12 Apr 2013

The sweet sound of devotion

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Hot wheels for Dubai cops

These images released by the Dubai Police show a Lamborghini Aventador police car in Dubai. — AP

See Page 9

Local FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

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Local FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Conspiracy Theories

Local Spotlight

Never again

Keep Kuwait clean

By Muna Al-Fuzai

By Badrya Darwish

muna@kuwaittimes.net

badrya_d@kuwaittimes.net

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ven when we were children, we were taught about certain dos and don’ts in school and elsewhere, and one of them was about keeping our surroundings clean. However, I was recently in a discussion with a group of women and was left wondering how effectively such calls have been imbibed by the people. Just look around residential areas like Hawally or Farwaniya, for instance, around midnight on any regular day anytime of the year or take a quick tour of the streets and you will be shocked at the large quantities of trash dumped indiscriminately.

In fact, the idea of recycling does not even exist as something we are under obligation to practice for our planet Earth. Also, most people in these areas do not even use the bags meant to collect trash but instead tend to save some money by using regular shopping bags. Most of these bags that come from the local market shops are rather small and not meant to hold trash.

We do discuss the level of public awareness but are we ourselves aware enough when it comes to keeping our environment clean and healthy? I believe that we do not have an access to any educational or societal instruments that inspire us to

put into practice our ideas. I think many people behave carelessly because they have never been made to understand how important it is to preserve our planet. Moreover, may think that by burying all the trash, it will disappear forever without causing any harm. This is completely wrong.

The fact that we are only preparing a time bomb and that it is ticking away escapes their understanding. A number of people leave behind a lot of leftovers or garbage after their trip or camp in the desert comes to an end. We cannot always depend upon other people to clean after us and dispose of the trash. I think we as Kuwaitis should act and be a role model for the expats, especially those who come from poor or developed countries that are careless about the environment.

So, what should we do? We must teach those who do not want to respect our planet Earth. Yes, we need to levy fines upon those who dirty our beaches and deserts. We need to run awareness programs on public and private television channels and involve school students as well. There are so many things that we need to do to keep our planet clean and our health protected.

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went crazy last week and I woke up thinking I was in my 20s and I could go to the gym and exercise for hours and come out energetic. As I lately put on some weight, I decided to hit the gym. Instead of doing what I used to do in the past few years - work out a little bit and join an aquatonic class and hear all the stories from the ladies who are in my category who are in the pool for socializing and not exercising because our pool has turned into a Starbucks coffee shop. But I digress.

I decided to jump into the cardio room and shed that fat something I used to achieve with a two-day training previously.

I tried to sweat an hour at the cardio. Of course I did not do any movement correct. If the instructor counted four turns, I was doing my second turn. Mind you, I did not stretch as far as she was showing. Still, I congratulated myself. I did it myself. I was happy because I challenged myself. It was some challenge. As a result I am not trying to cross my legs with the help of my hands.

That kept me awake all night tossing and turning with terrible pain. If I turned to the right, my right leg hurt. If I turned to the left my left leg was in pain. If I wanted to sleep on my back, my neck wouldn’t give me a break. When I laughed at jokes, my stomach was sending terrible pain all over the body.

Some weight shedding I did, I tell you. Never again. I am a little chubby and I like it. I am not going to bluff myself that I am as flexible and go to work as a trapeze acrobat in the circus. @BadryaD

Kuwait’s my business

Who’s ready to publish the next Kuwait blog?

By John P Hayes

local@kuwaittimes.net

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nyone who complains that Kuwait is a place where there’s nothing to do, nothing new, and nothing going on, hasn’t discovered the local blogosphere. To me, it’s one of the great mysteries about Kuwait: Some people wonder where all the oil comes from; I wonder where all the bloggers come from! One thing’s for sure, if there was nothing to do in Kuwait we wouldn’t have a vibrant blogging community.

Don’t know what a blog is? It’s shorthand for “web log.”

On a personal level, think diary; on a professional level, think online newsletter. Some people like to spout their opinions about a variety of topics and blogging gives them the perfect platform, even if they’re only spouting to family and friends.

Writing skills are not essential - in fact, among Kuwait’s bloggers a picture is worth 10,000 words. But in the universal blogosphere, text trumps images. View the top 100 blogs as ranked by Technocrati.com, which lists more than 1.3 million blogs, and you’ll see that while images are used to attract readership, words dominate the content.

“But Arabs are visual people and they don’t like to read,” explains Khalid Al-Zanki, a Kuwait product launch expert who created The Blogging Class to help start-up bloggers. And since bloggers first and foremost must understand the market, Kuwait’s bloggers use endless photographs. Six photos of chocolate brownies with a one word caption: “Yummy!”,

might sell thousands of dinar worth of baked goods.

Blogs exist to sell something!

And selling, one way or another, is what blogging is all about. Even if the blog isn’t intended to earn the blogger a paycheck, bloggers are selling something, beginning with their opinions. They want to be influential for reasons that include boosting their self-image (maybe even hoping to become famous), sharing ideas and information, and gaining a reputation among business owners who might advertise in their blog or at least send them free stuff. However, the most popular blogs universally share quality content that one way or another enhances the reader’s life, i.e. news, humor, howto info, training info, etc. Opinions sell best when the blogger gains credibility with the audience (which requires telling the truth, even when it’s negative). Most blogs are free to the public, and those that generate income for the bloggers sell ad space - some for millions of dollars annually.

Blogging became popular in the 1990s with the emergence of web publishing tools like Wordpress and Blogger.

Using either of those tools, anyone can publish a blog in about 15 minutes. And on any given day, I suspect there are a dozen new bloggers emerging in Kuwait. Alas, new blogs die as quickly as they are born.

Kuwait’s blogosphere mystery No one knows for sure how many blogs exist in Kuwait, but Al-Zanki estimates there are between 500 and 700 on any given day. Alexa.com, which tracks website traffic (not specifically blogs), shares information about some 200 Kuwait-related blogs, but is missing some of the betterknown blogs. All of these blogs share information, ideas, and opinions about what’s happening in Kuwait. Some blogs are written for specific audiences, i.e. IndiansinKuwait.com and EEK.com (Expats Express Kuwait!), some have specific

themes, i.e. ConfashionsfromKuwait.com and KuwaitMusic.com, but most are of general interest.

KuwaitBlogsSuck.com comments about local blogs, but it hasn’t been updated in recent months.

No one knows for sure which blogs are the most popular in Kuwait (why is it always so difficult to find hard facts about businesses in Kuwait?). Al-Zanki diplomatically bowed out of naming names, but said there are at least 20 influential bloggers, and that’s a respectable number for a diversified population of only 3 million people. I’ve polled a small number of bloggers and each claims to get 2,000 to 3,000 visitors daily seems like a huge number, doesn’t it? But these are not “unique” visitors - 100 individual visitors can easily rack up 2,000 site visits, so the data is misleading. However, based on my students’ evaluations (and students, believe me, have the best insights to what’s happening in Kuwait) local bloggers drive a substantial amount of Kuwait’s retail traffic. “My cousin paid a blogger 250 KD for a promotion,” a senior student told me, “and that same day she got 600 new customers.”

Calling Kuwait bloggers Ah, but there’s the rub. Should bloggers charge money for promotions? Is it fair? Is it credible? Should bloggers be required to tell us when they are being paid for their favorable opinions? So many questions and so many words for an audience that, supposedly, doesn’t like to read! So I will continue this topic in future columns. Meanwhile, Kuwait bloggers, past, current and future, I’d like to hear from you.

NOTE: Dr John P Hayes teaches online marketing at GUST where his students create their own blogs. Got information or opinions about Kuwait blogging? Contact Dr Hayes at questions@hayesworldwide.com, or via Twitter @drjohnhayes.

Local FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

By Nawara Fattahova

d on

Young Kuwaiti artiste tastes success with religious songs

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and people came to know him from various songs. “I believe that my popularity happened over many stages rather than on a single occasion. As I said, I started singing when I was very young, so after each song, more people would know about me. However, I think people came to know me much more after I appeared in Zain Telecom’s TV commercial last Ramadan (Fekra),” he explained.

