s fifth consecutive win.

Gonzalez’s homer in the first inning was his 32nd of the season and gave him 100 RBIs. He’s in prime position to challenge for the NL Triple Crown, leading in average (.340), taking over the top spot in RBIs and vaulting into a third-place tie with Joey Votto and Mark Reynolds in homers.

Chacin (8-9) turned in his fourth straight outing in which he has surrendered two earned runs or less.

The rookie right-hander allowed two runs and six hits, struck out five and walked one. Huston Street worked the ninth for his 16th save.

Padres 2, Dodgers 1 At San Diego, Mat Latos bounced back from stomach flu to strike out 10 batters for the third time in four starts as the NL West-leading San Diego beat Los Angeles. Latos held Los Angeles to four hits in seven innings. He set a big league record with his 15th straight start of five or more innings with two or fewer runs allowed. He had been tied with Greg Maddux (1993-94) and Mike Scott (1986) with 14.

Latos (14-5) also lowered his major league-leading ERA from 2.25 to 2.21. His 10 strikeouts matched his career high, and his 113 pitches were a career high. He walked none.

ground on first-place Texas. Oakland scored three times in the ninth, but David Aardsma got one out for his 29th save in 34 tries.

MILWAUKEE: St. Louis Cardinals shortstop Tyler Greene lands on Milwaukee Brewers’ Craig Counsell as he turns a double play on a ball hit by Chris Narveson during the second inning.—AP Chris Young homered for the Diamondbacks in a game that took just 2 hours, 16 minutes - Arizona’s shortest of the year.

Giants 6, D’backs 3

Pirates 5, Braves 0

At Phoenix, Tim Lincecum struck out 11 batters and San Francisco hit three homers in a win over Arizona. The Giants have won four straight and six of seven.

They began the day one game behind the first-place Padres, who started a little later against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Aubrey Huff, Freddy Sanchez and Pat Burrell homered off Barry Enright (6-3).

Jeremy Affeldt induced a gameending double play for a one-pitch save. It was his fourth of the season.

At Pittsburgh, James McDonald pitched seven innings and Ronny Cedeno’s triple keyed a five-run seventh as last-place Pittsburgh beat Atlanta for the second straight day.

The Braves have scored only 12 runs while losing five of six, a slump that followed a five-game winning streak. The Pirates had lost seven of nine and were on pace to lose 109 games before winning the first two games of the three-game series.

Tim Hudson (15-7) held the Pirates to three hits over six shutout

innings, but he retired only one batter during the Pirates’ breakthrough seventh. He was charged with four runs after pitching 28 consecutive innings against Pittsburgh without allowing an earned run.

Mets 4, Nationals 1 At Washington, Dillon Gee took a no-hitter into the sixth inning of his major league debut to lead New York past Washington.

The 24-year-old right-hander did a masterful job over seven innings.

Willie Harris led off the sixth with a home run to right field, the only run the rookie would allow. In a rare matchup of pitchers making big league debuts, Gee (1-0) outpitched Yunesky Maya, a 28-year-old Cuban

defector. Maya (0-1) allowed a threerun first-inning homer to Ike Davis and a run in the second before retiring 11 of the last 12 batters he faced.

Astros 7, Cubs 3 At Chicago, Michael Bourn had three hits and three RBIs, and Brett Wallace hit his first career home run as Houston downed Chicago. Bourn scored twice for the Astros, who won for the 12th time in 16 games.

Astros starter Nelson Figueroa (5-2) pitched five innings to earn the victory. He allowed three runs and six hits. Figueroa was backed by four scoreless innings from the Houston bullpen, which allowed only one hit. Tyler Colvin drove in two runs on two hits for the Cubs.—AP

BASEL: Hermann Maier was never likely to take things easy in retirement so it comes as no surprise that, after a career spent racing downhill at high speed, the former Olympic and world champion is off to the South Pole.

“It’s a pretty exciting and unique adventure; it’s also a great opportunity for me to do something really special and unforgettable,” said Maier.

The Austrian, who won four Alpine ski World Cup overall titles and five gold medals at Olympics and world championships, will begin his journey on Dec. 8, the day after his 38th birthday, with a flight to Cape Town.

From there, Maier will travel to the Russian base of Novo in Antarctica to begin the trek to the Pole as part of a four-man Austrian team.

They will compete against a German team in an event being organised by Austrian national broadcaster ORF and Germany’s ZDF and timed to mark the 100th anniversary of Norwegian Roald Amundsen becoming the first man to reach the South Pole.

“It’s called the Race to the South Pole yet I don’t see it as a competition, it’s more an exploration and a formidable challenge,” said Maier. “It’s something amazing, it may never happen again. How many people nowadays have a chance to reach the South Pole by ski?”

Maier will team up with another top Austrian athlete, triathlon specialist Tom Walek, who is 38 and a radio reporter on ORF. On the German side, triathlete Joey Kelly will be joined by television commentator Markus Lanz. Both teams will be supplemented by two more people chosen from 9,600 candidates who put themselves forward for a series of tests in August and September.

A 25-person crew, including a doctor

and an Antarctic specialist, will follow the two teams with special “snowcars” and record their efforts for a series of television shows to be aired next year.

The British agency Extreme World Races, which is in charge of logistics, expects that, with good weather, the trip should take 16 days. Departure from the base camp is scheduled for Dec. 25 with the teams due to arrive at the South Pole around Jan. 9.

Maier and his partners will travel for some 16 hours a day on special touring skis, pulling a heavy sled laden with food and equipment including a large tent.

They will ski an estimated distance of 400 km in total, at an average altitude of 3,000 metres, often in strong winds.

Maier’s public relations adviser, Walter Delle Karth, is confident about the physical and mental shape of his charge. “Since his retirement, Hermann has been looking for something special like this,” said the former spokesman of the Austrian Ski Team.

“He is definitely in good shape and he will be working out hard for this. He took special care of his resistance strength in the past months. As you know, he has always been very strongminded and focused when it really mattered.”

A former ski instructor and bricklayer before dominating ski racing for nearly a decade, Maier had an horrific motorcycle accident in August 2001, nearly losing a leg. He recovered and returned to racing, racking up a total of 53 wins in World Cup events before retiring a year ago. Maier, too, is confident about his new adventure. “I know my body pretty well and I’m aware of what it needs to be in perfect shape,” he said. “I spent a lot of time this summer on my bike and I swam a lot too. I’m looking forward to our first training camp on snow in Norway.”—Reuters

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

Saints hope to march to second Super Bowl LOS ANGELES: The New Orleans Saints are seeking their second-straight Super Bowl rings as the 2010 National Football League season is set to begin this week with 14 players serving suspensions.

The Pittsburgh Steelers will start without quarterback Ben Roethlisberger who is one of four players suspended for violating the league’s personal conduct policy. The others are Baltimore Ravens cornerback Cary Williams, New England Patriots tackle Quinn Ojinnaka and Tampa Bay Buccaneers cornerback Aqib Talib.

Atlanta has the most suspended players with two, comprising defensive tackle Jonathan Babineaux and linebacker Robert James who got slapped for violating the league’s policy on performance-enhancing drugs.

James is one of three players suspended for performance-enhancing drugs and there are seven banned for substance abuse.

The season beings today with a rematch of the NFC title game between Brett Favre’s Minnesota Vikings and the reigning champion Saints.

The Saints eliminated the Vikings last year and now Minnesota hopes to return the favour by spoiling New Orlean’s banner raising party.

Led by quarterback Drew Brees, New Orleans upset Indianapolis in the championship game last year 31-17. Saints’ cornerback Tracy Porter helped seal the win by intercepting quarterback Peyton Manning and running 74 yards for the late touchdown.

Brees threw for 288 yards and was named most valuable player of the game.

“We haven’t been down this road before as defending champs, but the fact of the matter is we all know this is a new season and everybody has the same hopes and aspirations,” Brees said. “There are 32 teams that believe this can be their year. We know that

we are going to get everybody’s best shot.

We know we have to put our best foot forward every time we step on the field.”

One of the closest battles could be in the AFC East where New England, the New York Jets and the Miami Dolphins square off. The Patriots have all-world quarterback Tom Brady and a coaching legend in Bill Belichick.

The Jets finally got all-star cornerback Darrelle Revis signed to a new contract. Add that with the addition of running back LaDainian Tomlinson, linebacker Jason Taylor and wide receiver Santonio Holmes and the pieces of the puzzle seem to be coming together. Holmes however won’t be available until after he finishes serving a four-game ban.

Miami will be looking to avoid repeating last year’s late season flop down the stretch.

Quarterback Chad Henne’s favorite target will be new receiver Brandon Marshall.

The Baltimore Ravens have also added a dangerous receiving threat in Anquan Boldin. The Ravens need to stay healthy and if they do they should be a Super Bowl contender.

Quarterback Joe Flacco, who made great strides last year, and running back Ray Rice, who had a breakthrough season, help define their offence.

Don’t call them the Cincinnati Bungles anymore because now they are the defending AFC North Division champs. In fact, the Bengals swept all six games within the division last year.

The addition of Terrell Owens should help and hopefully won’t be a distraction in the dressing room. Their solid defence and strong running game might get through the first round of the post-season this time.

Pittsburgh opened last season with fivestraight wins but this year they are going to have to get by early without suspended

quarterback Roethlisberger. In the AFC South, four-time MVP Peyton Manning will anchor the Indianapolis Colts’ offence.

The Super Bowl runner-ups were the premier team in the regular season and once again Manning will have a strong supporting cast which includes receivers Reggie Wayne, Austin Collie and Pierre Garcon.

In the NFC East, Manning’s brother Eli also has a lot of targets to choose from. The Giants started last season with five consecutive wins but everybody remembers the late season collapse and the disappointing two final losses to Minnesota and Carolina.

The Dallas Cowboys are hoping to become the first team in a Super Bowl in their home stadium. But is quarterback Tony Romo the person to get them there?

The Philadelphia Eagles are hoping Kevin Kolb can succeed at quarterback after trading away Donovan McNabb-to division rival Washington no less. There is another

quarterback tussle going on in the NFC North. Green Bay’s Aaron Rodgers has proven he can be an elite quarterback.

And surprise, surprise, aging veteran Brett Favre is back with the Minnesota Vikings. Quarterback Favre has some huge offensive weapons to work with and the division title should come down to head-to-head affairs with the Packers.

Chicago is no longer the Monsters of the Midway because the Bears are rebuilding.

They took a huge step forward by signing high-profile free agent Julius Peppers to a six-year, 91 million dollar deal.

Two of the most improved teams should be the Redskins in the NFC and the Kansas City Chiefs in the AFC. The Redskins have new quarterback McNabb and new coach Mike Shanahan while the Chiefs are building through draft picks like safety Eric Berry and running back Dexter McCluster. — AFP

An important Ryder Cup for Tiger

NEW YORK: The United States Ryder Cup golf team is shown in these 2010 file photos. They are (top row from left) Stewart Cink, Rickie Fowler, Jim Furyk, Dustin Johnson, Zach Johnson and Matt Kuchar.

(Bottom from left) Hunter Mahan, Phil Mickelson, Jeff Overton, Steve Stricker, Bubba Watson and Tiger Woods. — AP

A winner receives his trophy.

Captain Mohammad Abbas receives his memorial plaque.

KBC Ramadan tourneys conclude KUWAIT: The Kuwait Banks Club recently concluded its Ramadan Tournaments festival which included competitions in various games such as billiards, foosball, video games and table tennis.

At the final day of the events, a cere-

mony was held at the KBC headquarters featuring attendance of board members Mohammad Al-Sayegh and Khalil AlBlushi, as well as assistant manager Abbas Al-Blushi, who supervised the ceremony in which the top five finalists in each tour-

nament were awarded.

Furthermore, the event featured a special ceremony to honor caption Mohammad Abbas for leading the KBC team to victory at the Kendery futsal tournament.

Al-Sayegh and Al-Blushi pose with the winners.

NEW YORK: Tiger Woods experienced a Ryder Cup tradition for the first time Tuesday. Corey Pavin sat at the head table on the seventh floor of the New York Stock Exchange and announced his four captain’s picks to reporters and PGA of America dignitaries.

The players, so thrilled to be chosen you could almost see them beaming as they listened via a conference call, were introduced one by one and asked to say “hello” to their captain. This was new for Woods. He has led the Ryder Cup standings every time since turning pro.

“Tiger Woods, are you with us today?” PGA spokesman Julius Mason said from the podium.

“Say ‘good morning’ to your captain and everybody else in attendance today.” An awkward silence followed.

Mason turned slightly nervous when he called out his name again, and for the briefest moment, some in the room wondered if Woods didn’t bother calling in or had hung up. Mason looked relieved to finally hear Woods’ voice.

The only time Woods is ever on a conference call is to accept PGA Tour player of the year or to speak to local media at a tournament where he is the defending champion.

On Tuesday, he was no different than Zach Johnson, Stewart Cink and Rickie Fowler — even though he is very different.

Woods has won twice as many majors as the rest of the US team combined, and nearly as many PGA Tour titles. He has been No. 1 in the world longer than seven of his teammates have been on tour.

But he still needed to be a captain’s pick to play. And there’s a reason for that. True, Woods got a late start on the year when he tried to salvage a marriage that was shattered by his infidelity. He didn’t play until the Masters and has competed only 11 times this year. That still should have been enough for him to qualify for the team, except that Woods had trouble finishing in the top 10.

He no longer looks invincible on the golf course. The American team no longer can be perceived as Tiger Woods and 11 other guys wearing the same uniform.

At the moment, he’s not playing any better than them. It could be the best thing that ever happened to him.

Woods is not the loner on tour that some make him out to be. At one tournament this year, he bet one of his playing partners who would shoot the lowest score over 36 holes, and the loser had to buy tickets to the movies that afternoon.

And while he privately rolls his eyes at black-tie dinners and opening ceremonies at the Ryder Cup that can feel more like a presidential inauguration, the best times of the year are spent in the team room with his fellow Americans.

“What nobody understands — it doesn’t matter if it’s you or my son or a fan on TV or Tiger’s mom — you don’t get it unless you’re in the team room,” said Davis Love III, an assistant captain this year.

“Tiger is great in the team room. He’s a smart guy. He’s a talented player. He wants to do everything he can to win. He’s learned how to be a quiet leader and a vocal leader. He’s learned to say the right things. It’s just hard to describe.” Woods makes it sound as if this Ryder Cup is no different from the others.

“I’m part of the team, and honored to be part of the team,” Woods said. —AP

Top KSSC officials pose with the winners.

Sultan crowned KSSC bowling tourney champ KUWAIT: Kuwaiti competitors dominated the 19th annual bowling tournament organized by the Kuwait Sea Sports Club, and that after winning the first three places.

The tournament, held each year during the holy month of Ramadan under the patronage

by KSSC chairman Maj. Gen.

Fahad Al-Fahad, featured participation of 73 competitors that include Kuwaitis and expatriate residents.

National champion Ahmad Sultan was crowned as the tournament’s champion after defeating Fahad Abul in the final match, while Abdullah AlFeeli came in the third place

ahead of Imad Bushara from Lebanon.

The tournament’s conclusion day was attended by CEO of the KSSC Ahmad Al-Ghanim, as well as head of the public relations and media committee Mahmoud Abu Al-Qassim and head of the bowling center at the club Talib Abbas.

Sultan receives the championship trophy from Al-Ghanim.

Thongchai upbeat ahead of Handa Singapore Classic SINGAPORE: Reigning Asian Tour number one Thongchai Jaidee of Thailand hopes to overcome fatigue and launch a title assault at the 400,000dollar Handa Singapore Classic starting today.

Thongchai arrived from Switzerland on Tuesday and is planning to make the most of his return to the Orchid Country Club, a venue he last played in 1999.

The three-time Order of Merit champion is one of the main draw cards this week and he will begin his campaign against a plethora of Asian Tour stars.

His rivals include Australian Marcus Fraser, currently ranked second on the Order of Merit, India’s Gaganjeet Bhullar, Angelo Que of the Philippines and local hope Lam Chih Bing.

Thongchai is hoping for a memorable return to Asia,

where he last played in April but admitted that exhaustion might hamper his chances of glory this week.

“I played a lot of tournaments this year and feel a bit tired. I have been travelling to Europe and the United States and to Asia so hopefully I get can some rest and I’ll be okay,” said the 40-year-old former paratrooper, a 12-time Asian Tour champion.

Since ending his sevenyear title drought at the Ballantine’s Championship in Korea in April, Fraser has yet to produce his winning form but he is determined to hit a purple patch at the Handa Singapore Classic.

“Apart from winning in Korea, my form has been okay, nothing too flashy as I haven’t been able to get myself in contention. It is quite frustrating but there’s still plenty of golf to play and

hopefully I’ll get into contention again,” said the 32year-old.

India’s rising star Bhullar hopes to draw inspiration from compatriot Arjun Atwal’s victory at the Wyndham Championship on the US PGA Tour last month.

“Whenever any Indian win a tournament or do well, it gives me the confidence for me to shoot for glory and I hope to do so this week,” said Bhullar, who won the Asian Tour International in Thailand in February. The 22-year-old is hoping to continue his rich vein of form after missing only two cuts this season.

“My form has been good and Singapore is one of my favourite venues in Asia. The golf course is looking nice and the fairways are pretty tight.

Overall, it looks like a straight forward course,” said Bhullar.

— AFP

Thursday, September 9, 2010

LAHORE: (Left) A Pakistani bookmaker works in a tiny room in Lahore struggling to keep up with calls from Pakistanis placing ille-

17

SPORTS

gal bets on a cricket match in England. The phones are rigged to tape-recorders to ensure that gamblers do not renege on their

wagers later on. (Right) Pakistani bookmakers attend from Pakistanis placing illegal bets on a cricket match.—AP

Pakistani bookies rake in cash on England match LAHORE: In a tiny room overlooking a slum, four men work a dozen or so phones, struggling to keep up with calls from Pakistanis placing illegal bets on a cricket match in England.

Some phones are rigged to taperecorders to ensure that gamblers do not renege on their wagers later on. The men are small-time gangsters, but sit on the lower rungs of something much larger: an underworld betting industry that spans the cricket world and has been implicated in a match-fixing scandal engulfing Pakistan’s national team.

While there is little by way of evidence, these Lahore bookmakers and others close to the trade say notorious Indian crime lord Dawood Ibrahim sits atop the global syndicate. The United States accuses Ibrahim of supporting al-Qaida and funding attacks in India.

The bookmakers said fixing in the sport, especially in the Pakistani team, had been common for years. Such is the variety of bets available on every aspect of the game — not just the outcome — a player can perform to order and not necessarily affect the result.

Knowing what will happen in any match can be extremely valuable information to gamblers and bookies.

“Almost each match is fixed in some department,” said one of the bookies, who

asked to be identified only as “PK.” He added, however, that neither he nor his customers was aware of this information, suggesting scams on that scale went far higher up the syndicate. “It goes right to the top,” he said.

Business was brisk on Tuesday night, when Pakistan’s disastrous tour of England hit a new low as Shahid Afridi’s depleted lineup was bowled out for 89 — its worst total ever in a Twenty20 international — and ultimately lost by six wickets.

Test captain Salman Butt and bowlers Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir were suspended by the International Cricket Council last week for allegedly being involved in “spot fixing” after a British tabloid newspaper sting uncovered evidence that some players were being secretly paid to deliver no-balls at set times.

An Associated Press reporting crew was given a rare invitation by the bookmakers to see them at work for Tuesday’s match.

PK and his fellow bookie, “Amer,” insisted that their real names not be used or their faces photographed or filmed because their work is illegal. And this is despite warnings of a crackdown on illegal gambling by Pakistani authorities and the International Cricket Council.

The News of the World newspaper reports of spot fixing are being investigated

by British police and the ICC’s anti-corruption unit, which was established in 2000 when the sport’s reputation was in tatters after revelations the former captains of South Africa, India and Pakistan had been involved in match-fixing.

The latest scandal has led to national shame in Pakistan, where the fortunes of the team had provided something positive amid terrorist attacks and this summer’s devastating floods.

Betting is illegal in this conservative Islamic country and in neighboring India. But as in prohibition-era America, a vast industry has risen to cater for the millions who like to gamble. The amounts of money involved dwarf the sums wagered on cricket in countries such as England and Australia, where betting is legal.

PK and Amer claim that millions of dollars are spent each year in payoffs to corrupt police and government officials so that the illegal gambling can continue. The pair said they had been raided once in 18 years — a bribe got them out of jail — and that they were unconcerned about talk of a crackdown.

The immense size of the industry in South Asia can be gauged by the pair’s takings.

They said they each took between $20,000 and $30,000 dollars on a typical Twenty20 match from gamblers living in Lahore, a city of 8 million people. The pair

estimated there were around 1,000 other bookmakers of a similar size in the city.

William Hill, one of the largest gambling houses in Britain, said it took around $120,000 on the first Twenty20 match between England and Pakistan on Sunday. It said that was more than normal, likely because the scandal had attracted publicity.

In Lahore, PK dresses in the baggy-shirt and pajama trousers that are worn by most men in Pakistan. Only his red eyes, the result of a hashish habit and hours sitting on the floor late into the night taking bets, and the ring-tone on his phone give some hint to his background. “It’s business, but it’s a bad business,” the recording of a Bollywood singer croons each time someone calls in a bet.

The pair work from the second-floor of a house that is at the end of alley in a poor part of town, known for prostitution and crime.

Neighboring buildings are home to shoe and garment factories operating out of single rooms and cramped boarding houses.

There is no furniture, except for two cushions, and the phones are strewn across a carpet emblazoned with red roses.

A new flat-screen TV and sound system is fixed to the wall. A man with a long beard, nicknamed “Osama bin Laden” by PK and his crew, operates the computer for $25 per night - a large sum in a country where many

people earn less than $100 a month.

He sits cross-legged in front of a website offering ball-by-ball odds on the game.

Another two people are employed to help take down bets.

The phones started ringing an hour before the match started. They only stopped when it became clear England was destined to win and the bookies closed shop.

Winnings and losses are squared a day or two after each match. It’s all cash transactions. Gamblers either send somebody to pick up winnings, or the bookies send an intermediary to collect.

“It all depends on trust. We know the people and recognize their voice,” said Amer. “But if they don’t pay then we well we find them and they get clubbed,” he says as he stabs his finger into a large calculator and jots down a wager in a well-thumbed ledger.

PK and Amer each make around $800 a night. The rest of the profits go to the syndicate. Their books are open for every international cricket match as well as the domestic leagues in India and England.

The odds are continuously squawked into the room via speakerphone from a man in Karachi, changing with every twist and turn of the game. PK said the odds were set by the syndicate in London, then relayed by telephone to Dubai, then Mumbai — all three cities are alleged to be major cities in

the gambling underworld — before Karachi and then the rest of Pakistan.

Allegations that Dawood Ibrahim controls the betting trade have swirled around for years, though as with everything regarding the man, it is hard to be sure where facts end and rumor begins. Indian officials allege he is living in Pakistan under the protection of that country’s security agencies.

PK and another bookmaker who asked not to be named said Ibrahim was involved, but declined to answer when asked how they knew. In 2003, the US Treasury Department froze Ibrahim’s assets, saying they were “targeting ties between the criminal underworld and al-Qaida.”

When the match is over, the bookies quickly tally their takings and tidy away the phones. “Osama,” the Internet operator, finds Shakira’s “Waka Waka” on YouTube and plays it through the loudspeakers. PK takes a small lump of hash from a fold in his trousers and tosses it to someone to roll a cigarette.

With India’s domestic competition due to start soon, the gang is in for some late nights. “We are going to be too busy,” said Amer with a smile. A former gambler himself, PK talks about how he got into the business. “I lost so much money doing it myself I decided I had to get my money back somehow,” he said.—AP

England cruise to win after Pakistan collapse

CARDIFF: Pakistan supporters watch from the stands during the second Natwest International Twenty20 cricket match between England and Pakistan.—AFP

Champions League T20 to be played under strict controls JOHANNESBURG: With cricket reeling from match-fixing allegations, the Champions League Twenty20 tournament will be played under strict anti-corruption controls amid hopes the gloom surrounding a sport that has slumped to one of its lowest points will be lifted.

The International Cricket Council’s AntiCorruption and Security Unit, a local security firm and ground officials will all be on alert, organizers say, when 10 teams compete in South Africa for the title in the two-week tournament from Friday.

The Indian Premier League is represented by the Chennai Super Kings, Mumbai Indians and Royal Challengers Bangalore — all bigspending outfits with an array of international stars.

Australia has the South Australian Redbacks and Victorian Bushrangers, and the host nation will field the Warriors and Highveld Lions.

New Zealand domestic champions Central Stags, Sri Lanka’s Wayamba Elevens and

Guyana of the West Indies complete the lineup. Only Bangalore, Victoria and Wayamba played in the inaugural event in India last year.

Unrelated to the fixing controversy, Pakistan and England are not represented.

Vuvuzelas will not make an appearance either, after the Champions League was the latest sporting event to ban the polarizing plastic horns made famous at South Africa’s football World Cup. Star-studded Chennai, the 2010 IPL champion, is led by India captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni and contains batsmen Matthew Hayden and Michael Hussey of Australia and India’s Murali Vijay and Suresh Raina. Big-hitting Albie Morkel and Justin Kemp will add local knowledge, and the bowling will feature test cricket’s leading wicket-taker, Muttiah Muralitharan.

The team is heavily favored to qualify for the semifinals from Group A ahead of the Warriors, Victoria, Wayamba and Central Stags.

“Chennai Super Kings have an amazing

squad. Now, it is our responsibility to deliver,” Vijay said. Delivering titles has not been straightforward for top teams in cricket’s shortest, most unpredictable form.

Favorites in the 2009 Champions League, Bangalore failed to make the last four. It still has a strong lineup with India’s Rahul Dravid, South Africa’s allrounder Jacques Kallis and fast bowler Dale Steyn, Ross Taylor of New Zealand and Australia’s destructive hitter, Cameron White. Three of those players could have played for their regular home teams: Kallis normally plays for the Warriors, Taylor for the Central Stags and White for Victoria.

“The biggest challenge is how quickly you acclimatize to the conditions,” Bangalore captain Anil Kumble said, “and the need to start well in the tournament.” Sachin Tendulkar’s 2010 IPL runner-up Mumbai has experienced India bowlers Zaheer Khan and Harbhajan Singh, Sri Lanka fast man Lasith Malinga and JP Duminy — the leading run-scorer last year when he played for South Africa’s Cape Cobras. —AP

CARDIFF: England wrapped up a 2-0 Twenty20 series victory over Pakistan after the tourists suffered the embarrassment of being dismissed for 89 to add to their off-field problems here on Tuesday.

World Twenty20 champions England finished on 90 for four to complete a six-wicket win with 36 balls to spare, having won by five wickets here Sunday.

Pakistan’s total was their worst in 40 matches at this level while England’s seventh straight Twenty20 international win saw them equal a record held jointly

by South Africa and Pakistan.

“It was irresponsible the way we played,” said Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi. “England are the world champions. We have to take more responsibility and show more pride.”

By contrast, elated England skipper Paul Collingwood said: “It’s a special achievement and we obviously did it during the best time which was during the World Cup. “We are just doing a lot of things really good - and we still have a lot of intent with the bat as well. Hopefully that continues into the future.”

Yorkshire seamer Tim Bresnan, the man-of-the-match, took three wickets for 10 runs in 3.4 overs as Pakistan fell well short of their previous worst Twenty20 international score of 125 for nine in 20 overs against Australia at Melbourne in February.

England had held Pakistan to 126 for four on Sunday. But they did even better in this match as Pakistan were bowled out with eight balls of their innings left.

Stuart Broad, left-arm quick Ryan Sidebottom and off-spinner Graeme Swann took two wickets each, while left-arm spinner Michael Yardy’s four overs cost just 10 runs. Umar Akmal’s 17 was the top score for 2009 World Twenty20 winners Pakistan.

The tourists, after Afridi won the toss, collapsed to 22 for four off five overs-after taking 11 off the first from Sidebottom. —AFP

CARDIFF: England’s Tim Bresnan claims the wicket of Pakistan’s Shoaib Akhtar during the Second Twenty20 cricket International in Cardiff.—AP

SCOREBOARD CARDIFF: Final scoreboard in the second Twenty20 international between England and Pakistan at Sophia Gardens here on yesterday: Pakistan Kamran Akmal c Swann b Bresnan 11 Shahzaib Hasan c Davies b Broad 3 Mohammad Yousuf c Bopara b Bresnan 4 Umar Akmal b Swann 17 Shahid Afridi c Morgan b Broad 2 Mohammad Hafeez run out 14 Abdul Razzaq c Yardy b Sidebottom 11 Fawad Alam c Davies b Swann 0 Umar Gul c Bopara b Sidebottom 16 Shoaib Akhtar b Bresnan 4 Saeed Ajmal not out 0 Extras (lb2, w5) 7 Total (all out, 18.4 overs) 89 Fall of wickets: 1-11 (K Akmal), 2-18 (Yousuf), 3-20 (Shahzaib), 4-22 (Afridi), 5-44 (U Akmal), 6-55 (Hafeez), 7-56 (Alam), 8-85 (Razzaq), 9-85 (Gul), 10-89 (Akhtar).

Bowling: Sidebottom 3-0-22-2 (1w); Bresnan 3.4-0-10-

3; Broad 4-0-18-2; Yardy 4-0-10-0; Swann 4-0-27-2 (4w).

England C. Kieswetter run out (U Akmal) 16 S. Davies c U Akmal b Akhtar 9 R. Bopara lbw b Afridi 12 P. Collingwood c Hafeez b Ajmal 21 E. Morgan not out 18 M. Yardy not out 6 Extras (b4, lb2, w1, nb1) 8 Total (4 wkts, 14 overs) 90 Did not bat: L Wright, T Bresnan, G Swann, S Broad, R Sidebottom Fall of wickets: 1-26 (Davies), 2-26 (Kieswetter), 3-57 (Collingwood), 4-63 (Bopara).

Bowling: Akhtar 4-1-18-1; Gul 2-0-23-0 (1nb, 1w); Ajmal 4-0-18-1; Afridi 3-0-15-1; Hafeez 1-0-10-0.

Result: England won by six wickets

SPORTS

18

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Italian Grand Prix to end European season MADRID: The Italian Grand Prix this weekend will mark the close of Formula One’s European season, and it is also looking likely to be important in deciding the drivers’ championship title.

Although five drivers are still in the hunt with six races left, Lewis Hamilton of McLaren and Mark Webber of Red Bull have opened up some room on top of the standings after filling the top two places at the Belgian GP. Hamilton has 182 points to lead Webber by three, while Sebastian Vettel fell behind after another lapse of judgment by the Red Bull driver in Belgium.

Vettel crashed into defending F1 champion Jenson Button at Spa, knocking the McLaren driver out of the race and leaving Vettel out of the points.

Vettel has 151 points, Button 147 and Fernando Alonso has 141, although the Ferrari driver could be facing a points penalty at a disciplinary hearing later Wednesday. Ferrari is accused of breaking F1 rules by ordering Felipe Massa to let Alonso overtake him for the win at the German Grand Prix in July, where the team finished 1-2.

Things are looking better for McL aren, however, as Hamilton and

Button were running 1-2 until Vettel’s erratic overtaking maneuver. That momentum is expected to carry over to the track outside of Milan, which is the circuit’s fastest and is well-suited to the British team.

“Our pace over the whole weekend in Belgium was extremely encouraging,” Button said, “so I’m optimistic that we’ll be able to maintain that form in Italy.”

Red Bull has consistently been the fastest team in qualifying, taking pole position in 12 of 13 races, but has only managed to convert that into six victories, with Webber taking four of them.

The Italian race could provide an extra challenge as Red Bull’s straight-line speed isn’t its strongest point.

“I think we can still do well at Monza,” Webber said. “We might have a bit more in the way of opposition. In addition to Ferrari, McL aren and Renault, Force India could also be in the mix for the top places.” Robert Kubica of Renault was third in Spa, when the French team ran its F-duct system for the first time. Renault is unsure whether it will go with the aerodynamic upgrade in Italy.

“This circuit can sometimes throw up

some surprises,” Kubica said. “If the car feels as good as it did in Spa, then there’s no reason why we won’t be competitive in Monza.”

Vettel returns to the site of his first F1 win looking to ease criticism following his crash into Button, which came after a similar run-in between him and Webber prevented a Red Bull 1-2 at Turkish GP. “Here was one of those races where it just did not go his way,” Red Bull team principal Christian Horner said. “He needs to stay calm and focused and eventually it will come his way.” While

Ferrari has problems off the track, Alonso said the team was encouraged by straight-line testing after the Spa race, where he crashed out close to the end while Massa was fourth.

“I am therefore confident about our chances of getting back to fighting for a place on the podium,” said Alonso, who won in Monza with McLaren three years ago. Seven-time F1 champion Michael Schumacher also returns to race in front of the Tifosi for the first time since coming out of retirement to join Mercedes.

The German driver won five of his championships with Ferrari. —AP

India stretch Formula One calendar to record 20 races

YEONGAM: In a picture taken on September 4, 2010 Hispania Racing’s driver Karun Chandhok of India gestures from the cockpit of a Red Bull car during a demonstration run on the Korean International Circuit under construction for the upcoming Korean Formula One Grand Prix. —AFP

Ferrari escape further punishment from FIA PARIS: Formula One giants Ferrari were spared further punishment for giving drivers Fernando Alonso and Felipe Massa team orders during the German Grand Prix, according to an Italian Automobile official yesterday.

Ferrari told Massa to let Alonso pass him during the Grand Prix in July for which they initially received a 100,000 dollar fine.

And having attended a FIA hearing in Paris, Angelo Sticchi Damiani, the president of the Italian Automobile Commission, told Italian reporters that the fine had been confirmed but no new penalties imposed.

And according to Enrico Gelpi, president of the Italian Automobile Club, the FIA has agreed to review the controversial ruling against team orders. “We have a rule that

presents difficulties in its interpretation, it will be reviewed,” said Gelpi. “We would be in favor of it being completely removed.”

Gelpi added that this rule would be reviewed at the next general meeting in November but he said that the general consensus was in favour of removing the rule.

The team orders rule was introduced after the infamous 2002 Austrian Grand Prix when Ferrari - then run by present FIA supremo Jean Todt who stepped aside for the hearing - instructed race leader Rubens Barrichello to pull over to allow Michael Schumacher through and claim victory.

Massa, despite leading from the start, was informed

by Ferrari race engineer Rob Smedley over the team’s radio: “Ok, Fernando is faster

than you. Can you confirm you have understood this message?”

Following the controversial move, Smedley was again on the radio apologising to Massa. “Good lad - just stick with it now, sorry,” said the Ferrari official.

Ferrari team boss Stefano Domenicali has insisted that there were no team orders at Hockenheim and that it was Massa’s decision to let Alonso past. “We gave information to the driver and it was his decision to decide how to react” he said.

Domenicali added that Smedley’s apology was simply due to the fact that Massa’s car was not as fast as Alonso’s.

“You have to consider that fact that he gave the information to Felipe to help him, and was sorry that his car was not

as fast.” The German race stewards dished out a 100,000 euro fine to the Italian stable after the race at Hockenheim for breaching sporting regulations.

World Motor Sports Council’s disciplinary panel could have gone as far as excluding the team from the 2010 championship.

Although Ferrari insist they did nothing wrong their actions in Germany resulted in a huge backlash from the media and fans worldwide.

With six races of the season remaining Alonso is lying fifth in the drivers standings, 41 points behind McL aren pacesetter Lewis Hamilton.

In the race for the constructors’ crown Ferrari are third, 80 points behind leaders Red Bull ahead of Sunday’s Italian Grand Prix at Monza. —AFP

PARIS: Formula One will stretch to a record 20 races next year with India making its grand prix debut in late October although no new teams will be coming in, the sport’s governing body said yesterday.

The Indian round, at a circuit being built near New Delhi, is due to be the 18th of the championship on Oct. 30 subject to the facility passing a final inspection by the International Automobile Federation (FIA).