Social media plays an important role in his life and popularity, and it appears that he is very active on it. Khudher currently has 380,000 followers on Facebook, 240,000 on Twitter, 54,000 on Instagram, and 80,000 followers on Keek. “Social media today is an essential tool for any artiste to communicate with his fans. For me, managing my social media accounts and keeping these updated has become part of my lifestyle, and now it is easier than ever, thanks to smartphones,” stated Khudher.

Studying in different universities and countries enriched his knowledge and experience. “I obtained my bachelor’s degree in Mass Communication from Kuwait University. After that, I took piano and vocal lessons in Toronto, Canada. I also studied a music business course at Berklee College of Music. Singing is my main source for earning a living and not just a hobby. So I am a full-time singer,” he noted.

Khudher sings in different languages. “I mainly sing in Arabic (fusha or classical) and Khaleeji. However, I released a song in the Egyptian dialect (Ana Masr) and another song in English (Keep Me True),” he added. The music video of Keep Me True has over two million views on YouTube. “I think it became a success because it was in both English and Arabic. That made it accessible to a much wider audience. Another reason could be that the video was produced professionally. We filmed in Los Angeles with director Lena Khan, who came up with the creative concept of the video,” concluded Khudher.

ave you been enchanted by religious songs? If you have, you might have heard some performed by Humood AlKhudher - a young Kuwaiti singer and composer of religious songs who has released musical albums and performed in many concerts. Religious songs have become quite popular over the last few years, and can be found all over social media websites, YouTube and various music applications.

Khudher started singing when he was 10 years old. “I started singing with my uncle - a well-known artiste. I followed him into the studios and used to watch his every step. I watched the way he wrote the lyrics, set up the rhythm, assembled the vocals and performed on stage. I learned from his experience,” he said, explaining that it proved to be a shortcut for his success.

Khudher says he had several offers from other artistes to cut joint albums with him. “I did not miss any opportunity and put in my best efforts when I sang. My first auditions were very successful - alhamdulillah.

The audience reaction was very positive, and it will always be an inspiration to improve and contribute more and more songs,” added Khudher.

He also composes the melodies.

“Sometimes I compose the melodies, while at other times, I tap into the talent of other composers to give my music a different taste. It is good to have a variety of tastes, so that I always have something different to give,” he pointed out. There are no specific subjects that he prefers for his songs. “The topics I sing about vary. They could be social, spiritual, motivational or something else. But whatever I sing about, I make sure that it carries a positive message,” he said.

Khudher became popular after his performances Humood Al-Khudher

Local FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Fish fun

to keep at home

By Ben Garcia

K

uwait is not a friendly place for any kind of pet animal. Why? First is the weather; secondly, no suitable place to keep animals safely as pets, and thirdly, unfriendly kids around. But as the saying goes, ‘if there is a will, there’s a way’. Such obstacles and hindrances can be overcome as long as you have determination to keep one. With the help of some non-governmental organizations such as the Protecting Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) and Kuwait Society for the Protection of Animals and Their Habitat (K’S PATH), the attitudes of many over keeping pets at home are now significantly changing.

Many janitors do not allow dogs or cats to be kept in their buildings. They cite health and hygienic reasons as to why the building owners won’t allow anyone to keep pet dogs in the building or flats. Besides, there are people who would not want to be disturbed by dog or cat noises.

But once a pet enthusiast, always a pet enthusiast. There’s a way to satisfy cravings to owning pet animals. If you never want to hear anything from your building haris, buy pets that are considered low maintenance and are stationary or can be kept in one place, such as birds and fish.

Keeping fish at home, considered by Chinese as lucky charm, is probably the most easiest and most acceptable. Apart from its low maintenance pet, they are calm and gentle except for some very limited noise an oxygen pump could create.

“Owning a fish pet is the most easiest way to own a pet in Kuwait. No hassle, no complaints from others they are being disturbed by your pets. So, I recommend all pet enthusiasts to consider keeping fish as pets.”

In fact, the only thing a fish owner should worry about is the food, the tank and its oxygen. “Owning a fish pet is the most easiest way to own a pet in Kuwait.

No hassle, no complaints from others they are being disturbed by your pets. So, I recommend all pet enthusiasts to consider keeping fish as pets,” said an attendant at the Friday Market in Al-Rai. According to Ahmed, a Kuwaiti pet enthusiast who owns a fish store in Al-Rai, feeding a fish is a very important task to consider. “Many of us do not really know how to feed a fish,” he said. “It’s not just throwing some food and ‘khalas’, no, we have to make it a habit that we give the food properly,” he warned.

“Follow the timings suitable for the fish and don’t give food every now and then. They’ll die. Fish are not humans or cows; when there is food to eat out there they’ll eat,” he added. Caring for fish is very important according to Ahmed and it involves a lot of responsibility.”Maybe some fish owner will say they are not that

very hard to keep. Yes, but then again, you have to tell yourself why you are trying to keep them anyway. This is for your gratification, if you like seeing fish at home, moving and enjoying your care,” he said.

Choosing a specific time to feed your fish is highly recommended for proper care of your fish. “Fish can adjust on your feeding schedule. But please, don’t be so insensitive, they also want to be fed in a manner just like us, with proper timing.

There are species that are more comfortable eating at night and there are varieties of fish that can be fed during daylight,” he said.

“The attitude of fish can be studied while feeding them. There are fish that can wait till you put food in their mouths.

There are fish that only eat at a specific place in your tank. Some fish prefer to eat food that floats on the top of the water and there are fish that are comfortable grazing food on the bottom of the aquarium,” he noted.

As a fish owner, Ahmed said, you have to consider their dietary needs, read labels and ask someone who knows about keeping fish as pet. “Don’t just trust someone from the market. Read a lot from the Internet, and ask about how to care for the fish. Fish can either be classified as carnivores, omnivores or herbivores. In keeping fish at home, you also have to consider the fish’s age when choosing fish food - this could include flakes, pellets, liquid and freeze-dried food,” he said. Another thing to consider in keeping your fish happy is cleaning the aquarium properly.

“Change the water at least twice a month. That is ideal but if you have a good water filter, at least we recommend once every one month. That is very ideal for the fish to be happy and enjoy the aquarium,” he said. Accessorizing your aquarium is the last step to consider.

“Anyway, these are just decorations and are not of value for you fish,” Ahmed concluded.

Local FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Bling patrol: Dubai’s $550,000 squad car

DUBAI: A handout picture released by Dubai police yesterday shows the police department’s new patrol car, a specially modified quarter-million-dollar Lamborghini Aventador. — AFP DUBAI: In a city of boundless bling, Dubai police also are in hot pursuit after adding a nearly $550,000 Lamborghini to its fleet. The introduction of the sports car, which can reach speeds of up to 349 km/h, could make justice quicker on

Dubai’s dangerous highways. But the beaut, painted in green-and-white colors of the Dubai force, will not likely be roaring after law breakers.

Instead, it will be mostly dispatched to tourist areas to show - in the words of deputy police

director, Gen Khamis Matter Al-Muzaina - “how classy Dubai is”.

Local media reports Thursday say the Italianmade Lamborghini Aventador is the crown jewel of a wider upgrade in Dubai police wheels. The

force also is adding some American Camaro muscle cars. Dubai seeks to show it has rebounded from its debt crisis with brash plans that include the world’s largest Ferris wheel and a satellite city named after the city-state’s ruler. — Agencies

Govt seeks free hand to hike charges on services Debate on new media law rages Tweeter acquitted l

By B Izzak

GENEVA: Kuwaiti inventor Adel Jumaa Al-Abdine is seen at the 41st Geneva Exhibition of Inventions. — KUNA

Inventor grateful for PM’s support GENEVA: Kuwaiti inventor Adel Jumaa Al-Abdine yesterday expressed his gratitude to Prime Minister Sheikh Jaber AlMubarak Al-Sabah for his support as he (Abdine) participates in the 41st Geneva Exhibition of Inventions. Abdine, who invented the world’s first safe landing strip for planes, said he also appreciates the support of Sabah Al-Ahmad Center for Giftedness and Creativity. The center particularly helped in building the model representing the invention and for acquiring a patent.