The governing body said in a statement after a meeting of its world motor sport council that the 2011 season will start in Bahrain on March 13 and end in Brazil on Nov. 27 with Abu Dhabi becoming the penultimate race on Nov. 13.

The current season is a record-equalling 19 races, with South Korea the 2010 newcomers.

However, the slim hopes of the starting grid being expanded to a full capacity of 13 teams, assuming all of the existing ones remain, were snuffed out.

The FIA said a number of parties had expressed an interest but “it was considered that none of the candidates met the requirements to be granted an entry into the championship.

“Consequently, the allocation of the 13th team will not be granted.” Many of the expected main contenders had already withdrawn for financial reasons but Spanish-based Epsilon Euzkadi and a joint effort involving Italy’s Durango and Canada’s former world champion Jacques Villeneuve had remained in the running.

A 20 race calendar has long been a desire of the sport’s commercial supremo Bernie Ecclestone but has met resistance from teams in the past due to the extra burden imposed on mechanics and travelling employees.

Cost cutting measures have further reduced the number of staff attending races, while some test teams have been disbanded due to the ban on testing during the season.

The world motor sport council also announced steps to enable the governing body to punish Formula One drivers and other competitors in FIA series who commit motoring offences on public roads.

McL aren’s 2008 world champion Lewis Hamilton was fined A$500 ($458.7) after being stopped by police for reckless driving in a Melbourne street at this year’s Australian Grand Prix.

“Competitors at FIA events must act as ambassadors for the sport, be aware their conduct on the road must be exemplary and respect road safety rules,” declared the FIA statement. It said the international sporting code would be amended to enable the governing body to withdraw a driver’s international super licence in the most serious cases. —Reuters

ROSARIO: Germany’s Natascha Keller (left) gets ready to hit the ball followed by Australia’s Fiona Johnson during the Women World Cup 2010 field hockey Group A match. — AFP

Germany see off Australia ROSARIO: Germany beat Australia 1-0 in Pool A on Tuesday to reach the semi-finals of the women’s hockey World Cup where they will meet hosts Argentina.

Favourites Netherlands, the reigning world and Olympic champions, face England in the other semi-final after making sure of first place in the pool with a 5-2 victory over Japan that gave them a 25-8 goals record in five matches.

The semi-finals are scheduled for today.

Germany defender Tina Bachman scored the only goal from a 43rd-minute penalty corner in

a tight final Pool A match. The Australians qualified for the fifth-place decider against South Korea.

Maartje Paumen took her goals tally to 10 when she flicked in two penalty corners as the Dutch ran up a 5-0 lead before relaxing and allowing Japan’s Kaori Chiba to score twice in two minutes in reply.

New Zealand scored three goals in 10 minutes, two by captain Kayla Sharland, midway through the second half to beat India 3-0 and avoid finishing bottom of the pool. —Reuters

Higgins cleared over bribery claims but gets suspension LONDON: Former world champion John Higgins was cleared of bribery allegations yesterday but banned for six months and fined 75,000 pounds (115,000 dollars) for bringing the game into disrepute.

Higgins admitted “intentionally giving the impression to others that they were agreeing to act in breach of the betting rules” and failing to report an approach made to him by undercover reporters asking him to throw matches.

The more serious charges of “agreeing or offering” to accept bribes and “agreeing to engage in corrupt or fraudulent conduct” were withdrawn by governing body World Snooker following the two-day hearing in London.

The hearing follows allegations by the News of the World newspaper that Higgins tried to bet against himself at last year’s world championships.

The newspaper filmed Higgins and his manager Pat Mooney allegedly accepting 261,000 pounds to fix match-

LONDON: Threetime former World Snooker Champion John Higgins arrives to face a tribunal hearing in London yesterday. —AP es by throwing frames.

Higgins, 35, said he accepted the decision by Sport Resolutions, an independent dispute tribunal. “I welcome today’s judgment by Sport Resolutions and endorsed by the WPBSA (World

Professional Billiards and Snooker Association) following their exhaustive enquiry into the allegations against me by a tabloid newspaper,” the Scot said in a statement.

“I was not guilty of any dishonesty and had no intention to fix a match and no intention to do anything corrupt”.

Higgins repeated his statement from May, when he refuted the allegations made by the Sunday newspaper: “I have never been involved in any form of snooker match fixing,” Higgins stated.

“In my 18 years playing professional snooker, I have never deliberately missed a shot, never mind intentionally lost a frame or a match.

“If I am guilty of anything, it is of naivety and trusting those who, I believed, were working in the best interests of snooker and myself.”

Higgins’s suspension ends in November and the Scot said he would “be back... and be back winning.” Higgins has won 21 ranking titles during his career. —AFP

Rice apologizes for Twitter slur

FRANCE: FIA president Jean Todt (left) arrives at Formula One’s headquarters, to answer charges of breaking the rules governing team orders at the German Grand Prix in July. —AFP

SYDNEY: Triple Olympic swimming gold medalist Stephanie Rice made a tearful apology yesterday for a homophobic slur she posted Saturday on Twitter.

Rice twice broke down in tears at a news conference she called in Sydney where she asked for forgiveness for her “thoughtless and careless” comment.

The 22-year-old Rice tweeted the derogatory remark after Australia’s last-minute win over South Africa in a rugby union test match at Bloemfontein.

Rice, who reportedly is dating

Australia flyhalf Quade Cooper, later deleted the tweet and apologized, saying she didn’t mean to cause offense.

She said she called yesterday’s news conference because she felt a public apology was also necessary.

“I owe it to those who I have offended to publicly say, I am sorry. It is not me to give offense to other people no matter who they are,” Rice said. “I am not a person who judges others or speaks in a way that hurts others.

“My comments were thoughtless and careless but I can assure you when I made those comments on Twitter I

never intended to offend anybody.”

Saturday’s tweet cost Rice an endorsement contract with luxury carmaker Jaguar.

“I’ve learned a lot in the last couple of days,” she said Wednesday. “I’ve learned I must think before I speak and this has been a very important lesson.

“I’ve also learned that some things you say can mean more to others than they do to you.” Rice said she hoped her apology would help her regain the public’s trust. “I felt I’ve let a lot of people down,” she said. “I just want people to know how sorry I am. —AP

SPORTS

Thursday, September 9, 2010

19

By accident or design, Capello hits on winning formula LONDON: England’s second accomplished victory within a week may not have erased the bitter memory of a woeful World Cup campaign but the dark clouds hanging over coach Fabio Capello’s head are showing signs of dissipating.

Injuries and retirements may have forced the Italian’s hand but England’s performances in the 4-0 home win against Bulgaria and Tuesday’s 3-1 win against Switzerland in Basel have been a breath of fresh air and even Capello appears to be having fun.

Whether by design or by accident, England suddenly look like a team

capable of shaking off years of underachievement.

When substitute Darren Bent rammed in England’s third goal to put Capello’s side top of Euro 2012 qualifying Group G, his grizzled face broke into a broad smile and he cheekily poked out his tongue at goalkeeping coach Ray Clemence.

It was a moment of spontaneity that matched much of the play of his team, which while still set up in traditional 4-4-2 formation, suddenly looks to have shed the straight-jacket that suffocated their soccer in South Africa.

Emile Heskey’s retirement from international football and the injury to Peter Crouch meant Capello had no option but to abandon his preference for a target man and play Jermain Defoe in unison with a deeper-lying Wayne Rooney. Immediately the dynamic was changed.

Long aerial passes, of which Steven Gerrard often used to overplay, became pointless and the emphasis was on quick incisive passing into the feet of mobile strikers.

It worked a treat and the only surprise was that England failed to add to the early opener scored by Rooney-

his first competitive goal for his country for nearly a year.

Rooney’s vision is wasted when he leads the line chasing down the channels and his movement and passing against Bulgaria was a reminiscent of his Manchester United team mate Paul Scholes at his best.

Skipper Gerrard clearly reveled in his role too, which was more akin to the position he plays to such effect with Liverpool and the dilemma Capello now faces is what happens when Frank Lampard, ruled out through injury, is fit again?

“The first half was perfect-every-

thing the manager asked of us,” Gerrard, who played in the lively Adam Johnson for England’s second goal, said after the game.

“We got the game plan spot on.

People were talking about how good Switzerland are, defensively, but we just tore them apart.”

Manchester City’s Johnson, who replaced the injured Theo Walcott early on, has scored in both Euro 2012 qualifiers and oozes composure, having stepped up from the under 21s with fellow City player James Milner, another player to impress.

England’s defence coped easily

without John Terry and Rio Ferdinand, although the likes of Michael Dawson, who was injured against Bulgaria, Everton’s Phil Jagielka and Manchester City’s Joleon Lescott will face much sterner tests.

With England already in a commanding position in the group, Capello will now turn his thoughts to the visit of Montenegro next monththe Balkan side having emerged as the unlikely challengers for top spot after also winning their opening games.

England should now qualify with something to spare from a group that

suddenly looks very enticing but, after all, that is the bare minimum requirement for a coach costing the Football Association a staggering amount of money each year.

It is when the pressure is really on and the fear of losing becomes intense that players and managers often revert to type.

So until England qualify for Euro 2012 and prove that they can also play vibrant football against teams like Spain, Germany and the Netherlands, when it really matters, Capello will still be shadowed by the bitter memories of South Africa. —Reuters

France end winless run as big guns hit target

GERMANY: Dutch national soccer player Klaas-Jan Huntelaar (right) holds his new shirt with Schalke 04 head coach Felix Magath. Netherland’s 27-year-old forward changed from Milan for a three-year contract to the German Bundesliga club and Champions League participant. —AP

Ballack facing tough battle to return to Germany side BERLIN: Germany were at their dazzling best when they crushed Azerbaijan 6-1 to continue their perfect start to Euro 2012 qualifying on Tuesday, sending out a clear message that absent captain Michael Ballack is not being missed.

Germany’s fast-paced style and the clinical finishing that was so impressive in their exciting run to the World Cup third spot in July was again evident in Cologne. “We are having fun, enjoying football and scoring goals,” said defender Philipp Lahm.

The 33-year-old Ballack, who missed the World Cup due to an ankle injury and has yet to be recalled because of a lack of match practice, faces a tough battle to get back into Joachim Loew’s side.

“It’s fun watching this team play. You

really feel that the team is well-oiled,” Loew told reporters after the game. “The combinations work very well.”

It is difficult to see how Loew, who earlier in the week said Ballack was still part of his plans, could integrate him in this fast and young team with holding midfielders Bastian Schweinsteiger, 26, and Sami Khedira, 23, in superb form.

While being confirmed as captain, Ballack has also been told he will need to win back his starting spot at the expense of one of the two midfielders-an unlikely prospect at present.

Real Madrid’s gifted Mesut Ozil has also successfully taken over some of the playmaking duties further down the pitch of the Bayer Leverkusen captain, who opted not

to attend the match in Cologne.

“Even after such a game, I still believe there is room for improvement,” said striker Miroslav Klose, who netted twice in the game to join Joachim Streich with 55 goals in second place on Germany’s top scorers list, behind Gerd Mueller.

“There is still a bit missing in our stamina so it is important not to rest and take that next step,” he said, with the Bundesliga having only seen two matchdays so far.

Germany next host Turkey, who have also won two out of two games in Group A, on Oct. 8 in Berlin. With Ballack having turned 34 by then, his time in the team could be running out faster than a Germany attack. —Reuters

Culture of secrecy still surround gay footballers LONDON: More than one in four British professional soccer players, coaches and referees polled in an online survey personally know gay footballers currently in the game.

Researchers Ellis Cashmore and Jamie Cleland have sent the findings of the survey of more than 3,000 fans and football professionals to both the Football Association and the Professional Footballers’ Association.

“Of the professional players, coaches and referees in the survey, over one in four (27 percent) personally

know gay players currently in the game, though none have taken the step of coming out,” Cashmore said in a statement released to Reuters.

“There are about half a million professional football players in the world. Not one of them is openly gay.

Football fans are now challenging the game’s governing organisations to oppose the culture of secrecy surrounding gay players.”

Cashmore, a professor of culture, media and sport at Staffordshire University, said the survey showed fans and professionals firmly

believed that gay footballers were pressured into keeping their sexual preferences secret by agents and their clubs rather than the fear of abuse from fans. “It seems commercial pressures are behind football’s secretiveness,” he said.

“But being gay hasn’t hurt the careers of actors, musicians and politicians, and people in the study think that the first openly gay footballer would have tremendous branding opportunities.”

Cleland, a senior lecturer in sociology and a former Coventry City goalkeeper,

said fans thought gay players were urged by their agents and their clubs not to disclose their homosexuality.

“Fans say they are too often blamed, but over 90 percent say there is no place for homophobia in football,” he said. Only one footballer has ever announced he was homosexual during his professional career.

Justin Fashanu, who played for many clubs, including Norwich City, Nottingham Forest and Manchester City, and who faced racial abuse from the terraces, committed suicide in 1998, aged 37. —Reuters

China coach downplays hopes for 2011 Asian Cup BEIJING: Despite improved play in recent months by China’s beleaguered football team including a draw with Paraguay this week, the national coach has urged fans to lower expectations for next year’s Asian Cup. In friendly tune-ups for the January tournament in Qatar, China lost to Iran 20 last week, but tied World Cup quarterfinalists Paraguay 1-1 on Tuesday in front of 30,000 fans in Nanjing.

Borussia Dortmund forward Lucas Barrios drew first blood in the opening minutes to give Paraguay a 1-0 lead, before China’s youthful striker Gao Lin headed home the equaliser in the 34th minute.

“Paraguay is a world-class team-we played well today and we succeeded in containing their attack,” coach Gao Hongbo said in post-match comments.

“It was not so important to win or lose

this match. I am happy that everyone overcame the pressure and that we were able to play our game.”

Gao, who at 44 is the youngest man to coach China’s national side, has put together a string of impressive performances since assuming his post in May 2009.

China-who did not qualify for the World Cup in South Africa shocked France 1-0 in a warm-up friendly, but in recent months Gao’s charges have beaten Asian rivals South Korea and battled to draws against Germany and Japan. His only defeats have come against Portugal and Iran.

Still he cautioned against overconfidence and insists his only goal is to qualify for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil.

“We have set our sights on the 2014 World Cup. The Asian Cup is only a warmup for the World Cup,” Gao told state media.

“Chinese soccer has been on a downhill path over the past six years... people should lower their expectations.”

As the seventh man to take the helm in China since 2000, Gao was hired after the national side failed to qualify for South Africa and went winless in the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

Gambling, match-fixing, crooked referees and poor performances by the national team have made the sport the laughing stock of increasingly indifferent fans and a matter of mounting state concern.

China Football Association chief Nan Yong, his deputy Yang Yimin and another top aide were arrested on bribe-taking and match-fixing charges. Scores of officials and referees have been detained.

Nan served as CFA head for less than a year before he was arrested, reportedly for crimes that began early in his tenure at the association. —AFP

LONDON: Two late goals from Karim Benzema and Florent Malouda gave France their first win in six competitive matches and kick-started their Euro 2012 qualifying campaign when they beat Bosnia 2-0 on Tuesday.

Traditional powerhouses Italy, Germany, England and World Cup runners-up Netherlands all maintained their perfect starts with the goals flowing as they seek to seal their places in the finals in Poland and Ukraine in 2012.

Italy crushed Faroe Islands 50, Germany blasted Azerbaijan, managed by former West Germany’s World Cup winner Berti Vogts, 6-1, England won 3-1 in Switzerland and the Dutch saw off Finland 2-1 with Klaas-Jan Huntelaar scoring both their goals.

Sweden also hit the goal trail with a 6-0 win over San Marino but Portugal, struggling without suspended coach Carlos Queiroz and the injured Cristiano Ronaldo, continued to stumble.

After drawing 4-4 with Cyprus in their opening qualifier on Friday, Portugal crashed to a 1-0 defeat against Norway in Oslo and they are now second-bottom of Group H ahead of traditional nohopers Iceland who were beaten 1-0 by Denmark.

There was a thriller in Istanbul where Turkey and Belgium traded the lead before the Turks won 3-2 to maintain their perfect start in Group A. There were few shocks on the second major night of European Championship qualifiers which brought to a close the first double-header of the campaign following Friday’s opening games. But Russia were stunned in Moscow where Slovakia secured a 1-0 victory thanks to a first-half goal from Miroslav Stoch. Liechtenstein also came within seconds of a rare competitive point against Scotland at Hampden Park where they took the lead through skipper Mario Frick early in the second half.

Scotland, facing one of the worst results in their long international history, salvaged their respect and all three points with a 97th minute winner from Stephen McManus who headed home a corner in the last few seconds of stoppage time.

One man who has already suffered a damaging home defeat in this campaign is new France coach Laurent Blanc, whose team compounded their World Cup failure with a shocking 1-0 home defeat to Belarus in Group D on Friday.

They went to Bosnia desperate for their first victory in a competitive match since beating Ireland in the first leg of their World Cup playoff last November.

France appeared to be heading for a draw in Sarajevo until Benzema scored with a magical strike after 72 minutes and Florent Malouda secured the points six minutes later with their second goal. Former World champions Italy, whose World Cup also ended in a group stage exit like France, struggled to win their opening qualifier in Estonia on Friday but had no problems on Tuesday. Five players got on the scoresheet against the Faroe Islands in Florence-Alberto Gilardino (11th minute), Daniele De Rossi (22), Antonio Cassano (27), Fabio Quagliarella (80) and Andrea Pirlo (89).

Germany were also in no mood to show mercy to outclassed opponents and one of their great soccer heroes Vogts, who is now in charge of Azerbaijan. Miroslav Klose scored twice to take his tally to 55 goals for Germany in his 103rd international, while Lukas Podolski showed a welcome return to form as Germany went top of Group A on goal difference ahead of Turkey. England, also seeking redemption after a poor World Cup, followed up last week’s 4-0 win over Bulgaria in London with an excellent 3-1 victory over Switzerland in Basle.

Wayne Rooney, who has had stoires about his private life splashed all over the tabloids in Britain, scored England’s opener and his first goal for his country for a year. —Reuters

OLOMOUC: Milan Baros of Czech Republic (center) fights for a ball with Lithuania’s Tadas Kijanskas (left) and Tomas Danilevicius (right) during their Euro 2012 qualifying football match. —AFP

SARAJEVO: France’s Mathieu Valbuena (right) is challenged to head the ball by Bosnia’s Elvir Rahimic (top left) during their Euro 2012 Group D qualifying soccer match. —AP

Euro 2012 qualifying results/standings Group A Turkey 3, Belgium 2, Austria 2, Germany 6, Azerbaijan 1.

Standings: P W D L Germany 2 2 0 0 Turkey 2 2 0 0 Austria 1 1 0 0 Belgium 2 0 0 2 Azerbaijan 1 0 0 1 Kazakhstan 2 0 0 2 Group B Russia 0, Slovakia 1, Macedonia Ireland 3, Andorra 1.

Ireland 2 2 0 0 Slovakia 2 2 0 0 Russia 2 1 0 1 Armenia 2 0 1 1 Macedonia 2 0 1 1 Andorra 2 0 0 2

Kazakhstan 0, F 7 6 2 2 1 0

A 1 2 0 4 6 5

Pts 6 6 3 0 0 0

2, Armenia 2, 4 2 2 2 2 1

1 0 1 3 3 5

6 6 3 1 1 0

Group C Serbia 1, Slovenia 1, Italy 5, Faroe Islands 0.

Italy 2 2 0 0 7 1 6 Serbia 2 1 1 0 4 1 4 N Ireland 1 1 0 0 1 0 3 Estonia 2 1 0 1 3 3 3 Slovenia 2 0 1 1 1 2 1 Faroe Islands 3 0 0 3 1 10 0 Group D Belarus 0, Romania 0, Albania 1, Luxembourg 0, Bosnia 0, France 2.

Albania 2 1 1 0 2 1 4 Belarus 2 1 1 0 1 0 4 France 2 1 0 1 2 1 3 Bosnia 2 1 0 1 3 2 3 Romania 2 0 2 0 1 1 2 Luxembourg 2 0 0 2 0 4 0 Group E Sweden 6, San Marino 0, Netherlands 2, Finland 1, Hungary 2, Moldova 1.

Sweden 2 2 0 0 8 0 6

Netherlands Hungary Moldova Finland San Marino

2 2 2 2 2

2 1 1 0 0

0 0 0 0 0

0 1 1 2 2

7 2 3 1 0

1 3 2 4 11

6 3 3 0 0

Group F Georgia 0, Israel 0, Malta 0, Latvia 2, Croatia 0, Greece 0.

Croatia 2 1 1 0 3 0 4 Israel 2 1 1 0 3 1 4 Latvia 2 1 0 1 2 3 3 Georgia 2 0 2 0 1 1 2 Greece 2 0 2 0 1 1 2 Malta 2 0 0 2 1 5 0 Group G Bulgaria 0, Montenegro 1, Switzerland 1, England 3.

England 2 2 0 0 7 1 6 Montenegro 2 2 0 0 2 0 6 Wales 1 0 0 1 0 1 0 Switzerland 1 0 0 1 1 3 0 Bulgaria 2 0 0 2 0 5 0 Group H Denmark 1, Iceland 0, Norway 1, Portugal 0.

Norway 2 2 0 0 3 1 6 Denmark 1 1 0 0 1 0 3 Cyprus 1 0 1 0 4 4 1 Portugal 2 0 1 1 4 5 1 Iceland 2 0 0 2 1 3 0 Group I Czech Republic 0,Lithuania 1, Liechtenstein 1.

Scotland 2 1 1 0 Lithuania 2 1 1 0 Spain 1 1 0 0 Liechtenstein 2 0 0 2 Czech Republic 1 0 0 1

Scotland 2, 2 1 4 1 0

1 0 0 6 1

4 4 3 0 0

www.kuwaittimes.net

Nadal powers past Lopez as Wawrinka dumps Querrey NEW YORK: Venus Williams of the United States, prepares to serve to Francesca Schiavone of Italy, during a quarterfinal match at the US Open. —AP

Venus, Clijsters set up semifinal showdown NEW YORK: Two-time champions Kim Clijsters and Venus Williams booked a US Open semi-final showdown with hard-fought victories on Tuesday, struggling in windy conditions to overcome their toughest foes yet.

Defending champion Clijsters, trying to become the first winner to repeat since Williams in 2001, struggled but stretched her Flushing Meadows win streak to 19 matches by ousting Australian fifth seed Samantha Stosur 6-4, 5-7, 6-3.

“I didn’t play a good match but I was able to win it,” Clijsters said. “Even after the match I was like, ‘How did I win this?’ Next match everything will have to be a lot better.”

US third seed Williams, a seven-time Grand Slam champion who has not won a US Open crown since completing her back-to-back feat, eliminated sixthseeded French Open winner Francesca Schiavone of Italy 7-6 (7/5), 6-4.

“I was trying to find a rhythm in the wind to get on top of it,” Williams said. “It was challenging. I don’t think either of us were able to play our exact normal game. When the stakes were higher I was able to raise my game.”

Entering Friday’s semi-final, Clijsters and Williams have split 12 matches, although Williams has lost their past four meetings, including a 2005 US Open quarter-final and a fourth-round match last year

that went three sets.

“We had a great match last year. It was really close,” Williams said. “I’m sure we’ll have another really good matchup. I would like to kind of flip the way it turns out.”

Williams, who has yet to drop a set in this Flushing Meadows fortnight, became the first 30year-old woman to reach a Grand Slam semi-final since France’s Mary Pierce at the 2005 US Open.

“She has been playing really well,” Clijsters said.

“It’s a challenge. I look forward to it.”

Clijsters and Stosur exchanged breaks in the first six games of the third set before the Belgian held serve, then broke Stosur again when the Aussie double faulted for a 5-3 edge. Clijsters then held again for the victory.

“I just had to be aggressive in the third set and keep going when my serve wasn’t as good as I would like it,” Clijsters said.

French Open runner-up Stosur, now 0-4 against Clijsters, missed a chance to become the first Aussie woman in the US Open semi-finals since Wendy Turnbull in 1984.

“I’m going to be disappointed about this one,” she said. “You can’t break serve and have chance after chance after chance and blow it in a quarter-final. It’s just too big an opportunity to let go. Unfortunately that’s what I did.” —AFP

NEW YORK: Rafael Nadal kept his perfect record intact at the US Open Tuesday as he powered past Spanish compatriot Feliciano Lopez into the quarter-finals.

The top seed won 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 and in four outings to date he has yet to drop a set or even his serve. Next up in his sights is old foe Fernando Verdasco, another Spaniard against whom Nadal has a perfect 10-0 winloss record.

“I was ready for the late start and the hardest thing was for the fans to be here,” he said.

“This year I am healthy and hope to continue to play well and have my chances.”

Verdasco took four hours 23 minutes to see off compatriot David Ferrer in a typically gruelling Iberian clash that involved merciless, end-to-end tennis. “I hope that it is going to give me big confidence, this match,” the eighth seed said.

“And also I hope to be 100 percent physically after a tough match like today to play against a player like Nadal that you need to be like 100 percent to try to face him, to try to beat him.”

Home hopes, meanwhile, were blown away by Switzerland’s Stanislas Wawrinka when he outlasted Sam Querrey in a marathon fourth round tie.

The 7-6 (11/9), 6-7 (5/7), 75, 4-6, 6-4 defeat means that there will be no US player in the men’s singles quarter-finals for the second year in a row.

Last year was the first time that had happened in the Open era dating back to 1968.

The 20th-seeded Wawrinka joins Roger Federer in the last eight, making it the first time two Swiss players have reached the quarter-finals of a Grand Slam in the Open era. The match, played in tough, windy conditions, lasted four hours 28 minutes.

“I think for sure the crowd was hoping that he can stay in the tournament. But if you watch the match they were very fair. For me it was great to play that kind of match with that crowd,” the 25-year-old Wawrinka said after reaching his first Grand Slam quarterfinal.

His opponent for a place in the semi-finals will be 12thseeded Russian Mikhail Youzhny, who defeated Tommy Robredo of Spain 7-5, 6-2, 4-6, 6-4.

The 22-year-old Querrey, also seeking to reach his first Grand Slam quarter-final, said that the difference between winning and losing had been slight.

“Just a couple of points here and there, It was like every set was like that. Just really a couple of points in every set that made the difference,” he said.

Wawrinka reached the fourth round by playing some of the best tennis of his life to defeat fourth seed Andy Murray of Britain in four sets, while all the pressure was on Querrey as the last US player left in the tournament.

The Swiss player let slip a golden chance of clamping a stranglehold on the match when he squandered four second set points before Querrey run off six points in a row from 0-3

NEW YORK: Rafael Nadal of Spain celebrates after he won match point against Feliciano Lopez of Spain during his men’s singles match on day nine of the 2010 US Open.—AFP down in the ensuing tie-break to level the match.

After sharing the third and fourth sets, both players looked leg weary going into the fifth set and another tie-break looked on the cards until Wawrinka gathered his forces for one last push in the 10th game. He finally finished Querrey off with a chip and charge on his second match point.

The 28-year-old Youzhny, the sole surviving Russian in the men’s draw, grabbed the first break of serve of the match

in the 11th game to take the first set against Robredo.

He then had back-to-back breaks in the second to take a commanding two sets to love lead. Robredo hit back to take the third set and looked the stronger going into the fourth set, but it was Youzhny who made the breakthrough in what turned out to be a decisive fifth game.

He set up break point with a deft backhand sliced drop shot and then cashed in when his service return clipped the net

and dropped stone dead on Robredo’s side.

From 3-2 up, the Russian held serve three times to advance to the last eight. It is the second time that Youzhny has made it through to the last eight in New York following his run into the semi-finals in 2006 when he beat Rafael Nadal along the way. “I like the result and actually I like how I played today,” Youzhny said. “Of course, I have some mistakes and I was a little bit lucky in the fourth set.”—AFP

Japan’s intervention hints fail to halt yen

Wall Street up as fears for European economy ease

Sarkozy holds firm as unions plot next move

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Obama economic moves likely too late WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama is proposing a flurry of economic measures that might be too little, too late to fend off a huge Republican wave in November congressional elections — with Democrats losing their majority in the House of Representatives and, perhaps, the Senate.

With less than two months remaining before the critical vote, Americans are in a sour mood over an unemployment rate stubbornly holding near 10 percent and an economy that has made little progress in pulling the nation out of its worst downturn since the Great Depression of the 1930s. Polls are virtually unanimous in showing Democrats primed to surrender their big majority in the House as voters prepare to cast ballots against incumbents and in favor of new blood from among Republicans and candidates aligned with the ultraconservative tea party phenomenon. Republican chances for taking a majority in the Senate are slim but not impossible.

In a speech in Cleveland, Ohio, Obama will ask Congress to pass new tax breaks that would allow businesses to write off 100 percent of new capital investments through 2011. Additionally, Obama is seeking a $50 billion infrastructure investment plan to boost employment and a permanent expansion of tax credits to companies for investment in research and development.

On Friday morning, Obama will discuss his economic program in only his second televised news conference of the year. Several million people and 1.5 million businesses would benefit from the tax breaks, according to the White House. Estimates put the cost to taxpayers over 10 years at $30 billion, with most of the money lost in tax revenue being recouped as the economy strengthens. The news conference will cap a week of appearances in which the president is rolling out new spending and tax cut proposals aimed at helping the economy. Obama unveiled a $50 billion transportation infrastructure proposal on Monday at a Labor Day rally with union members in Milwaukee.

Obama showed little life on the economy through a summer that his administration said would witness a major recovery as a result of the nearly $800 billion stimulus he pushed through Congress shortly after taking office in early 2009. As the economy continues to languish, support for Democrats in Congress has declined in lockstep with backing for Obama. The president’s popularity decline is notable given what were his very high ratings when he swept into the White House on a message of hope and change in the midst of a fiscal crisis and near collapse of the country’s financial system.

The big changes Obama now wants to make, while they ordinarily would find philosophical support among opposition Republicans, stand little chance of congressional approval in the toxic pre-election atmosphere. Republicans have been near unanimous in voting “no” on Obama initiatives in Congress. What’s more, many of the president’s fellow Democrats are leery of voting for more spending so close to the election. Even if the measures passed, they would do little, if anything, to quickly improve the dismal economy. On the offensive, Republicans are putting forward their own economic options.

House Republican Leader John Boehner said he was proposing a two-year freeze on all tax rates and a cut in government spending to the levels of 2008, before the recession hit.

In a broadcast interview, the Ohio Republican offered an alternative to the package of business tax incentives and infrastructure spending Obama was to announce in Cleveland.

Republicans have made significant political gains by accusing Obama of extravagant spending and expansion of government that will burden taxpayers and their children for years to come. That has led to widespread expectations that the Republicans will take at least 40 House seats from the Democrats to gain the majority.

Expectations are so low for the Democrats, however, that even holding on to a slim majority would be called victory. — AP

Unemployment rate stubbornly holding near 10%

MIAMI: Guillermo Rodriguez, left, talks with Labor Finders manager Emmanuel Garcia, right, after being assigned a day’s work on a construction site, yesterday, in Miami. Labor Finders is an industrial labor staffing company. Job openings rose in July after two months of declines, a positive sign that companies could step up hiring in the coming months. — AP

Qtel at 2-yr high ahead of unit IPO, markets rise DUBAI: Qatar Telecom (Qtel) hit a twoyear high yesterday, a day after Oman unit Nawras said it could raise as much as $608 million from its 40 percent initial public offering.

Qtel climbed 1.3 percent to its highest finish since August 4, 2008, while Qatar National Bank rose 1.4 percent and Industries Qatar added 0.7 percent.

Doha’s index rose 0.4 percent to be within 0.2 percent below Sunday’s 17week peak.

“Foreign investors have been buying into Qatar - these are long-term, value investors who believe Qatar is cheap relative to international markets,” said Robert Pramberger, acting head of asset management at Doha firm The First Investor.

Investors are looking at big companies

that are liquid and have upside potential or have attractive dividends, he said.

“A lot of stocks fit into this picture and bank results in the first and second quarters were good and this will continue,” Pramberger added.

Kuwait’s index rose for a fifth straight session, despite investors cashing in gains in some banks.

National Bank of Kuwait dropped 1.3 percent, easing from Tuesday’s 23-month high, and Burgan Bank fell 2.1 percent.

“Banks made a good move in recent weeks, so it was time for profit taking, but this isn’t heavy when compared to their gains,” said Naser al-Nafisi, general manager for Al Joman Center for Economic Consultancy in Kuwait.

The banking index fell 0.6 percent,

trimming its gains since July 4 to 22 percent.

Lenders’ shares have surged on bets of a risk-free windfall from the government’s 30 billion dinar ($104 billion) development plan, which is expected to be par tly financed by state-backed loans.

“Banks are significantly over-boughtpeople have been getting carried away,” said a Kuwait trader who asked not to be identified.

Egypt’s index rose for a first day in four as investors focused on small- and mid-cap stocks, particularly textile firms after positive data on Egyptian cotton exports.

“Arab Cotton Ginning has been outperforming the market,” said Sarah Tolba at Pharos Securities. “I think this will pull up the textile industry and this is already seen

Egypt reformer to leave cabinet for World Bank CAIRO: Egyptian Investment Minister Mahmoud Mohieldin, a prominent economic liberaliser, will resign from the government to take up a senior post at the World Bank beginning next month, the cabinet said yesterday.

Speculation he would join the World Bank has already sparked media discussion about possible successors for his ministerial portfolio, seen as vital to an economic team that has pushed through controversial free market reforms since 2004.

Mohieldin told the Arabic satellite channel al-Arabiya that he was nominated to one of three managing director positions that report directly to World Bank President Robert Zoellick.

“Several candidates are being studied (for the ministerial post) by the prime minister, so that he can present the names at the appropriate time to the (Egyptian) president,” he said.

The state-run egynews.net

website said possible nominees to head the ministr y included Ziad Bahaa el-Din, a fellow supporter of liberalisation who works under Mohieldin as chair man of Egypt’s financial regulatory authority.

“His successor will have to work hard to cour t foreign investment from fellow emerging market countries, particularly those in East Asia and the Gulf,” said EFG Her mes strategist Simon Kitchen, adding tens of billions of dollars of foreign direct investment had flowed into Egypt under Mohieldin’s watch.

Cabinet spokesman Magdy Rady said Mohieldin would leave the cabinet on taking up the World Bank assignment on Oct. 4. He said the World Bank’s board approved the appointment on Tuesday and Egypt replied with its approval the same day.

Mohieldin will oversee World Bank offices involved in finance and private sector

development, sustainable development, poverty reduction and economic management, human development and the World Bank Institute, the bank said in a statement.

Mohieldin is one of three leading ministers who spearheaded liberal measures taken by the government of Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif. These included the sale of major state assets and sharp reductions in income taxes and tariffs.

Investors will be watching closely to see who will replace Mohieldin, who is close to President Hosni Mubarak’s son Gamal.

Although both father and son deny any succession plans, Gamal Mubarak, 46, is considered a top contender to succeed as president if his father, 82, chooses not to run in 2011.

Mohieldin is also expected to scrap his plans to seek a seat in parliament for the ruling National Democratic Party in an election due in November. — Reuters

in spinning company Arab Polavara.”

Arab Cotton Ginning climbed 3.9 percent, taking its gain over the last five sessions to 11.3 percent. Arab Polavara rose 1.7 percent.

Banks fell as Oman’s index declined for a first session in six in subdued trade.

Bank Muscat dropped 0.1 percent and National Bank of Oman lost 0.9 percent.

“It was a very quiet session, with some buying from local pension fund into Bank Muscat as foreign and local institutions sold,” said Adel Nasr, United Securities brokerage manager. “Tomorrow is likely to be even more dull.”

Markets in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates were closed for Eid al-Fitr holidays.

HIGHLIGHTS QATAR The benchmark rose 0.4 percent to 7,454 points.

KUWAIT The index edged up 0.05 percent to 6,757 points.