The landing strip is provided with an electronic safety system to help in the event of malfunction in the wheels’ mechanism during landing. The system prevents friction with the landing strip which sometimes causes a fire, explained Abdine. Abdine hoped the Sabah Al-Ahmad Center and the Directorate General of Civil Aviation would cooperate to present his invention before international civil aviation associations. He recalled that his invention received a gold medal and a prize at the sixth Kuwait inventions exhibition.

The 41st Geneva Exhibition of Inventions kicked off on April 10, and will last till April 14, with 725 inventors from 45 countries participating and vying for prizes and contracts that would help investors turning their inventions into actual production. — KUNA

KUWAIT: The National Assembly’s financial and economic affairs committee yesterday discussed with Finance Minister Mustafa Al-Shamali a government draft law which seeks a free hand to raise charges on public services which have remained without change since 1993 due to legal constraints. Rapporteur of the committee MP Safa Al-Hashem said the panel decided to refer the governmentsponsored draft law to the legal and legislative affairs committee to establish if the bill is in line with the constitution, adding that the draft legislation contains a number of loopholes and is unconstitutional.

The Assembly passed in 1993 a law that bars the government from imposing new charges or increasing existing charges on public services without a law passed by the Assembly. Hashem said the government wants through the draft law to increase charges on services without improving the services and utilities and without developing infrastructure. She said that one of the provisions states that the government has the right to amend and increase charges without consulting the Assembly, adding this would practically authorize the government to raise charges on various applications and services like health, education, housing, electricity, water and others.

She also said the government provided no details or financial data to illustrate the need for this measure. Most charges on public services have remained unchanged for many years mainly due to the 1993 law and as a result of high windfall from oil.

The price of electricity and water has remained unchanged since the mid-1960s,

KUWAIT: Former opposition MPs (from right) Faisal Al-Mislem, Musallam AlBarrak, Khaled Al-Sultan, Ali Al-Deqbasi and Jamaan Al-Harbash take part in a sit-in to call for the release of activists jailed for insulting the Amir outside the Palace of Justice late Wednesday. —Photo by Yasser Al-Zayyat while the last time fuel prices were increased was about 15 years ago after prior consultation with the Assembly.

Health services remain totally free for Kuwaitis and moderate for expatriates who are required to pay KD 50 in health insurance per person every year and also pay additional charges on selected medical services, especially laboratory tests and x-rays. If the legal and legislative committee clears the draft law for being in line with the constitution, it will come back to the financial committee for a detailed discussion and then go to the Assembly for debate. In another development, the proposed new draft media law has come under fire as being repressive and belonging to the old ages, but a number of MPs said it was necessary and should pass. The new bill, called the “combined media law”, extends information ministry control to all new social networks including Web-based publications and Twitter, and proposes hefty cash penalties on violators that in

some cases reach as high as KD 300,000.

The maximum fine in the current media law is KD 20,000.

Leading opposition members and former MPs said the proposed legislation will only transform Kuwait into a repressive state and that the bill aims at silencing people and the opposition. MP Yacoub AlSane said the bill imposes prior censorship and contains articles that are in violation of the constitution and these should be scrapped. But MPs Youssef Al-Zalzalah and Safa Al-Hashem said the bill is ideal and is needed at this stage to curb violators.

Hashem said the draft law should be passed. The criminal court yesterday acquitted opposition tweeter Mohammad Al-Ajami of charges that he insulted HH the Amir and undermined his authorities through tweets on his Twitter accounts. In issuing the verdict, the court said that tweeters should not be penalized on the grounds of perception and interpretation but on the basis of actual tweets written.

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

At least 57 die in shelling, executions in Syrian town

N Korea keeps world on edge over missile launch

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Mubarak’s retrial eclipsed by political and economic woes

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RIYADH: Asian labourers work on a highway construction site in eastern Riyadh. Saudi Arabia has given illegal foreign workers a three-month grace period to legalise their status, after panic over reported mass deportations. — AFP

Saudi labour restrictions spark anger, fear ‘Police chase us like we’re thieves’ RIYADH: Abdel Qayum had to borrow money back home in India to buy a Saudi labour visa, but with new curbs on foreigners in the kingdom the construction worker could be deported even before paying off his debt. “I paid an equivalent of $4,000 in India to get a work visa in Saudi Arabia,” said the shabbily-dressed bearded man who earns less than $600 a month in Riyadh where he has been working for two and a half years. “Nobody told me, either here or in India, that we cannot work for other than our sponsors. My sponsor had no job for me here, so I was forced to work for someone else,” said Qayum, who has so far failed to make enough money to pay back the costs of his visa to the kingdom.

Under new rules imposed this year, foreigners are allowed to work only for their legal sponsors in the kingdom while their spouses cannot take up jobs. The change in the law affects millions of expatriates in the Gulf state and has sparked fears of mass deportations of migrant workers. Some 200,000 people, mostly Asians and Yemenis, have already been expelled from

the oil-rich kingdom in the past three months due to the new restrictions, immigration officials say.

Many foreigners enter Saudi Arabia under the sponsorship of a Saudi national but end up working for others, or set up their own businesses. Saudi Arabia officially hosts eight million foreign workers, while economists say there are another two million unregistered non-Saudi workers in the kingdom. In a calming measure, King Abdullah on Saturday ordered the interior and labour ministries to allow “workers violating the labour and residency system a maximum of three months to rectify their situation.”

The practice of sponsoring expatriates, which repeatedly comes under fire from rights groups, has become a lucrative business for many Saudis who engage in trafficking of work visas. “Police chase us like we’re thieves,” complains one Jordanian resident who identified himself only as Nizam. “The sponsorship system must be reformed instead of deporting innocent people who are only trying to make a living.” In 2010, UN rights chief Navi Pillay called on Gulf

countries to stop requiring migrant workers to secure local sponsors, saying the system fosters abuses.

She said foreign workers in the Gulf are frequently subject to unlawful confiscation of passports, withholding of wages and other abuses. Mukhtar, a Pakistani who works at a shopping mall in Riyadh, said he pays 8,000 riyals ($2,135) per year to his sponsor to secure a renewal of his work permit. “My sponsor is just an owner of camels grazing in the desert, and he could not employ me,” he said. “Our agreement was that he takes care of my documents and I find myself a job. I am working to make up for what I have to pay to stay here and now they want us out.

This is unfair.” Although the kingdom has the largest Arab economy, and is the world’s biggest oil exporter, the unemployment rate remains above 12.5 percent in a country where youth make up 55 to 60 percent of the around 19 million nationals. Labour Minister Adel Fakih has admitted that “six million foreign workers are employed in low jobs unfit for Saudis and 68 percent of them are paid less than 1,000 riyals ($270) per month.”

The majority of Saudis prefer working in the public sector where they are better paid for shorter working hours and enjoy more holidays.

“The labour ministry has the right to promote the employment of Saudis to replace foreigners, but this should not disrupt the economic activity as sectors such as the construction need foreign workers,” said chief economist at the National Commercial Bank, Said Al-Shaikh. According to Shaikh, the retail sector employs 1.7 million non-Saudis while 2.8 million foreigners work in construction. Nearly 700,000 people are employed in the industrial sector of whom only 20 percent are Saudis. During the three-month grace period, workers trying to avoid deportation have begun regularising their status by transferring their sponsorships to their current employers. Mohammed Abdullah Awad, a 27-year-old Yemeni, had to pay $2,000 for his sponsor to allow him to transfer his visa to his employer. “Sponsors exploit us and we can do nothing about it,” Awad said sadly. “I have 13 dependants to take care of.” — AFP

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

G8 ministers share North Korea concerns LONDON: G8 foreign ministers shared their deep concerns over North Korea at a meeting in London yesterday dominated by Pyongyang’s nuclear threats as well as the bloody conflict in Syria. North Korea’s expected missile launch was first on the agenda, followed by discussions on Iran’s nuclear programme and Wednesday’s fresh appeals from the Syrian opposition for weapons to fight President Bashar Al-Assad, a British official said.

US actress Angelina Jolie also attended a session dedicated to sexual violence in conflict zones, which British Foreign Secretary William Hague has made a priority of his country’s chairmanship of the Group of Eight rich nations this year. The talks, which began with informal meetings and a dinner on Wednesday, have been dominated by the rising tensions on the Korean peninsula and efforts to address the bloodshed in Syria.

The Japanese foreign minister made clear in talks with US Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday his deep concerns about North Korea’s increasingly threatening behaviour. Fumio Kishida said Japan was

extremely concerned over Pyongyang’s intention to restart nuclear facilities in Yongbyong as well as the expected missile launch and threats made against the US and its allies, a Japanese official told Kyodo News.

US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel has warned that Pyongyang was “skating very close to a dangerous line”.

Kerry is due to visit South Korea and Japan after he leaves Britain. The G8 condemned a North Korea missile launch last year and despite their divisions on other issues, is likely to agree on a similar response if this happens again, US officials say. Russia has close ties to North Korea’s key ally China, and is at odds with the US and EU over their support for the opposition in Syria, but says it has “no differences” with Washington over the Korean crisis.

After talks with Kerry on Wednesday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov warned however against exacerbating tensions with military manoeuvres-although he did not identify which country he believed was carrying out such manoeuvres. “On North Korea we have no differences with the

United States,” Lavrov told reporters. “One just shouldn’t scare anyone with military manoeuvres and there’s a chance that everything will calm down.”

US ‘didn’t promise anything’ to Syrian rebels-The G8 ministers have also been discussing the conflict in Syria, which is now in its third year and has claimed 70,000 lives, according to the United Nations. Kerry and Hague met on Wednesday with members of the Syrian opposition, who renewed their appeal for weapons to aid their fight against Assad’s regime.

But a top US State Department official said Kerry “didn’t promise anything”. “We are always considering a variety of options, we are going to continue to aid the opposition, working with them in terms of what they need, in terms of what we’re willing to provide,” the official said. The US and EU are currently providing non-lethal aid such as communications equipment, and are beginning to distribute food and medical supplies to the Free Syrian Army, but have stopped short of providing weaponry.

Britain-and until recently France-has

N Korea keeps world on edge over missile launch North marks anniversary of Jong-un’s rise to power SEOUL: South Korea and the United States were on high alert for a North Korean missile launch yesterday as the reclusive and poverty-stricken state turned its attention to celebrating the ruling Kim dynasty and appeared to tone down rhetoric of impending war. Despite threats it will attack US bases and the South in response to any hostile acts, North Korea started to welcome a stream of visitors for Monday’s celebrations marking the birthday of founding father, Kim Il-sung. North Korea has stationed as many as five medium-range missiles on its east coast, according to defence assessments made by Washington and Seoul, possibly in readiness for a test launch that would demonstrate its ability to hit US bases on Guam.

“There are signs the North could fire off Musudan missiles any time soon,” an unnamed intelligence source in Seoul told Yonhap news agency. Musudan missiles are medium-range missiles that have the potential to hit US bases on Guam, although it is not known whether they have been tested or can fly that far. “But the North has been repeatedly moving its missiles in and out of a shed, which needs close monitoring.”

Most observers say Pyongyang has no intention of igniting a conflict that could bring its own destruction but warn of the risks of miscalculation on the militarised Korean peninsula. There did not appear to be any signs of panic in Seoul, the South Korean capital, and financial markets shrugged off the risk of conflict with stocks posting a third day of gains. New South Korean President Park Geun-hye met foreign businessmen yesterday and reassured them that the country was safe and that it was working closely with the United States and China, the North’s only major diplomatic ally.

Taiwan appeared to become the first country to warn its citizens against travelling to South Korea after Pyongyang said that foreigners should leave, but hotels were reporting brisk business.

Pyongyang issued a statement that appeared to be tinged with regret over the closure of the joint Kaesong industrial zone that was shuttered when it ordered its workers out this week, terming the North-South Korean venture “the pinnacle of General Kim Jong-il’s limitless love for his people and brothers”.

The statement on the country’s KCNA news agency blamed Park for bringing the money-spinning venture to “the brink of shutting down”. Kim Jong-il, Kim Il-sung’s son, ruled North Korea until his death in December 2011. He was succeeded by Kim Jong-un, the third of his line to preside over one of the world’s poorest and most heavily militarised countries.

Since taking office, the 30-year-old has staged two long-range rocket launches and a nuclear weapons test. The nuclear test in February triggered UN sanctions that Pyongyang has termed a hostile act and a precursor to invasion. For over a month,

TOKYO: A Patriot Advanced Capability-3 (PAC-3) missile launcher is refueled from a tank truck at the Defence Ministry yesterday. Japan is on full alert ahead of an expected mid-range missile launch by North Korea. — AFP Pyongyang has issued an almost daily series of threats to the United States and South Korea, most recently warning foreigners to leave the South due to an impending “thermonuclear” war.

Apart from the swipe at South Korea’s new president, verbal threats appeared to fall off as KCNA listed arrivals for the upcoming birthday celebrations, naming an eclectic mix ranging from Chinese businessmen to Cold War-era enthusiasts of its socialist monarchy and official ideology of “juche”, or self-reliance. Ramon Jimenez Lopez, listed as the chairman of the Latin American Institute of the Juche Idea, and Jie Wenjiang, who it said was in charge of Hantong International freight company in Dandong, China, were among the arrivals, KCNA said. —Reuters

been pushing to amend an EU embargo blocking the supply of arms to the rebels, but there are concerns that any weapons supplied may fall into the wrong hands. This fear was exacerbated by the declaration by one of the top rebel fighting forces in Syria, the Al-Nusra Front, of its allegiance to AlQaeda chief Ayman Al-Zawahiri. Britain’s Foreign Office said yesterday it was “concerned about terrorist groups getting a foothold in Syria” and insisted: “We identify the recipients of any assistance very carefully.” The “Friends of Syria”, a group opposed to Assad’s rule comprising the United States, European and Arab countries, will hold its next meeting in Istanbul on April 20.

Another issue on the table in London was Iran, which this week unveiled a new uranium production facility and two extraction mines only days after talks with world powers on its disputed nuclear programme ended in deadlock. The ministers also discussed Britain’s call for action to end the culture of impunity over the use of rape and sexual violence in conflicts, which is supported by Jolie, a UN special envoy. — AFP

N Korea’s permanent war SEOUL: North Korea’s shrill threats of nuclear war may seem overblown or absurd, but they are well tailored to a domestic audience raised on the constant fear of imminent US invasion, analysts say. While Pyongyang’s warlike rhetoric has to reach a certain decibel-level for the rest of the world to take note, North Koreans are weaned on a relentless, daily propaganda formula almost from birth.

It paints a reality of North Korea as a racially pure nation surrounded by scheming enemies-led by the United States-who are bent on invasion and enslavement.

Problems like food shortages are the fault of unfair, punitive sanctions aimed at weakening the North which must therefore focus all its resources on national defence for a final, decisive battle that could come at any time.

From that viewpoint, the blistering threats and warnings emanating from Pyongyang make perfect sense, and the clearly exaggerated claims for the North’s nuclear strike capability are-in the absence of any information to the contrary-taken at face value. “The guy in the White House National Security Council knows it’s absurd, but the guy watching on TV in Pyongyang is probably roaring his country on,” said Daniel Pinkston, a North Korea analyst with International Crisis Group.

B R Myers, an expert in North Korean propaganda, believes Pyongyang is exploiting current tensions to incite workers and get them to channel their rage at the US into projects such as a land-reclamation drive on the east coast. “The regime can no longer fire up people with any coherent or credible vision of a socialist future, so it tries to cast the entire workforce... as an adjunct to the military,” he told the New York Times. “Work places are ‘battlegrounds’, and all labour strengthens the country for the final victory of unification,” said Myers, professor of international studies at Dongseo University in Busan, South Korea.

Defectors note that much of working life in North Korea is placed in a combative, martial context. “We were at war all the time, all year round,” Oh Ji-Heon, who fled the North in 2010, told the defector-run website, New Focus International. “In spring, there was the ‘war of rice planting’. In summer the ‘war of weeding’. Autumn was the ‘harvest war’ and in winter we fought the ‘fishing war’,” Oh said. “Every season brought a new enemy for us to conquer,” she added.