EGYPT The measure rose 0.8 percent to 6,500 points.

OMAN The index slipped 0.09 percent to 6,286 points.

BAHRAIN The measure rose 0.02 percent to 1,431 points. — Reuters

Oil pares earlier losses, falls to around $74 LONDON: Oil fell to around $74 a barrel yesterday, declining for a third straight session, but gaining European equity markets helped pare losses.

European shares rebounded from earlier losses, leaving the pan-European FTSEurofirst up 0.75 percent. The day’s trading, however, reflected the skittishness that has dominated markets over the past few months.

The MSCI All Country World Index was slightly down on the day.

US crude for October fell 22 cents to $73.87 a barrel by 1138 GMT, having hit an earlier low of $73.37.

Share prices have been highly cor related with oil for most of 2010 because both are seen as indicators of economic health. Oil gained support yesterday from a weaker US dollar, which makes oil cheaper for other currency holders.

“The dollar gave up some of gains and equity futures bounced a little bit so that’s why crude oil for

now has erased some of the losses,” said Olivier Jakob of consultants Petromatrix.

The market is also awaiting the release of weekly US industry and government statistics on inventories, delayed by a day following Monday’s Labor Day holiday in the United States.

“It’s well in a range of between $75 and $80 and we need some strong news to push prices out of this range,” Christophe Barret, an oil analyst at Credit Agricole, said.

“L ast week’s data was a bit weak and this week will be interesting as it will reflect what happened just ahead of the Labor Day weekend.” US crude is trading at a steep discount of $3.30 to futures based on the European Brent benchmark. The gap reached a peak of $3.91 earlier in the day, its highest since mid-May. Brent was 50 cents down on the day at $77.24. Eugen Weinberg, commodities analyst at Commerzbank in Frankfurt said US crude’s discount to Brent was “definitely due to investment outflow, weaker

demand, and high oil inventories (in the United States).”

Total US petroleum stockpiles are at their highest since weekly records began in 1990.

Maintenance at North Sea fields and a strong Urals crude market have also contributed to Brent’s premium.

However, US crude inventories probably fell for the first time in three weeks last week, down by a moderate 600,000 bar rels, as refineries reduced impor ts in preparation for stormy weather, according to a Reuters poll on Tuesday.

The American Petroleum Institute will publish its weekly US industry statistics on inventories at 2030 GMT yesterday with the Energy Infor mation Administration publishing government figures on Thursday.

The poll also forecast a 700,000 barrel increase in stockpiles of distillates, including heating oil and diesel fuel, and a 900,000 barrel decline in gasoline supplies.

— Reuters

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

China’s foreign exchange reserves balloon to record $2.454 trillion

China buys $6.9bn of Japan bonds in July TOKYO: China bought 6.9 billion dollars w orth of J apanese bonds in J uly, J apan’s finance ministry said yesterday, as the Asian giant continues to ramp up purchases of J apanese debt. China bought a net 583.1 billion yen of J apanese bonds in J uly, a finance ministry official said. The figure counts long-term government bonds as w ell as medium- and short term bonds issued by the public and private sectors.

Gitex shopper 2010 stages biggest ever sales bonanza for ME consumers DUBAI: Exhibitors at this year’s GITEX Shopper exhibition are planning the biggest ever sales bonanza for Middle East consumers, with launches of the latest technology products and exclusive offers which cover a wide range of hi-tech merchandise.

The largest consumer IT and electronics show in the Middle East, GITEX Shopper takes place from 16-23 October at the Airport Expo Dubai and is organised by the Dubai World Trade Centre (DWTC). Part of GITEX TECHNOLOGY WEEK, one of the world’s largest technology trade events which celebrates its 30th anniversary this year, GITEX Shopper 2010 will be staging an unprecedented retail sales festival to commemorate the occasion.

“Technology today is an integral part of our lifestyles,

providing mobility, connectivity and convenience to our work, school and home environments. The substantial increase in product ranges being exhibited at this year’s GITEX Shopper reflects the strong market demand for the latest consumer technology, and with more than 25,000 products on show, this really is the most anticipated retail event of the year. In celebration of the 30th anniversary of GITEX TECHNOLOGY WEEK, exhibitors at GITEX Shopper will be unveiling incredible deals that are guaranteed to thrill Shopper fans,” said Trixee Loh, Senior Vice President, DWTC. The world’s top consumer IT and electronics brands have confirmed their presence, with a number of previews and regional launches scheduled during the show.

Global players such as Acer,

Canon, Dell, HP, Lenovo, Microsoft, Nokia, Samsung, Sandisk and Sony will be among the many brands showcased. Top regional distributors and retailers, including BDL, CompuME, E-Max, E4U, iSTYLE, Klick, Jacky’s Electronics, Jumbo Electronics and Plug-Ins will all be running special promotions exclusively during GITEX Shopper.

Ashish Panjabi, Chief Operating Officer, Jacky’s Electronics, one of Shopper’s biggest power retailers noted: “Jacky’s enjoyed great success at last year’s GITEX Shopper, increasing our sales significantly in key segments such as digital cameras and LCD TVs. We believe GITEX Shopper 2010 will be even bigger and better and we are preparing some excellent bundled deals on a range of consumer electronics to

appeal to the record crowds expected at the exhibition this year.”

“We are thrilled to participate in GITEX Shopper for the first time and make Apple products available to people visiting the consumer electronics exhibition of the year.

GITEX Shopper is the perfect platform for iSTYLE to showcase our innovative products that are always a favourite with gadget lovers. With increased space, more products and exclusive offers at GITEX Shopper 2010, we could not have picked a better year to join the exhibition,” said Hani NehmÈ, Regional Development Manager, iSTYLE. Interactive visitor features, bundled offers, competitions and giveaways, make GITEX Shopper the most entertaining retail platform for technology in the region.

The figure was higher than the 456.7 billion yen worth of securities purchased in June.

The news came after the yen marked a fresh 15-year high against the dollar yesterday. Currency traders say China’s buying of yen-denominated assets, while too small on its own to sharply push up the yen, could be bolstering the currency indirectly.

For the first half of the year, China bought 1.73 trillion yen worth of debt, nearly seven times the full-year record of 253.8 billion yen in 2005.

In May alone Chinese investors bought a net 735.2 billion yen in Japanese government bonds (JGBs).

China has sought to diversify its vast investments away from the dollar and Europe since the onset of the financial crisis.

Most of the bonds bought by China are thought to be used by the government to manage its foreign reserves.

The increase coincides with renewed doubts about the pace of recovery in the United States and Europe and indicates China is putting more of its ballooning foreign exchange reserves into relatively stable Japanese bonds as a result, say analysts.

With around 95 percent held by domestic investors, Japan’s risk of default is perceived to be much lower than other countries, even though its public debt is nearing 200 percent of gross domestic product, the highest among developed countries.

However, “China appears to be using JGBs as a temporary shelter and it does not appear to be settling down for a long stay,” given the predominance of the short-dated JGB buying, Shuji Tonouchi, a senior fixed income strategist at Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley, told Dow Jones Newswires.

Echoing that view, last week’s China Securities Journal report said that China was unlikely to continue buying Japanese government debt in the coming months due to the yen’s volatility.

China’s foreign exchange reserves have ballooned in recent years, surging to a record 2.454 trillion dollars at the end of June.

The reserves, already the world’s largest, grew 15.1 percent from a year ago, the People’s Bank of China said on its website. —AFP

Landmark Group launches 7th Max store in Kuwait KUWAIT: Max, the Middle East’s largest value retail brand reached yet another milestone this Eid with the launch of its 7th store in Kuwait at Jahra. This is the 115th Showroom of Max across all regions, and the brand has established firm footprints across the GCC, Turkey, Egypt, Jordan & India. The new outlet at Jahra was inaugurated by Madame Abeer Abdullah Al Sumait.

The outlet is located on the Mezzanine floor of Sahari Mall which covers more than 2030 sq. mts.

“Max has built its success on a single, simple principle: to provide customers with trendy quality merchandise at reasonable prices” said Saibal Basu, Chief Operating Officer, Landmark Group Kuwait.

“Max has always been a big hit in Kuwait and is an indication that people are getting more discerning when it comes to fashion. We combine quality and style to appeal to a broad

customer base. People come to Max and find something that fits their personal style and their budget.”

“The opening of this stand alone store is a part of Landmark Group’s expansion plans of not only introducing new retail brands into the region but also increasing the number of existing brands. We will continue with such extensive expansions in the coming years and try to serve our customers in every possible manner” concluded Basu.

The Max retail philosophy of providing style-conscious customers with fashion at affordable prices has gained attraction across the Middle East with continued growth expected across the region in coming years.

The store features distinctive niches and departments offering the latest fashion range with the hottest new international trends in textures and fabrics to guarantee its patrons an enjoyable Eid

shopping experience. Every season, Max produces a collection that is unique and fits with its overall philosophy, and this Eid season is no different!! So also, do check out the latest trends in the Back to School collection for your little ones guaranteed to bring a smile on their faces and leave a lasting impression on the others.

There’s a wide variety of apparel to choose from; so do visit any of the stores located at Al Rai, Salmiya, Hawally, Fahaheel, Khaitan, The Avenues and now at Jahra to discover more!

The Landmark Group first launched Max in the Middle East in May 2004. Today, Max operates 115 stores across the Middle East, India and others.

Max on this joyous occasion of its new store opening; would like to wish its patrons a very Happy and blessed Eid and invites them all to experience a wonderful time shopping at Max this festive season!

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 Philippine peso Egyptian pounds

.2820000 .4520000 .3740000 .2730000 .2770000 .2580000 .0045000 .0020000 .0777470 .7574670 .4020000 .0750000 .7425640 .0045000 .0500000

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

CUSTOMER TRANSFER RATES .2859500 .4539840 .3767280 .2755600 .2794520 .0505620 .0402660 .2606160 .0368170 .2114800 .0033090 .0062160 .0025470 .0033440 .0041440 .0778920 .7588780 .4044140 .0762930 .7431050 .0063540

US Dollar Sterling pounds Swiss Francs Saudi Riyals

TRANSFER CHEQUES RATES .2880500 .4571910 .2775120 .0767790

Al-Muzaini Exchange Co. Japanese Yen Indian Rupees

ASIAN COUNTRIES 3.447 6.174

.2920000 .4610000 .3830000 .2810000 .2850000 .2650000 .0075000 .0035000 .0785280 .7650800 .4180000 .0790000 .7500270 .0072000 .0580000 .2880500 .4571910 .3793890 .2775120 .2814310 .0509200 .0405510 .2624570 .0370780 .2129780 .0033330 .0062600 .0025650 .0033680 .0041730 .0783890 .7637180 .4072790 .0767790 .7478440 .0063990

Pakistani Rupees Srilankan Rupees Nepali Rupees Singapore Dollar Hongkong Dollar Bangladesh Taka Philippine Peso Thai Baht Irani Riyal - Transfer Irani Riyal - Cash

3.353 2.558 3.875 214.570 37.134 4.151 6.498 9.281 0.296 0.310

Saudi Riyal Qatari Riyal Omani Riyal Bahraini Dinar UAE Dirham

GCC COUNTRIES 76.932 79.269 749.530 766.250 78.563

Egyptian Pound - Cash Egyptian Pound Yemen Riyal Tunisian Dinar Jordanian Dinar Lebanese Lira Syrian Lier Morocco Dirham

ARAB COUNTRIES 52.150 50.568 1.373 194.850 407.400 193.500 6.162 33.729

EUROPEAN & AMERICAN COUNTRIES US Dollar Transfer 288.380 Euro 370.860 Sterling Pound 444.970 Canadian dollar 279.710 Turkish lire 191.610 Swiss Franc 286.950 Australian dollar 263.290 US Dollar Buying 287.845 GOLD 245.000 125.000 64.000

20 Gram 10 Gram 5 Gram

SELL CASH 267.800 767.060 4.350 279.300 566.400 14.100 50.200 167.800 52.000 371.600

37.780 6.400 0.035 0.272 0.252 3.550 409.160 0.195 95.470 46.100 4.510 211.700 1.965 46.900 749.260 3.500 6.600 79.770 77.010 215.470 42.210 2.746 450.000 40.000 289.400 6.300 9.530 198.263 78.700 288.800 1.310

37.630 6.175 0.035

407.710 0.194 95.470 3.870 210.200 749.080 3.375 6.490 79.340 77.010 215.470 42.210 2.560 448.000 287.900 6.300 9.400 78.600 288.400

GOLD 1,358.080

10 Tola Sterling Pound US Dollar

TRAVELLER?S CHEQUE 448.000 288.400

Dollarco Exchange Co. Ltd

Bahrain Exchange Company COUNTRY Australian dollar Bahraini dinar Bangladeshi taka 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

SELL DRAFT 266.300 767.060 4.154 277.800

215.500 50.595 370.100

Rate for Transfer US Dollar Canadian Dollar Sterling Pound Euro Swiss Frank Cyprus Pound Bahrain Dinar UAE Dirhams Qatari Riyals Saudi Riyals Jordanian Dinar Egyptian Pound Indian Rupees Pakistani Rupees

Selling Rate 287.300 280.799 450.263 377.664 274.314 706.271 762.697 78.432 79.127 76.809 406.617 50.574 6.160 3.372

Sri Lankan Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Pesso Japanese Yen Thai Bhat Syrian Pound Nepalese Rupees

2.552 4.167 6.268 3.310 8.903 6.286 3.846

Kuwait Bahrain Intl Exchange Co. Currency US Dollar Pak Rupees Indian Rupees Sri Lankan Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Peso UAE Dirhams Saudi Riyals Bahraini Dinars Egyptian Pounds Pound Sterling Indonesian Rupiah Nepali rupee Yemeni Riyal Jordanian Dinars Syrian Pounds Euro Candaian Dollars

Rate per 1000 (Tran) 288.400 3.375 6.180 2.570 4.150 6.520 78.610 77.110 766.700 50.585 450.700 0.00003280 3.890 1.550 409.600 5.750 372.800 281.400

Al Mulla Exchange Currency Transfer Rate (Per 1000 US Dollar 287.600 Euro 372.550 Pound Sterling 447.000 Canadian Dollar 279.000 Japanese Yen 3.440 Indian Rupee 6.195 Egyptian Pound 50.450 Sri Lankan Rupee 2.557 Bangladesh Taka 4.137 Philippines Peso 6.488 Pakistan Rupee 3.375 Bahraini Dinar 765.550 UAE Dirham 78.415 Saudi Riyal 76.800 *Rates are subject to change

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

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Air fares up as Asian travel rebounds from recession SINGAPORE: Asia-Pacific airlines are raising ticket prices as travellers return in their droves after holding back on their travel plans last year because of the global recession.

A strong economic rebound, led

by China, has resulted in carriers filling more seats during the summer holidays and demand should remain robust despite slower expansion in the second half of this year, industry analysts said.

Singapore Airlines (SIA) said it will raise fares on certain routes from October 1, while Korean Air bumped up ticket prices for international passengers by up to 10 percent in August, its second increase

since June.

“Air fares are generally a function of market demand and supply and they are adjusted depending on market conditions,” an SIA spokesman told AFP. “Actual changes in fares also vary from route to route, and a range of fares is offered in different booking classes.”

While the carrier did not give details of the increases, the local Straits Times newspaper said SIA raised fares by as much as 148 US dollars for an economy seat and 742 dollars for a premium ticket.

More than one million travellers visited Singapore in July, crossing

the seven-figure mark for the first time ever in a single month, thanks in part to the lure of two new casino resorts in the city-state.

Australian flag-carrier Qantas increased its international and domestic fares on July 28 by three percent.

“Pricing is reviewed continuously across all routes, taking into account demand and capacity, competitor activity and business performance,” Qantas said in announcing the price hike.

Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific and its subsidiary Dragonair posted July passenger traffic figures that were 19.5 percent higher than in

2009 with the pair carrying 2.48 million passengers combined.

But a Cathay spokeswoman declined to comment on whether the carriers had jacked up prices.

“We won’t comment on faresthey differ by market. But (the price) is based on supply and demand,” she told AFP in Hong Kong.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA) said in its latest report that it expected global passenger traffic to expand by 7.1 percent this year despite a projected easing of the economic rebound in the second half.

While average airline fares are rising, they are still below levels

reached before the US-triggered global economic meltdown that struck in the third quarter of 2008, the global airline trade body said.

The global recession lasted well into 2009 and IATA estimates that the world’s civil aviation industry lost 9.4 billion dollars that year.

“Average one-way economy fares are 15 percent higher compared to the 2009 low, but still five percent below the early 2008 peaks,” IATA spokesman Albert Tjoeng told AFP. Premium airline fares are 10 percent above 2009 lows but still 20 percent below the pre-recession peaks, he added.

Regional airlines carried a record

17.2 million international passengers in July, up 20.4 percent from the same month last year, according to the latest data from the Association of Asia Pacific Airlines (AAPA).

In the first seven months of the year, the carriers carried 15.6 percent more passengers over the same period last year, it said.

This reflected “growing consumer confidence across the AsiaPacific region”, said AAPA directorgeneral Andrew Herdman.

“Commercial activity has also picked up strongly, leading to a rebound in premium passenger traffic on both regional and long-haul routes,” he said in a recent press

statement.

IATA chief Giovanni Bisignani has cautioned however that the airline industry’s recovery will be affected by the forecast slowdown in global economic growth in the second half of 2010.

AAPA’s Herdman said airlines were still cautious about expanding seat capacity and adding routes.

“Asian airlines are still focussed on careful management of capacity, tight cost controls and ongoing efforts to achieve further productivity improvements as the industry strives to restore profitability after two years of heavy losses,” he said. —AFP

Strong yen clouds outlook for exports and capex

Japan’s intervention hints fail to halt yen TOKYO: Japan’s finance minister acknowledged currency intervention is an option for the first time since the yen’s 14 percent rise since May, and a candidate to become prime minister sanctioned solo intervention as the yen jumped to a 15-year high versus the dollar. Finance Minister Yoshihiko

SINGAPORE: Passengers check in for their flights at an airline counter at Changi International Airport in Singapore yesterday. Asia-Pacific airlines are raising ticket prices as travellers return in their droves after holding back on their travel plans last year because of the global recession. —AFP

Bangladesh exports soar as orders shift from China DHAKA: Bangladesh said yesterday exports leapt more than 25 percent year on year in July, with manufacturers linking the jump to a shift in orders from China to the low-cost South Asian country.

In July, the first month of its financial year, Bangladesh shipped 1.82 billion dollars of goods-the highest export figure in the country’s 40-year history, the Export Promotion Bureau said.

This was due to a sharp rise in apparel exports as firms chose to buy from Bangladesh instead of China in a bid to keep costs down, Jalal Ahmed, the head of the EPB, told AFP. “Our textile exporters are receiving more orders from new markets which previously

would source products in China,” he said.

EPB figures showed shipments to new markets such as Turkey, Japan, South Africa and China grew 200 percent, although Western Europe and the United States still account for nearly 90 percent of Bangladesh’s export market.

Apparel exports rose nearly 30 percent year-on-year, with overall shipments up 25.5 percent, Ahmed said, adding that exports of eco-friendly juteknown as hessian in Europe or burlap in the United Stateshave also surged.

The figures come as Beijing has been forced to increase minimum wages over the past few months following several protests and raising concerns in

China that foreign firms may look elsewhere for cheaper labour.

Abdus Salam Murshedy, the head of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) said that despite the strong figures, a chronic utilities crisis and shoddy infrastructure was hindering export growth.

“We are ready to grab new opportunities as China becomes increasingly costly. These July export figures are good, but we can do far better,” he said.

The government must improve power and gas supplies and find a way to make the country’s main port in southern Chittagong town, more efficient, he added. —AFP

Ranked 48th worldwide on YouTube

NBK Eid TVC hits record advertising scores KUWAIT: National Bank of Kuwait’s creative Eid Advertisement has attracted unprecedented participation among viewers and visitors of web blogs and social interactive media websites even prior to being aired on TV channels.

The ad, which created a splash in the electronic media arena, has registered more than 100,000 views during the first day of launching it through web blogs and social electronic interaction channels.

Commenting on the occasion, Manal Al Mattar, NBK Executive Manager of Public Relations and Advertising stated “The unprecedented reception NBK’s Eid Ad had witnessed by web blog viewers and visitors had further solidified

the connection that NBK maintains with its clients and public and provides a new testament of the bank’s consistent involvement with society and culture via creative mediums” This remarkable success is yet another example of NBK’s

many record successes and achievements, demonstrating the NBK’s leading role in the market due to the bank’s modern management approach and youth oriented manpower that holds great appreciation for contemporary mass media”

Political powerbroker Ichiro Ozawa, who is challenging Prime Minister Naoto Kan in a closefought ruling party leadership race, later said Japan should take all possible steps to counter the rising currency including market intervention, even if solo action is ineffective.

Investors initially ignored Noda’s comments and pushed the yen to a 15-year high of 83.34 yen per dollar, doubting that Japan would risk going solo and all but ruling out coordinated intervention with other Group of Seven countries.

The yen later gave back some of its gains.

A report showing Japanese machinery orders rose by the most in seven months in July did little to ease concern that a surging yen could undermine the country’s important export sector, seen as critical to the recovery from the global economic crisis.

The Bank of Japan has indicated it is willing to ease monetary policy to help the economy, but is likely to bide its time until the ruling party settles a routine leadership contest with a vote on Sept. 14.

As the yen surged, the Nikkei average fell 2.2 percent to its lowest close in a week on worries about the potential hit to export earnings.

Japanese officials have been trying to talk down the yen but so far their comments have had little effect as it keeps rising due to concerns about a slowdown in the global economy and the health of the European banking system.

“Basically, it is important to closely communicate with the international community, and we are currently making efforts on this,” Finance Minister Noda told lawmakers in parliament.

“In the end, we will take decisive measures including intervention when needed.”

The remarks indicated a shift in Noda’s language. Previously he has repeatedly declined to comment on intervention when asked about it by the media.

The government will make necessary preparations for intervention, which should be conducted in the most effective way possible, Parliamentary Secretary of Finance Hiroshi Ogushi said.

Meanwhile Ozawa told reporters Japan should intervene and sell the yen even if solo action was likely to be ineffective.

He had said last week Japan should be prepared to act on currencies.

“They are trying to talk as much as they can, but we think actual intervention is unlikely because other G7 countries wouldn’t cooperate,” said Thomas Harr, head of Asian foreign exchange strategy at Standard Chartered in Singapore.

“The most likely outcome is more easing from the BOJ, which may be some measures to lower short-term interest rates.”

Kan has vowed to take firm measures against currencies when needed in a plan to boost jobs and the economy.

Japan has not intervened in the currency market since March 2004, after spending 35 trillion yen ($420 billion) over a 15month period to support an economic recovery. —Reuters

Noda sharpened his rhetoric on foreign exchange yesterday as a rise in the yen underlined concerns that the currency’s strength could hurt exports, heighten deflationary pressures and therefore derail a fragile economic recovery.

TOKYO: A money trader walks past a large screen displaying the US dollar is being traded at 83.69 yen at a foreign exchange firm in Tokyo, yesterday. Earlier Tuesday, the yen hit a 15-year high of 83.52 to the green buck. —AP

Verdict expected in Vodafone $2.6 billion India tax case MUMBAI: A court is set to rule Wednesday on whether Vodafone Group Plc must pay 120 billion rupees ($2.6 billion) in back taxes for its 2007 acquisition of one of India’s largest mobile phone companies. Vodafone maintains that it isn’t liable for tax on the $11.1 billion transaction, and a verdict in the company’s three year legal fight is expected later in the day.

India’s tax authorities have a fearsome reputation among foreign investors, and the verdict will be closely watched by companies like SABMiller, General Electric and AT&T, who have also been swept up in the tax department’s increasing activism over the last three years. The implications for them were worrisome enough that top British - though not American - diplomats took up the tax cause, with U.K. Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne report-

edly petitioning India’s Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on the issue during British Prime Minister David Cameron’s July visit.

The Vodafone verdict will hinge on whether Indian tax authorities have jurisdiction over a deal between two foreign entities.

In May 2007, Vodafone International Holdings BV - a Dutch subsidiary of the British telecom giant - acquired a 67 percent stake in CGP Investments Ltd., a Cayman Islands company, which held the India telecom assets of Hong Kong’s Hutchison Telecommunications International Ltd. In June this year, the tax department told Vodafone how much it owed in back taxes.

Vodafone maintains that India has never before sought to tax such overseas transac-

tions between two foreign parties. The Indian tax department counters that because an Indian asset changed hands, Vodafone should have paid capital gains taxes on the deal.

“Just because you entered into a transaction in Hong Kong and the shares are owned by some Cayman Islands company, it doesn’t mean you are not dealing with an Indian asset,” tax department attorney B.M. Chatterjee said in an interview.

India generated just 7 percent of Vodafone’s group revenues in the year ended March, but with over 100 million subscribers - a third of the group’s total Vodafone’s fast-growing India business is a key long term asset, according to Moody’s analyst Ivan Palacios. The timing of Vodafone’s huge tax bill could not have been worse. —AP

JetPrivilege inks partnership with ‘the leading hotels of the world’ MUMBAI: In an endeavor to offer its members an enhanced lifestyle experience, Jet Airways’ JetPrivilege, India’s largest frequent flyer programme, has entered into a partnership with The Leading Hotels of the World.

With this, JetPrivilege members may now earn JPMiles at several leading hotels in key cities including those located in cities where Jet Airways flies to, which are part of The Leading Hotels of the World - the largest international luxury hotel brand in the world.

These include the Al Maha Resort & Spa (Dubai), Banyan Tree Bangkok, Capella Singapore, The Pierre - a Taj Hotel (New York), The Ritz London and participating hotels of the TAJ Hotels, Resorts and Palaces, to name a few.

Effective September 01, 2010, JetPrivilege members will be able to earn 1,000 JPMiles on qualifying reservations and stays as part of the regular offer. During the festive season between September 1 to December 31, 2010 members will earn 2,000 bonus JPMiles as a part of the launch offer thus enabling them to earn 3,000 JPMiles during the offer period.

To enjoy the privileges of this partnership, JetPrivilege members must initiate the booking process through the exclusive booking link www.lhw.com/jetairways or call on India toll free reservations number: 000800-650-1240 or the local Leading Hotels of The World contact numbers.

Commenting on the partnership, Mr Sudheer Raghavan, Chief

Commercial Officer, Jet Airways, said, “Guest delight is at the core of Jet Airways’ strategy to offer better value creation for its JetPrivilege members. This partnership positions us among the leading airline frequent flyer programmes in India with the high value it offers members and the wide range of product choices.

This is an effort to create an exceptional experience and will result in creating a strong relationship based on trust and reliability with JetPrivilege members.”

“We are delighted to have developed this strategic partnership with Jet Airways’ JetPrivilege frequent flyer programme ,” said Philip Ho, Vice President, Asia Pacific The Leading Hotels of the World.

“Opportunities to engage with likeminded premium brands are of huge value to us; it means we can go above and beyond customer expectations providing them with a number of valueadded services.

Given Jet Airways’ extensive route network and the high propensity of its guests to travel, it is a natural partner for a brand like Leading Hotels.”

The Leading Hotels of the World, Ltd. is the prestigious luxury hospitality organization representing more than 450 of the world’s finest hotels, resorts and spas, with properties around the world and is the operator of www.lhw.com and www.lhwspas.com - the online sources for your luxury lifestyle.

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BUSINESS

Thursday, September 9, 2010

GLOBAL DAILY MARKET REPORT

KSE stocks close up 3.7 pts KUWAIT: KSE stocks ended in positive territory, although National Bank of Kuwait tumbles from Monday’s 23-month high as investors book profits in Kuwait banks stocks ahead of a long weekend to mark Eid Al-Fitr.

Market Indices Global General Index (GGI) closed 0.31 points up (0.15 percent) during the day at 208.31 point as the Market capitalization was up for the day reaching KD34.44mn. On the other side, Kuwait Stock Exchange Price Index managed to close up gaining a 3.70 point (0.05 percent) to its value and closed at 6,757.1 point.

Market Breadth During the session, 102 companies were traded.

Market breadth was skewed towards advancers as 39 equities advanced versus 28 that retreated, while 145 stocks remained unchanged during the trading session.

Daily Trading Activity Trading activities ended on a negative note today as volume of shares traded on the exchange decreased by 17.88 percent to reach 107.30mn shares, and value of shares traded decreased by 49.61 percent to stand at KD24.27mn.

The Service Sector was the volume leader today, accounting for 33.37 percent of total shares and the Service Sector was the value leader, with 39.07 percent of total traded value.

Abyaar Real Estate Development Co. was the volume leader today, with a total

Carrefour announces winners of Summer Fiesta promotion

traded volume of 10.64mn shares.

Mobile Telecommunication Co. (ZAIN) was the value leader, with a total traded value of KD5.05mn.

In terms of top gainers, Abyaar Real Estate Development Co. was the biggest gainer for the day, adding 7.55 percent and closed at KD0.0285. On the other hand, Mena Real Estate Company was the biggest decliner, dropping by 4.65 percent and closed at KD0.041.

Sectors Wise The advance was broad-

based with 4 out of 8 sectors closing in positive territory.

Services stocks spearheaded advancers, clocking 0.98 percent in sector gains. Mobile Telecommunication Co. (ZAIN) added 1.59 percent, Agility Company was up by 1.09 percent, whilst Kuwait & Gulf Link Transport Co. added 4.76 percent.

Real Estate stocks inched higher by 0.42 percent. Al Dar National Real Estate was a remarkable gainer during the session, going up by 4.76 percent.

On the down side, investors book profits in

Kuwait banks stocks ahead of a long weekend to mark Eid Al-Fitr, with only Kuwait Finance House (KFH) ended in green territory. The scrips traded 2.27mn shares via 144 deals, the stock rose 1.72 percent.

On the otherhand, Global’s special indices closed in positive note.

Global High Yield Index ended the day up by 1.13 percent.

Oil News The price of OPEC basket of twelve crudes stood at $73.02 a barrel on Tuesday, compared with US$73.46 the

previous day, according to OPEC Secretariat calculations.

Corporate News Kuwait’s cabinet has passed a draft decree appointing the director of the country’s stock exchange as the head of the new stock market regulator, state news agency KUNA reported yesterday. The draft decree appoints Saleh al-Falah as chairman of the regulator’s board of commissioners, minister of trade and industry Ahmad alHaroun was quoted by KUNA as saying.

KUWAIT: Carrefour Kuwait announced the winners of Summer Fiesta promotion which awarded five lucky raffle entrants with a Nissan Altima 2010.

The winners were Ms Yang Chan, Mahmoud Othman, Abdul Nizar, Abdul Rida Mohamed and Abou Bacher.

The Promotion which ran from 30 June to 19 August 2010 provided customers with one raffle coupon for every KD.5 spent at Carrefour Hypermarket in Kuwait, with one vehicle being raffled every 10 days.

The prize draws were conducted in the presence of a representative of the Ministry

of Commerce and Mr. Philippe Leroy on behalf of MAF Hypermarkets who serves as general manager for Carrefour Kuwait.

Leroy said: “When we set out to create this year’s Summer Fiesta promotion, the overarching objective was to make it accessible to everyone, as well as give each entry more than one chance of winning this exciting grand prize.

The results have been outstanding and demonstrate the great relationship we enjoy with our customers in Kuwait.”

He said promotions such as the Summer Fiesta prize draw are an expression of apprecia-

tion to loyal customers.

“Carrefour Hypermarkets strive to provide the best experience to our customers. This include giving our customers the most value for their purchases and the best choices available in the market.”

With such a valuable prize being distributed every 10 days, the Summer Fiesta 2010 is also one of the biggest prizes awarded by the Hypermarket brand in Kuwait and demonstrates the brand’s leadership in the market as well as its accessibility to customers through strategically located outlet at The Avenues Mall where the majority of Kuwaiti citizens and residents go to shop.

China Mobile shares down HONG KONG: China Mobile shares tumbled yesterday as frenzied trading in the telecoms giant accounted for nearly half the value of Hong Kong’s trading activity.

The drop came after Britain’s Vodafone, the world’s biggest mobile operator by revenue, unloaded its 3.2 percent stake in China Mobile, worth about 50.9 billion Hong Kong dollars (6.55 billion US dollars).

Turnover in China Mobile shares totalled 58.84 billion Hong Kong dollars, while the city’s exchange posted total turnover Wednesday of 118.81 billion Hong Kong dollars.

Investors exchanged 743 million China Mobile shares yesterday, about 37 times the pre-

vious day’s total, with the stock down 3.78 percent to close at 78.9 Hong Kong dollars.

Vodafone said late Tuesday that it sold its stake in the Chinese mobile giant but would continue its commercial and technology cooperation, despite the divestment.

Vodafone initially bought a 2.18 percent stake in China Mobile in 2000 when it announced a strategic alliance with the group, and then increased its shareholding to 3.2 percent in 2002. About 70 percent of the sale proceeds will be returned to shareholders through a share buyback, with the remainder earmarked for reducing Vodafone’s debt of about 50 billion US dollars. —AFP

BUSINESS

Thursday, September 9, 2010

25

Gold settles at record high amid economic fears NEW YORK: Gold prices settled at a record high following renewed worries about European banks and the global economy.

Gold for December delivery added $8.20 to settle at $1,259.30 an ounce after reaching $1,261.60 earlier in the day. Its record high settlement price was $1,258.30 an ounce, although it has reached an intraday high of $1,266.50 an ounce. Both occurred in late June. Some analysts believe gold could

rise even higher in the months ahead as investors use the asset as a hedge against riskier bets and as more people buy gold during the fall festival season in India.

IG Markets analyst Dan Cook speculated gold could reach $1,295 an ounce to $1,300 an ounce this fall. He noted gold prices have risen in September in all but three of the past 15 years.

Investors focused on reports that raised

concerns about the global economy.

European Union finance ministers acknowledged the recovery remains fragile, and news reports said European banks may have more risky government debt on their books than previously disclosed.

A Wall Street Journal report claimed European “stress tests” of 91 banks in July understated some lenders’ holdings of potentially risky debt. The Financial Times

said Germany’s top 10 banks will have to raise as much as §105 billion ($135 billion) to meet new capital requirements.

“Against that backdrop, I think you’ll continue to see strong investment demand for gold as a hedge,” CPM Group analyst Carlos Sanchez said.

The combined report also hit other commodities, which ended the day on a mixed note.

In metals contracts for December delivery, silver slipped 3.5 cents to settle at $19.914 an ounce and copper lost 2.95 cents to $3.4705 a pound.

September palladium fell $7.45 to settle at $521.60 an ounce and October platinum settled down $4.80 at $1,556.30 an ounce.

Energy contracts were mixed.

In October contracts on the New York Mercantile Exchange, benchmark crude fell

51 cents to settle at $74.09 a barrel; heating oil added 1.7 cents to $2.0743 a gallon, gasoline rose 1.34 cents to settle at $1.9329 a gallon and natural gas lost 2.7 cents to settle at $3.852 per 1,000 cubic feet.

In grains contracts for December, wheat fell 6 cents to $7.3525 a bushel and corn added 1.75 cents to $4.6625 a bushel.

November soybeans added 17 cents to $10.52 a bushel. — AP

Govt offers mild concessions including on arduous work

Sarkozy holds firm as unions plot next move PARIS: President Nicolas Sarkozy faced dow n French trade unions yesterday, refusing to back dow n on plans to raise the retirement age despite Tuesday’s nationw ide protests against pension reform. In a statement issued shortly before unions met to decide on possible further protests, Sarkozy said he w as asking his government to make some amendments to the pension reform bill, but the rise in the minimum pensionable age w ould stay.

360 Mall supports Bayt Abdullah’s playground event KUWAIT: 360 MALL, Kuwait’s newest and most exciting shopping centre supported Bayt Abdullah’s recent charity ‘Playground Event’organized by Media Production, in the Mall’s exhibition hall. The Playground Event featured games such as stickers installation on to a huge playground canvas at the Hall wall, providing a supervised playground area for children to enjoy a number of activities, including face painting, hair braiding, colouring, decorating cup cakes, as well as interactive lighting and music all generously sponsored by a group of local & International companies. The proceeds of these activities were donated to Bayt Abdullah Children’s Hospice.

Claudia Lopusinska, 360 MALL’s Marketing Manager said: “360 MALL Bayt Abdullah Children’s Hospice is an icon of volunteer and philanthropic involvement. It is focused on providing direct medical relief as well as social and emotional

care for children in Kuwait suffering from incurable illnesses.

360 MALL is committed to making every effort to make projects such as these achieve their full social and humanitarian potential.”

“360 MALL continuously devotes its resources to serve the society and participate in its ongoing development. We are fully committed to organizations and associations such as

KAACH that enhance its role as a socially responsible Kuwaiti leading entity among many diverse groups. 360 MALL has also contributed and patronized many of the government as well as non-profit organizations’ social activities, awareness campaigns, educational and cultural events which aim to strengthen its social interaction across the society,” added Lopusinska.

Skittish investors lift Europe stocks, hit dollar LONDON: World shares were generally weaker yesterday but gaining in Europe, subject to another bout of on-again, off-again investor jitters, this time about European banks.

The dollar hit a 15-year low against the Japanese yen and Wall Street looked set to open higher after suffering more than 1 percent losses in the previous session.

Investors have spent most of the northern hemisphere’s summer trying to buy risk assets such as stocks, but fleeing at the first hint of any trouble. Yesterday’s catalyst-which took MSCI’s main world stock index down 0.1 percent-was a surge of concern about the European financial system. There was little concrete to trigger this, although there are worries that Ireland’s latest efforts to drag its banking system out of crisis point to deeper trouble that will spill over into other sovereigns.

One result was that European shares rebounded from earlier losses, leaving the panEuropean FTSEurofirst up 0.3 percent for a 1.9 percent year-to-date gain.

The day’s trading, however, reflected the skittishness that has dominated markets over the past few months.

“Profits generally from active traders have been pretty soft so they are trying to eke out a positive return but they are also wary of ending

down for the year,” said Jeremy Armitage, head of research at State Street Global Markets.

“They are in a bifurcated mindset. They can’t afford to be long and wrong,” he said.

Such an uncertain climate, meanwhile, would explain why the VIX volatility index remains at relatively benign levels- implying little expectation of major moves.

Japan’s Nikkei closed down 2.18 percent for a 14.4 percent year-to-date loss.

The day’s risk aversion pushed the yen to a fresh 15-year high against the dollar and helped the Swiss franc hit an all-time high versus the euro. Persistent buying from investors seeking a temporary refuge in the yen is testing the Japanese authorities’ pain threshold for strength in their currency.

“There’s been an intensification in verbal rhetoric from Japan but I don’t think they will intervene here. The serious intervention risk comes in below 80 yen,” said Manuel Oliveri, currency strategist at UBS in Zurich.

Finance Minister Yoshihiko Noda repeated his warning that he would take decisive action if necessary.

The dollar fell as far as 83.34 yen, down 0.5 percent on the day and its cheapest since 1995 when it struck an all-time low around 79.75. It later recovered towards 84.00. — Reuters

“There is no question of going back on this,” Sarkozy said. “Working a little longer is the most reasonable path.”

Union leaders have warned of an escalation after strikes and massive street marches on Tuesday against the rise in the minimum retirement age to 62 from 60, rallying support as workers’ fears grow about austerity across Europe.

Sarkozy said he would ask ministers to amend the pension reform bill before parliament, which also raises to 67 from 65 the age at which people are entitled to retire on a full pension in a plan to balance the system’s finances by 2018.

However, rather than affecting the bill’s chief elements, the changes would accommodate complaints about the impact on people in particularly gruelling jobs, those who started working very early in life, and people relying on many different pensions schemes.

The tone of Sarkozy’s statement suggested that he is ready to give ground on non-core issues, but he is also willing to face down the unions on what many consider the hallmark reform of his five-year presidency. He faces elections in early 2012.

The CFDT, one of the country’s two biggest unions, called the government’s concessions mild and makeshift, saying Sarkozy was not resolving the core problems of the reform.

“Clearly, further action is needed,” it said in a statement.

The government has repeatedly said it will stand firm on what it considers the essential points. “When some people say the reform must be withdrawnthat’s simply not possible,” Xavier Bertrand, head of Sarkozy’s ruling UMP party said.

The government unveiled the reform bill in June. Without the changes, the pay-as-you-go pension system would run up annual deficits of 100 billion euros ($128 billion) by 2050, it says.

Heartened by the biggest strikes since 2003, the unions met yesterday to discuss their next step.

They say Tuesday’s protests in well over 100 cities drew a turnout of 2.5-2.7 million people while the official count is 1.12 million. Either way, the turnout was significantly bigger than for a previous protest in June and large enough for unions to try to press their case further.

The protests and strikes halved national rail services, disrupted underground train services in Paris and led to cancellation of a quarter of flights at Paris airports.

Francois Chereque, head of the large CFDT union, has floated the idea of more protests on Sept. 15, the day the reform bill is due to go to a first vote in the lower house of parliament.

Another possibility is Sept.

18, which being a Saturday could help to muster more support from private sector employees who are generally more reluctant to strike.

With the government aiming to pass the reform before the end of October, it leaves the unions little time to manoeuvre.

Opinion polls show twothirds of voters think Sarkozy’s plan is unfair, but two-thirds think strikes will make no difference. “There is no question of letting anybody distort the reform, as it would imperil the rebalancing of our pensions,” Sarkozy said. — Reuters

PARIS: Demonstrator holds a banner reading “Get Out” showing President Nicolas Sarkozy, left, and Labor Minister Eric Woerth during the demonstration, in Paris. French unions challenged unpopular President Nicolas Sarkozy with a major nationwide strike over plans to raise the retirement age from 60 to 62, cutting service on trains, planes, buses and subways. — AP

All-new 2011 Cadillac CTS Coupe, CTS-V Coupe set the standard with uncompromising design DUBAI: Later this month, Cadillac will be unveiling the 2011 CTS Coupe and CTS-V Coupe, the latest and most dramatic of the brand’s series of new designs to reach production.

Arriving acrosss the region in September 2010, the CTS Coupe is a new luxury sports coupe designed to become the centerpiece of the brand’s lineup.

The stunning concept car, which the production version Coupes are based on, made its regional debut at the 10th Dubai International Motor Show in December 2009, where it was revealed to great fanfare.

“We pride ourselves on the Cadillac brand’s ability to maintain a balance of design, performance and technology,” said Fadi Ghosn, Marketing Director at GM Middle East, “and we are excited to raise the bar and further develop on these brand characteristics in the CTS Coupe and CTS-V Coupe, especially as we make it available to the customers in the Middle East.”

The Cadillac CTS Coupe originally emerged as a proposal inside Cadillac’s dedicated design studio, where designers developed and evolved the brand’s Art and Science philoso-

phy, and so the path to production for the 2011 Cadillac CTS Coupe & CTS-V Coupe was rapid.

Building on the extraordinary success of the CTS Sport

Sedan and the 556 - horsepower CTS - V, the CTS Coupe and CTS - V Coupe join Cadillac’s lineup as the brand continues to make in-roads into the entry luxury segment.

ing LG’s leadership in mobile convergence.”

This unique media file-sharing technology will be embedded in upcoming LG Optimus 7 smartphones, which go on sale early in the fourth quarter of this year. With more than 240 leading consumer electronics brands

adopting the media sharing technology, DLNA is expected to set a new industry standard for home entertainment.

LG is demonstrating this DLNA-based multimedia sharing feature at the LG booth at IFA in Berlin, Germany from September 3-7, 2010.

LG introduces a new era of entertainment sharing KUWAIT: LG Electronics (LG) is showcasing a major breakthrough in mobile and home convergence at this year’s IFA trade show in Berlin. The new technology makes it possible to share multimedia files on LG’s upcoming LG Optimus 7 and all DLNA* compliant digital devices at the touch of a finger.

LG’s unique multimedia sharing technology on LG Optimus 7 allows users to enjoy content on the phone across today’s digital platforms with a simple finger flick. This preinstalled feature allows users to send files directly from the phone’s media galleries, without having to leave for another application. The

phone will automatically display compatible devices in the same Wi-Fi zone and let users literally flick media files to the targeted device. Users can transfer multimedia saved on their phones — 720p HD videos, high-resolution photos and high-quality music files — wirelessly to their TV or home theatre system.

“This unique feature is a direct response to the growing need for technologies that empower users to share multimedia content across electronic devices,” said Mr H.S. Paik, President of LG Gulf FZE. “LG Optimus 7 smartphones will be at the center of a complete entertainment experience, represent-

BUSINESS

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

Americans face fading dream of home ownership WASHINGTON: For many Americans the long-cherished dream of home ownership was dashed by the financial crisis, but upcoming government reforms may make it even more difficult to secure that picket-fenced home.

After overhauling Wall Street and the US health care system President Barack Obama’s administration will-by January 2011 — tackle rules that have underpinned the housing industry for decades.

Obama’s main tool for change is a shift in the policies of huge governmentbacked lenders that have provided mortgages for millions of middle-class

Americans since the 1930s, but which recently needed bailouts worth hundreds of billions of dollars to stay afloat.

How the Treasury Department intends to reform the housing market is unclear.

But one thing is certain: the state will no longer sustain home ownership rates at levels seen before the crisis.

With the creation of lenders Fannie Mae and later Freddie Mac, as they are commonly known, successive governments have fostered home ownership.

Ownership rates saw almost constant growth between 1940 and 2004, with a blip in the 1980s when interest rates rose

prohibitively.

According to the historian and sociologist Thomas Sugrue, “every generation has offered its own version of the claim that owner-occupied homes are the nation’s saving grace.

“During the Cold War, home ownership was moral armor, protecting America from dangerous outside influences.”

As William Levitt, the father of suburbia, once claimed: “no man who owns his own house and lot can be a Communist.”

Later, in the Bill Clinton era, home ownership was seen as an important element in achieving personal fulfillment,

neighborhood stability and crime prevention.

But as millions of Americans struggle to pay monthly bills, the crisis has kicked up a painful realization that not every American might be qualified to own their own home.

That realization has forged Obama’s approach, which is likely to break with the notion of a “home ownership society” supported by successive presidents across party lines.

In 1994 Democratic president Bill Clinton set a target of having 67.5 percent of occupants own their homes by 2000.

Wall Street up as fears for European economy ease

NEW YORK: In this Aug. 11, 2010 file photograph, specialist Patrick Murphy, left, works at his post on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. Stock futures rose slightly yesterday, as investors try to brush off fresh worries about the health of European banks. — AP

NEW YORK: US stocks were slightly up yesterday after news of a successful Portuguese debt auction eased the previous day’s concerns about the European economy.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 60.17 points (0.58 percent) to 10,400.86 at 1410 GMT, while the broader S&P 500 index gained 6.28 points (0.56 percent) to 1,097.91 points.

The tech-rich Nasdaq composite index was up 15.55 points (0.69 percent) to 2,224.16.

Wall Street closed with losses on Tuesday, with the Dow losing 107 points after traders returning from a long weekend holiday cashed in on last week’s robust gains amid concerns over the European banking system.

But Portugal’s bond auction on Wednesday eased concerns over the strength of the eurozone, said Joseph Hargett, analyst at Schaeffer’s Investment research.

Traders are waiting for the release at 1800 GMT of the Federal Reserve’s beige book, a summary of current economic conditions, which will offer further indications on how the US economy is faring.

At around the same time, President Barack Obama is expected to unveil in a speech in Cleveland, Ohio his two-year plan for 200 billion dollar tax cuts for businesses as he struggles to show progress in his efforts to battle the economic downturn ahead of November’s mid-term elections.

“Conviction is still low, pessimism high and volume light, which adds up to more volatility and range bound trading in our estimation,” said Scott Marcouiller, an analyst at Wells Fargo.

Among the stocks in focus, BP shares were almost three percent higher after it said in its much-anticipated report on the Gulf of Mexico oil spill that it was caused by human and technical failures by BP and other sides.

Computer giant Hewlett-Packard saw its stocks drop 2.23 percent after it had filed suit against former CEO Mark Hurd after he was named a co-president at US business software giant Oracle.

The bond market was slightly lower.

The yield on the 10-year US Treasury bond jumped to 2.648 percent from 2.609 percent on Tuesday while that on the 30-year bond was up to 3.711 percent from 3.669 percent. Bond yield and prices move in opposite directions. — AFP

The goal was reached and taken further by his Republican successor George W. Bush who vowed to expand “home ownership for all Americans.”

The ownership rate rose to a peak of 69.2 percent in late 2004, according to figures from the Census Bureau.

But that figure has retreated dramatically with the crisis.

According to a recent study by the Federal Reserve, the 67.2-percent-rate of home ownership seen at the end of 2009 may actually inflated by around 5.6 percent, as some homes are in reality owned by banks rather than their occupants.

That would make current home ownership levels the lowest since the 1960s.

And the writing may be on the wall for further declines.

A move to overhaul Fannie and Freddie could further reduce access to capital for the less well-off, dampening a dream which has been embossed on the American political and social landscape for decades.

“To be clear, the government’s footprint in the housing market needs to be smaller than it is today,” Shaun Donovan, Obama’s head of housing policy, recently remarked. — AFP

Canada’s central bank hikes interest rate to one percent OTTAWA: The Bank of Canada raised its key interest rate by one-quarter percentage point to one percent yesterday, the third bump in as many months.

The rate hike was largely expected, after the central bank began raising rates in June from a historic low amid signs of an economic rebound.

As the economy now appears to be recovering more slowly than expected, the central bank hinted it would hold back on further rate hikes in the near term.

The global economic recovery “remains uneven, balancing strong activity in emerging market economies with weak growth in some advanced economies,” the bank said in a statement.

In Canada, economic activity in the second quarter was “slightly softer” than the central bank had expected, it said.

Going forward, growth in consumer spending is expected to “remain solid” and business investment to “rise strongly.”

“The bank now expects the economic recovery in Canada to be slightly more gradual than it had projected in its July monetary policy report, largely reflecting a weaker profile for US activity.”

With inflation on target, and financial conditions in Canada modestly tightened but still “exceptionally stimulative,” the Bank of Canada said any further rate reduction “would need to be carefully considered in light of the unusual uncertainty surrounding the outlook.”

Canada was the first G7 nation to increase lending rates after the global economic crisis of 2008, after having lowered its key lending rate rapidly through 2008 and early 2009 to its “lowest possible level.” — AFP

German industrial output edges higher in July FRANKFURT: German industrial output edged 0.1 percent higher in July from the June level, adjusted data showed yesterday after a sharp drop in orders suggested that the economy could be cooling down.

Analysts polled by Dow Jones Newswires had forecast a gain of 1.0 percent in industrial output.

The economy ministry confirmed that this measure of output had slipped by 0.6 percent in June.

The data indicated that Europe’s biggest economy was slowing down slightly following record quarterly

growth of 2.2 percent in the second quarter of the year.

“It was to be expected that industrial production assumed a more moderate rhythm,” an economy ministry statement said.

UniCredit economist Alexander Koch said: “The best of the industrial rebound lies behind us. The recent outstanding performance was not sustainable.”

The economy ministry forecast however that “the process of industrial recovery would continue, though at a slower pace.”

On Tuesday, the figure for German industrial orders in July dropped sharply after a strong rise the month before.

Orders fell by 2.2 percent on the month, ministry data showed, following an upwardly revised gain of 3.6 percent in June.

A breakdown of the industrial production data showed that output of industrial goods stagnated but that construction advanced by 0.9 percent.

“The third quarter has started on a negative note as the first batch of real economic data brought back a good

dose of realism,” ING senior economist Carsten Brzeski commented.

“However, there is no need to panic,” he added.

“Leading indicators, richly filled order books, the drop in short-work schemes and anecdotal evidence of labour shortages all point towards a renewed pick-up in industrial production in the coming months.”

Germany officially expects its economy to expand 1.4 percent this year but many economists and the central bank have mooted a level closer to 3.0 percent. — AFP

Employee-owned business model offers greater resilience: Research KUWAIT: Businesses owned by their employees have proved more resilient than other companies in the downturn, according to new research by Cass Business School. The study also reveals that employee owned businesses (EOBs) tend to create new jobs more quickly and typically outperform those companies in which employees do not have an ownership stake.

The research was conducted by Joseph Lampel, Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship, and Dr Ajay Bhalla, senior lecturer in Information and Knowledge Management, at Cass Business School, London. The findings were based on a survey of more than 60 senior executives, and financial data from more than 250 firms.

“The advantage for EOBs comes from taking a stakeholder rather than a shareholder view of management.

Employees who have a stake in the company they work for are more committed to delivering quality and more flexible in responding to the needs of the business,” said Dr Bhalla.

In Britain businesses wholly or substantially owned by their staff are estimated to turn over £25 billion a year, or about two per cent of the UK GDP. In the Middle East employee owned businesses are less common due to the local ownership regulations. However, some international companies such as leading management, engineering and development consultancy Mott

Joseph Lampel

Dr Ajay Bhalla

MacDonald have extended their EOB model to the Middle East, where they are experiencing much success.

Paul Looker, from Mott MacDonald comments: “In the Middle East at present many of our publicly owned competitors have been under stress with their stock market positions, so being str uctured as an employee owned business has been a major benefit for us.”

“The EOB model has aided our growth in this market, as expansion is financed through the company funds

with a confirmed policy of growth decision making. The model also provided us with more resilience during the economic downturn. We have been able to support our clients through difficult times, with a view to long term business relationships.”

The research documents how EOBs create jobs faster than traditionally structured businesses, with an average increase in employment of nearly 7.5% per annum from 2005-2008, compared with 3.9% in non-EOBs. This rate escalated during the recession (2008-

2009), with 12.9% employment growth in EOBs compared with 2.7% in nonemployee-owned businesses.

From the research, it has also been shown that EOBs are more resilient, with more stable performance over business cycles and less sales variability. From 2005 to 2008, non-EOBs experienced higher average sales growth per annum than EOBs (12.1% vs.

10.0%). However, the average sales growth of EOBs during the recession (2008-2009) was 11.08%, significantly surpassing that of non-EOBs at just 0.61%.

According to Professor L ampel, “Resilience - the ability of firms to sustain employment and growth during difficult economic conditions - has been neglected as a crucial aspect of company per for mance over the past two decades. Instead, business strategy and public policy have been dominated by an unremitting focus on maximising share value. In the current economic conditions, business leaders and policy makers should be looking again at the resilience associated with the employee ownership model - and how it could benefit economies as a whole.”

T h e n e w re s e a rc h a l s o re v e a l s some key barriers to the growth of employee-owned companies, including how to retain the advantage of a potentially more committed workforce, as the business grows bigger and more complex.

STOCKHOLM: Sweden’s Finance Minister Anders Borg talks with the foreign media during a press conference at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs in Stockholm yesterday. Economic growth in the Scandinavian country accelerated in the second quarter by 4.6 percent on a 12-month comparison, and by 1.9 percent compared to output in the previous quarter, according to revised numbers from the national statistics agency.— AFP

Christchurch quake may have silver lining for NZ economy WELLINGTON: The earthquake that devastated Christchurch may help, rather than hinder, economic growth by triggering a construction spree as New Zealand tries to shake off the effects of recession, analysts say.

While no one died in Saturday’s 7.0-magnitude quake, economic activity in the city has ground to a halt as authorities enforce a no-go zone in parts considered unsafe to enter due to danger from falling debris.

The quake damaged an estimated 100,000 homes, tore up roads and smashed infrastructure such as water and sewage pipes, creating a repair bill officials estimate will reach four billion New Zealand dollars (2.7 billion US).

Yet the benchmark NZX-50 share index rose steadily when trading resumed after the disaster, lifting more than two percent on Monday and Tuesday.

Construction firms such as Fletcher Building and steel products manufacturer Steel & Tube were the biggest gainers as investors looked to an increase in building activity as the clean-up gathers pace.

“The local economy is likely to get a substantial boost from reconstruction activity that will be much larger than the initial income loss,” Westpac economists said in a briefing note.

Analysts said billions of dollars being pumped into earthquake repairs could lift the economy as it slowly recovers from a recession that began in early 2008 and extended into the second quarter of 2009 . “In many ways it couldn’t have come at a better time, although that’s an awful way to describe it,” BNZ senior economist Craig Egbert said.

Egbert said retailers could also benefit as homeowners and wholesalers replenished damaged goods, although he warned the disaster’s scale made economic modelling difficult.

But Nick Tuffley, an economist at ASB Bank, said there were international precedents for cataclysmic natural events lifting economic activity.

“Overseas experiences suggest national GDP (gross domestic product) could be weak in the third quarter. However, reconstruction activity will subsequently boost GDP, potentially by 1.5 percentage points,” Tuffley said.

Westpac said natural disaster were most dangerous to an economy when it was performing strongly.

“When the economy is running below capacity-as is the case today, and especially in the construction sector-the temporary boost to demand can be a substantial boost to GDP,” the bank said.

It pointed out that New Zealand’s most destructive earthquake, at Napier in 1931 and which killed 256 people, occurred during the Great Depression and helped spur growth.

Economists agreed that the Reserve Bank of New Zealand was set to keep interest rates on hold at 3.0 percent as it assesses the quake’s impact.

“The RBNZ will seek to shore up confidence in the first instance, so any remaining chance of a rate hike in the September monetary policy statement has been eliminated,” Westpac said.

Egbert said there was still uncertainty about the quake’s effect, particularly since the government was about to introduce changes to its existing consumption tax and one of the country’s biggest non-bank lenders, South Canterbury Finance, went into receivership this month.

“The data was always going to be volatile, this just adds a whole layer of uncertainty to that,” he said. — AFP

TECHNOLOGY

Thursday, September 9, 2010

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Two thirds of Internet users hit by cybercrime: Norton SAN FRANCISCO: Computer security firm Symantec yesterday reported that about two thirds of the world’s Internet users have fallen victim to cybercrime and few think crooks will be caught. China was tops when it came to online victims, with 83 percent of Internet users there having been hit by computer viruses,

identity theft, online credit card fraud or other crimes, according to a Norton Cybercrime Report.

Brazil and India were tied for second place with 76 percent, while the United States was next in line with 73 percent. While victims admitted to feeling furious and cheated, they were reluctant to take action because

they felt efforts would be futile, according to a study by Symantec consumer division Norton. Reporting cybercrime is critical, because some times larger patterns can be pieced together by police fielding reports that, individually, appear minor.

“Cybercriminals purposely steal small amounts to remain undetected,

but all of these add up,” said Adam Palmer, Norton lead cyber security advisor. “If you fail to report a loss, you may actually be helping the criminal stay under the radar.” A tendency by people to accept cybercrime was in part due to “learned helplessness,” according to Joseph LaBrie, an associate professor of psychology at

Loyola Marymount University.

“It’s like getting ripped off at a garage-if you don’t know enough about cars, you don’t argue with the mechanic,” LaBrie said. “People just accept a situation, even if it feels bad.” The study revealed some moral gray zones; nearly half of those interviewed thought it was legal to down-

load a single digital CD or movie without paying. Some 24 percent of those surveyed saw nothing wrong with secretly reading someone else’s email messages or Web browsing history.

“People resist protecting themselves and their computers because they think it’s too complicated,” said

Anne Collier, co-director of ConnectSafely.org, a US non-profit group that collaborated with Norton on the study. “But everyone can take simple steps, such as having up-todate, comprehensive security software in place. In the case of online crime, an ounce of prevention is worth a ton of cure.”—AFP

Personal vendettas to blame for charges

WikiLeaks founder says rape charges clear set-up STOCKHOLM: WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange insisted in an interview with AFP Tuesday that the rape charges against him in Sweden are part of “a clear set-up,” marked by “personal vendettas” and the prosecutor’s “careerism.” “The only victim here is me,” stressed the 39-year-old Australian spokesman of the whistleblower website notorious for having

SAN FRANCISCO: In this Oct 24, 2006 file photo shows then, Hewlett Packard CEO Mark Hurd gestures during a keynote address at the Oracle Open World conference in San Francisco. —AP

HP sues ex-CEO Hurd over new job at rival Oracle SAN FRANCISCO: Hewlett-Packard Co. is suing the chief executive it ousted last month, Mark Hurd, to stop him from taking a top job at rival Oracle Corp. The lawsuit, filed Tuesday in a California state court, came a day after Oracle hired Hurd as co-president to help lead the database software maker’s efforts to steal business from HP. HP claims that Hurd won’t be able to perform his job at Oracle without spilling HP’s trade secrets and violating a confidentiality agreement. This type of complaint isn’t unusual in the technology world, nor is the confidentiality agreement that Hurd had signed as part of a severance package from HP that could top $40 million.

Technology companies often require such agreements because workers walk out the door with valuable technical information. But the stakes are higher with Hurd than a rank-and-file employee, and the lawsuit may delay when Hurd could start his new job. The latest lawsuit shows the growing rancor between HP and Oracle.

The companies have worked together for 25 years to make sure that their products work well together. But that relationship is straining now that Oracle, like HP, sells the computer servers that power companies’ back offices. Oracle got that business through its $7.4 billion purchase of Sun Microsystems last year.

Oracle is mostly known for its database software, which many people use every day but likely don’t know it, such as when they’re pulling money out of a bank or booking a flight. The software helps companies organize and access their data. It essentially gives them a map to all their information, so their computers know exactly where to find things. Oracle is the world’s No. 1 database software maker, and with the Sun business, Oracle is now among the world’s top seller of servers, as is HP. As HP’s CEO for five years, a stint that ended after a sexual-harassment investigation, Hurd was responsible for preparing HP’s strategic plans and has intimate details about HP’s profit margins and special deals it has offered customers, according to HP’s lawsuit. HP also insisted that Hurd was privy to a “highly confidential” analysis of Oracle’s competitiveness against HP. “Hurd’s actions are a serious threat to HP’s business,” HP lawyers wrote in the lawsuit, which was filed in California Superior Court for

Santa Clara County. Unless stopped, HP said, Hurd would diminish the value of HP’s trade secrets, hurt customer relationships and “give Oracle a strategic advantage as to where to allocate or not allocate resources and exploit the knowledge of HP’s strengths and weaknesses.”

Hurd and Oracle declined to comment. These types of cases often end up with a court ordering disputed executives to stay away from certain parts of their new employers’ businesses. Hurd’s deep involvement with all aspects of HP’s businesses could complicate his case.

Still, the lawsuit may only delay Oracle’s ability to put Hurd to work. “In the end, it is likely going to be difficult for HP to prevail,” said Kenneth Freeman, dean of Boston University’s School of Management. “It’s usually a very difficult area to enforce.” HP itself was on the other end of this type of case last year, after it hired David Donatelli, a veteran of the data-storage industry, from EMC Corp. HP was temporarily prohibited from letting Donatelli start work as an executive vice president because of a lawsuit by EMC. A court later ruled that Donatelli could work for HP, but under certain restrictions that split up some of his responsibilities.

Hurd resigned from HP last month after an investigation uncovered inaccurate expense reports connected with Hurd’s outings with an actress and HP contractor named Jodie Fisher, who later claimed that her work helping organize HP events dried up after she rebuffed Hurd’s advances. Hurd, 53, who is married with two children, denies making any advances on Fisher.

Hurd also insists he didn’t prepare his own expenses and didn’t try to conceal his outings with Fisher, which often included dinner after the events Fisher helped organize and that Hurd attended. Ellison loudly came to Hurd’s defense after Hurd was forced out of HP last month.

Ellison has said the HP board’s decision to publicly disclose the harassment claim against Hurd amounted to “cowardly corporate political correctness,” as the board had found that Hurd didn’t violate the company’s sexual-harassment policies. HP has emphasized that its board voted unanimously for Hurd’s resignation. Shares of HP, which is based on Palo Alto, fell 42 cents, or 1 percent, to close Tuesday at $39.92. Shares of Oracle, based in Redwood City, increased $1.34, or 5.9 percent, to $24.26. —AP

Craigslist quiet on fate of adult services section SAN FRANCISCO: Connecticut’s top law enforcement official on Tuesday called for online classifieds website Craigslist to confirm that it has permanently closed its “adult services” listings. Craigslist has remained quiet as to why it replaced the section tab with a “censored” label in the United States over the weekend.

The move did not appear to affect non-US sites, which continued to feature listings for “erotic services.” Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal, an ardent Craigslist critic, tentatively took partial credit for the editing of the website but sought assurances that adult services ads had been banished.

“In apparent response to pressure and appeals from attorneys general, advocacy groups, victims and public outrage, Craigslist has shut down the Adult Services Section of its website,” Blumenthal said in a

statement. “This step is exactly what we requested, and I commend Craigslist for heeding our call, but significant questions remain.”

Craigslist’s blog offered no explanation for the changes.

Blumenthal sent a letter to Craigslist, urging it to promise that adult services ads were gone for good and that sexually graphic references will be purged from personal ads and other sections of the website.

Craigslist shut down the erotic services section of its website in May in the United States, replacing it with the adult services section. It pledged that all listings under the renamed section would be manually reviewed.

The website-which offers users free and paid advertising for everything from houses to babysitters to furniture for salehas been under pressure for months from state law enforcement officials over some of its

listings. The popular website has faced accusations that its erotic or adult services listings have facilitated prostitution, including cases where sex workers were trafficked and exploited.

In August, a group of state attorneys called on Craigslist chief executive Jim Buckmaster and the company’s founder, Craig Newark, to remove the renamed adult services section.

Blumenthal is a leader of that alliance, which he said had grown to 21 attorneys general.

“Craigslist is committed to being socially responsible, and when it comes to adult services ads,” Craigslist chief executive Jim Buckmaster wrote in an August 30 blog post.

“We are working intensively as I write this with experts and thought leaders at leading non-profits and among law enforcement on further substantive measures we can take.” —AFP

“This entire rape investigation has been conducted without my input,” he lamented, pointing out that “no one has asked me any questions regarding the rape case. The police refuse to say if there is a warrant out for me or not.” “It’s been two weeks now,” added the lanky former hacker who has been at the heart of a media circus ever since a confusing muddle of rape charges against him were first filed, then withdrawn and then filed again.

It was late in the evening on August 20 that rape allegations from two women led a duty prosecutor to issue an arrest warrant for Assange. Another prosecutor however abruptly withdrew the warrant the next day and cancelled the rape charges a few days later, only to see her decision appealed and the rape case reopened by yet another prosecutor.

Assange admitted to AFP that he had met both women in question, who according to their lawyer are both Swedish and aged between 25 and 35, saying “they were both at my press conference.” However, when asked whether he had had sex with either of the women, he refused to answer, saying it was “a private matter.” The whole case, he said, “is a clear set up by the people involved, the complainants and possibly the Expressen tabloid,” which first broke the story just hours after the initial arrest warrant was issued.

“There is at different stages in the case personal vendettas, there is ideology, there is carreerism ... from the head prosecutor (Marianne Ny) of the most disgusting kind,” he claimed.

The enigmatic Australian, who in the past has charged the allegations against him were part of a Washington-orchestrated “smear campaign” aimed at discrediting WikiLeaks, was Tuesday more cautious about handing out blame beyond Sweden’s borders.

US intelligence services “are probably very happy now,” he said, adding however that “mentioning their involvement is for now only speculation.” “And there’s also circumstantial evidence that there is political involvement but not clear evidence,” he added. Assange said his website now had “two reliable intelligence sources that state that Swedish intelligence was approached last month by the United States and told that Sweden must not be a safehaven for WikiLeaks.”

Regardless of who is behind the allegations, he acknowledged the criminal case against him had caused significant damage to his organization, which is preparing to publish another 15,000 classified US military documents about the war in Afghanistan and to again draw the ire of the Pentagon. Assange, who shortly before the rape allegations first emerged had said WikiLeaks would release the new, even more controversial batch of documents within a few weeks, refused to say Tuesday when he thought they would be published.

“The Swedish case has caused delays, significant delays in all of our projects. It’s been an enormous disruption,” he said.

That does not mean the website is putting its leaking activities on hold. “We have upcoming releases relating to financial fraud, the banking industry and war crimes,” Assange confided. But due to the Swedish charges, the WikiLeaks founder himself has been forced to withdraw from most of the websites activities and reduce his spokesperson role to a minimum. —AFP

recently published nearly 77,000 classified US military documents about Afghanistan. “These accusations are baseless, and the process by which they’ve come out is disturbing,” Assange told AFP in a telephone interview, maintaining that he has decided to stay in Sweden to prove his innocence.

STOCKHOLM: Leif Silbersky, lawyer of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, talks to the media in Stockholm on September 1, 2010. A top Swedish prosecutor said yesterday she would reopen a rape investigation against Assange, overturning a previous ruling to quash a probe of the Australian. —AFP

Sock-pairing robot a promising match for software gurus SAN FRANCISCO: Willow Garage is out to transform the world of robotics with a formula that has helped make stars of Apple gadgets and Facebook. The Northern California company believes that thirdparty applications can do for robots what they did for the iPhone and the world’s top online social networking service.

An open-source ross.org software platform along with a PR2 robot priced at 400,000 dollars combine in a technology mix that lets software savants craft applications to make machines do their bidding.

Willow Garage began selling the robots late Tuesday in what it depicted as a step on the journey to the kinds of personal, affordable robots science fiction writers have long envisioned.

“This is fundamentally going to change the pace of development,” Willow Garage co-director Keenan Wyrobek told AFP. “It

will be a couple of years before robots get priced down to being in the house, but this is an absolutely necessary step to get there.”

University of California, Berkeley, researchers that took part in a test phase got a PR2 to fold towels and match pairs of socks from the laundry. Engineers at German technology giant Bosch had one of the robots sorting and delivering mail to desks in an office.

Students at the University of Pennsylvania had a PR2 “reading” music and playing songs by rock bands U2 and the Beatles using drums and an electric organ.

Video of robots in action was posted online at willowgarage.com/blog. The PR2 is intended to spare researchers from wasting time, effort and resources on building their own robots from scratch.

“Most of the people who want PR2 are

software gurus; crazy good software developers that have some cool app in mind,” Wyrobek said. “We are opening the field to software developers like what happened in the smartphone space, or Facebook and all those social networks.”

PR2 moves about on wheels and has arms with changeable grips. It stands four feet 1.2 meters) tall but has a telescoping spine that lets it rise to 5.5 feet (1.6 meters). The machine also has an array of sensors. “If you have some cool idea you want to develop, it gives you a good starting point,” Wyrobek said.

The robots are assembled in Menlo Park, the California city where Willow Garage was founded in 2006. Proven leaders in the open-source software community can qualify for a reduced price of 280,000 dollars for a robot, according to Willow Garage. —AFP

TOKYO: A woman introduces Microsoft’s new gesture-sensing system for the Xbox 360 videogame console ‘Kinect’ (L/bottom) during a press preview in Tokyo yesterday. Microsoft will sell the “Xbox 360 4GB and Kinect Sensor” package beginning on November 20. —AFP

HEALTH & SCIENCE

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New EU rules on animal testing ban use of apes STRASBOURG: Europe banned the use of great apes in animal testing yesterday as part of drastically tightened rules to scale back the number of animals used in scientific research. After two years of heated debate on how to protect animal welfare without scuppering scientific research, the new limits, updating regulations from 1986, were adopted by the European Parliament despite objections from Green MEPs. Under the new legislations, experiments

on great apes such as chimpanzees, gorillas and orangutans are to be banned and “strict” restrictions set on the use of primates in general. Members of the 27-nation bloc, who are given two years to comply with the rules, also need “to ensure that whenever an alternative method is available, this is used instead of animal testing.” And they must work at “reducing levels of pain inflicted on animals.”

Proponents of the abolition of animal

testing objected that the new rules failed to go far enough. “Animals will still be used as guinea pigs,” said the Greens in a statement.