The constant reinforcement of this state of permanent warfare means that inside North Korea at least, there is far less of a disconnect between people’s daily lives and the regime’s apocalyptic rantings against Washington and Seoul. The outside world may roll its eyes at choreographed outpourings of public joy, grief or anger shown on television, but the fact they are stage-managed does not necessarily mean they misrepresent public passions. —AFP

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Northern Syria’s Kurds struggle to deal with influx AFRIN: In recent weeks, residents of Afrin have seen their quiet Syrian town transformed, with the arrival of thousands of people displaced by fighting in previously calm Kurdish parts of the city of Aleppo. “I never thought it would happen to us,” said Nisrine, a 25-year-old woman who fled to Afrin, a mostly-Kurdish town 40 kilometres from Aleppo, in northern Syria. “We were getting on with our lives and then all of a sudden we had to flee with just the clothes on our backs,” she said.

Nisrine now lives in a classroom with her husband, son, parents-in-law and survives only thanks to food aid given by the Supreme Kurdish Council, the umbrella organisation for Kurdish political parties in Syria. These Syrian Kurds took the road to Afrin without a second thought because “it is the only safe place, and we are among our own people,” said the head of a family housed in one of Afrin’s 17 schools hastily converted into makeshift camps.

The other men all agreed. The new

arrivals come from Sheikh Maqsud, an area in the north of Aleppo which had been as calm as the Kurdish villages in the northeast, the only part of Syria still free of bomb blasts and gunfire, and buildings gutted by air strikes.

Since the beginning of Syria’s uprising more than two years ago, the Kurds, who make up about 15 percent of the population, have tried to stay out of the fighting, stopping both rebel and regime forces from entering their neighbourhoods.

Last summer, Assad’s troops pulled out of majority-Kurdish areas and the Committees for the Protection of the Kurdish People (YPG), the armed wing of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), took over. The PYD is considered as the Syrian branch of Turkey’s PKK. “We are with the revolution against the Baathist regime that has robbed us of our rights,” a party member said at Afrin. “We have taken a defensive position, we have never gone on the attack, we just retaliate, which is what happened at Sheikh Maqsud.”

Kurds account for 20 percent of Aleppo’s

population.

In Sheikh Maqsud, rebels and Kurdish groups have joined together to fight forces loyal to Bashar Al-Assad. Government forces, in turn, have struck back by calling in air raids, one of which killed 15 people, including nine children, on Saturday. The casualties were evacuated to a field hospital in Afrin, where beds were filled with children, women, civilians and a handful of YPG fighters, among them a 28-year-old man wounded by shellfire. “I was brought to this hospital a week ago, I don’t know if my children are in Aleppo or even if they are still alive,” he said.

“In the first days of fighting, 100,000 people arrived here. Ten days later, that number had risen to 250,000,” said Seenan Mohammad, co-president of the People’s Council of Western Kurdistan (PCWK), an offshoot of the PYD. “As other people displaced by fighting had arrived in the area before then, from Homs (centre) and from Deraa (south), the population of Afrin and the villages around it more than doubled from

At least 57 die in shelling, executions in Syrian town Activists reject Qaeda call for Islamic state BEIRUT: At least 57 Syrians were killed, some of them in cold blood, after troops stormed the contested town of Sanamein in the southern province of Deraa, opposition activists and a monitoring group said yesterday. The Britishbased Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said dozens of civilians, including children, were killed on Wednesday in shelling and summary executions after forces loyal to President Bashar Al-Assad entered Sanamein.

There was no immediate comment from Syrian state officials. Security forces had been fighting anti-Assad rebels in the town in Deraa, a province bordering Jordan that has become a focal point of battles as both sides seek to control Syria’s frontiers and seize supply lines to the capital, Damascus. Rami Abdelrahman, head of the Observatory, which uses a network of contacts in Syria, told Reuters by telephone that the situation was still too confused to determine how many people had died in the fighting and how many in cold blood.

“Residents say there were heavy clashes yesterday and later security forces stormed the town. As they entered, they started shelling some districts and other gunmen were executing people,” he said, adding that 45 victims of what he called a massacre had been named, with the confirmed death toll likely to rise. Dozens of houses had been destroyed in shelling or by fire, Abdelrahman said. Activist groups in Deraa said more than 60 people had been killed. Video uploaded by residents showed rows of corpses laid out in a building, their faces covered in blood and their bodies wrapped in blankets, with names scribbled on sheets of paper placed on top of them. Some of the dead appeared to be young children.

“Sanamein, April 10, a massacre has happened in Sanamein. I put my faith in God,” said the cameraman filming the scene. Reports and videos from inside

ALEPPO: Photo shows destroyed homes in a government airstrike and shelling, in the neighborhood of Marjeh in the northern city of Aleppo yesterday. — AP Syria are hard to verify, as access to the country for international media is limited.

CALL FOR ISLAMIC STATE Syrian activists yesterday dismissed as “blatant interference” a weekend call

by Al-Qaeda chief Ayman Al-Zawahiri for an Islamic state to be established in the strife-torn country. “The Local Coordination Committees in Syria completely reject the statement by ...

Zawahiri in which he called for the establishment of an Islamic state in Syria,” said the LCC, a network of peaceful activists on the ground.

“The LCC condemns (Zawahiri’s) blatant interference in Syria’s internal affairs,” it added. The LCC’s statement comes a day after Al-Nusra Front, a jihadist group battling Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad’s regime, pledged allegiance to Zawahiri but distanced itself

from claims of a merger with Al-Qaeda in Iraq. The LCC made no mention of AlNusra’s statement, while debate rages among activists over whether the powerful jihadists should be recognised as a legitimate part of Syrian revolutionary forces.

Analysts warn that two years into a revolt that has left more than 70,000 people dead, according to UN figures, sectarianism and extremism could sweep away the ideals with which activists first took to the streets in a popular uprising two years ago. “Only Syrians will decide their country’s future.

The LCC says once again that the Syrian revolution began in order to achieve freedom, justice and a civil, democratic, pluralist state,” the statement said. It added that the anti-Assad revolt is aimed at setting up in Syria “a state for all its citizens”. — Agencies

600,000 to 1.5 million,” she added.

Mohammad also sits on the Supreme Kurdish Council, which oversees a dozen of Syria’s Kurdish parties.

The recent influx has seen the area change drastically, placing its resources and services under serious strain, residents said.

“Before, Afrin was a quiet town. But now you would think you were in Paris with all these traffic jams,” one man said. “International organisations have sent no aid to help support displaced Kurds. For the moment, residents are picking up the costs and giving food, but what will we do a month from now?”, a volunteer with the Humanitarian Committee of the Supreme Council asked.

Some of those displaced by the fighting in Aleppo predict that their stay in Afrin could go on for quite some time. “Yesterday, the neighbours called us to tell us our house in Sheikh Maqsud had burned down,” one woman said from the room where she shares with her family, living on half a dozen mattresses scattered across the floor. — AFP

Mali Islamists cast a long shadow over Inais valley FES EN FES: Ibrahim Ould Hannoush clings to his staff, trembling and stammering as he is interrogated in his native Tamashek language by Malian soldiers who believe he may have links with Islamist militants. The suspect is bombarded with questions from the men, who are hunting insurgents in a valley in northern Mali as part of Operation Gustav, one of France’s largest military operations during its three-month intervention in its former colony.

Hannoush insists he is a simple Tuareg shepherd living with family in the arid Inais valley, which the French believe to be an important logistics base for the Al-Qaeda-linked “Movement for Oneness and Jihad in West Africa” (MUJAO). But the Malian security forces helping the French seek out the militants aren’t buying his story. “Does he know something about the terrorists?” a policeman demands.

A Tuareg special forces soldier translates: “He said he saw three on a motorbike yesterday but that even the French had seen them.” Off to the side, Chief Warrant Officer Alo Mazzak Agnamaka, also from the Malian special forces, glowers at Hannoush. “He may not have taken up arms but he’s still complicit. It’s not possible to know nothing in this valley,” he says.

“Where does he think they’ve gone?” “That way,” Hannoush replies, pointing eastwards. “Three days ago, in five vehicles, they came through here.”

The warrant officer, frustrated with the quality of information Hannoush is offering, mumbles into his scarf. “He won’t tell us anything. It’s not worth bothering, no one can talk. They are all in the same situation.” A thousand French troops backed by tanks and covered from the air went into the Inais valley, a dry river basin 160 kilometres (100 miles) north of Gao, Mali’s largest northern city, at the launch of Operation Gustav at dawn on Sunday.