“They will still suffer pain.” “It is possible to reduce the number of animals used for science without hindering research,” added Belgian Green Isballe Durant.

But Health and Consumer Policy Commissioner John Dalli dubbed it “a good compromise on a difficult topic.” “Today we

have the chance to bring the EU to the forefront by caring for animals and protecting science,” he said. Other MEPs said the demands of scientific research came over and above animal welfare.

“An animal’s an animal and a human being’s a human being,” said Italian conservative Herbert Dorfmann.

“Medical progress is crucial to humanity and unfortunately, to achieve this progress there must be animal testing.” The legislation notably

allows the use of primates in testing illnesses such as Alzheimer’s, cancer or Parkinson’s disease if there is scientific evidence that the research cannot be achieved without using these species.

To avoid repeated suffering by an animal, it lists different categories of pain that may be inflicted during a test (non-recovery, mild, moderate or severe) and proposes that the same animals be reused only if the pain is classed as “moderate,” and provided a vet

is consulted.

At the moment some 12 million animals are used each year in scientific experiments in the EU. The legislation calls for government inspections on a third of national laboratories that use animals, some of which must be unannounced. Last year the European Union banned the testing of animals for developing cosmetics, except for long-running toxicology tests which will be banned altogether in 2013.—AFP

Climate change may add to disaster death tolls Changes may worsen disease after-effects OSLO: Natural disasters are tending to kill fewer people but climate change may add to the toll by unleashing more extreme weather and causing aftereffects such as disease and malnutrition, experts say. Better warnings of cyclones or heat waves and an easing of poverty in developing nations in the past few decades have made many nations better prepared for weather

extremes, helping to curb death tolls. “In terms of actually saving lives we are doing well,” said Diarmid Campbell-Lendrum, a senior expert at the United Nations’ World Health Organization (WHO). “But that’s no guarantee for the future as we see the hazard increasing, particularly things like heat stress where we may not be very well prepared,” he told Reuters.

DHAKA: Amin Amzad, a five-year-old Bangladeshi who has been infected with anthrax, is seen at the Dhaka Medical College hospital in Dhaka. —AFP

Bangladesh anthrax spreads, public panics ahead of Eid DHAKA: Bangladesh has set up anthrax checkpoints at cattle markets as a major outbreak of the disease spreads through the country’s dairy belt, infecting more than 400 people, officials said yesterday. Eight districts have confirmed human and cattle anthrax infections and meat consumption ahead of the Islamic festival of Eid, set to start Friday, has fallen sharply as panicked consumers turn their back on beef, officials said.

“We’re still getting reports of new anthrax infections-the number of cases could soar,” said Mahmudur Rahman, a

director of health ministry. “In one district 66 people were infected in one day,” he said.

The government this week put livestock and health officials on “red alert”, suspended all leave in the livestock department and sent emergency veterinarian teams to affected districts.

Officials have described the outbreak as the biggest in the country’s history, although there have been no deaths so far.

Anthrax is a potentially lethal bacterium that exists naturally in the soil and commonly infects livestock which ingest or inhale its spores while grazing. It can be

transmitted to humans who handle or eat infected animals. Scores of cows have died in the current outbreak, which started August 18, causing panic among farmers and consumers.

The authorities have set up checkpoints across the country in an effort to prevent diseased meat reaching the capital Dhaka, said livestock department deputy director Mosaddek Hossain. “We have sent vets to markets to screen animals. We want to calm the public down. Already meat consumption has declined sharply as panicky consumers are avoiding beef,” he said.—AFP

WUPPERTAL: A keeper feeds two weeks old baby tiger “Schuna” at the zoo in Wuppertal, western Germany. As “Schuna” was not accepted by its mother “Mymosa”, the animal is bottle-fed and brought up by keepers. —AFP

Rising temperatures can aggravate the aftermath of disasters, as well as causing creeping changes from higher temperatures such as disruptions to food production. “Climate change just adds another reason why we should be getting on with controlling malaria, diarrhoea and dealing with the problem of malnutrition,” said CampbellLendrum. “Those are the big challenges.

UN studies project global warming will cause more droughts, wildfires, heat waves, floods, mudslides and rising sea levels-all threats for an increasing human population set to reach 9 billion by 2050 from 6.8 billion now. And it is often the after-effects of natural disasters that are the worst, in terms of extra deaths. Deaths from extreme weather this year such as in Pakistan’s floods “are a warning that we need to renew efforts to bring climate change under control,” said Andrew Haines, director of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

“There is an increased death rate from indirect causes- people become impoverished, so child death rates that are not normally counted rise,” Haines said.

“There might be a substantial under-estimate in the deaths,” he said. Climate change would add to the damaging after-effects of natural disasters.

More than 1,750 people have died in Pakistan’s floods but millions more are at risk of disease.

At least 54 people died from wildfires in Russia in July and August that drove up world grain pricesthreatening malnutrition for the poor. The WHO will issue a report next year updating an initial 2003 study that estimated an extra 150,000 people were dying every year from global warmingmainly from malnutrition, diarrhoea and malaria.

It projected that the toll was set to double by 2030. CampbellLendrum declined to predict the new numbers. “The short-term response is disaster preparedness” to help save lives, said Achim Steiner, head of the UN Environment Programme, pointing to successes in Bangladesh and Cuba in limiting deaths from storms in recent decades.

In Bangladesh, for instance, advance warning and shelters have helped. Cyclone Bhola killed 300,000 people in 1970, while a 1991 cyclone killed 139,000, according to the EMDAT disaster database. In 2007, Cyclone Sidr killed 3,500 people.

Alongside investments in flood defences in Pakistan, or better information about how to cope with heat waves, Steiner said, the long-term solution had to be cuts in greenhouse gases, mainly from burning fossil fuels. “Ultimately it is addressing the fundamental drivers of environmental change which will either lead the world to have increasingly to invest in disaster management or development,” he told Reuters. “That is the choice of this generation.”

Campbell-Lendrum said the WHO’s 2003 study may have under-estimated the impact of inland flooding, such as in Pakistan, and of heat waves such as in Russia. Up to 70,000 people died in Europe in 2003 from a heat wave. He said climate change was an argument to bolster basic health services in poor nations, where 830 million people suffer malnutrition and are most at risk. A changing climate also has both bad and good effects- more people are under threat from heat waves, for instance, but some elderly people also survive better with milder winters.—Reuters

HANNOVER: Elephant baby Dinkar eats salad leaves in its enclosure at the zoo in Hanover, northern Germany on Tuesday. —AFP

Doctors alarmed by HIV risk for European gays PARIS: Homosexual men in Europe are increasingly failing to adhere to safe sex, according to two new studies. In France, transmission of the AIDS virus “seems to be out of control” among men who have sex with men, said a paper published on Thursday in The Lancet Infectious Diseases.

Overall incidence of HIV in France declined from 8,390 new infections in 2003 to 6,940 in 2008, said its lead author, Stephane le Vu of the National Institute for Public Health Surveillance.

But men who have sex with men accounted for 48 percent of new cases and have an infection rate that is 200 times higher than in the heterosexual population, despite a long-running campaign to promote safe sex, le Vu noted. Separately, investigators at Ghent University in Belgium, publishing in the open-access journal BMC Infectious Diseases on Monday, found genetic evidence

pointing to risky behaviour among young white gays. They sequenced the strains of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) from more than 500 patients, male and female, heterosexual and homosexual, who had been newly diagnosed between 2001 and 2009. Genetic profiling revealed “clusters” of closely-related variants among young white homosexual men, pointing to risky sex practises among this minority.

The concerns in Europe mirror those in the United States, where the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate that more than 55,000 new infections occur every year, of which more than half occur among gays. “Data for other for other regions are often difficult to find, but the number of new infections in MSM is very high in most regions of the world,” a commentary published in The Lancet’s journal said.—AFP

West Nile virus kills 3 in Turkey ANKARA: Three Turks have died after contracting the West Nile virus while four others have been infected with the mosquito-borne disease, a Turkish health ministry official said yesterday.

The victims, who lived in the Western provinces of Manisa, Aydin and Isparta, were all elderly and suffered from other serious underlying diseases, Mustafa Ertek, the head of the ministry’ main disease control laboratory, told a press conference here.

Two of those who contracted the virus were receiving treatment in hospital, added. Ertek said

there was no outbreak and no serious threat to public health. “We expect to see either fewer new cases or no new cases since it is autumn and the temperature is dropping,” he added. The virus, transmitted through bites by infected mosquitos, has claimed six lives in Russia, four in Greece and two in Romania.

First discovered in Uganda in 1937, the West Nile virus is indigenous to Africa, Asia, Europe, and Australia and can cause a variety of syndromes, including meningitis and encephalitis, an inflammation of the brain.— AFP

Study highlights new self-harm by teens NEW YORK: American doctors have come across a little-reported form of deliberate self-injury by teenagers-embedding objects ranging from glass to needles to wood under their own skin. In recent years, the problem of “self-harm,” particularly among teens, has received increasing attention in the media and in medical studies. Self-harm refers to self-inflicted injuries that are not intended to be fatal although there is evidence that people who self-harm are more at risk of suicide.

But a new study of children undergoing radiology treatment at the Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, has pointed to another littlerecognized form of self-injury where children embed objects under their own skin. In a report published in the journal Radiology (http://link.reuters.com/nas89n), researchers from the hospital describe the cases of 11 teenagers who were treated to remove foreign objects deliberately implanted through cuts in their skin.

The patients had implanted a total of 76 objectsincluding paper clips, staples, pencil lead and glass fragments — in what the researchers term “selfembedding behavior.” Researcher Dr. William E. Shiels II said this latest report appeared to be the first to describe a series of teenage patients with self-embedding behavior-and the first to detail the successful removal of the implanted objects with the help of ultrasound and/or fluoroscopic imaging.

He said most parents were unlikely to know selfembedding behavior exists, and the same is true of most doctors.

To date the spotlight has mainly been on the practice of “cutting,” where a person uses a razor

or knife to make cuts in their skin, often, research suggests, with the goal of using the pain to distract from other emotional pain or feelings. Shiels told Reuters Health that the goal of reporting on this series of patients was to bring self-embedding behavior to the attention of parents and teachers, as well as pediatricians, ER doctors and radiologists.

The findings come from a review of 600 patients at Nationwide Children’s Hospital who were part of a long-term study of using imaging technology to help remove small foreign bodies embedded in patients’ soft tissue. Most of these children had been involved in accidents but Shiels and his colleagues identified 11 patients-nine girls and two boys aged between 14 and 18 — who were selfembedding.

All 11 teenagers had a history of mental health conditions, including bipolar disorder, depression, and anxiety disorders. Shiels said the study illustrates a “clear role” for radiologists for spotting self-embedding behavior. “We may become the first provider to make a clear diagnosis of it,” he said. Shiels said there were not yet any estimates of how common self-embedding might be but there are some figures on self-harm. According to a recent research review, studies suggest that 1 percent to 4 percent of adults have deliberately injured themselves but up to 23 percent of teenagers admit to trying self-harm, again most commonly by cutting. Researchers say it is unclear, whether selfharm is actually becoming more common, or whether adults are more reluctant than teenagers to admit to past or current self-harm.— Reuters

HEALTH & SCIENCE

Thursday, September 9, 2010

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Microbes are eating BP oil without using up oxygen WASHINGTON: Government scientists studying the BP disaster are reporting the best possible outcome: Microbes are consuming the oil in the Gulf of Mexico without depleting the oxygen in the water and creating “dead zones” where fish cannot survive.

Outside scientists said this so far vindicates the difficult and much-debated decision by BP PLC and the government to use massive amounts of chemical dispersants deep underwater to break up the oil before it reached the surface. Oxygen levels in some places where the BP oil spilled are down by 20 percent, but that is not nearly low enough to create dead zones, according to the 95-page report released Tuesday.

In an unusual move, BP released 771,000 gallons (2.9 million liters) of chemical dispersant about a mile (1,500 meters) deep, right at the spewing wellhead instead of on the surface, to break down the oil into tiny droplets. The idea was to make it easier for oil-eating microbes to do their job.

But the risk was that the microbes would use up the oxygen in the water. So BP had to perform a delicate balancing act. “Has it hit the sweet spot? Yes. Was it by design?

Partly,” said Steve Murawski, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration senior scientist who headed the federal team of researchers.

One reason that oxygen levels didn’t drop too low was the natural mixing of water in the Gulf, which kept bringing in oxygen from other areas, Murawski said.

Oxygen levels would have had to fall by three-quarters for the water to be classified as a dead zone, he said. The Gulf of Mexico already has a yearly major problem with a natural dead zone _ this year, it is the size of Belgium _ because of farm runoff coming down the Mississippi River.

Fertilizer in the runoff stimulates the runaway growth of algae, depleting the oxygen in a giant patch of the Gulf every summer.

Federal officials had been tracking oxy-

LOUISIANA: In this Sept 4, 2010 file photo, the Deepwater Horizon blowout preventer is lifted out of the Gulf of Mexico by the Helix Q4000 near the coast of Louisiana. —AP gen levels and use of dispersants since the spill, which spewed more than 200 million gallons (757 million liters) of oil into the Gulf between April and July. Had the oxygen plummeted near dangerous levels, the

dispersant use would have been stopped, said Greg Wilson, science adviser at the Environmental Protection Agency’s emergency management office.

The use of dispersants has been a

source of fierce debate because it involves an environmental trade-off: protecting the shoreline from oil at the risk of causing unknown problems in the deep. While dispersants make it easier for bacteria to

Vietnam maths star prefers life in the shadows HANOI: His work is incomprehensible to most people, but Ngo Bau Chau has been feted like a champion athlete or a pop star since last month when he won the Fields Medal, the mathematics version of the Nobel Prize. Returning to Hanoi, Chau was welcomed like a heroan uncomfortable role for the Frencheducated academic who says he prefers life in the shadows, where mathematics had firmly kept him.

He met Vietnam’s President Nguyen Minh Triet and Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung, while his story features prominently in the country’s media. “When I go to buy cigarettes, people recognize me. It’s terrible,” Chau says in an interview with AFP. Official media reported 3,000 people attended a ceremony to welcome him home. The prime minister said Chau, 38, had “brought fame to the nation”.

One reader of the popular VNExpress news website wrote that Chau is “like Pele of world football.”

On Chau’s blog, another reader said that all the articles about the prizewinner seemed more like publicity “for an actor or a singer.” Chau received the award for his proof of a mathematical conundrum known as the fundamental lemma. The International Congress of Mathematicians honored his “profound and beautiful argument, built on insights mathematicians have contributed for over 30 years”.

On its website, the group said

Chau’s breakthrough “removed one of the great impediments to a grand, decades-long program to uncover hidden connections between seemingly disparate areas of mathematics”. His achievement had already gained public recognition when Time magazine included it in a list of the top 10 scientific discoveries of 2009. Chau’s face still looks young. But his hair is greying and he speaks carefully, fixing eyes on his questioner from above his spectacles.

He may have preferred working away from the limelight, but he tells AFP the prize has brought responsibilities and obligations to his homeland.

“From now on I have a heavy responsibility because I will be listened to more,” he says at a coffee shop. Chau grew up in Vietnam but made his professional breakthrough in France and is proud of his ties to both countries. “It’s as a Franco-Vietnamese that I receive this honor,” he says. Chau says he “hurried to become French” and attained his nationality in February when he felt he would win the prize. It would have been unjust had his success not also brought recognition to French mathematicians, he explains.

Chau is following the profession of his father, a mathematician who worked for the Vietnamese army until the 1980s, when he returned to academia. His mother conducts chemical research at a hospital laboratory. Until

degrade the oil, they tend to hide oil below the surface. There have also been concerns about the chemicals’ toxicity and the longterm effects on marine life.

In May, the federal government con-

vened about 50 scientists for advice on whether to continue using the dispersants.

Though the researchers were divided before the meeting, they unanimously recommended continuing with the chemicals, said University of California Davis oil spill scientist Ron Tjeerdema.

“The best of two options _ neither of which were great _ was to continue dispersing,” Tjeerdema said. Louisiana State University researcher Ed Overton, who also was part of that meeting, said he feels vindicated. “Right now it looks like an incredibly good idea,” he said. “It was a risky but necessary application. Damage was going to be done somewhere.” But Overton said it may be years before scientists know if there is long-term damage from the dispersants. Last month, after federal officials said much of the oil had dissolved, dispersed or evaporated, outside researchers were skeptical. Two new studies called that into question, finding that invisible underwater plumes of oil remained deep underwater.

But Tuesday’s report dovetails with another outside study, published last month, announcing the discovery of a new oil-consuming microbe in the Gulf that was flourishing on BP’s spill. The sagging oxygen levels also lend more weight to the government’s claims last month that microbes are consuming oil, because there would be no dip in oxygen if the bacteria weren’t feeding on the BP leftovers, Murawski said.

The new work is based on data collected from May through August at 419 locations by nine government and private research ships in the Gulf. Larry McKinney, director of a Gulf of Mexico research center at Texas A&M University in Corpus Christi, said the new federal data showed that it was a “nearly perfect” outcome. “They hit it on the head, which is good,” said McKinney, who was not involved in the report. —AP

Pneumococcal shots give space for new strains: Study

HANOI: French Vietnamese Mathematician Ngo Bao Chau smokes along a street in downtown Hanoi. — AFP the age of 12 Chau was enrolled in an experimental program where “students were encouraged to have a great deal of free speech”, unusual in a communist country where repetitive teaching methods and a submissive relationship persists between students and teachers. His passion for mathematics evolved in his high school years when he was already winning international prizes. With a grant from the French embassy in Hanoi, Chau left home in 1990 to begin university in Paris. He continued at Ecole Normale Superieure-one of France’s best postsecondary institutions-and earned a doctorate from Paris-Sud University in 1997. In 2004, along with Gerard Laumon, Chau earned the prestigious

Clay Research Award for work on the fundamental lemma. But it needed more. “I was at a key point in my progress. All my attempts were blocked,” he says. He left France in 2006 for the Institute for Advanced Study, an independent academic institution in Princeton, New Jersey.

Suddenly in the US, the breakthrough came. “Everything played out in one or two weeks in December 2006.

At that moment I found the missing piece of my puzzle. And I knew that I would go to the end, and prove the lemma.” Now at the University of Chicago, Chau says he plans to spend three months a year in Vietnam and open a mathematics institute under the Ministry of Education. —AP

LONDON: Fighting pneumococcal disease with immunizations is like trying to hit a moving target because vaccines that zero in on certain strains also make space for new types to develop and dominate, Dutch scientists said on Tuesday. Experts say there are as many as 90 different types of Streptococcus pneumoniae bacteria, or pneumococcus, which can cause serious illnesses such as pneumonia and meningitis.

Dutch researchers who studied children vaccinated with Pfizer’s Prevnar 7 pneumococcal vaccine found they were more likely than unvaccinated children to develop a strain of the disease known as 19A, which is not covered by the shot. The research suggests that while vaccinating children against dramatically reduces the burden of pneumococcal disease caused by the strains targeted by the vaccine, constant surveillance is needed to check for new strains, or serotypes, which are likely to take the opportunity to fight through.

Pneumococcal disease is one of the world’s biggest killers of children, claiming up to 1.6 million lives a year.

Around 95 percent of deaths are in Africa and Asia but pneumococcal

infections also affect many thousands in developed countries. Pfizer has already developed a next generation pneumococcal shot called Prevnar 13, which was approved by US regulators in February and targets 19A as well as 12 other strains. Rival drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline has a 10-strain vaccine called Synflorix, which has shown in lab tests it can also tackle 19A. However, the researchers, whose study was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), said their work showed that immunising populations against pneumococcal disease is an almost constantly evolving process. “It seems as though eradicating the seven types that are targeted by the vaccine makes room for new types,” said Lieke Sanders of Utrecht’s University Medical Centre, who conducted the study. “Overall the net benefit is still good and there is a substantial decrease in the amount of disease, but new types are coming up and one of the most prominent types is 19A.” Wealthy countries have already started switching to the new generation of broad-protection pneumococ-

cal shots, and a deal agreed in March by the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation paved the way for modern pneumococcal vaccines to be introduced in 47 developing nations by 2015. Data for the United States show that the introduction of Prevnar 7 there in 2000 led to a 99 percent drop in the number of pneumococcal infection cases in children under 5 years old by 2007, according to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

However, serotype 19A is now the leading cause of invasive and respiratory pneumococcal disease in the United States and the one most frequently found in the noses and throats of patients.

“We have to be aware that this type of vaccine that eradicates the pneumococci types that are in it will make room for new pneumococci that may take over,” Sanders said. “It is a constantly moving target.” Sanders and colleagues analyzed links between pneumococcal vaccination and acquisition of serotype 19A pneumococci in the nose and throats of 1,003 healthy newborn babies in the Netherlands during follow-up to the age of 24 months. —Reuters

WHATʼS ON IN KUWAIT

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Thursday, September 9, 2010 IPC - Islamic courses PC is offering Islamic courses in English (for ladies only). 1. Tilawa Surah Al Imran on Tuesday at 5:30-7 pm on October 5, 2010 2.

Forty Hadith (Part 2) Tuesday from 7-8:30pm on October 5, 2010 Instructor: Sr. Zeinab Hassan Ashry at IPC Women Section AlRawdah - Area 3 - St. 30 House 12. Call 22512257 97290270.

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Mar Thoma Forum uwait Mar Thoma Senior Forum is organizing a brief pre-school motivation program for the children who are joining school or nursery for the first time. The ezhuthinirutha sisrusha is scheduled to be held at NECK Church & Parish Hall, on Friday, September 10 at 4.30pm. The program will be conducted in the auspicious presence of Kuwait Mar Thoma Parish Vicar, Rev. Thomas Varghese, Assistant Vicars, Rev. A.Y. Varghese and Rev. Genil Abraham.

Parish members who have already registered the name of their children are requested to be present at NECK at 4.30pm.

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Konni Onam onni Nivasi Sangamam, Kuwait will celebrate Onam on September 11 at United Indian School, Abbassiya from 10 am till 3 pm with variety of entertainments, cultural programs and a banquet to conclude the grant occasion of Onam celebrations. Konni Nivasi Sangamam members may kindly contact 90042777 / 66252930 for further details.

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City International Exchange opens branch in Mahboula

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ity International Exchange Company WLL, the Premier Exchange Company in Kuwait, which has won the confidence and trust of its customers for the last 25 years, have recently opened a Branch in Mahboula on

public demand, as part of their Silver Jubilee celebrations in customers service.The new Branch was inaugurated by the Company’s Chairman and Managing Director, Hamad Al-Ateeqi, Abdullah AlAteequ, Salem Al-Ateeqi, Hassan of Ateeqi

Group and a large number of customers from Bangladesh, India, Philippines, Srilanka and Egypt have graced the occasion with their presence and offered their best wishes. While addressing the customers, M P Dalbehera, General Manager,

informed that City International Exchange is the first Exchange House in Kuwait to offer remittance services to Bangladesh and a pioneer in introducing the Electronic Funds Transfer facilities of ICICI Bank and HDFC Banks of India. The new Branch is

Holiday Inn Salmiya reinforces tourism to Kuwait

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ndeavoring to stay abreast of all major developments in Kuwait, Holiday Inn Salmiya decided to add a different flavor to Eid Al Fitr this year. A lucrative offer that welcomes all visitors from Saudi Arabia to Kuwait, the Holiday Inn Hotel has readied its modern and homely double rooms for all guests. Just for KD 50, every guest will be enjoying the comfort and convenience of his home at the hotel. Residents and expatriates staying in Kuwait are also welcome to avail this offer that covers every aspect of a complete stay package at the

hotel.

Enjoy a complimentary and savory breakfast for 2 at Al Diwan International Buffet and then move towards a healthy workout and treatment at the well - equipped gym, that is open 24 hours of the day. Relax yourself in the clean blue waters of the swimming pool and freeing your muscles of tension with a massage at the hands of the experts. Access all your emails with the free high speed internet connection available throughout the hotel and enjoy and glamorous 50% discount on restaurant bills for children above the age of 10 years.

The dining aspect of the hotel covers every corner of the world with its five elegant restaurants, serving tempting fare from around the globe. A sumptuous buffet awaits your presence at Al Diwan International Buffet, while Tang Chao serves you authentic Chinese dishes characterized by Szechuan, Canton and Jiangsu cuisines. The rugged feel of the West comes alive to you at the Rib Eye Steak house with perfectly grilled steaks, Ayam Zaman Lebanese restaurant offers you delicacies to the strains of traditional music, L’Aroma Café serves a selection of international favorites throughout the day with the newly open Sakura Xpress being a unique representation of Japan’s traditional cuisine.

The management of the Holiday Inn Salmiya has taken every effort to cater to the needs of all guests this Eid, with its continued support to the State of Kuwait in all its endeavors.

IOC photo exhibition and arts competitions I ndian Overseas Congress (IOC) is organizing “Gandhidarsan 2010” - a photo exhibition related to Mahatma Gandhi’s life and teachings on October 7th and 8th at United Indian School, Abbasiya. More than 300 pictures portraying Mahatma Gandhi’s childhood to his tragic death will be exhibited at the venue. Students from the Indian schools in Kuwait will be given separate timings on Thursday morning and the rest of the two days will be for public. The exhibition will be inaugurated by His Excellency the Indian Ambassador Mr. Ajai Malhotra on Thursday 7th October 2010 at 9.00 am and the exhibition will be continued for public at United Indian

School from 5.00pm on 7th Thursday till Friday evening.

IOC is conducting various arts competitions which is done every year. Cinematic dance, Group dance, Patriotic song, Elocution, Poetry recitation, Solo, Poster Poem, Tableau and drawing competitions will be held for junior, senior and super senior groups. Poster-Poem competition will be held in English for senior group and in Malayalam for super senior group will be a new item of competition. General conveners Adv. John Thomas and K. J. John and Joint convenors Geevarghese Abraham and Tom Chirayil are coordinating the program.

Reji. C. Ninan, Varghese Mamparampan,

Heavenlyfeast Kuwait

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r Thomas Abraham (Thomaskutty Br.) in Kuwait welcomes to the Overflowing Blessings. Preaching, Deliverance, Healing, Praise & Worship on September 9, 10, 11, 12 at Marina Hall Abbassiya (Near Indian Central School) from 6:30 to 9:30 pm Day Meetings 10th Friday 9 am Worship, Preaching, Deliverance 11th Saturday 10 am Youth Praise & worship, Special Prayer for Students. Transportation will be available from all areas in Kuwait For more Details Contact: TEL: (965) 97337016, 66418707, 97210755, 97635260, 55624159.

Thampan Mani, Raju Karunakaran, George Joseph, Joshuvakutty, Thajudeen, Shaji Kavalam and Dr. George Varkey are the various committee conveners. Registrations can be done through telephone also. The entry forms for the competitions will be available at Hidine Restaurant, Hidine Super Market and Sakina Book shop(Abbassiya), Edee Stores(Salmiya), Al Dallah Super Market(Riggae) and Zaas Restaurant(Abu Halifa). Entry forms can also be sent through email id: iockuwait@hotmail.com. For details and registration contact: 24316426,6610570,99827113,66853100,992349 68,99576162.

Tulu Koota merit cum means scholarship

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pplications are now being invited for “Tulukoota Kuwait Merit Cum Means Scholarship” to be awarded during Tuluparba 2010 scheduled to be held on 14th & 15th October 2010.

The objective of this scholarship is to provide financial assistance and support to deserving meritorious students, to enable them 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 2009-2010.

Copies of marks sheet & proof of income to be submitted along with the application for scholarship to Welfare officer Mr. Ramesh Kidiyoor Tel: 99596457/97204716 Applications will be accepted from 5th September 2010- 30th September 2010. Candidates obtaining high grades but not eligible for merit cum means scholarship shall be honored with Merit Certificate and Medal during Tuluparba 2010, For more information contact: Mr. Ramesh Kidiyoor: 99596457/97204716, Sathyanarayan: 66585077; Chandrahasa Shetty: 55941955.

being headed by D Subramanyam. The photographs show Hamad Al-Ateeqi inaugurating the Branch in the presence of M P Dalbehera, General Manager, T V Reddy, Deputy General Manager, and other distinguished guests.

Greetings Happy Birthday to our dearest daughter: Shiekha Alexis De Leon we wish all the best in life, good health, good future.. we love you! greetings from: Daddy Alog & Mommy Rachelle, lolo & lola, tatay & ina, family and friends!!!

Toastmasters Club announcement o you want to overcome your fear of speaking in public? Do you want to sharpen your presentation skills? Do you want to develop leadership skills? Do you wish to attend job interviews with confidence? All of these can be achieved for a nominal fee with unlimited opportunities to practice and develop at the new Toastmasters Club (affiliated to Toastmasters International USA), being chartered in Salmiya. If you want to be part of your own chartered club, join us at Bayan Restaurant, Salmiya (next to Red Tag) at 7:45 pm on Friday, September 3, 2010. For free registration contact Vishwanath at 67735024 visragmal@yahoo.com or Xavier at 99850173 xaviermuthu@hotmail.com

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Arpan Onam celebration rpan Kuwait will celebrate Onam — the harvest festival of Kerala — on October 1, 2010 from 10 am onwards at the Indian Community School (Amman Branch), Salmiya.

Arpan office-bearers are lining up an array of cultural programs to celebrate the festival that marks the homecoming of the legendary King Mahabali. A variety of programs to be presented by Arpan members and their families will include Mohiniyattom, Onam songs, folk and traditional songs, skits etc. Arrival of Mahabali with the accompaniment of ‘chenda’, ‘arpu’ and ‘pulikkali’ will be the highlight of the celebration. Athappookkalam, to be drawn by the Ladies Wing of Arpan will be an added attraction. The celebration will conclude with the traditional ‘Onasadya.’

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WHATʼS ON IN KUWAIT

Thursday, September 9, 2010

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Announcements Sept 17 Onam Fest 2010: ‘Vanithavedi Kuwait’ a leading women’s association will be celebrating Onam on Friday, Sept 17, 2010, from 9 am - 6 pm at the Indian Community School, Khaitan Branch, the program named as ‘OnamFest 2010’ will have the public meeting followed by various cultural programs. The traditional Onasadya will be served. For the successful conduct of Onam Fest 2010, a program committee has been formed. Dr Vasanthy Nair (general convenor), Valsamma George, Dr Mary (Joint Convenors), Prasanna Ramabhadran (Arts convenor), Tolly Prakash (Food convenor), Shiny Ajith (Raffle convenor), Sumathy Babu (Souvenir convenor), Valsa Sam (Publicity convenor), Syamala Narayanan, (Reception convenor), Sharlette Albert (Volunteer captain). For more details, contact: 24342807, 66428433, 66596625, 24331598.

Theater & Music All level music classes: ‘Treasure of Talents’ (est in 1992) music education program invites all level music classes on piano, theory of music, vocal, flute.

Academic Level teachers help prepare for international exams, children concerts, yearly ‘Treasure of Talents’ Festival and music competitions. Contact Prof Cezary, Tel. 25320427, 66549009 of Ms Yasmeene Berlitz Institute Tel: 22542212. 22512533 or email: treasureoftalents@yahoo.com treasureoftalents@hotmail.com ✦✦✦ Call to classical music lovers: Are you a lover of music? Would you like to promote the traditional Indian classical music in Kuwait? If your answer is in the affirmative, please write ton more details to music_karnatic@yahoo.co. in (that is, music underscore karnatic) with your contact details or call 7978286.

SEPT 24 NSS Onam: Nair Service Society (NSS), Kuwait will celebrate Onam on Sept 24, at Cambridge School, Mangaf. South Indian film star and acclaimed dancer Lakshmi Gopalaswamy will perform during the function. Ajai Malhotra, Indian Ambassador to Kuwait, will be the chief guest at the Onam celebration on September 24, which will be followed by a full day variety entertainment program depicting the rich heritage and art forms of Kerala. Muraleekrishnan P, President of Nair Service Society, Kuwait (NSS Kuwait) will preside over the function.The Ona-Sadhya (Onam Feast) will be served in the traditional Kerala style on banana leaf on September 24. Nair Service Society (NSS) Kuwait, is one of the largest Socio-Cultural Organization in Kuwait formed in year 2001 and now has more than 3000 Indians as members. For more information, contact Anish Nair, NSS Kuwait 9969-1431.

KTMCC arranged a reception for Rev Prince Varghese Kuwait Town Malayalee Christian Congregation held a reception to congratulate newly ordained priest Rev Prince Varghese, who is the first priest from Kuwait in the history of Marthoma Syrian church.

Pakistan lawyers hold meeting

A

special meeting has been organized dated 30th September, 2010 by the lawyers hailing from Pakistan. A number of Lawyers participated in the function, which was presided by an eminent Lawyer Mahmud Jassim.

The Program was decorated in the hotel at Salmiya, Kuwait and the program was started with the recitation of the Holy Quran by Fadal-ur-Rehman and Nasheed by Mahtabl Alam.

The organizer of the function Rajab Ali Khan Abbasi spokes that the basic aim of this forum to organize the Lawyers, service in a

stream and smooth line to help out the Pakistanis working in Kuwait and helping the Pakistanis economy while investing their skillful services in Kuwait and to make them legally helpful, well-equipped and mentally peaceful. Muhammad Shahid Dar Advocate said he will put all his effort to

make this forum to be strengthened. Jafar Samdani Advocate of High courts / Lawyer spokes that we will try our best to take the trust of the countrymen as our belief and we will make this stage the best choice of countrymen for their services.

At the End of the pro-

MANAM organizes Iftar party

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uthamil Arignar Narpani Mandram (MANAM) organized their 2nd year grand Iftar Party on 26th Aug’ 10 at Trichy Restaurant, Murgab, Kuwait. The function began with recitation of the Holy Quran by Maulana Br Jamaludeen Fawzi, followed by a special address on the significance of fasting month on the holy Ramadan in an elegant style. Association propaganda secretary Sadiq Batcha presided over the party in the presence of Nellai E.M.Hanifa, Keelakkarai Nawshath and Er Raman. Lr B Shekar delivered welcome address.The function was well anchored by Associations Dy secretary Aranthai KK Mathivanan during the course.

Religious songs by Kalibulla and special poems on holy month of Ramadan were recited by Viuukkatti Mastan and Pattukkottai Sathya pulled the attention of’ the gathering the Association office hearers and members of various Tam II Associations reigned in Kuwait attended the program.

As a wholesome, the function attained a great success in achieving communal harmony, as people from different sects, belief and walks of life gathered on this occasion with their precious presence.

Athikkadai Deen B Mohammed delivered vote of Thanks. Party ended with delicious dinner served to all after the completion of Isha prayer at night.

Oct 14 Tulukoota Kuwait announces its “Decennial Parba “on October 14th & 15th.

2010 at American International School Hawally. We invite all Tulukoota Kuwait members to join us for fun filled and exciting events planned to celebrate the milestones throughout Tulukoota Kuwait’s 10 years journey. 14th October Rasamanjari musical show by Star performer Anuradha Bhatt, Prakash Mahadevan Naveen Koppa & others, Vismaya Jadoo by Mega Magic Star Ganesh Kudroli & troupe. Dr. Mohan Alva Cultural Performances & King of Comedy Navin D Padil presents tulu drama “ Paniyerla aath Panande Budiyerla aath” This is a fun tilled evening for entire family!

Join us for a great time. For more information call : Swarna C Shetty - 99006934; Pascal Pinto - 9953 1557; Sathya Narayan 66585077: Suresh Salian - 99161228; Chandrahasa Shetty - 55941955.

OCT 21 Rendezvous 2010: The Kuwait Chapter of the St. Aloysius College Alumni Association (SACAA KUWAIT) have announced that “Rendezvous” their hallmark event will be conducted on 21st October at Asia Asia Restaurant, Souk Al Watiya, Kuwait City from 8 pm onwards. This year, SACAA Kuwait celebrates five years of its existence in Kuwait. SACAA-Kuwait has been synonymous with various fund raising initiatives through which they consistently supported various needs of their Alma Mater and its students back in Mangalore, India.

Through Rendezvous-2010, SACAA-Kuwait intends to help generate funds for the Poor Students Fund of St. Aloysius institutions where numerous needy students look forward to assistance to subsidize their costs.

SACAA Kuwait calls upon all Aloysians, their families and also like minded people to join this noble cause and help make life a little better for those needy students back home. For entry passes and further information, kindly contact - 66731828, 66746425, 66181041, 94093275, 66699857, 66091962.

OCT 29 Onathanima tug of war: Thanima is conducting its annual Onam celebrations along with its celebrated tug of war competitions on October 29 at Central School compound, Abbasiya. Cultural procession, concert and other attractive cultural items will add glitter to the evening function in which many prominent personalities are expected to be present. Those teams wishing to participate in the tug of war competition, please contact 99865499 / 97253653 / 66071276 / 99703872.

Nov 17 Trend setter Udupi Restaurant, Kuwait proudly presents “ Gandharva Ganam” a live carnatic classical concert by living legend & maestro Padmabooshan Dr. K.J.Yesudas with his troupe on 17th Nov. 2010 at American International School, Kuwait. Sri. Nagai Murali on violin, Sri. Bakthavalsalam on Mridangam and Sri. Thripunithura Radhakrishnan on Ghatam.

For more details, please contact 66752462 or 66784867.

gram offices bears were announced to work out upon the guidelines drawn by the President of Pakistan Lawyers Forum, which are as under.

1- Rajab Ali Khan Abbasi, President 2- Maqsood Ahmed, Vice President 3- Muhammad Shahid Dar,

Vice President 4- Jafar Samdani, Secretary General 5- Obaidullah, Joint Secretary The Chief guest (who is well-know, an experienced Lawyer in the state of Kuwait) of the day said in this speech that he is to present his services where ever he would be requested to help out this worthy forum. His experience, his vision and efforts are there and he is prayfull as will.

It was given the duty to the Secretary General to call all the Lawyers hailing from Pakistan for the forum to make it strong, healthy, and esteemed.

Eid Al Fitr at the Crowne Plaza brings tourism to Kuwait

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n an effort to add sparkle and joy to the occasion of Eid Al Fitr in Kuwait, Crowne Plaza Kuwait has taken magnanimous steps to stimulate the tourism industry in Kuwait.

Welcoming residents and guests alike, the hotel has opened its doors to all people visiting Kuwait to avail an exclusive offer of only KD 39 per night on a luxurious double room within the hotel.

Newly renovated with all the modern amenities that make Crowne Plaza Kuwait your home away from home, all guests who take advantage of this special gift also benefit from the facilities of the hotel, which are designed to take care of every need of our clients. Enjoy a breakfast for 2 persons at the Al Ahmadi International Buffet restaurant, where children under 4 years eat free and children between 4 - 8 years get an exclusive 50% discount. The Nautilus Fitness Centre, which boasts of state - of - the - art technology in equipments is open 24 hours of the day to help stay healthy and fit. Access all

your emails with the free high speed internet connection available throughout the hotel and enjoy and glamorous 50% discount on restaurant bills for children above the age of 10 years.

To top it all off, feel free to

check - in early and check - out late, without any extra additions to the amount you will pay - the specialty being that we want to you to have this offer even after Eid. Enjoy an appetizing tour

around the world with the eight specialty restaurants of Crowne Plaza Kuwait this Eid Al Fitr.

Tantalize your taste buds with flavors from the world around with the exotic dishes that await you at Al Ahmadi

International Buffet, while the treasures of the seas come to your table at the Al Noukhaza Seafood restaurant and original steaks char - grilled to perfection are available for your selection at the Rib Eye Steak house. Persian cuisine in all its royalty is served you at the Shabestan Iranian restaurant, Florence brings you its original Italian dishes at Viaggio and Japan’s finest dishes are all yours at the Sakura Japanese restaurant. Savor the feel of the Hanging Gardens of Babylon at the Ayam Zaman Lebanese restaurant or treat yourself to elegant pastries with the delicious Parisian tea at the Fauchon Salon de The. With all the options available to one and all, there is nothing that the management of the Crowne Plaza Kuwait has left to chance in its quest to cover every need and satisfy every taste of our privileged customers. In the bringing forth of such offers, Crowne Plaza Kuwait continues to support the State of Kuwait in all its endeavors.

EMBASSY OF CANADA Middle East Education Initiative (MEEI) 2010 October 2 to 4, 2010 organized by the Embassy of Canada.

Representatives of leading Canadian universities, colleges and other institutions of higher education will be available to meet students, parents, teachers and guidance counsellors to present the advantages of studying in Canada. On October 4, 2010 a “Study in Canada” exhibition will be being held at the Safir Marina Hotel, Salmiya 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. Please contact the Canadian Embassy in Kuwait for additional information. The MEEI tour will also be visiting the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia and Morocco.

EMBASSY OF PAKISTAN On the auspicious occasion of Eid-ulFitr, the Embassy of Pakistan, Kuwait will remain closed from (Thursday-Sunday) 9th September to 12th September 2010 (Both Days Inclusive). The Embassy will reopen on Monday, 13th September 2010 with its routine office timings from 8 am to 4 pm.

EMBASSY OF CZECH REPUBLIC The Embassy of the Czech Republic in the State of Kuwait wishes to inform that it will hold the Czech National Day reception on Wednesday, 29th September from 6:30 - 9:00 p.m. at the Hilton Kuwait Resort, Fahaheel - Mangaf. All addressed media are cordially welcomed to send its journalists to report about this meaningful event. To register please call in advance 22529018.

EMBASSY OF BANGLADESH The Embassy of the People’s Republic of Bangladesh in Kuwait will remain closed from Thursday, 09 September 2010 to Tuesday, 14 September 2010 on the occasion of EID-AL FITR. The Embassy will be re-opened on Wednesday, 15 September 2010.

SOUTH AFRICAN EMBASSY On the occasion of Eid-ul-Fitr, the South African Embassy will be closed from Thursday, 9 September 2010 to Saturday, 11 September 2010. The Embassy will resume it’s normal working hours on Sunday, 12 September 2010, from Sunday to Thursday.

Please note that the Working hours will be from 8h00 to 16h00 & the Consular Section operation hours will from 8h30 to 12h30.

EMBASSY OF SRILANKA The Embassy of Srilanka will be closed for public from Thurday, 09th September 2010 to 12th September 2010 in lieu of “Ramadan” festival.

AUSTRALIAN EMBASSY On the occasion of Eid Al-Fitr, the Australian Emabssy wishes to advise that it will be closed on Thursday 9 & Sunday 12 September 2010. The Embassy will reopen on Monday 13 September 2010.

EMBASSY OF KENYA The Embassy of Kenya wishes to inform the general public that it will remain closed from Thursday 9th of September to Sunday 12th of September on the occasion of Eid Al Fitr. Office operations will resume on Monday 13th of September and the normal office hours will revert to 8 am to 4 pm. Happy holidays!

EMBASSY OF US The United States Department of State announces the increase in various visa fees to ensure sufficient resources to cover the increasing cost of processing nonimmigrant visas (NIVs). US law requires the Department to recover the cost of processing non-immigrant visas through the collection of the application fees. The increased fees are to take effect June 4, 2010. Under the new rule, applicants for all visas that are not petition-based, including B1/B2 tourist and business visitor visas and all student and exchange-visitor visas, will pay a fee of $140. Applicants for petition-based visas will pay an application fee of $150, as each of the below categories requires a review of extensive documentation and a more in-depth interview of the applicant than other categories, such as tourists.

These categories include: H visa for temporary workers and trainees L visa for intra-company transferees O visa for aliens with extraordinary ability P visa for athletes, artists and entertainers Q visa for international cultural exchange visitors R visa for religious occupations The application fee for K visas for fiance(e)s of US citizens will be $350. The fee for E visas for treaty-traders and treaty-investors will be $390.

TV PROGRAMS

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

Orbit / Showtime Listings

00:00 The Unit 01:00 Lie to Me 02:00 Law & Order 03:00 The Invisible Man 04:00 Dawson’s Creek 05:00 In Plain Sight 06:00 Defying Gravity 07:00 The Unit 08:00 Dawson’s Creek 09:00 Criminal Minds 10:00 The Invisible Man 11:00 Hawthorne 12:00 Defying Gravity 13:00 Criminal Minds 14:00 Karen Sisco 15:00 Dawson’s Creek 16:00 Lie to Me 17:00 Law & Order 18:00 Dollhouse 19:00 Defying Gravity 20:00 One Tree Hill 21:00 Warehouse 13 22:00 Criminal Minds 23:00 Grey’s Anatomy

00:45 Untamed & Uncut 01:40 Planet Earth 02:35 L.A. Taskforce (Pilot) 03:30 Animal Cops Philadelphia 04:25 The Last Lion of Liuwa 05:20 Untamed & Uncut 06:10 RSPCA: Have You Got What it Takes?

06:35 Planet Wild 07:00 Animal Crackers 07:25 Meerkat Manor 07:50 The Planet’s Funniest Animals 08:40 Britain’s Worst Pet 09:05 Britain’s Worst Pet 09:35 Planet Wild 10:00 L.A. Taskforce (Pilot) 10:55 Monkey Life 11:20 Night 11:50 Miami Animal Police 12:45 E-Vets: The Interns 13:10 Pet Rescue 13:40 Animal Cops South Africa 14:35 Wildlife SOS 15:00 RSPCA: Have You Got What it Takes?

15:30 L.A. Taskforce (Pilot) 16:25 The Planet’s Funniest Animals 17:20 Breed All About It 17:45 Breed All About It 18:15 Weird Creatures with Nick Baker 19:10 Jessica the Hippo 20:10 Crocodile Hunter 21:05 Weird Creatures with Nick Baker 22:00 Pit Bulls and Parolees 22:55 Animal Cops South Africa 23:50 Jessica the Hippo

00:25 Hyperdrive 00:55 Vital Signs 01:45 Last Of The Summer Wine 02:15 Eastenders 02:45 Doctors 03:15 Last Of The Summer Wine 04:20 Gigglebiz 04:35 Teletubbies 09:00 Tikkabilla 09:30 Last Of The Summer Wine 10:30 The Weakest Link 11:15 A Thing Called Love 12:10 Doctors 12:40 Eastenders 13:10 Casualty 14:00 Last Of The Summer Wine 15:30 A Thing Called Love 16:30 The Weakest Link 17:15 Doctors 17:45 Eastenders 18:15 Casualty 19:05 A Thing Called Love 20:00 The Weakest Link 20:45 Doctors 21:15 Eastenders 21:45 Casualty

00:15 Daily Cooks Challenge 00:40 Daily Cooks Challenge 01:10 The Home Show 01:55 Cash In The Attic

02:45 Cash In The Attic 03:35 Come Dine With Me 04:25 Daily Cooks Challenge 05:15 Bargain Hunt 06:05 The Home Show 07:15 Antiques Roadshow 08:55 Bargain Hunt 09:40 Hidden Potential 10:00 Cash In The Attic Usa 10:20 The Hairy Bakers 10:45 Glamour Puds 11:10 The Home Show 11:55 10 Years Younger 12:45 Come Dine With Me 13:30 Cash In The Attic 14:20 Fantasy Homes By The Sea 15:05 The Hairy Bakers 15:30 Glamour Puds 15:55 Antiques Roadshow 16:45 Daily Cooks Challenge 17:10 Cash In The Attic 18:00 Daily Cooks Challenge 18:50 Come Dine With Me 19:40 Celebrity Masterchef Goes Large 20:10 Indian Food Made Easy 20:35 Chuck’s Day Off 21:00 Cash In The Attic 22:40 Come Dine With Me 23:30 Celebrity Masterchef Goes Large

00:05 Cow And Chicken 00:30 Cramp Twins 00:55 George Of The Jungle 01:20 Adrenalini Brothers 01:45 Eliot Kid 02:10 Ed, Edd N Eddy 02:35 Ben 10: Alien Force 03:00 The Powerpuff Girls 03:15 Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends 03:40 The Secret Saturdays 04:05 Codename: Kids Next Door 04:30 Ben 10 04:55 Best ED 05:20 Samurai Jack 05:45 Cramp Twins 06:10 Eliot Kid 06:35 The Marvelous Misadventures Of Flapjack 07:00 Codename: Kids Next Door 07:25 Chowder 07:50 Best ED 08:15 Chop Socky Chooks 08:40 Ben 10: Alien Force 09:05 Bakugan Battle Brawlers 09:30 Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Heroes 09:55 Eliot Kid 10:20 My Gym Partner’s A Monkey 10:30 Squirrel Boy 10:55 Robotboy 11:20 Camp Lazlo 11:45 The Powerpuff Girls 12:10 Class Of 3000 12:35 Ed, Edd N Eddy 13:00 Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends 13:25 Codename: Kids Next Door 13:50 Ben 10 14:15 My Gym Partner’s A Monkey 14:40 Squirrel Boy 15:05 Eliot Kid 15:35 Casper’s Scare School 16:00 Skunk Fu! 16:25 Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Heroes 16:50 Bakugan Battle Brawlers 17:15 The Secret Saturdays 17:40 Celebrity Manhunt’s Total Drama...

18:30 Total Drama World Tour 19:00 Best ED 19:25 Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends 19:50 My Gym Partner’s A Monkey 20:05 The Powerpuff Girls 20:30 The Marvelous Misadventures Of Flapjack 20:45 Ben 10: Alien Force 21:10 Ed, Edd N Eddy 21:35 Robotboy 22:00 Camp Lazlo 22:25 Samurai Jack 22:50 Megas Xlr 23:15 Out Of Jimmy’s Head 23:40 Chowder

01:15 Primo Basilio-18 03:00 The Indian Runner-PG15 05:15 Fool’s Gold-PG15 07:15 Disco-PG 09:00 Morning Light-PG 10:45 October Sky-PG15 12:45 Max And Co.-PG

14:00 Meet Joe Black-PG15 17:00 Annie-FAM 19:15 December Boys-PG15 21:00 Everything Put Together-PG15 22:45 Surviving Picasso-18

00:40 Street Customs 2008 01:35 Dirty Jobs 02:30 Moments of Terror 03:25 Mega Builders 04:20 Mythbusters 05:15 How It’s Made 05:40 How Does it Work?

06:05 Dirty Jobs 07:00 Mean Machines: Transatlantic Challenge 07:25 Mega Builders 08:15 Street Customs 2008 09:10 Mythbusters 10:05 Ultimate Survival 11:00 Eyewitness 11:30 Eyewitness 11:55 Border Security 12:25 How Does it Work?

12:50 How It’s Made 13:20 Mythbusters 14:15 Miami Ink 15:10 Ultimate Survival 16:05 Dirty Jobs 17:00 Overhaulin’ 17:55 Mythbusters 18:50 Cake Boss 19:15 Border Security 19:40 The Gadget Show 20:05 How Does it Work?

20:35 How It’s Made 21:00 Sole Survivor 21:55 Serial Killers 22:50 I Escaped Death 23:45 MacIntyre: World’s Toughest Towns

00:30 What’s That About?

01:20 The Gadget Show 01:45 How Stuff’s Made 02:10 How Stuff’s Made 02:35 Engineered 03:25 How Does That Work?

03:50 Thunder Races 04:45 Robotica 05:40 Weird Connections 06:10 What’s That About?

07:00 Junkyard Mega-Wars 08:00 Investigation X 09:00 The Future of...

09:55 Stunt Junkies 10:20 Weird Connections 10:50 Engineered 11:45 How Does That Work?

12:15 The Greatest Ever 13:10 One Step Beyond 13:35 The Future of...

14:30 Perfect Disaster 15:25 The Gadget Show 15:55 Investigation X 16:50 Kings of Construction 17:45 Brainiac 18:40 Catch It Keep It 19:30 Science of the Movies 20:20 How It’s Made 20:45 The Gadget Show 21:10 The Greatest Ever 22:00 Catch It Keep It 22:50 Science of the Movies 23:40 The Greatest Ever

00:15 Leave It To Lamas 00:40 Dr 90210 01:30 Wildest TV Show Moments 01:55 Reality Hell 02:20 E!ES 03:15 Extreme Hollywood 04:10 Sexiest 05:05 Battle of the Hollywood Hotties 05:30 Streets of Hollywood 06:00 25 Hottest Hollywood Cougar Tales 07:45 Behind the Scenes 08:10 Behind the Scenes 08:35 E! News 09:00 The Daily 10 09:25 Denise Richards: It’s Complicated 09:50 Leave It To Lamas 10:15 THS 12:00 E! News 12:25 The Daily 10 12:50 Behind the Scenes 13:15 Pretty Wild 13:40 Keeping Up with the Kardashians

14:05 Kendra 14:30 Dr 90210 15:25 THS 16:15 Behind the Scenes 16:40 Behind the Scenes 17:10 Kourtney & Khlo√© Take Miami 17:35 Kourtney & Khlo√© Take Miami 18:00 E! News 18:25 The Daily 10 18:50 Keeping Up with the Kardashians 19:15 Pretty Wild 19:40 E!ES 20:30 Kendra 20:55 Chelsea Lately 21:20 E!ES 21:45 Holly’s World 22:10 E! News 22:35 The Daily 10

00:00 Iron Chef America 01:00 30 Minute Meals 01:30 Tyler’s Ultimate 02:00 Food Network Challenge 03:00 Barefoot Contessa 03:30 Everyday Italian 04:00 Iron Chef America 05:00 Throwdown With Bobby Flay 05:30 Guys Big Bite 06:00 Chopped 07:00 30 Minute Meals 07:25 Good Deal with Dave Lieberman 07:50 Guys Big Bite 08:15 Barefoot Contessa 08:40 Everyday Italian 09:05 30 Minute Meals 09:30 Tyler’s Ultimate 10:00 Guys Big Bite 10:30 Barefoot Contessa 11:00 Everyday Italian 11:30 Food Network Challenge 12:30 30 Minute Meals 13:00 Good Deal with Dave Lieberman 13:30 Guys Big Bite 14:00 Barefoot Contessa 14:30 Everyday Italian 15:00 30 Minute Meals 15:30 Throwdown With Bobby Flay 16:00 Iron Chef America 17:00 Barefoot Contessa 17:30 Everyday Italian 18:00 30 Minute Meals 18:30 Guys Big Bite 19:00 Throwdown With Bobby Flay 19:30 Good Deal with Dave Lieberman 20:00 Food Network Challenge 21:00 Barefoot Contessa 21:30 Everyday Italian 22:00 Iron Chef America 23:00 Throwdown With Bobby Flay

00:00 PGA Tour Highlights: Deutsche Bank Championship 01:00 Golf Central International 01:30 The Golf Channel - TBA 04:00 Nationwide Tour: Mylan Classic presented by Consol Energy Final Rd. Canonsburg, PA 07:00 Major League Soccer D.C. United v Columbus Crew 10:00 NASCAR Camping World Truck Series Built Ford Tough 250 13:00 Golf Central International 13:30 Inside the PGA Tour 14:00 World of Athletics 14:30 Sport Central 15:00 Nationwide Tour Highlights: Mylan Classic 16:00 Inside the PGA Tour 16:30 European Tour The KLM Open Rd. 1 Hilversum, Netherlands 19:30 2010 American Le Mans Series: Grand Prix of Mosport from Bowmanville, Canada 22:00 PGA Tour: BMW Championship Rd. 1 Lemont, IL

00:30 A Haunting 01:20 FBI Files 02:10 I Almost Got Away With It 03:05 Murder Shift 04:00 Forensic Detectives 04:55 Crime Scene Psychics 05:20 Dr G: Medical Examiner 06:10 Real Emergency Calls 06:35 Real Emergency Calls 07:00 Forensic Detectives 07:50 FBI Files 08:40 Fugitive Strike Force 09:30 Mystery ER 10:20 Forensic Detectives 11:10 Mystery Diagnosis 12:00 Real Emergency Calls 12:25 Real Emergency Calls 12:50 On the Case with Paula Zahn 13:40 CSU 14:30 Forensic Detectives 15:20 FBI Files 16:10 Fugitive Strike Force 17:00 Mystery ER 17:50 Forensic Detectives 18:40 Mystery Diagnosis 19:30 Real Emergency Calls 19:55 Real Emergency Calls 20:20 On the Case with Paula Zahn 21:10 CSU 22:00 Autopsy: Most Shocking Cases 22:50 Dr G: Medical Examiner 23:40 Dr G: Medical Examiner

00:00 Sfw 01:35 Sweet Land 03:25 The Rage: Carrie 2 05:10 The Offence 07:00 Exposed 08:40 The Spikes Gang 10:15 The Black Stallion Returns 11:55 Return Of A Man Called Horse 14:00 The Spring 15:30 Boy, Did I Get A Wrong Number!

17:10 Woman Of Straw 19:05 The Knack And How To Get It 20:30 Interiors 22:00 Man In The Moon 23:40 Network

Blindness on Show Movies

00:30 Cruise Ship Diaries 01:30 Banged Up Abroad 02:30 Banged Up Abroad 03:30 Wild Rides 04:00 Long Way Down 05:00 Bondi Rescue 05:30 Banged Up Abroad 06:30 Cruise Ship Diaries 07:30 Banged Up Abroad 08:30 Banged Up Abroad 09:30 Wild Rides 10:00 Long Way Down 11:00 Bondi Rescue 11:30 Banged Up Abroad 12:30 Cruise Ship Diaries 13:30 Bondi Rescue 14:00 The Best Job In The World 14:30 4Real 15:00 Don’t Tell My Mother 15:30 Wild Rides 16:00 Long Way Down 17:00 Bondi Rescue 17:30 Banged Up Abroad

18:30 Cruise Ship Diaries 19:30 Bondi Rescue 20:00 The Best Job In The World 20:30 4Real 21:00 Don’t Tell My Mother 21:30 Wild Rides 22:00 Long Way Down 23:00 Bondi Rescue 23:30 Banged Up Abroad

00:00 Rita Rocks 00:30 Seinfeld 01:00 The Daily Show with Jon Stewart 01:30 The Colbert Report 02:00 Late night with Jimmy Fallon 03:00 Cleveland Show 03:30 Will & Grace 04:00 Everybody Loves Raymond 04:30 Late night with Jimmy Fallon 05:30 Just Shoot me!

06:00 Malcolm in the Middle 06:30 The Drew Carey Show 07:00 Everybody Loves Raymond 07:30 Frasier 08:00 Seinfeld 08:30 Just Shoot me!

09:00 Malcolm in the Middle 09:30 The Drew Carey Show 10:00 Will & Grace 10:30 The League 11:00 Everybody Loves Raymond 11:30 Frasier 12:00 Late night with Jimmy Fallon 13:00 Seinfeld 13:30 Just Shoot me!

14:00 Malcolm in the Middle 14:30 Rita Rocks 15:00 The League 15:30 The Daily Show with Jon Stewart 16:00 The Colbert Report 16:30 The Drew Carey Show 17:00 Everybody Loves Raymond 17:30 Frasier 18:00 Seinfeld 18:30 Will & Grace 19:00 The League 19:30 Til Death 20:00 Late night with Jimmy Fallon 21:00 The Daily Show with Jon Stewart 21:30 The Colbert Report 22:00 Will & Grace 22:30 The Ricky Gervais Show 23:00 Everybody Loves Raymond 23:30 The League

00:00 The Martha Stewart Show 01:00 The Tonight show with Jay Leno 02:00 The Ellen DeGeneres Show 03:00 The Monique Show 04:00 The Tonight show with Jay Leno 05:00 GMA (repeat) 07:00 GMA Health 07:30 What’s the Buzz 08:00 Jimmy Kimmel Live!

09:00 Never Trust a Skinny Cook 09:30 Huey’s cooking adventures 10:00 The Martha Stewart Show 11:00 The View 12:00 The Ellen DeGeneres Show 13:00 What’s Good For You 14:00 GMA Live 16:00 GMA Health 16:30 What’s the Buzz 17:00 Never Trust a Skinny Cook 17:30 Huey’s cooking adventures 18:00 Look A Like 18:30 Look A Like 19:00 The View 20:00 The Ellen DeGeneres Show 21:00 Jimmy Kimmel Live!

22:00 The Tonight show with Jay Leno 23:00 The Monique Show

00:00 The Guitar-18 02:00 Blindness-18 04:00 Meet Bill-PG15 05:45 The Express-PG 08:00 G.i. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra-PG15 10:00 One Week-PG 12:00 Smart People-PG15 14:00 Einstein And Eddington-PG15 16:00 G.i. Joe: The Rise Of Cobra-PG15 18:00 Smart People-PG15 20:00 Seven Pounds-PG15 22:00 Watchmen-18

01:00 Vertical Limit-PG15 03:00 Traitor-PG15 05:00 Dragonball: Evolution-PG 07:00 Connected-PG15 09:00 Resident Evil: Degeneration-PG15 11:00 Lost Junction-PG15 13:00 Ba’al-PG15 15:00 Resident Evil: Degeneration-PG15 17:00 Shadows In Paradise-PG15 19:00 Planet Of The Apes-PG15 21:00 Mutant Chronicles-PG15 23:00 Serbian Scars-PG15

00:00 Zero Effect-PG15 02:00 How To Be-PG15 04:00 Slap Shots 3-PG15 06:00 Will You Merry Me-PG15 08:00 Faintheart-PG15 10:00 Kung Fu Panda-PG 12:00 Americanizing Shelly-PG 14:00 Scrooged-PG 16:00 Zero Effect-PG15 18:00 The Matchmaker-PG15 20:00 How To Lose Friends And Alienate People-PG15 22:00 The Big Lebowski-18

00:00 The Enchanted Mountain-PG 02:00 Chitty Chitty Bang Bang-PG 04:20 Justice League: Crisis On Two Earths-PG 06:00 Yogi’s Great Escape-PG 08:00 Legend Of Sleeping Beauty-PG 10:00 Justice League: Crisis On Two Earths-PG 12:00 Velveteen Rabbit-FAM 14:00 Chitty Chitty Bang Bang-PG 16:20 Space Buddies-PG 18:00 Clockstoppers-FAM 20:00 Tommy And The Cool Mule-PG 22:00 Velveteen Rabbit-FAM

00:00 Burn Notice 01:00 Cold Case 02:00 CSI Miami 03:00 Ghost Whisperer 04:00 8 Simple rules 04:30 Rita Rocks 05:00 Lie To Me 06:00 Emmerdale 06:30 Coronation Street 07:00 CSI Miami 08:00 8 Simple rules 08:30 Rita Rocks 09:00 Ghost Whisperer 10:00 Lie To Me 11:00 CSI Miami

Mirrors on Super Movies 12:00 Emmerdale 12:30 Coronation Street 13:00 8 Simple rules 13:30 Rita Rocks 14:00 Burn Notice 15:00 Cold Case 16:00 Lie To Me 17:00 Smallville 18:00 Emmerdale 18:30 Turn Back Your Body Clock 19:00 Heroes 20:00 Cold Case 21:00 CSI Miami 22:00 Lie To Me 23:00 Smallville

00:00 European PGA Tour Highlights 01:00 AFL Highlights 02:00 Super League 04:00 Futbol Mundial 04:30 European Tour Weekly 05:00 Ladies European PGA Tour Highlights 06:00 AFL Highlights 07:00 Aviva Premiership 09:00 Tri Nations 11:00 European Tour Weekly 11:30 World Pool Masters 12:30 ICC Cricket World 13:00 Rugby Union 15:00 Mobil 1 The Grid 15:30 Triatholn 19:30 Mobil 1 The Grid 20:00 ICC Cricket World 20:30 World Sport 21:00 Total Rugby 21:30 Premier League Snooker

00:00 ITU World C’ship Triathlon 01:00 World Pool Masters 02:00 Currie Cup 04:00 ICC Cricket World 04:30 Brazil League Highlights 05:00 Mobil 1 The Grid 05:30 Futbol Mundial 06:00 European PGA Tour Highlights 07:00 World Pool Masters 08:00 Scottish Premier League Highlights 08:30 Brazil League Highlights 09:00 Ladies European Tour Highlights 10:00 Countdown to The Ryder Cup 10:30 AFL Highlights 11:30 Aviva Premiership 14:00 NRL Full Time 14:30 Ladies European Tour Highlights 15:30 Countdown to The Ryder Cup 16:00 Live European PGA Tour 19:00 Countdown to The Ryder Cup 19:30 Brazil League Highlights 20:00 Futbol Mundial

00:00 Le Mans Series Highlights 01:00 Le Mans Series Magazine 01:30 Planet Power Boats 02:00 WWE NXT 03:00 UFC 118 06:00 UFC Unleashed 07:00 WWE SmackDown 09:00 WWE Bottom Line 10:00 Red Bull X-Fighters 11:30 Mobil 1 The Grid 12:00 WWE Vintage Collection 13:00 V8 Supercars Championship Highlights 14:00 V8 Supercars Championship Highlights 15:00 Mobil 1 The Grid 15:30 Le Mans Series Highlights 16:30 Le Mans Series Magazine 17:00 UFC 118 20:00 WWE NXT 21:00 UFC The Ultimate Fighter Season 11 Finale

01:00 Ye Olde Times-PG 03:00 Sins Of The Mother-PG15

05:00 The Other Man-PG15 07:00 Kit Kittredge: An American Girl-PG 09:00 A Dog Year-PG 10:45 The Loss Of A Teardrop Diamond 12:45 Monsters Vs. Aliens-PG 14:45 Journey To The Center Of The Earth-PG 16:30 A Dog Year-PG 18:15 Australia-PG 21:00 Love Happens-PG15 23:00 Mirrors-18

01:20 Where Eagles Dare 04:00 The Screening Room 04:25 Real Genius 06:10 The Screening Room 06:35 The Screening Room 07:00 Beau Brummell 08:50 Some Came Running 11:05 Bhowani Junction 12:55 Viva Las Vegas 14:20 Where Eagles Dare 16:50 Sam Whiskey 18:25 The Asphalt Jungle 20:15 Captain Nemo And The Underwater City 22:00 Zebrahead 23:40 X Y And Zee

00:30 Conspiracy?

01:20 Dead Men’s Secrets 02:10 Cities Of The Underworld 03:00 Pawn Stars 03:25 Pawn Stars 03:55 Angels And Demons Decoded 05:40 Nostradamus Effect 06:30 Conspiracy?

07:20 Dead Men’s Secrets 08:10 Cities Of The Underworld 09:00 Pawn Stars 09:25 Pawn Stars 09:55 Angels And Demons Decoded 11:40 Nostradamus Effect 12:30 Conspiracy?

13:20 Dead Men’s Secrets 14:10 Cities Of The Underworld 15:00 Pawn Stars 15:25 Pawn Stars 15:55 Angels And Demons Decoded 17:40 Nostradamus Effect 18:30 Conspiracy?

19:20 Dead Men’s Secrets 20:10 Cities Of The Underworld 21:00 Flying Pyramids: Soaring Stones 21:55 Beyond The Da Vinci Code 23:40 How The Earth Was Made

00:00 Dr 90210 01:00 The Designers 01:30 Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane 02:00 How Do I Look?

03:00 Split Ends 04:00 The Designers 04:30 Style Her Famous 05:00 Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane 06:00 How Do I Look?

07:00 Millennium Fashion: The Year In Fashion 08:00 My Celebrity Home 09:00 Whose Wedding Is it Anyway?

10:00 Married Away 11:00 Peter Perfect 12:00 How Do I Look?

13:00 Clean House 14:00 Clean House Comes Clean 14:30 Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane 15:00 Jerseylicious 16:00 Ruby 17:00 Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane 18:00 Kimora: Life in the Fab Lane 19:00 Split Ends 20:00 Clean House: Search For The Messiest...

21:00 How Do I Look?

22:00 Jerseylicious 23:00 Jerseylicious

00:15 Top Sexy 00:17 Playlist 01:00 Latina 10 01:45 Playlist 02:00 Urban Hit 02:45 Playlist 03:15 Top New 03:17 Playlist 05:00 Legend 06:00 Playlist 07:15 Top Fashion 07:17 Playlist 08:00 Latina 10 08:45 Playlist 09:15 Top Gossip 09:17 Playlist 13:00 Urban Hit 13:45 Playlist 14:00 Trace Video Mix 15:00 Playlist 15:15 Top Money 15:17 Playlist 16:00 Rnb 10 16:45 Playlist 17:15 Monthly Top 17:17 Playlist 18:00 Urban Hit 18:45 Playlist 20:00 Sound System 10 20:45 Playlist 21:00 Guest Star 21:15 Playlist 22:15 Top Sexy 22:17 Playlist

00:00 Julian and Camilla’s World Odyssey 01:00 Hollywood and Vines 01:30 Sophie Grigson In The Orient 02:00 Culinary Asia 03:00 Planet Food 04:00 Globe Trekker 05:00 Julian and Camilla’s World Odyssey 06:00 Planet Food 07:00 Globe Trekker 08:00 Travel Oz 08:30 Distant Shores 09:00 Hollywood and Vines 09:30 Travel Today 10:00 Planet Food 11:00 Riding Eastern Europe 11:30 Travel Today 12:00 Globe Trekker 13:00 Taste Takes Off 13:30 The Thirsty Traveler 14:00 Entrada 14:30 Distant Shores 15:00 Hollywood and Vines 15:30 Travel Today 16:00 Globe Trekker 17:00 Travel Oz 17:30 Taste Takes Off 18:00 Planet Food 19:00 Globe Trekker 20:00 Travel Notebook 21:00 Julian and Camilla’s World Odyssey 22:00 Intrepid Journeys 23:00 Globe Trekker

00:00 Music For The Masses 01:00 Greatest Hits 02:00 VH1 Music 05:00 Chill Out 07:00 VH1 Hits 09:00 Aerobic 10:00 VH1 Hits 11:00 VH1 Superchart 12:00 Top 10 Depeche Mode 13:00 Music For The Masses 14:00 VH1 Pop Chart 15:00 VH1 Music 17:00 Music For The Masses 18:00 VH1 Superchart 19:00 Guess The Year

Thursday, September 9, 2010

33 ACCOMMODATION One bedroom furnished flat Central A/C in Fahaheel with all new items.

Rent KD 130 per month.

Please Contact Khaled.

Tel: 65603645. (C 2651) 9-9-2010 Sharing accommodation available for decent working ladies or small family with small Indian family at Farwaniya, from 1st Oct. 2010.