The mission comes as France prepares to withdraw threequarters of the 4,000 troops it deployed in January to block a feared advance on the Malian capital Bamako by Al-Qaeda-linked insurgents. France’s intervention has driven the militants from most of their northern strongholds but Paris is preparing to hand over to a UN-mandated African force in the coming weeks, leaving just 1,000 of its troops to fight terrorism. The extremists had occupied Mali’s northern settlements, including the fabled Saharan caravan town of Timbuktu, terrorising locals with amputations and executions performed under their brutal interpretation of sharia Islamic law.

While French-led troops have inflicted severe losses on the Islamists, soldiers are still battling significant pockets of resistance around Gao, where MUJAO are the most active rebel group.

French and Malian troops have discovered numerous caches of ammunition, often very high calibre, in the Inais valley but very few weapons. They are relying on information from the local population of semi-nomadic Tuareg pastoralists to help them seek out and destroy as much of MUJAO’s logistic infrastructure as possible, but they are under no illusions. In a sparsely populated region where everyone watches and no movement goes unnoticed, it can be fatal to be seen talking to “infidels”. —AFP

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Myanmar’s police struggle to adapt to post-junta era YANGON: After decades in the shadow of the military, Myanmar’s ragtag police force has found itself thrust onto the security frontlineand under fire for failing to stop a wave of religious unrest. Under the former junta that ruled the country also known as Burma for almost half a century, any sign of unrest was quickly quelled by soldiers. But since a new reformist government took power two years ago, the job of maintaining order has been largely left to police who lack basic equipment and only have about a year of training. “The police were never wellequipped,” said an officer with 20 years in the force who did not want to be named.

“Under the military government, nobody cared about the police,” the officer said. “Still they don’t care now, but we’re the first to be blamed when something happens even though we tried our best to protect the people.” The challenges are immense in a society testing the limits of its new-found freedoms, including the right to protest. A botched raid on a demonstration at a copper mine in November sparked an outpouring of anger after police used phosphorus against protesters in the harshest crackdown since the end of military rule.

Dozens of monks and villagers were injured in the incident at the Chinese-backed Letpadaung mine-a disastrous outcome that analysts blame mainly on incompetence. “They had no equipment or training for appropriate riot control, took what they thought were harmless smoke grenades from some military arsenal, and learned the hard way that they contained phosphorus,” said Jim Della-Giacoma, a

Myanmar expert at the International Crisis Group think-tank. When police also used water cannon, the phosphorus turned into phosphoric acid, causing severe burns.

The police have also been accused of failing to act-or even complicity in several episodes of sectarian violence since last year. In the western state of Rakhine last year, Human Rights Watch

accused the police and other security forces of killings and other abuses against stateless Rohingya Muslims. The New York-based rights watchdog has also urged the government to investigate the failure of police to stop a fresh wave of Buddhist-Muslim violence in Meiktila in central Myanmar that left 43 people dead last month.

SITTWE: Myanmar policemen patroling with rifles on the streets of Sittwe, capital of the western state of Rakhine. — AFP

India-Iran company liquidated as sanctions bite NEW DELHI: India will get control of six ships following a decision to dismantle a joint Iranian-Indian shipping company hit

by Western sanctions on Iran, a government official said yesterday. The Irano Hind Shipping Company was finding it difficult to get customers or insurance for its ships because of the sanctions. Last week, the Indian government agreed to close down the 39-year-old joint venture.

The state-owned Shipping Corporation of India will take over six of the seven vessels belonging to Irano Hind, the official said. In return, SCI will take on the liability of repaying the joint company’s debt, estimated at around $88 million. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media. Western countries have imposed sanctions on Iran to deter it from pursuing a nuclear weapons program. Iran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.

India is one of the main targets of US attempts to chip away at Iran’s critical commercial lifelines across Asia. The Irano Hind Shipping Company was set up before Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution as a joint venture between the Shipping Corporation of India and the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines. The IRISL held a 51 percent stake in the company, while SCI had the remaining 49 percent. The company’s ships were mainly used to transport Iranian crude to Indian refineries. The company suspended its operations last year after the Western sanctions kicked in. The official said the company found the going tough because the IRISL figured on the list of sanctioned entities. There were no takers to hire the ships, and sources for insurance and finance dried up. The Shipping Corporation of India will buy four of the vessels at market value, and get two others at a slightly reduced price. SCI will be allowed to deploy all of the ships using the Indian flag, the official said.

Meanwhile, India’s imports of Iranian crude have been steadily declining as New Delhi explores alternative oil sources since the US and European sanctions came into effect, a petroleum ministry official said. Energy-starved India imports around 75 percent of its oil to power its economic growth. Indian officials say crude oil imports from Iran have fallen from 10.5 percent in 2010 to around 7 percent in 2012. —AP

The police “just stood and watched”, said local opposition MP Win Htein. “I don’t know whether the police didn’t do anything because they didn’t receive any order from above or if they were slow to respond because they were blamed for the crackdown at the Letpadaung copper mine,” he said. In both Rakhine and Meiktila, the government later declared a state of emergency for the affected areas and sent in government troops after police and other local security forces failed to stem the bloodshed.

“Most of the police forces in the local towns are not trained as a riot police,” President Thein Sein’s spokesman Ye Htut said. “When a mob is coming in five or six places at the same time they can’t control the situation.” The European Union has offered some training programmes, drawing on past experience helping forces elsewhere in the world. “We need non-lethal weapons to control riots in line with international standards,” said a senior Myanmar police officer. “We understand international norms and standards. We want to practise them.

But we are just doing what we can within our capabilities.” Former general Thein Sein is credited with a string of dramatic political reforms including the release of political prisoners and welcoming the opposition into mainstream politics. Now his government must also ensure that the police are well equipped and organised with a clear mandate and standard operating procedures, said Della-Giacoma. To win people’s trust will also require the police “to truly shed their authoritarian mindset and become more of a police service rather than a force,” he said.— AFP

Former nuclear negotiator joins Iran presidential race Little known at home, most moderate contender so far DUBAI: A former Iranian nuclear negotiator announced yesterday he would run for president, the most moderate contender so far to bid to succeed Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in a June election dominated by conservatives. Hassan Rowhani, 64, was head of the powerful Supreme National Security Council under presidents Ali Akbar Rafsanjani, considered a master of realpolitik rather than an ideologue, and Mohammad Khatami, who pushed for wide-ranging social and political reforms.

Rowhani, a Muslim cleric, presided over talks with Britain, France and Germany that saw Iran agree to suspend uranium enrichment-related activities between 2003 and 2005. He resigned after Ahmadinejad took office in August that year. The nuclear work was resumed and Rowhani was derided for being too accommodating in negotiations. During Ahmadinejad’s two terms in office, tensions with the West over Iran’s nuclear programme have worsened, with the United States and Europe imposing sanctions on its oil and banks over suspicions Tehran is seeking atomic arms, which it denies.

“We need a new management for the country but not based on quarrelling, inconsistency and eroding domestic capacity, but through unity, consensus and attracting honest and efficient people,” Rowhani told a gathering of supporters yesterday, Iran’s Mehr news agency reported. The June election is Iran’s first presidential poll since 2009 when mass street protests erupted against Ahmadinejad’s disputed re-election.

The defeated reformist candidates in that election, Mirhossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi, who became figureheads for the “Green movement” - which mounted Iran’s biggest street protests since the Islamic revolution in 1979 - have been under house arrest for more than two years. It is unclear whether the Guardian Council, a state body that can veto candidates, will allow reformists to run, but barring too many contenders risks destroying public interest in a vote which bolsters Iran’s claims to democratic legitimacy.

STRAIGHTFORWARD SERVANT A former Western ambassador to Iran who had dealings with Rowhani during the Khatami administration described him as “approachable and no-nonsense,” likely to be “a calm, orthodox,

efficient and straightforward servant ... and less a charismatic or an independent figure”. With nuclear policy directed by supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei rather than the president, the election is not likely to produce any tangible policy shift there.

“My government will be one of prudence and hope and my message is about saving the economy, reviving ethics and interaction with the world,” Rowhani said in a critique of Ahmadinejad’s economic record. “Inflation is above 30 percent, the reduction in the value of the national currency, unemployment and zero economic growth are among the country’s problems.” While Rafsanjani was not present for the announcement, his son and daughter, Yasser and Fatemeh Hashemi, attended the event, an apparent indication of the former president’s support for Rowhani, his long-serving protege. Also attending Rowhani’s announcement was Mahmoud Alavi, a member of Iran’s Assembly of Experts, the body responsible for overseeing the actions of supreme leader Khamenei - indicating he has some status inside Iran’s establishment.

Hooman Majd, a New York-based Iranian-American journalist and author, said Rowhani - head of an Iranian think-tank, the Centre for Strategic Research - might attract some voters looking for change, without being radical enough to risk being banned.

“Rowhani has been a loyal soldier of Khamenei and is not considered a threat to the system. I think it would be too much for the Guardian Council to disqualify someone like that,” Majd said.

“Rowhani’s not a personality people know very well but he could be viable with support from the Rafsanjani camp and a modern youthful campaign.”

Khamenei’s close advisers plan to put forward their own candidate, hoping to minimise the chances of the next president mounting challenges to the leader’s authority, as they accuse Ahmadinejad of doing, especially during his second term.

Khamenei loyalists accuse Ahmadinejad of trying to erode the influence of the clergy and the supreme leader and fear he will try to extend his political influence after his final term ends in June by helping a close ally win the election. The most likely candidate from the Ahmadinejad camp is his former chief of staff, Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei, but there has been no official word so far on whether he will try to run. — Reuters

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Homophobic assaults surge in France PARIS: Wilfred de Bruijn’s face is bloated, seeped in blood, his bruised right eye shut tight, his tooth broken-the victim of a brutal attack in Paris while he was “walking arm in arm” with his boyfriend. His is one of the latest cases of homophobia in France, where activists say reports of verbal and physical assaults on gays have surged amid rabid debate over a bill allowing same-sex marriage, currently being discussed in the Senate.

“Sorry to show you this. It’s the face of homophobia,” de Bruijn, a Dutch man living in France for 10 years, wrote on his Facebook page next to a photo of his battered face that has been shared thousands of times. Elizabeth Ronzier, head of SOS homophobie, said there had been a 30 percent rise in reports of homophobic and transphobic assaults last year compared to 2011, with a marked surge when debate began in the autumn.

“And in the two months to the end of February this year, we received the same amount of testimonies that we would normally get over a period of six months,” she said.

The bill has galvanised public opinion in France, not only on the streets where supporters and opponents have regularly faced off in nationwide protests attracting hundreds of thousands, but also among friends and family.

Despite this, it has made its way through the legislative process, adopted by the cabinet in November and the parliament’s lower house in February. It is now in the Senate, where debate on the bill is due to end today. More homophobes ‘expressing themselves’-”It’s difficult to say whether there are more homophobes than before, but there are more who are expressing themselves,” said Nicolas Gougain, spokesman for the Inter-LGBT, a rights group for lesbians, gays, bi and trans-sexuals.

Protests have been led mainly by religious groups and conservatives in a country that is officially secular but predominantly Catholic. They have focused not only on samesex marriage, but also on other aspects of the bill such as allowing gay couples to adopt children. And while polls in France regularly show that a majority of people support gay marriage, far less are in favour of same-sex adoption.

Some of the demonstrations have turned violent. Last month, police were forced to fire tear gas on people protesting the bill in Paris, and dozens were arrested.

Opponents insist they are not against homosexuals, but that marriage is an institution meant for a man and a woman, pointing to civil unions that already exist for samesex couples. But as the bill progresses towards final approval-or less likely, rejection-some opponents have upped the ante, resorting to more radical actions to get their message across.

Senator Esther Benbassa, for instance, says her car was trashed over the weekend-a move she believes is linked to her support for the bill - and that she has received threatening phone calls, emails and letters for days. Erwann Binet, a Socialist MP who supports the bill, has also been forced to cancel planned debates for security reasons after being heckled by far-right militants, who have taken a front seat in the debate.

The main opposition movement “Manif pour tous” has sought to distance itself from these actions, saying they are the work of a radical few. But activists say that’s not enough. “Men and women in the Roman Catholic church, in the (right-wing) UMP party... must realise that to say all the time that homos are dangerous for kids, to place them in sub-categories, is... an extremely hurtful form of discrimination,” de Bruijn said Wednesday on France Inter radio.

“It’s the tone that makes me fear that many other less educated, less polite people let loose.” And the sheer scale of opposition in a country governed by the motto “freedom, equality, fraternity” has surprised more than one. But experts have sought to calm fears, pointing to mass protests and opposition in the late 1990s surrounding adoption of France’s PACS-a form of civil union between two adults of different or same sex.

This was a bill “that was adopted with a lot of difficulty, with huge opposition on the streets-as big as today-with a third of French mothers who opposed it, debates that lasted hundreds of hours,” said Frederic Martel, author of the book “Global Gay”. “The law was finally voted on at the end of 1999, and a year later, it was unanimously accepted in the country... That allows us to put into perspective the opposition to this bill.”— AFP

US, others boycott Serbian ‘inflammatory’ UN session Serbia, Russia criticize Yugoslavia war crimes court UNITED NATIONS: The United States boycotted as “inflammatory” a meeting on international justice on Wednesday organized by a Serbian politician who heads the UN General Assembly - a session some nations say was intended merely to complain about the treatment of Serbs in war crimes tribunals. The meeting and panel discussion were set up by former Serbian Foreign Minister Vuk Jeremic, who is serving as president of the 193-nation assembly.

Some UN diplomats have privately accused Jeremic of using the General Assembly to promote his own career and his home country.

Jeremic told Reuters in an interview that he considered the event a success, but added it was “regrettable” some important countries like the United States did not participate.

European and other Western nations have said Wednesday’s session on international justice was a thinly veiled attempt to attack the international war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, which Serbia has criticized. Jordan and Canada joined the United States in boycotting the debate. “The United States strongly disagrees with the decision of the president of the General Assembly to hold an unbalanced, inflammatory thematic debate today on the role of international criminal justice in reconciliation and will not participate,” said Erin Pelton, spokeswoman for the US mission to the United Nations.

“We believe that ad hoc international criminal tribunals and other judicial institutions in Rwanda, the former Yugoslavia, Sierra Leone and Cambodia have been critical to ending impunity and helping these countries chart a new, more positive future,” Pelton said in a statement. Pelton added that it was especially problematic that the day’s events “fail to provide the victims of these atrocities an appropriate voice.”

A senior Western diplomat said on condition of anonymity that

Jeremic’s decision to organize the meeting on April 10 - the day that Croatia’s Nazi puppet state was established in 1941 - ensured that the “whole event took on a Serbian feel.” He added that Jeremic had refused to change the date after he was requested to do so by a number of delegations. Jeremic confirmed that to Reuters, but made clear he considered it an appropriate date that called attention to Nazi-era crimes.

‘VERY DELICATE TOPIC’ “This is obviously a very delicate topic, international criminal justice,” Jeremic said, adding it was the first time the General Assembly had debated it. He said about 82 countries either spoke or associated themselves with the position of a regional bloc presented during the debate. There are “lessons to be learned with the aim of having a more perfect international justice in the future,” he said.

“I find it highly regrettable that some important members of the international community, like the United States, chose not to be a part of the debate,” he said. Jordan’s UN ambassador, Prince Zeid Ra’ad Zeid Al-Hussein, told a small group of reporters that Serbia’s approach to the session on international justice was “almost an impeachable offense” - ostensibly referring to Jeremic’s largely ceremonial post as the head of the General Assembly.