Call: 97823565. (C 2647) 8-9-2010

FOR AIRPORT INFORMATION 161

FLIGHT SCHEDULE

Arrival Flights on Thursday 09/09/2010 Airlines Flt Route Jordanian 802 Amman Wataniya Airways 188 Bahrain Wataniya Airways 305 Cairo Gulf Air 211 Bahrain Wataniya Airways 408 Beirut Bangladesh 045 Dhaka/Bahrain Turkish 772 Istanbul Ethiopian 620 Addis Ababa Egypt Air 614 Cairo Jazeera 267 Beirut DHL 370 Bahrain Emirates 853 Dubai Etihad 305 Abu Dhabi Qatari 138 Doha Kuwait 802 Cairo Falcon 201 Dubai Jazeera 637 Aleppo Jazeera 503 Luxor Kuwait 412 Manila/Bangkok Jazeera 527 Alexandria British 157 London Jazeera 529 Assiut Jazeera 613 Lahore Kuwait 204 Lahore Iran Air 605 Isfahan Kuwait 302 Mumbai Fly Dubai 053 Dubai Kuwait 332 Trivandrum Kuwait 676 Dubai Kuwait 284 Dhaka Kuwait 362 Colombo Emirates 855 Dubai Arabia 121 Sharjah Qatari 132 Doha Etihad 301 Abu Dhabi Gulf Air 213 Bahrain Wataniya Airways 182 Bahrain Middle East 404 Beirut Wataniya Airways 102 Dubai Jazeera 447 Doha Syrian Air 341 Damascus Kuwait 772 Riyadh Jazeera 171 Dubai Almasria Universal 407 Alexandria Gulf Air 219 Bahrain Iran Aseman 6791 Mashad Wataniya Airways 422 Amman Egypt Air 610 Cairo Jazeera 457 Damascus Kuwait 672 Dubai United 982 Washington DC Dulles Jordanian 800 Amman Wataniya Airways 432 Damascus Egypt Air 621 Assiut Almasria Universal 407 Alexandria Fly Dubai 057 Dubai Jazeera 257 Beirut Wataniya Airways 332 Alexandria Saudia 500 Jeddah Kuwait 552 Damascus Nas Air 745 Jeddah Qatari 134 Doha Kuwait 546 Alexandria Kuwait 678 Muscat/Abu Dhabi Syrian Air 1081 Damascus Jazeera 173 Dubai Kuwait 118 New York Mihin 403 Colombo/Dubai Etihad 303 Abu Dhabi Emirates 857 Dubai Kuwait 1554 Damascus Gulf Air 215 Bahrain Wataniya Airways 402 Beirut Saudia 510 Riyadh Kuwait 562 Amman Iran Air 617 Ahwaz Arabia 125 Sharjah Jazeera 493 Jeddah Kuwait 774 Riyadh Jazeera 129 Bahrain Srilankan 227 Colombo/Dubai Wataniya Airways 304 Cairo Kuwait 104 London Wataniya Airways 106 Dubai Rovos 093 Kandahar/Dubai Kuwait 502 Beirut Kuwait 542 Cairo Kuwait 618 Doha Kuwait 786 Jeddah Wataniya Airways 202 Jeddah Jazeera 177 Dubai Air Arabia Egypt 555 Alexandria Kuwait 674 Dubai Kuwait 614 Bahrain Bahrain Air 344 Bahrain Singapore 458 Singapore/Abu Dhabi Fly Dubai 061 Dubai Jazeera 459 Damascus Oman Air 647 Muscat Wataniya Airways 612 Sabiha Middle East 402 Beirut Rovos 081 Baghdad Jet A/W 572 Mumbai Egypt Air 618 Alexandria KLM 0445 Amsterdam Kuwait 554 Damascus Wataniya Airways 404 Beirut Jazeera 183 Dubai DHL 372 Bahrain Gulf Air 217 Bahrain Emirates 859 Dubai Kuwait 178 Geneva/Frankfurt Qatari 136 Doha United 981 Bahrain Iran Aseman 6793 Mashad Indian 981 Chennai/Hyderabad/Ahmedabad Jazeera 429 Bahrain Lufthansa 636 Frankfurt Egypt Air 612 Cairo Bangladesh 043 Dhaka Egypt Air 606 Luxor India Express 389 Kozhikode/Mangalore Pakistan 205 Lahore Wataniya Airways 108 Dubai

Time 00:05 00:30 00:50 01:05 01:05 01:05 01:15 01:45 02:05 02:10 02:15 02:25 02:55 03:25 04:45 05:25 05:45 05:30 06:15 06:20 06:30 06:40 07:05 07:10 07:45 07:50 07:55 07:55 08:00 08:10 08:20 08:25 08:40 09:00 09:25 10:45 10:45 10:50 11:05 11:20 12:05 12:10 12:40 12:45 12:50 12:50 12:50 12:55 13:10 13:15 13:35 13:35 13:35 13:40 13:50 13:50 14:05 14:05 14:30 14:35 14:55 15:05 15:30 15:35 16:00 16:05 16:15 16:40 16:50 16:55 17:10 17:15 17:15 17:20 17:30 17:40 17:40 17:40 17:45 17:55 18:00 18:35 18:35 18:45 18:45 18:50 18:50 18:55 18:55 18:55 19:05 19:15 19:20 19:20 19:25 19:25 20:05 20:10 20:15 20:20 20:20 20:30 20:30 20:35 20:40 20:50 20:50 21:00 21:00 21:05 21:15 21:20 21:35 21:55 22:00 22:05 22:10 22:30 22:55 23:00 23:15 23:10 23:55 23:55

Departure Flights on Thursday 09/09/2010 Airlines Flt Route Jazeera 528 Assiut Shaheen Air 442 Lahore Egypt Air 607 Luxor India Express 394 Cochin/Kozhikode KLM 0447 Amsterdam Indian 576 Goa/Chennai Lufthansa 637 Frankfurt Pakistan 216 Karachi Turkish 773 Istanbul Bangladesh 046 Dhaka Ethiopian 620 Bahrain/Addis Ababa Egypt Air 615 Cairo DHL 371 Bahrain Emirates 854 Dubai Etihad 306 Abu Dhabi Qatari 139 Doha Wataniya Airways 101 Dubai Jordanian 803 Amman Jazeera 331 Alexandria Jazeera 446 Doha Gulf Air 212 Bahrain Jazeera 456 Damascus Wataniya Airways 421 Amman Wataniya Airways 181 Bahrain Rovos 094 Dubai/Kandahar Jazeera 256 Beirut Wataniya Airways 431 Damascus British 156 London Jazeera 170 Dubai Kuwait 545 Alexandria Fly Dubai 054 Dubai Iran Air 606 Mashad Kuwait 771 Riyadh Kuwait 677 Abu Dhabi/Muscat Kuwait 671 Dubai Kuwait 551 Damascus Arabia 122 Sharjah Kuwait 101 London/New York Emirates 856 Dubai Qatari 133 Doha Etihad 302 Abu Dhabi Wataniya Airways 401 Beirut Kuwait 1553 Damascus Gulf Air 214 Bahrain Kuwait 165 Rome/Paris Wataniya Airways 401 Beirut Wataniya Airways 303 Cairo Jazeera 172 Dubai Kuwait 541 Cairo Wataniya Airways 611 Sabiha Jazeera 492 Jeddah Kuwait 561 Amman Middle East 405 Beirut Kuwait 501 Beirut Syrian Air 342 Damascus Kuwait 785 Jeddah Gulf Air 220 Bahrain Wataniya Airways 201 Jeddah Iran Aseman 6792 Mashad Egypt Air 611 Cairo Jazeera 432 Mashad Wataniya Airways 105 Dubai Jordanian 801 Amman Kuwait 773 Riyadh Fly Dubai 058 Dubai Egypt Air 622 Assiut Jazeera 458 Damascus Almasria Universal 408 Assiut United 982 Bahrain Jazeera 176 Dubai Jazeera 128 Bahrain Kuwait 673 Dubai Wataniya Airways 403 Beirut Kuwait 553 Damascus Kuwait 617 Doha Nas Air 746 Jeddah Saudia 505 Jeddah Qatari 135 Doha Kuwait 613 Bahrain Jazeera 182 Dubai Rovos 082 Baghdad Syrian Air 1082 Damascus Etihad 304 Abu Dhabi Mihin 404 Dubai/Colombo Gulf Air 216 Bahrain Emirates 858 Dubai Wataniya Airways 306 Cairo Kuwait 543 Cairo Arabia 126 Sharjah Saudia 511 Riyadh Iran Air 616 Ahwaz Kuwait 285 Chittagong Srilankan 228 Dubai/Colombo Jazeera 428 Bahrain Wataniya Airways 407 Beirut Wataniya Airways 433 Damascus Wataniya Airways 107 Dubai Air Arabia Egypt 556 Alexandria Kuwait 283 Dhaka Jazeera 266 Beirut Bahrain Air 345 Bahrain Kuwait 361 Colombo Jazeera 512 Sharm El Sheikh Fly Dubai 062 Dubai Singapore 457 Abu Dhabi/Singapore Jazeera 186 Dubai Wataniya Airways 321 Sharm El Sheikh Kuwait 351 Cochin Oman Air 648 Muscat Middle East 403 Beirut Jet A/W 571 Mumbai Egypt Air 619 Alexandria Wataniya Airways 187 Bahrain KLM 0445 Bahrain/Amsterdam Gulf Air 218 Bahrain Jazeera 240 Amman DHL 373 Bahrain Kuwait 675 Dubai Emirates 860 Dubai Almasria Universal 110 Alexandria Falcon 102 Bahrain Qatari 137 Doha Kuwait 301 Mumbai Kuwait 205 Islamabad Iran Aseman 6794 Mashad Jazeera 526 Alexandria Jazeera 502 Luxor United 981 Washington DC Dulles Kuwait 411 Bangkok/Manila Kuwait 415 Kuala Lumpur/Jakarta Egypt Air 613 Cairo

Time 00:05 00:10 00:15 00:25 00:30 00:50 00:50 01:10 02:15 02:15 02:30 03:05 03:15 03:45 04:00 05:00 06:50 07:00 07:30 07:40 07:45 07:45 07:50 07:50 08:00 08:05 08:10 08:25 08:30 08:35 08:40 08:45 08:55 08:45 09:00 09:10 09:20 09:30 09:40 10:00 10:10 11:35 11:35 11:35 11:45 11:35 11:50 11:55 12:00 12:05 12:15 12:25 12:50 13:00 13:05 13:30 13:40 13:45 13:50 13:55 14:00 14:30 14:30 14:30 14:35 14:40 14:45 14:50 14:50 14:55 15:00 15:10 15:10 15:35 15:35 15:45 16:00 16:20 16:20 16:55 17:00 17:00 17:35 17:40 18:05 18:05 18:05 18:10 18:20 18:35 18:40 18:45 19:10 19:10 19:25 19:30 19:40 19:55 20:15 20:10 20:10 20:20 20:20 20:50 20:55 21:00 21:00 21:05 21:15 21:20 21:30 21:35 21:35 21:40 21:55 21:55 22:00 22:10 22:25 22:30 22:30 22:35 22:45 22:55 23:00 23:20 23:30 23:40 23:40 23:50 23:55

Sharing accommodation available for bachelors Goan / Mangalorean only with / without food. Jabriya bridge 4th Ring Road. Tel: 22662734. (C 2643) Room with kitchen / bathroom for a family or working ladies, opposite Lulu Hyper Market, Shuwaikh. C-A/C + Satellite, Indian or Sri Lankan only. Please call: 65152017. (C 2644) 7-9-2010 Sharing accommodation available in Abbassiya, 3 bedroom / 2 attached bathroom C-A/C new flat for

family (KD 150 for 2 rooms ext.) or one decent working lady (KD 50 for one room) with Keralite couples. Contact: 66013882. (C 2640) 5-9-2010

FOR SALE 2006 Toyota Corolla 1.8 XLI colour white, km done 65000, excellent condition. Cash price KD 2450.

Contact: 99934965. (C 2650) 9-9-2010 Corolla 2007 model XL, sky blue color, good condition.

Cont: 97800987. (C 2649) 8-9-2010 2009 Toyota, Corolla 1.8 XLI, colour light blue, done 16000 km only, excellent condition. Price KD 3850 cash. Contact: 94973026.

(C 2645) 7-9-2010 Household furniture for sale, fridge, cooking range, pressure cooker, cutlery items, big cupboard, single beds, dressing table, side tables, TV with stand, side tables, VCR, computer with table + printer etc. all items 2 yrs old sparingly used.

Contact Tel: 66764062.

(C 2641) 5-9-2010

CHANGE OF NAME I Natasha Furtado Crystal Joaquina holder of Indian passport No: F6634473, hereby change my name to Crystal Joaquina Natasha Furtado. (C 2639) 4-9-2010 SITUATION VACANT

Wanted live in maid with good English. For housekeeping, cooking and child care, good salary, Friday holiday. Mob: 66822337 / 99872345. (C 2642) 5-9-2010

MATRIMONIAL Orthodox Christian parents living in Kuwait invite suitable proposal for their son, 27 year old, 165 cm, fair, B.Tech in IT and MBA in finance, currently working as financial consultant in Kuwait. (Planning to go for leave in December). Contact No. 66063442 after 4pm.

Email:

mvjosy@gmail.com (C 2648) 8-9-2010 Orthodox parents invite proposals for their daughter MBA 28/160 working in MNC Kuwait. Prefer qualified Orthodox / Marthomite / Jacobite professionals.

Contact: geokwt45@yahoo.com (C 2646) 7-9-2010 Proposals invited for well educated (B-Tech with MBA) Nair girl, 25 years, 160 cm, 54kg, slim, fair, working in Kuwait, from handsome Nair boys well educated Engineers with MS/MBA, Age 27-30 preferably working in Kuwait or abroad with good family background.

Contact: cpvgdeepam@hotmail.com 6-9-2010

SPECTRUM

34 CROSSWORD 77

Thursday, September 9, 2010

Calvin Aries (March 21-April 19) The energies are working in your favor in all areas of your life. If you are not a boss or owner of a company—you might consider this a good time to request a raise or promotion. You naturally gravitate toward positions of power and authority. Others see in you a great practical ability and will easily accept you as a leader or authority figure. You value fairness in all things and go out of your way to be just. You have an innate sense of how to work with and guide others in making decisions. You understand the choices and can spot the right ones. You may be able to complete some of those projects that have been left hanging the past few days. Communication with superiors is positive. A time with loved ones this evening is fulfilling.

Taurus (April 20-May 20) You may not appreciate the emotional energy of someone you meet today— patience. You may be in the mood for deep and penetrating conversations or thoughts, especially with a close friend, but you are wise to wait and allow things to develop on their own. You may be pleasantly surprised at what one or two positive words will do to help move things into a positive direction. This is a good time, when your efforts in the workplace can really pay off. This afternoon you have an opportunity to work without any interruptions thereby producing many good results. It is your turn to cook and you may decide to show off a little by cooking several choices of foods that are intriguing and healthy and fun. You can teach healthy habits through your efforts.

Pooch Cafe

ACROSS 1. Committee formed by a special-interest group to raise money for their favorite political candidates.

4. Colorless watery fluid of blood and lymph containing no cells and in which erythrocytes and leukocytes and platelets are suspended.

10. A label made of cardboard or plastic or metal.

13. A constellation in the southern hemisphere near Telescopium and Norma.

14. An Asian skiff usually propelled by two oars.

15. A loose sleeveless outer garment made from aba cloth.

16. A small cake leavened with yeast.

18. A prearranged fight with deadly weapons by two people (accompanied by seconds) in order to settle a quarrel over a point of honor.

19. 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.

20. A state in northwestern North America.

21. Diabetes caused by a relative or absolute deficiency of insulin and characterized by polyuria.

23. Someone who works (or provides workers) during a strike.

25. A unit of length of thread or yarn.

28. A plant hormone promoting elongation of stems and roots.

30. Of or pertaining to Rwanda.

32. English historian noted for his constitutional history of medieval England (1825-1901).

36. Type genus of the family Arcidae.

37. (Greek mythology) Goddess of the earth and mother of Cronus and the Titans in ancient mythology.

39. A period marked by distinctive character or reckoned from a fixed point or event.

40. An artificial language that is a revision and simplification of Esperanto.

44. Wet from being plunged into liquid.

48. Goddess of the dead and queen of the underworld.

50. An ugly evil-looking old woman.

51. The United Nations agency concerned with atomic energy.

54. A monarchy in northwestern Europe occupying most of the British Isles.

55. A large metal or pottery vessel with a handle and spout.

59. The act of scanning.

60. (British) A waterproof raincoat made of rubberized fabric.

62. Plant with an elongated head of broad stalked leaves resembling celery.

63. The bureau of the Treasury Department responsible for tax collections.

66. A notable achievement.

67. The seat within a bishop's diocese where his cathedral is located adv.

68. A river that rises in central Germany and flows north to join the Elbe River.

69. Type genus of the Alcidae comprising solely the razorbill.

Gemini (May 21-June 20) The middle of this week may find you daydreaming. Be particularly vigilant when signing contracts or performing duties that are made up of little details. You may have a hard time being clearheaded right now. Thoughts and ideas that come may be inappropriate or misleading. Give yourself time to think things through and refrain from making rash decisions, including those that pertain to spending money. Eat light meals today and find a way to insert some exercise activity into your day—perhaps a long walk. Look for the funny side of life and laugh as much as possible—you will cheer yourself and others. Visiting with neighbors or friends is enjoyable this evening. Music or a comedy movie on videotape may be the perfect end to your day.

Non Sequitur

Cancer (June 21-July 22) This could be a challenging day, but one in which much can be accomplished. The challenges may only be your desire to compete with yourself in some area. You may have decided to get more education, take or give lectures or improve your writing skills, etc. Whatever the case, this is a good time to involve yourself in new projects.

It is also a good time to expand your knowledge or to teach others. Don’t be afraid to advertise yourself—make your dreams real. Ideas of group cooperation could further your career. Things are working with rather than against you now, so do not hold back. However, do not overdo and try to go too far too fast. You attach great importance to friendships and will find yourself with friends this evening.

Leo (July 23-August 22) General good feelings with a sense of support and harmony make this a happy time. If it makes sense you love it and if it does not you feel guilty about it: that’s what it’s like now. A loving attention to details and a sense of satisfaction in doing what is right are some of the qualities that come to your attention now. Discovering what you truly believe in—fighting for it, even—is a high personal priority now.

Religion, law, politics, travel and higher education are some of the arenas where this takes place. This is a time of testing your limits to see how far you can go. You are able to grasp and appreciate new trends and concepts at the very forefront of technology. A new item of technology may keep you busy studying this evening. Communication improves.

Zits

Virgo (August 23-September 22) You could find it difficult to gain any free time for yourself today. The pressure is on in the workplace. Time limits and time schedules may have you huffing and puffing. You have probably noticed that this may not be the best time to chat on the phone to your lover. There will, however, soon be a time to relax and sit back and see the productive success of your efforts. There is an opportunity to increase your earnings but now is not time for a pay raise; make sure you make notes in your work diary that today is the day you made great headway for the company and succeeded in whatever was necessary to have positive results. When it is time for that pay raise, you will have a report of your successes. Make sure the outside birds have water.

Libra (September 23-October 22) Before you act on a new idea today, consider the sources of your information. Make sure a new method or idea is a sound one by checking facts. When it comes to mental work, you are an expert at research and investigation. You enjoy examining and analyzing, particularly when it comes to psychological areas of the mind. Your ability to sift through the debris and come up with what is essential every time is exceptional. You like to discuss and communicate, again always at a psychological and very personal level. Others may find you very focused.

Your career always seems to get the support you need. This is the area of life that usually runs smoothly. You seem to understand what the public wants.

Mass marketing could be considered.

Mother Goose and Grimm

DOWN 1. A metabolic acid found in yeast and liver cells.

2. Any of various strong liquors distilled from the fermented sap of toddy palms or from fermented molasses.

3. A compartment in front of a motor vehicle where driver sits.

4. A note appended to a letter after the signature.

5. A boy or man.

6. Providing enjoyment.

7. A detailed description of design criteria for a piece of work.

8. Physical discomfort (as mild sickness or depression).

9. An associate degree in nursing.

10. An official language of the Republic of South Africa.

11. A French abbot.

12. Mentally or physically infirm with age.

17. A city in southern Turkey on the Seyhan River.

22. A condition (mostly in boys) characterized by behavioral and learning disorders.

24. A Chadic language spoken south of Lake Chad.

26. A device that, on receiving radar signals, transmits coded signals in response to help navigators determine their position.

27. A soft silvery metallic element of the alkali earth group.

29. A soft yellow malleable ductile (trivalent and univalent) metallic element.

31. Relating to the Urdu language.

33. Massive plantigrade carnivorous or omnivorous mammals with long shaggy coats and strong claws.

34. (informal) Exceptionally good.

35. The general activity of selling.

38. The blood group whose red cells carry both the A and B antigens.

41. A fixed charge for a privilege or for professional services.

42. 1 species.

43. A state of Uganda and site of a former Bantu kingdom.

44. An official language of the Republic of South Africa.

45. An inn in some Eastern countries with a large courtyard that provides accommodation for caravans.

46. 3 to 30 gigahertz.

47. A close friend who accompanies his buddies in their activities.

49. Jordan's port.

50. An international organization of European countries formed after World War II to reduce trade barriers and increase cooperation among its members.

52. A unit of area (4840 square yards) used in English-speaking countries.

53. Freedom from difficulty or hardship or effort.

56. A Gaelic-speaking Celt in Ireland or Scotland or the Isle of

Yesterday’s Solution

Scorpio (October 23-November 21) There could be some communications difficulty with a customer today. You realize that if you are not challenged you cannot grow—you swallow hard and move forward. You learn from the difficult situations that seem to call out to you for your aptness. You may feel like exercising or getting out during the noon hour today. By the end of the day you will see much progress. There is good eye-hand coordination and a sustained effort that makes almost any task run well. Consider a new picture for your wall or nook while shopping this afternoon. A new or renewed love relationship in your life creates an upbeat type of mood for you all day long.

Nothing disturbs your good feelings. There is much laughter in your heart.

Sagittarius (November 22-December 21) This is a special time when you may notice that everything is going your way. Circumstances seem to bend to your will and things have a way of working out smoothly. There are real opportunities to complete and work out difficulties and projects that require both long-term effort and a high degree of discipline.

Listening to other people talk about their investments you may pick up some good advice. Be careful of the quick-win type of investment; this almost never works out. A good investment can start small and grow beyond your wildest dreams—be on the lookout for opportunities that are reliable and come from a reliable source. You may be in the mood for fun conversations this evening; a good time to enjoy a family meal away from home.

Capricorn (December 22-January 19) You need to live in an ordered environment, whether it is a work, school or home situation. You can become quite frustrated when too many different matters grab your attention. This is a time to realize that unless there is a fire, you will have time to think through each matter separately. Perhaps by writing out a plan, you will become more focused on the steps you need to take. Learn methods of planning and organization by reading a guidebook, or taking a class in some management skills. As a high achiever, you can turn some of your business associates into friends—they will help you progress in your career and teach you the art of focusing. A successful businessperson is developing—you! There are some photo opportunities this evening.

Aquarius (January 20- February 18) You may be

Yesterday’s Solution

especially dynamic and assertive. There is a lot of enthusiasm and drive available for whatever you want to accomplish. You could be most persuasive with others and may find that the ideas or feelings you have will get great reception. The situation is a natural for self-expression and lends itself to your particular ideas. There has been an increase in your physical and mental energies recently, giving you a boost in your confidence. You may feel ready to conquer anything put in front of you today. Shopping with a friend, you are curious about some new invention. Wait a while longer before purchasing new electronic products—a hard-to-resist sale may tempt you; however, even new and better products are on the horizon.

Word Sleuth Solution

Pisces (February 19-March 20) There could be some worry about not being useful or being left out of the scheme of things today. This can be eased by jumping in with both feet and putting your thoughts into action. This is a time to take risks and dare to be a little eccentric. You will prosper through new insights and an independent point of view. Your career could open up now— keep your ears and eyes open so that you do not miss some important opportunity. Beyond whatever external considerations may be present, you exude a contagious thankfulness and fondness for things and people. These inner, loving qualities are experienced as a very real good. The light in your eyes says it all: your mind and ideas are central to your inner and philosophical life. Someone new is coming into your life.

INFORMATION

Thursday, September 9, 2010

35 FIRE BRIGADE Operation Room 112 Al-Madena 22418714 Al-Shohada始a 22545171 Al-Shuwaikh 24810598 Al-Nuzha 22545171 Sabhan 24742838 Al-Helaly 22434853 Al-Fayhaa 22545051 Al-Farwaniya 24711433 Al-Sulaibikhat 24316983 Al-Fahaheel 23927002 Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh 24316983 Ahmadi 23980088 Al-Mangaf 23711183 Al-Shuaiba 23262845 Al-Jahra 25610011 Al-Salmiya 25616368

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For labor-related inquiries and complaints: Call MSAL hotline 128 HOSPITALS Sabah Hospital

24812000

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THE PUBLIC AUTHORITY FOR CIVIL INFORMATION Automated enquiry about the Civil ID card is 1889988 AIRLINES

PHARMACIES ON 24 HRS DUTY GOVERNORATE Ahmadi

PHARMACY Sama Safwan Abu Halaifa Danat Al-Sultan

ADDRESS Fahaeel Makka St Abu Halaifa-Coastal Rd Mahboula Block 1, Coastal Rd

PHONE 23915883 23715414 23726558

Jahra

Modern Jahra Madina Munawara

Jahra-Block 3 Lot 1 Jahra-Block 92

24575518 24566622

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Ahlam Khaldiya Coop

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22436184 24833967

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PRIVATE CLINICS Ophthalmologists: Dr. Abidallah Al-Mansoor Dr. Samy Al-Rabeea Dr. Masoma Habeeb Dr. Mubarak Al-Ajmy Dr. Mohsen Abel Dr Adnan Hasan Alwayl Dr. Abdallah Al-Baghly

25622444 25752222 25321171 25739999 25757700 25732223 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-Awadi22616660 Dr. Adel Al-Hunayan FRCS (C) 25313120 Plastic Surgeons: Dr. Mohammad Al-Khalaf 22547272

22434064 22435865 22544200 22547133 22515277 22616662 25714406 22530801

Dr. Abdal-Redha Lari Dr. Abdel Quttainah

22617700 25625030/60

Family Doctor: Dr Divya Damodar 23729596/23729581

Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr. Dr.

Zahra Qabazard Sohail Qamar Snaa Maaroof Pradip Gujare Zacharias Mathew

25710444 22621099 25713514 23713100 24334282

(1) Ear, Nose and Throat Psychiatrists Dr. Esam Al-Ansari 22635047 Dr Eisa M. Al-Balhan 22613623/0 Gynaecologists & Obstetricians: Dr Adrian Harbe 23729596/23729581 Dr. Verginia s.Marin 2572-6666 ext 8321 Dr. Fozeya Ali Al-Qatan 22655539 Dr. Majeda Khalefa Aliytami 25343406 Dr. Ahmad Al-Khooly 25739272 Dr. Salem soso 22618787 General Surgeons:

Dr. Amer Zawaz Al-Amer 22610044 Dr. Mohammad Yousef Basher 25327148

Paediatricians: Dr. Abd Al-Aziz Al-Rashed 25340300

Rheumatologists: Dr. Adel Al-Awadi 25330060 Dr. Khaled Al-Jarallah 25722290

(2) Plastic Surgeon Dr. Abdul Mohsin Jafar, FRCS (Canada)

25655535 Dentists:

Dr Anil Thomas

3729596/3729581

Dr. Shamah Al-Matar

22641071/2

Dr. Anesah Al-Rasheed

22562226

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

Neurologists:

Internist, Chest & Heart: DR.Mohammes Akkad 24555050 Ext 210 Dr. Mohammad Zubaid MB, ChB, FRCPC, PACC Assistant Professor Of Medicine Head, Division of Cardiology Mubarak Al-Kabeer Hospital Tel: 25339667 Dr. Farida Al-Habib MD, PH.D, FACC Consultant Cardiologist Tel: 2611555-2622555 Inaya German Medical Center Te: 2575077 Fax: 25723123

Dr. Sohal Najem Al-Shemeri 25633324 Dr. Jasem Mola Hassan

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

Physiotherapists & VD: Dr. Deyaa Shehab 25722291 Dr. Musaed Faraj Khamees 22666288

25345875

Gastrologists Dr. Sami Aman

22636464

Dr. Mohammad Al-Shamaly 25322030 Dr. Foad Abidallah Al-Ali

22633135

Endocrinologist: Dr. Abd Al-Naser Al-Othman 25339330 Dr. Ahmad Al-Ansari

25658888

Dr. Kamal Al-Shomr

25329924

Psychologists/Psychotherapists Soor Center Tel: 2290-1677 Fax: 2290 1688 info@soorcenter.com www.soorcenter.com Dr. Naif Al-Mutawa, Ph.D. 2290-1677 Susannah-Joy Schuilenberg, M.A. 2290-1677 William Schuilenberg, RPC 2290-1677 Zaina Al Zabin, M.Sc. 2290-1677

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SPECTRUM

c i a g l a S m u ’ r s i e

atie Holmes thinks it is “magical” when she brings her daughter to work. The 31-year-old actress - who has four-year-old Suri with husband Tom Cruise - adores spending time with the youngster and admits she helps keep her spirits high when she’s having a bad day. She said: “It’s been really wonderful and I love being a mom. Suri comes to the set with me... She is amazing and it’s really fun to share making a movie with her. She brings so much to it. “She is such a light that you instantly feel better. When I’m working, I feel like, ‘Wow, this is so magical I get to share this with you, and you give me so much.’ It’s really fun.” Katie has spent the past few weeks portraying the late Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis for mini-series ‘The Kennedys’, alongside Greg Kinnear. The brunette beauty adored working on the show - which will air on the History Channel next year - because it allowed her to portray the “amazing” woman. She told US TV show ‘Access Hollywood’: “She was an amazing mother and she was a very strong woman. She did a lot right.” Katie was also delighted with how movie bosses have allowed them to integrate their family life into filming. She explained: “We’ve had a lot of fun with all of the kids on set.

Everyone brings their kids and we do play dates there and paint pottery. There’s always like a million things going on at once and you just do it.”

Gomez unsure of love elena Gomez doesn’t know what love is. The 18-year-old star - who has previously dated Nick Jonas - thinks she is too young to know about relationships and the feelings they bring. She said: “I’m 18, but I feel like I’m still 15. I feel very young at heart, and I still want to jump up and down on my bed singing and rocking out.

“You never really know when

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proud of recovery

Jamie Lee Curtis

Sheridan granted permission to sue Cherry

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icollette Sheridan has been granted permission to sue the creator of ‘Desperate Housewives’. The actress was told by Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Elizabeth Allen White that the case she filed in April 2010 accusing Marc Cherry and network ABC of alleged assault and battery, gender violence, wrongful termination and discrimination based on sex, sexual orientation and age following her axe from the show in September 2008 is valid. Lawyers for the network argued against the discrimination aspect of the suit, insisting it provided an uncertain cause of action because it combined three separate claims. However, the judge said: “Although annoying, inconvenient and inconsiderate, the failure to separate the three distinct wrongs does not result in an inability to understand what is alleged.” She also denied ABC’s request to have some language relating to the alleged harassment from the complaint. The network’s lawyer Adam Levin told the judge both parties had not agreed to mediation, meaning the dispute may now be played out in open court. In her suit, Nicollette - who is suing for $20 million damages claimed Marc hit her across the face and sacked her when she complained to network ABC. The case was originally filed in April, though a month later, the actress made an amendment to say he had given her a “light tap” on the face. The updated lawsuit states: “In December 2008, Sheridan was informed that ABC had fully investigated her complaint and had concluded that she was not mistreated. In fact, the Executive Vice President of ABC Studios, Howard Davine, claimed that ‘Marc Cherry simply gave her a light tap on the side of her head for the sole purpose of providing direction for a scene they were rehearsing.’ With that, ABC decided to take no further action and closed the investigation, informing Sheridan that ‘we will finish off the season in the spirit of professionalism and courtesy that has been the normal course for ‘Desperate Housewives’.’ “However, rather than a season of ‘professionalism and courtesy’, Sheridan was informed in February 2009 that her employment on the show was going to be terminated and that her character, Edie Britt, was being killed off the show.” At this point, it claims Nicollette was ordered to “break the story” she would be leaving to the press.

Thursday, September 9, 2010

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and Italian descent - is keen to learn Spanish. She told Latina magazine: “I really need to learn my language.

I practice, but I can understand it better than I can speak it.” Selena also revealed how she will only do projects she feels passionate about, saying: “I’m not just going to slap my name on something. I want to be really passionate about everything I do, so it’s all about timing.”

Knowles’ birthday surprise

ay-Z organized a surprise birthday bash for wife Beyonce Knowles at the weekend. The rapper made the ‘Halo’ hitmaker’s 29th birthday party on Saturday one to remember by hiring out New York eatery The Darby, where the couple were joined by celebrity pals Kayne West, P Diddy, Serena Williams and Alicia Keys. An insider told the New York Post newspaper: “Jay brought a six-layer cake out for Beyonce, they were really affectionate. Cassidy played Stevie Wonder’s ‘Happy Birthday’. The party went on until 6 am. “Both Jay and Beyonce’s moms were

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there, but there was no sign of her father or her sister. Diddy was the last to leave. Jay filled the room with orchids.” Earlier this week, it was claimed Lady Gaga had splashed out thousands of dollars on a custom-made diamond whip and matching underwear set as a birthday gift for the singer, which she presented to her backstage at Jay-Z’s concert in Detroit last week. A source explained: “Gaga wanted to give her something special. The whip was made out of hundreds of diamonds and leather. When Beyonce received it she squealed with excitement.”

Noel Gallagher praises rival N

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amie Lee Curtis regards her recovery from painkiller addiction as the “greatest accomplishment” of her life.

The US actress - who previously admitted she became dependant on prescription medicine aged 35 following cosmetic surgery on her eyes - thinks her life would have “fallen apart” if she had not beaten her problem. She told ‘The Today Show’: “My recovery is the single greatest accomplishment of my life. And without that, the rest of my life would have fallen apart “Recovery and motherhood are the two single greatest things in my life.” The ‘Freaky Friday’ actress also singled out Robert Downey Jr - whose drug fuelled younger days almost led to his career being irredeemably wrecked - as another example of someone coming back from the brink. She added: “Robert Downey Jr was in prison for a year. And he is not only the greatest movie star in the world, he’s a fantastic representative

you’re in love at this age. I don’t know what love is.” However, the ‘Wizards of Waverly Place’ actress says she has a good idea of what her ideal boyfriend will be like. She said: “I would like someone who is not cool and who is really fun to be around and loves family and has good morals.” As well as being on the search for her perfect man, Selena - who is of Mexican, English

of someone who can repair the damage of their life.” The 51-year-old star - who has adopted children Anne, 24, and Thomas, 15, with her husband Christopher Guest also admitted she used to drink to battle her loneliness and turned to plastic surgery when her body started to change shape as she grew older. Jamie wrote in more detail of the problems her addiction caused in the wake of pop star Michael Jackson’s death in June 2009 - from acute Propofol intoxication, although pathologists found a number of different prescription drugs in his system. She wrote: “I too found painkillers after a routine cosmetic surgical procedure and I too became addicted, the morphine becomes the warm bath from which to escape painful reality.

“I was a lucky one. I was able to see that the pain had started long ago and far away and that finding the narcotic was merely a matter of time.” Jamie has now been sober for over 10 years. —Bang Showbiz

oel Gallagher admitted Gorillaz deserved a prize at the GQ Men of the Year awards.

The former Oasis rocker praised the animated group masterminded by his former bitter chart rival Damon Albarn - as they collected the Band of the Year accolade at the starstudded ceremony at London’s Royal Opera House. Noel told The Sun newspaper: “Gorillaz definitely deserve some kind of award - if only for having 104 people on stage at Glastonbury. What a nice rider that must’ve been to organize.” Noel was at the ceremony to hand veteran Kinks frontman Ray Davies an Outstanding Achievement award.

Controversial US rocker Alice Cooper, who was sitting next to him at the awards spoke of the influence Ray had on his career. He said: “It was British bands like The Beatles, The Rolling Stones and The Kinks that got me into music. Ray is the man who made me want to write songs. I learned everything I know from analyzing his songs.” The annual awards show by the English magazine also saw rapper Dizzee Rascal pick up Solo Artist of the Year, while ‘Doctor Who’ star Matt Smith was honored as Actor of the Year. Hollywood star

Jason Statham picked up the Editor’s Special award, while fashion designer Giorgio Armani was named Designer of the Year. Though the ceremony honors high-profile men, actress Gemma Arterton also picked up a gong at the bash, taking home the International Woman of the Year trophy. Other stars to appear at the event included musician and producer Mark Ronson, model Daisy Lowe and pregnant singer Lily Allen.

Full list of GQ Men of the Year aw ards w inners: Outstanding Achievement - Ray Davies Solo Artist of the Year - Dizzee Rascal International Woman of the Year - Gemma Arterton International Man of the Year - Jon Hamm Band of the Year - Gorillaz Actor of the Year - Matt Smith Sportsman of the Year - Ryan Giggs Comedian of the Year - James Corden Chef of the Year - Heston Blumenthal Editor’s Special - Jason Statham Most Stylish Man of the Year - Aaron Johnson Politician of the Year - David Cameron Designer of the Year - Giorgio Armani Alfred Dunhill Cultural Icon - Anish Kapoor Breakthrough Talent of the Year - Ed Westwick Writer of the Year - Martin Amis Newspaper Editor of the Year - Simon Kelner Entrepreneur of the Year - Nick Jones

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

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‘America’s Next Top Model’ upgrades judges

By Lindsay Powers new crop of highly regarded fashion connoisseurs will appear as guest judges on the next installment of “America’s Next Top Model” this fall. Photographer Patrick Demarchelier, photographerdirector Matthew Rolston, and designers Diane von Furstenberg, Zac Posen and Roberto Cavalli will offer critiques on the 15th cycle of supermodel Tyra Bank’s series, which premieres Sept. 8 on the CW network.

While celebrities such as Victoria Beckham and Jennifer Lopez have appeared on the show in the past, the series is now attracting prestigious industry insiders thanks to a partnership with Italian Vogue, the Los Angeles Times reported. “We’ve always been a very mainstream show ... a hidden secret or guilty secret of the fashion world,” executive producer Ken Mok told the Times Tuesday.

“No one confesses out loud to watching it,” he added. “But the second we went out and told the world that Italian Vogue was going to be the prize ... that completely opened the doors, carte blanche, to any and everybody we wanted.”

The magazine’s editor, tastemaker Franca Sozzani, also will serve as a guest judge. The winner will appear in a six- to eight-page spread in the magazine early next year, as well as another spread in the May 2011 supplement, Beauty in Vogue.

Past winners have appeared on more consumer-friendly magazines such as Marie Claire, Jane, Elle and Seventeen. The show has declined in ratings in recent years. Last season averaged 3.3 million viewers compared to its high of 5 million in 2004. —Reuters

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Heidi Hoops performs her act “Lost And Found - The Sugar Candy Show” at the media launch of the Sydney Fringe alternative arts event yesterday.

From September 10 to 26, the theatres, pubs and public spaces of Sydney’s inner west will play host to 280 events by 3,000 plus artists as part of the inaugural Sydney Fringe. —AFP

In Choo and Payless, models launch fashion events s if a general strike weren’t enough to snarl Paris traffic, a hoard of fashionistas brought it to a crawl Tuesday as they turned out en masse for the City of Light’s edition of Fashion’s Night Out. Paris’ luxury “triangle d’or” — the tony Avenues Montaigne and Georges V and Rue Francois Premier-shed its imaged of hushed, tasteful shopping

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well past their regular hours and into the balmy night.

The brainchild of Vogue editor-incheif Anna Wintour, Fashion’s Night Out was launched last year as an antidote to the recession. This year, it’s slated to take place in New York, London, Milan and other cities. In Paris, thousands shrugged off a nationwide strike that saw major

heavy-hitting luxury label after another.

“If you’re going to drink like that at each store, we’re going to have to carry you home,” one reveler hissed to her tipsy companion. The women broke out their vertiginous, redsoled Louboutins for the occasion, while the many of the men took advantage of the warm weather to

Cave-dwellings and bubbles: Design and the new privacy

By Emma Charlton ink into a bathtub hewn from rough granite, in a womb-like grotto with animal pelts for rugs and a life-sized stuffed buffalo for company: Welcome to the caveman experience. Design gurus at this year’s Maison et Objet design fair in Paris were asked to think about privacy-and what it means in a era defined by Facebook, mass media, reality television and cities mapped out by security cameras.

One concept on display cast the home as a cave or primitive shelter, a place we can crawl to “reconnect with our roots, our origins,” said trendwatcher Elizabeth Leriche who imagined the space.

Raw-looking materials abounded, like lanterns or cabinets chiselled from rough stone, vases of leather or alabaster, or a Brazilianmade terracotta table that looked like a slab of cracked, dry-baked red earth, polished smooth. “Privacy has become a luxury,” Leriche said.

“In a globalised world where everything moves so fast, we want to slow things down, get back in touch with nature, with the seasons-and with the animal world.”

This is “cocooning”-the decadeold idea of the home as a safe, soothing nest-but pushed to the extreme, and with a dose of humor thrown in as well. Organic, life-like shapes filled the low-lit space, like a bench that swells into a giant papier-mache bees’ nest, or chairs that sprout branches or a shock of thick woolly hair from their back, by the Spanish designer Nacho Carbonnel.

Armchairs made from layered leather strips or undyed cow hide added to the animal theme, hammered home by the brooding presence of a taxidermied buffalo-a star attraction at the fair, along with tigers, peacocks or a polar bear. But the new privacy was not all about getting back to basics, renouncing technology and hiding away from the world. “The line between public and private is increasingly blurred. People want peace and quiet. They want comfort, but without cutting themselves off from the world altogether,” said trendwatcher Francois Bernard. “We are in the post-loft era. Everyone wants space, air, light, a view. Walls have come tumbling down, everything is open-space. Yet at the same time there is a need for privacy.”

One way designers are resolving the paradox is by replacing walls with furniture to create temporary “bubbles”, closed spaces in an open environment that play on the notion of boundaries. This year’s fair showed the backs of chairs creeping up, their sides curling round to envelop the sitter, while bookshelves were used as space-dividers. —AFP

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Models walk the runway during “Fashion’s Night Out: The Show” at Lincoln Center in New York on Tuesday. — AP photos People are seen outside fashion shop Dior in Paris as fashionistas turned out en masse for the City of Light’s edition of Fashion’s Night Out. for one of bubbly-and-macaroonfueled conspicuous consumption played out beneath a booming house and techno soundtrack. Celebrities, most of them designers or French starlets, added a shot of glamour to the event, which saw luxury giants including Chanel, Louis Vuitton and Valentino throw open their doors

demonstrations snake through the streets of France’s cities, where the number of buses and Metros was slashed to the barest of minimums.

Still, the city’s fashion crowd turned out in force, streaming up and down Avenue Montaigne and hitting one

Models walk the runway during Fashion’s Night Out: The Show at Lincoln Center on September 7, 2010 in New York City.

don their relaxed, vacation-wear just one last time. At the Chloe boutique, visitors swarmed a makeshift studio to get their 3-D portraits taken, while at Ralph Lauren, the less selfconscious ones shimmied to the Prohibition-era tunes of a jazz band.

Model Gisele Bundchen walks the runway during “Fashion’s Night Out: The Show” at Lincoln Center.

“Blondie” was blasting out of oversized loudspeakers as herds of fashionistas sullied the mythical gray carpets of Christian Dior’s labyrinthine headquarters, where the founder used to fit European royals and movie stars with their haute couture gowns.

Headhunter Catherine Euvrard, a striking fifty-something poured into a sharp black skirtsuit, was admiring the mix of people. “I love to see these grand dames who are richer than God but don’t have particularly good style with all the young, hip people, most of whom couldn’t dream of actually buying anything in a place like this,” said Euvrard, adding that she, unlike many in the younger generation, hadn’t come for the free drink. “I can afford my own, darling,” she said. Up the street at the Chanel boutique, the line to get in stretched down the block. Inside women with wills of steel queued up again, this time for a manicure with polish from this season’s taupe, drab and khaki collection. Oddly but tastily, the food obeyed a similar color scheme: Macaroons, Parmesan crackers and a chilled soup were all either brown or green, or both.

It was rumored the label’s uberdesigner Karl Lagerfeld would put in an appearance sometime before the sprawling boutique finally closed its doors at 11 pm (2100 GMT.) Still, the cash registers seemed to be humming the loudest at Louis Vuitton, where a small army of multilingual saleswomen-and a more foreboding one of beefy security guards-greeted revelers with dazzling white smiles.

Anxious to take advantage of every possible shopping second, an Italian man tried on two pairs of Vuitton shoes at once, wearing a white tennis shoe on his right foot and a loafer in gleaming black patent leather on his left. —AP

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Thursday, September 9, 2010

Music

The xx win UK Mercury music prize for debut album

By Venetia Rainey lectronic band the xx have been named the winners of Britain’s 2010 Mercury Prize for their debut album, “The xx”. The band, which consists of Romy Madley Croft, Oliver Sim and Jamie Smith, recorded their album in a small garage part of record label XL’s studios. Their critically acclaimed album, a sleepy but intoxicating mix of electronic beats and understated vocals, was ranked number two on NME magazine’s Best of the Year list, and reached number 10 in the UK charts.

“We’ve had the most incredible year,” xx frontman Sim said. “It feels like every day we wake up to something incredible. It hasn’t sunken in to be honest.”

They beat 11 other nominees including rapper Dizzee Rascal with his platinum album, “Tongue N’Cheek”, veteran musician Paul Weller’s 10th solo album, “Wake up the Nation”, and Corrine Bailey Rae’s “The Sea”. The award, which honors the best album released in the past 12 months, comes with a 20,000 pound ($30,740) prize and is likely to boost the band’s record sales.

One of the judges, Simon Frith, who has chaired the Mercury Prize panel since it began in 1992, said the winning album captures something of the slightly anxious mood of the country. “They have that urban soundscape where they are not exactly secure,” Frith said. “That late night feeling where you like the city, and it’s exhilarating, but you don’t know what’s going to happen.”

English group Foals stand with a trophy.

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English folk singer, Laura Marling stands with a trophy at the Grosvenor House Hotel.

Sim said the band’s next move would be a US tour and then some domestic changes. “We have our last tour coming up around the states, then we’re coming home and moving out and getting our own homes.” There was talk at the awards of a win by Mumford & Sons with their album “Sigh No More”.

This would have been in keeping with the Mercury’s inclination to give the prestigious award to little known nominees. In the end, however, the xx, who have been sweeping the festival scene this summer, received the accolade.

“We made this album in a converted garage the size of a bathroom,” Croft said. “So we would love to make our own studio and experiment and let Jamie (Smith) produce.” Weller, former singer for modband The Jam, had ousted newcomers The xx as the favorite to win the Prize earlier this week. Over the weekend bookmaker William Hill decided to slash its odds of Weller winning from 20/1 to 1/10 due to an unprecedented flurry of betting activity.

Weller has not been nominated for the Mercury since 1994, when his album “Wild Wood” was shortlisted, but failed to take the award. Last year’s winner was hip-hop star Speech Debelle with her debut release “Speech Therapy”. Other former winners include Dizzee Rascal, the Klaxons, and Badly Drawn Boy. The Mercury Prize, Awards which are open to any UK or Irish artist who has released an album during the past year, were presented by radio DJ Lauren Laverne and hosted by musician and television presenter Jools Holland. —Reuters

Conor J O’Brien of Irish group Villagers stands with a trophy.

British rapper Dizzee Rascal holds a trophy.

British group ‘The xx’ stand with a trophy at the Grosvenor House Hotel in central London ahead of the annual Mercury Prize awards on September 7, 2010. — AFP photos

English group, I Am Kloot, stand with a trophy.

Rolling Stones again at their peak in rerelease

By Chris Lehourites he Rolling Stones have hit their peak again in 2010, this time in the form of a rarely seen rereleased movie of a 1972 concert. “Ladies and Gentlemen ... The Rolling Stones” was originally released in late 1973 in Britain, but the film was not widely shown. The digitally remastered version, which made its global premiere on Tuesday in London, shows the Stones at their best, belting out classics like “Brown Sugar,” “You Can’t Always Get What You Want” and “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” along with “new” songs like “Tumbling Dice,” Sweet Virginia” and “Rip This Joint.” The latter songs were all on the 1972 album “Exile on Main St.,” which was also remastered and rereleased this year to great acclaim.

None of the current Rolling Stones members that are in the movie — Mick Jagger, Keith Richards and Charlie Watts — made it for the premiere, but former bassist Bill Wyman was in attendance. Wyman was with the band for 30 years but quit in 1992 to explore other musical opportunities. Although Jagger wasn’t there, a short interview with the lead singer was played on screen before the movie began. “Everyone’s very together and on,” Jagger said in the interview, which was recorded about six weeks ago in London. “I can remember the Rolling Stones being very, kind of, lackadaisical, very sloppy band on stage. But this was obviously not the case on this day.” The 1972 tour was the Stones at their peak, or at least at the tail end of it.

The five-year period leading up to that year is generally regarded as the band’s prime. From “Beggars Banquet” in 1968 through “Let It Bleed” in ‘69 and “Sticky Fingers” in ‘71, the Stones were the ultimate rock n’ roll band, playing hard and partying harder. The movie, pieced together from several different concerts played in Texas, was digitally remastered and will be shown in theaters around the world in the coming weeks. The DVD and Blu-ray versions are set to be released in October, according to Eagle Rock Entertainment chief operating officer Geoff Kempin.

The Stones also released “Stones in Exile” this year, a documentary about the making of “Exile on Main St” “(Jagger is) very strategic about where and when he wants stuff released,” Kempin said. The movie opens with a black screen and some background noise. Soon, though, the lights come on and Watts starts banging on his drums as the band breaks into “Brown Sugar.” Throughout the movie, the clothes change as the concert footage switches from show to show, but the music remains crisp and tight. Before they start playing “Midnight Rambler,” Jagger personifies the attitude of the band at the time by taking a couple of swigs from a big bottle of Jack Daniel’s whiskey.

The footage also harkens back to the days when playing concerts was more intimate for the band because the stage was so small, especially compared to later tours when Jagger would constantly be on the move, sometimes even running through the crowd with security guards all around him.

“We were really close together, super close together,” Jagger said. And with no additional vocals and only some keyboards and percussion in support, the sound was more raw. “I haven’t heard the Stones signing without backing vocals for years,” said Mike Griffiths, a 59-year-old television director and longtime fan. “It took me back.” The movie features 15 songs without interruption, finishing off with “Jumpin’ Jack Flash” and “Street Fighting Man.” “It was,” Jagger said, “a good choice of songs.”—AP

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John Lennon’s killer refused parole for sixth time ohn Lennon’s killer was denied parole for the sixth time on Tuesday, three months before the 30th anniversary of the former Beatle’s death.

The New York State Division of Parole turned down Mark David Chapman’s request, citing concerns “about the disregard you displayed for the norms of our society and the sanctity of human life,” according to a report by CNN. The three-member parole board panel concluded in written comments that Chapman’s “discretionary release remains inappropriate at this time and incompatible with the welfare of the community.” The New York Daily News said the parole division

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John Lennon

received 75 letters arguing against Chapman’s release, including one from Lennon’s 77-

year-old widow, Yoko Ono, who said last month she believed Chapman posed a risk to her,

Lennon’s two sons, the public and even to himself.

Her lawyer Peter Shukat told the newspaper that Ono was “very pleased” to hear of the decision to keep Chapman incarcerated. Chapman, 55, is serving a jail sentence of 20 years to life for shooting Lennon four times in the back outside the musician’s New York apartment building on Dec 8, 1980. He pleaded guilty to second-degree murder. He has served 29 years of his sentence at a maximum-security facility in Attica, New York. For the past 20 years he has been allowed conjugal visits with his wife Gloria whom he married in 1979. He has come up for parole every two years since 2000. —Reuters

Billy Ray Cyrus teams with son

By James Hibberd fter starring with his daughter Miley on the Dinsey Channel’s hit series “Hannah Montana” for four years, singer-actor Billy Ray Cyrus is now teaming with another one of his children. “UFO: Unbelievably Freakin’ Obvious” for US cable network Syfy has Cyrus and his 21-

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year-old son Trace investigating conspiracy theories.

“Our audience craves authentic, compelling and informative storytelling that pushes the boundaries of our normal world,” said Mark Stern, head of programming for the NBC Universal-owned network. “Allegations of cover-up and conspiracy around unexplained phenomena has inspired heated debate for

decades,” Stern said. “It will be interesting to see what truth Billy Ray and Trace may discover.”

“The existence of paranormal phenomena is something I’ve always wanted to explore further,” Cyrus said. “Getting the opportunity to take this adventure with my son, who has always had a keen interest in this area, is a dream come true.”— Reuters

Leonard Cohen to end world tour with 4 US shows eonard Cohen’s neverending world tour will actually end in December with four newly announced theater shows in the western United States, his promoter said Tuesday. The tireless Canadian folk poet emerged from a 15-year semi-retirement in May 2008 to crisscross large arenas around the world, and will have played more than 240 shows by the time he hangs up his fedora after a two-night stand in Las Vegas on Dec 10 and 11.

Cohen, who turns 76 later this month, plans

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Billy Ray Cyrus

to return to the studio next year to record his first album of new material since 2004’s “Dear Heather,” taking him off the road “for some time,” promoter AEG Live said in a statement.

He is known to take years to craft a single song.

The final four shows will kick off at Honolulu’s Blaisdell Concert Hall Dec 4. Cohen will play the Rose Quarter Theatre of the Clouds in Portland, Ore, Dec 8, and then head to the Colosseum at Caesars Palace in Las Vegas. —Reuters

Thursday, September 9, 2010

SPECTRUM

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Movies

Jolie upset over Quran burning plan ctress Angelina Jolie yesterday joined a growing chor us of opposition to plans by a US pastor to burn copies of the Quran on the anniversary of the Sept 11 attacks, amid fears it would fan religious hatred.

The Quran-torching event on Saturday planned

by Pastor Terry Jones, who heads a tiny, little-known church in Florida, is fueling growing fears about heightened Christian-Muslim tensions in the United States as well as elsewhere in the world.

Oscar-winning Jolie, who is visiting Pakistan to highlight the plight of millions of people devastated by the country’s worst-ever floods, said she would never support any such plans.

“Of course not. Of course not,” she told a news conference when asked if she supported Jones’ plans. She said she had “hardly the words” to express her opposition to burning someone’s religious text.

She hailed the US government’s opposition to the plans, which have already triggered angry protests in Afghanistan, where US troops are fighting Taliban militants.

US military commanders in Kabul have warned the spectacle could endanger American lives in Afghanistan while the White House and State Department weighed in with stern warnings making clear that President Barack Obama’s administration deplored the plan.

— Reuters

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(From Left) In this photo provided by the United Nations High Commission for Refugees, Angelina Jolie, the goodwill ambassador of UNHCR, sits with Pakistani flood-affected women during her visit to a camp for people displaced by heavy floods in Nowshera, Pakistan, Tuesday. —AP

Action! Long-lost movie by US filmmaker rolls again

Aamir Khan and his Midas touch

By Shilpa Jamkhandikar ne of India’s most popular actors, Aamir Khan, is considered Bollywood’s man with the Midas touch. The 45-year-old actor was last seen in the 2009 comedy “3 Idiots”, India’s biggest blockbuster to date, with 4 billion rupees ($85.6 million) in box-office takings. For his latest project, Khan turned producer for a low-budget film on the growing urban-rural divide in India.

“Peepli (Live)” released in August to rave reviews, with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh requesting a special screening. The film opens in the UK on Sept 24.

Khan spoke to Reuters about the importance of international audiences, the star system in Bollywood and why he isn’t interested in crossing over to the West.

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By Romain Raynaldy

Q: ‘Peep li (Live) focuses on the p oor in India and often films like this are accused of selling “poverty porn” to the West, reinforcing stereotypes about India. Do you think that’s true?

A: “I don’t look at this from that point of view.

When I saw ‘Slumdog Millionaire’ that was the least of the problems for me. As an Indian, I am not Q : Yo u r f i l m “ Pe e p l i ( L i v e ) ” i s b e i n g defensive. I believe that every country and every relea sed in the UK. As a n India n producer, culture has its issues. There are strengths and how important are international audiences for weaknesses in every culture and I don’t think ‘Peepli (Live)’ is trying to sell poverty. I don’t think you?

A: “It depends on the material. With ‘Peepli Anusha (Rizvi, the director) wrote the script with (Live)’, I felt that here is a film that has the poten- that in mind. If it were made for audiences abroad, tial to not only engage audiences who normally perhaps I would understand. But this film was made primarily for Indians so that is not an allegation I take seriously at all.”

Q: Bollyw ood is still a sta r-obsessed industry, isn’t it?

A: “The star system is there all over the world.

People like to see their heroes on screen, so why should producers stop them? You don’t need to counter that but the origin of the film should be the script. But I have always been like that, so if you look at me, you won’t see the rule, you will see the exception.”

Q: Does our style of filmmaking allow us to (From left) Indian Bollywood actor Aamir Khan and reach out to the w orld?

A: “Perhaps not. But I playback singer Asha Bhosle pose at a special screening of the Bollywood Hindi Film “Tessri Manzil” in Mumbai am not looking to break out. And I think most of late September 4, 2010. —AFP the filmmakers here have such a large and healthy watch Indian films but also audiences who may audience here that they don’t need to look outside. never have watched one. I had in mind right from It is countries where they have a small audience the beginning that if it turned out well, I would for their own cinema that they look for audiences pursue that and it did turn out well. As a producer I outside. “When it comes to world cinema, say in am trying my level best to see how far I can push the US, typically the business is $500,000 to $800,000. While our films do $1 or $2 million on an the envelope.” average. The diaspora audience is much bigger Q: W hen you sa y potentia l to enga ge a n than the niche audience. “So why would you want interna tiona l a udience, w ha t elem ents in a to go there? If you want to dramatically increase the stakes, then you go to a mainstream American film are you talking about?

A: “I don’t think it is what a film has but just audience, people who watch ‘Spiderman’. Why the sensibility it has. It is a different sensibility. I would they watch an Indian film? So better that we think in Indian cinema our emotional key is higher. sign Spielberg, pay him a fee and let him make the Films that are more understated, more real can film while I produce it sitting in India. I have no work for world audiences. Indian films are more emotional attachment to American audiences to larger than life and also the structure of the script want to make a film for them. I am excited about matters. Also, how a film ends matters a lot. For making films for my people here.”— Reuters

long-lost silent movie by legendary US filmmaker John Ford has had its first screening in more than eight decades-after being unearthed in New Zealand. “Upstream,” made by the veteran filmmaker in 1927, was dusted off and screened in Beverly Hills this month at the home of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which hosts the Oscars. The black-and-white film, which tell the story of a group of artists, was among some 75 American movies-features and shorts, documentaries and even cartoons, dating from 1898 to 1929 — left undiscovered for years.

But it was only earlier this year that a visiting archivist from the Academy took a look at the material, and identified the gem

by Ford, famous for westerns like “Stagecoach” as well as adaptations like “The Grapes of Wrath.” “It’s fantastic,” said Schawn Belston, a senior executive of Fox Studios, to which Ford-who won four Oscars during his glittering career-was contracted at the time he made “Upstream” 83 years ago.

“Unfortunately, it’s not something that happens everyday....

So many of the Fox silent films are lost or thought to be lost, that it’s a big part of our company’s history that’s lost or been missing.” Frank Stark, chief executive of The Film Archive of New Zealand, explained: “We have held these films for nearly 20 years and before that, they were in hands of private collectors in New Zealand.

“We were really very glad to have it and to take care of them, we had no money to preserve it.

So all we would do was to store them as well as we could, and try to keep them in good condition,” he told AFP. Like thousands of other Fox films, “Upstream” was thought to have gone up in

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Indian audiences, ‘Peepli (Live)’ is a very unusual conclusion. It doesn’t give you a very definite end and is open-ended on a lot of levels. It is not cathartic within the film itself.

“Most Indian films have a definite end so you come out of the theatre like this (dusts his hands).

We don’t want you to dust your hands, we want you to have the problem in your lap. And internationally, audiences are used to watching a film like that.”

Handout photo released by Bandidos Films of the still of Mexican movie “El Infierno” (Hell), showing Mexican actors Maria Rojo and Ernesto Gomez Cruz. —AFP

Mexico movie finds jokes in drug violence ‘hell’

By Sophie Nicholson Mexican returns from the United States to find his home town corrupted by drug traffickers in a polemical movie drawing laughs in Mexico despite its brutal depiction of drug violence.

Beheadings, mutilations and corrupt offici als, from local police right up to federal investigators, feature in El Infierno, or “Hell,” released two weeks before massive celebrations marking the bicentenary of Mexico’s independence and centenary of its revolution.

The black-humored satire also criticizes President Felipe Calderon’s military crackdown on drug gangs-which has been accompanied by a surge in violence leaving more than 28,000 dead since 2006 — and suggests that the country will have little to celebrate on September 16. “In some way the big question is: ‘Where will everything we’re seeing lead us?’” Luis Estrada, the film’s director, told AFP. Estrada is renowned for his controversial movie “L a Ley de Herodes,” or “Herod’s Law,” which took a humorous swipe at political corruption under the party which ruled Mexico for more than 70 years

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to 2000, the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI. “I’m surprised that 10 years later I realize we’re much worse off,” Estrada said. “Hell” suggests that government pressure to produce results against the country’s violent gangs is only producing more corruption and brutality.

The moustachioed protagonist, Benjamin Garcia, alias “The Benny,” is kicked back into Mexico after spending 20 years seeking a better life in the United States. His home town, called San Miguel Narcangel-a combination of “archangel” and “narco”-is desolate on his return, battered by the economic crisis, an eruption of violence and corruption. He soon learns that many of his friends and relatives have been knocked off by drug traffickers or drawn into brutal score-settling.

At first he is shocked by the violent influence of the drug gangs on the town, and the local women who now work as prostitutes for them.

But, having failed to send back money to his family from the United States, he soon slips into the ultra violent world of the local drug gangs-and takes a liking for its lifestyle, including payments in bundles of cash. —AFP

This undated handout photo shows actors Nancy Nash and Earle Fox in a still from ‘Upstream,’ a 1927 silent film by director John Ford, one of 75 early 20th century American films recently discovered at the New Zealand Film Archive and being restored by the New Zealand Project. —AFP smoke in 1937 when an enormous fire engulfed the studio’s archives in Little Ferry, in the US state of New Jersey.

Chances of any other copies of the movie surviving were slim, notably because of the way films were distributed at the time-and because they filmed using highly-inflammable chemicals. “The copies were played over and over and over and over again,” said Michael Pogorzelski, director of the Film Archive of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Science. “And then, when there were no other bookings, and nowhere else to run the film, they were destroyed, because they were dangerous.

They were more a liability than an asset. Storing it was a only a risk of fire.” —AFP

Deputy who arrested Mel Gibson sues own department

By Anthony McCartney he Los Angeles sheriff ’s deputy who arrested Mel Gibson for drunken driving in 2006 sued his department on Tuesday, claiming he has since been ostracized and passed over for promotions by the agency. Deputy James Mee’s lawsuit seeks unspecified damages for loss of income, benefits, medical expenses and for emotional distress and mental suffering.

Mee, who is Jewish, claims he was

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forced by his superiors to remove references to anti-Semitic slurs uttered by the actor-director during the arrest. Part of that report containing the slurs was leaked to the celebrity website TMZ.com, which also first reported the lawsuit.

Mee claims he was transferred after Gibson’s arrest and has not been awarded promotions to a traffic investigator or motorcycle deputy position because of the alleged discrimination.

The lawsuit claims the department violated its policies by taking

four years to investigate the leak and that has hurt Mee’s ability to be promoted. Sheriff’s spokesman Steve Whitmore denied the allegations.

“The whole story is not being told in this lawsuit and we look forward to telling it,” Whitmore said. “It has nothing to do with religious discrimination. We categorically deny those allegations.” Mee was the subject of a criminal investigation into the leaking of his initial report. The Los Angeles district attorney’s office declined to file charges against the deputy. —AP

www.kuwaittimes.net

Gals with guns:

These ‘divas’ are armed

By Jamie Stengle hen Judy Rhodes founded a group more than a decade ago to encourage women to shoot and hunt, her own outsized personality guaranteed that members would be a force to be reckoned with in the outdoors.The group-DIVA ...

Women Outdoors Worldwide, or DIVA WOW-now counts more than 1,500 members around the world. Rhodes, the daughter of a Texas rancher who learned how to handle a BB gun at age 4, said that about half of the women who join also have strong outdoors backgrounds, while the other half haven’t picked up a gun before. “That was just second nature to me to see a shotgun or a rifle in the gun rack,” said Rhodes, a feisty blonde with a Southern accent.

“Whenever something slithers, crawls or hops, you’ve got to pop it.”

The group offers clinics and seminars in fishing, archery, dog training and how to handle handguns, shotguns and even an AR15. They also organize hunts all over the world. Rhodes said the group gives women the chance to find their niche in the outdoors. For instance, she said, those who don’t want to shoot something “with eyelashes,” might enjoy shooting clay targets.

But the 60-year-old Dallas designer said it doesn’t take newcomers long to become converts.

Statistics from the National Sporting Goods Association show that the number of women hunting and shooting has been on the rise. According to the latest statistics, women hunting with firearms has increased from about 2.7 million in 2000 to about 3 million last year, and the number target shooting reached about 4.7 million. When the “divas” gather, there’s lots of encouragement shouted, and usually a fair amount of accessorizing as well, said Rhodes, who has decorated promotional materials and their website with leopard print.

“When they first come to see us they may be in flip-flops and blue jeans and a nice tailored shirt and the next thing we know, it’s Annie Oakley,” she said. “They have everything but the buckskin and the deer that they killed all draped around them.”

Cheryl Long, 58, joined the group around the time it was formed, not long after she started shooting pistols. She’s now the group’s communications director. “I really loved the actual part of the shooting and the competition,” she said. “Then it was the camaraderie of the women. I loved the independent spirit of the ladies.”— AP

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Winfrey, McCartney top new Kennedy Center Honors

By Steve Gorman alk show queen Oprah Winfrey and former Beatle Paul McCartney top the list of show business luminaries to be saluted for their contributions to US arts and culture at this year’s Kennedy Center Honors. Rounding out the roster of 2010’s honorees announced by organizers on Tuesday are country music legend Merle Haggard, Broadway composer and lyricist Jerry Herman of “Hello Dolly!” fame, and dancer-choreographer-director Bill T. Jones.

Recipients of the 33rd annual awards will be feted at a Dec. 5 gala event attended by US entertainment and political glitterati at the opera house of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington, DC President Barack Obama and first lady Michelle Obama will welcome the honorees to a White House reception.

The five recipients will be saluted with tributes and performances by peers at the Kennedy Center later in the evening.

Oprah Winfrey The CBS television network will broadcast the Kennedy Center gala, which has become a highlight of Washington’s cultural calendar, on Dec 28 as a two-hour special. “The Kennedy Center celebrates five individuals who have spent their lives enriching, inspiring and elevating the cultural vibrancy of our nation and the world,” Kennedy Center Chairman David Rubenstein said in a statement.

The naming of Winfrey, one of the most influential and highly paid women on television, comes as she prepares to end her popular weekday talk show in 2011 after 25 years on the air, to focus on the launch of her own cable channel, the Oprah Winfrey Network, or OWN, a Los Angeles-based venture she formed with Discovery Communications Inc. Winfrey, 56, also plans to debut a new evening program called “Oprah’s Next Chapter” she will host from different venues around the globe on OWN. Her original program, “The Oprah Winfrey Show,” is broadcast from Chicago and airs in more than 140 countries. It ranks as the top-rated US daytime talk show. —Reuters

A Malaysian Muslim recites the Quran inside a mosque in the last days of the holy fasting month of Ramadan in Kuala Lumpur on September 6, 2010. —AFP

Michelle Obama hosts first White House dance event

By Jocelyn Noveck n the end, it was a wonder the three massive chandeliers gracing the White House East Room remained intact, given the high-voltage expenditure of human energy taking place beneath them.

Tuesday’s inaugural performance of the new White House Dance Series transformed the stately room into a stage for some of the world’s most talented dancers to strut their stuff: Endless pirouettes, gravity-defying leaps, and some crazy one-handed spinning handstands, too.

Hosting the event was Michelle Obama, who brought along daughters

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Sasha and Malia-just home from their first day of school-and mom Marian Robinson, too. The first lady clapped along to some of the dances but leaped to a standing ovation when Dayton Tavares, one of Broadway’s high-flying Billy Elliots, finished his song, “Electricity,” with a virtuoso set of turns. The emotional highlight of the evening, though, was the performance of “Revelations” by the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, probably the most beloved work of modern dance in existence.

It was especially poignant because the evening was a tribute to Judith Jamison, the Ailey company’s artistic director and an iconic figure

in the dance world who will step down in 2011 after two decades leading the company after Ailey’s death in 1989. Mrs Obama called Jamison, 67, “an amazing, phenomenal, ‘fly’ woman.” “Let me tell you, your picture in ‘Cry’ was the only piece of art

afternoon of workshops for some 90 or so dance students who traveled to the White House from schools all over the country. Young girls in leotards, their hair tightly wrapped in buns, sprawled on the shiny East Room floor, stretching their legs into

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Judith Jamison, choreographer and artistic director of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, acknowledges applause from the audience during a tribute hosted by first lady Michelle Obama.

Linda Celeste Sims of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre performs an excerpt from “Cry” during a tribute to renowned dancer, Judith Jamison.

First lady Michelle Obama hosts a tribute to renowned dancer, Judith Jamison, choreographer and artistic director of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theatre, at the White House in Washington, Tuesday. — AP photos

in our house,” Mrs Obama told Jamison, sitting in the front row.

“Cry,” a 15-minute solo dance of great dramatic power, was the Ailey work for which Jamison was most famous in her dancing years, and an excerpt of it was performed Tuesday by company member Linda Celeste Sims. Tuesday’s event, directed by former New York City Ballet star Damian Woetzel, began with an

The right moves for men on the dance floor en who wish to attract women on the disco floor would be better advised to learn a few moves that answer the female mating drive rather than bother with the moonwalk. Psychologists have identified the key male dance movements that most arouse female interest-and all are to do with central body motions which send out primal signals of health, vigour and strength.

A team led by Nick Neave of Northumbria University in Newcastleupon-Tyne, northeastern England, filmed 19 men aged 18-35 in a lab as they danced to a standard disco beat. The men, none of whom was a professional dancer, wore reflective markers that studded their body and were filmed by a battery of 12 3D cameras.

The footage was used to create a

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dancing avatar, or animated figure, that was faceless and genderless. Thirty-seven young heterosexual women were then shown 15-second clips of the avatars and were asked to judge which dance movements were the most attractive. Eight “movement variables” emerged which distinguished the trolls from the Travoltas.

“Good” dancers did wider and bigger movements of the head, neck and torso, and did faster bending and twisting movements of their right knee (greater movements of the right knee rather than the left were to be expected, as 80 percent of the dancers favored their right leg). In contrast, “bad” dancers tended to be stiff and plod-and throwing their arms around was no substitute for fast, variable movement of the central body region. —AFP

splits as they warmed up. Jamison watched with a smile on her face as current Ailey dancers then taught the kids excerpts from “Revelations.” “Slow! Slooooow,” intoned teacher Nasha ThomasSchmitt, urging the kids at one point to take their time with a stretch.

“Wow,” Woetzel told the students after they were finished. “Now you’ve danced in the White House!”

The cast in the Korean theatre company Yohangza performs Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Nights Dream at a preview before the opening of their season in Melbourne, yesterday.

Yohangza’s production of A Midsummer Night’s Dream draws on music, movementbased theatre Korean mythology and mime to create infectious fun and boundless energy on stage to the Shakespeare classic. —AFP

After their workouts, the students had a quick break, cleaned up and returned for the performance, which also included excerpts of “Cloven Kingdom” by the Paul Taylor Dance Company, and Twyla Tharp’s “Nine Sinatra Songs,” danced by the Washington Ballet.

There was also a dizzying display of hip-hop acrobatics from Super CR3W, whose spinning handstands, headstands and similar moves evoked whoops of pleasure from the crowd. Not to be outdone, Ashley Bouder and Daniel Ullbricht of New York City Ballet showed that ballet can be equally energetic in its own way with a lively performance of George Balanchine’s “Tarantella.” At

the end, Jamison addressed the crowd. “Dance is the soul of this country!” she declared. “This is so American, it’s ridiculous.” In a weekend interview, Jamison told The Associated Press how she’d been to the White House a few times before, but never for an event as exciting as this.

“What a rare opportunity, to be invited by your country’s first lady to be honored like this,” Jamison said.

“This event is totally unique. It’s so terribly important to recognize this art form and to understand how important it is to the fabric of this country.” “This will be another clarion call to people: Pay attention to your arts!” Jamison said. —AP