Since it was set up in 1993, the war crimes tribunal for the former Yugoslavia has indicted 161 people for crimes stemming from the wars that shattered the Yugoslav federation, of whom 15 have been acquitted. Several dozen suspects remain on trial. Serbia and its ally Russia have sharply criticized the tribunal over recent decisions to free two Croatian generals and a Kosovo Albanian former guerilla commander. —Reuters

LONDON: Floral tributes line the front step at the home of British former Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in central London following her death earlier this week. — AFP

Frail and lonely, Thatcher’s last days at The Ritz LONDON: Frail, her memory failing her, and with few visitors for company, Margaret Thatcher’s final months were a marked contrast to her zenith striding the global stage. Unable to manage the stairs at her four-storey townhouse, the 87-year-old was recuperating at The Ritz hotel in London following an operation in December to remove a growth in her bladder, when she suffered a final, fatal stroke on Monday. Her 59-year-old twins Mark and Carol both live abroad and visits from friends were restricted on account of her health.

Only a handful of close friends were allowed up to her suite to see the former British prime minister in her last months. They told of how the white-haired baroness’s instincts remained sharp, even though her legendary physical and mental stamina had long since faded. Confidantes recount the sadness of seeing one of the world’s towering post-war figures knowingly struggle to formulate a point, hamstrung by memory loss-with only flashes of the old ‘Maggie’ making it through.

The notoriously tunnel-vision leader also found the confusion tiring. Her failing mental capacities were documented in the 2011 film “The Iron Lady”, for which Meryl Streep won the best actress Oscar. Suffering from ever-worsening dementia for more than a

decade due to repeated minor strokes, workaholic Thatcher retired from public speaking in 2002, on medical advice. She had faced her illness with characteristic defiance. Robin Harris, her confidant and adviser of 30 years, said she saw visits to the doctor in the early 2000s as chances to prove she was indestructible.

‘Final years were particularly sad’-Thatcher’s final book, “Statecraft”, her 2002 blueprint for setting the post-Cold War world to rights, had been a challenge to draft as she struggled to recall the thread of her arguments, he said. The loneliness of losing her ever-loyal husband Denis the following year plunged her into deep sadness, and some say, sped the decline in her own health. In recent years, she was unable to remember that he had died. Carol Thatcher once recounted her mother’s heartache each time she learned the news of his death, over and over again. “The final years of her life were particularly sad,” Harris wrote in his forthcoming biography, according to extracts in the Daily Mail newspaper. Following another stroke in December 2009, “she could no longer string a sentence together. This only partly righted itself, and not for long. Often, it was difficult to know what she was talking about. By 2011, meetings with her had become heartwrenching.—AFP

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Public doubt on bird flu a ghost of China’s past BEIJING: China has earned praise from international scientists for its handling of an outbreak of a deadly new bird flu in humans, but a history of public health cover-ups means the Chinese public is harder to win over. Even as global authorities have said the new H7N9 bird flu strain that has killed eight and infected 28 is no cause for panic, memories of past health scandals continue to undermine the government’s credibility at home in dealing with outbreaks.

Those suspicions have driven anxiety about the human cases in eastern China, and put the government’s response under the microscope as much as the bird flu virus itself. “People aren’t fundamentally worried about the bird flu, but about cover-ups and the lack of transparency. The mistrust of the government is far more frightening than H7N9,” wrote one user on China’s Twitterlike microblogging site Weibo.

Such fears stem from a long list of attempted cover-ups, including that of an epidemic of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), which emerged in China in 2002 and killed about one in 10 of the 8,000 people it infected worldwide. Suspicions are also tied to an HIV/AIDS scandal in the 1990s, when officials tried to suppress information of thousands of villagers who were infected through blood donation stations.

But both of those scandals came before the advent of popular local microblog sites; these now have millions of Internet-savvy users who, despite heavy online censorship, have managed to whip up public awareness over galling health and food-safety issues. The difficulty of keeping a lid on information is one reason China has increased transparency about H7N9, said Jia Xijin, an expert on civil society at Tsinghua University in Beijing.

“Concealing the information is impossible,” Jia said. “If they keep the information it will only increase criticism.”

Still, Chinese Internet users and newspapers question why it took weeks for the government to announce cases of the bird flu strain, especially as two of the victims fell ill in February. Health officials said it took time to identify the virus, which was previously unknown in humans. Senior officials are acutely aware of the mistrust, and on Monday Vice Premier Liu Yandong called for greater transparency surrounding the virus.

SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS In a sign of the intense public concern surrounding H7N9, people in China are making a record number of online searches for “bird flu”, according to a Google tracking tool. Search volumes are higher now than at any time in the past nine years. The results, calculated on a comparable adjusted basis, take into account growing Internet use in the country.

More Chinese people use the Chinese-language search engine Baidu, but the spike in Google searches is still significant. With the Internet at their fingertips, many Chinese are not holding back. Jia, the Tsinghua professor, said the government’s tight grip on information made transparency seem unattainable, leading to constant criticism and occasional wild rumours - among them talk of the flu being the result of a US attack.

Listening to the public, Chinese authorities have been quick to counter speculation that the H7N9 outbreak is related to more than 16,000 pig carcasses found dumped in rivers around Shanghai. The World Health Organization (WHO) has said some dead pigs from the rivers tested negative for influenza infection.

State media reported some Chinese consumers are making their own decisions, leading to a rush on pharmacy sales of isatis, a herb used in traditional Chinese medicine to cure fever.

GLOBAL PRAISE While sceptics in China have taken to social media to speak their minds, flu scientists and global public health experts are heaping praise on Beijing for its efforts so far. Chinese doctors and officials, they say, appear to have learned in the past decade that seeking to cover up a public health threat is more likely than not to backfire and create more panic and worry than publicising what is known.

“Things have improved tremendously,” said Ab Osterhaus, a flu expert at the Erasmus Medical Centre in the Netherlands. “What’s important is that communication with the WHO and the international scientific community is happening.” Michael O’Leary, the WHO’s representative in China, confirmed his team was getting at least daily updates from China’s National Health and Family Planning Commission and from the country’s Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.

Within a day or two of the first cases of the new strain being identified and reported in humans, scientists had posted gene sequence data from virus samples on the website of GISAID, the Global Initiative on Sharing All Influenza Data, which makes such data available to flu researchers worldwide. That swift publication has allowed flu experts in laboratories across the world to start picking through the DNA sequence data to try to assess H7N9’S potential for developing into a human pandemic. —Reuters

HEFEI: A Chinese vendor washes a chicken in a poultry market that is about to be closed because of the influence of bird flu in Hefei, central China’s Anhui province. — AFP

Canada breaks taboo on E Jerusalem talks Israel police hold 5 women for praying at Western Wall JERUSALEM: Canadian Foreign Minister John Baird met an Israeli minister in annexed Arab east Jerusalem this week, deliberately breaking a widely-observed diplomatic taboo, an Israeli newspaper reported yesterday. Baird met Justice Minister Tzipi Livni at her office in east Jerusalem, in a move normally avoided by visiting diplomats over concerns it could be seen as legitimising Israel’s annexation of the city’s eastern sector.

An Israeli working for an NGO that focusses on Canada-Israel relations told the Haaretz newspaper that the east Jerusalem meeting was a deliberate move with a political aim. “Baird recognises the sensitivity but he wants to set a precedent,” the source said. Israel captured east Jerusalem during the 1967 Six Day War and later annexed it in a move never recognised by the international community.

It considers all of Jerusalem its “eternal, indivisible” capital, but the Palestinians want the eastern sector as capital of their future state. “It is not common that foreign officials meet Israeli officials in east Jerusalem,” admitted foreign ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor. “The Canadians have been making a name for themselves by speaking out on the international scene in a way which is all too rare,” Palmor said, saying they were demonstrating an unusual “courage and moral stance.” “There should be nothing unusual about meeting Israel’s justice minister in east Jerusalem (where the ministry is based). What is strange is that this is the exception,” he said.

During his six-day visit to the region, Baird also visited troops in the Israeli-occupied sector of the Golan Heights, Syrian territory which Israel annexed in 1981 in another move never recognised by the international community. A senior official at the foreign ministry told Haaretz that the Canadian embassy had advised Baird against both the east Jerusalem meeting and the Golan visit. Canada is one of Israel’s staunchest allies and was one of the few countries that opposed a successful Palestinian bid for upgraded status at the United Nations late last year.

PRAYING AT WESTERN WALL Five Jewish feminists who yesterday wore prayer shawls and prayed out loud at Jerusalem’s Western Wall in defiance of a court order have been detained for questioning, a police spokeswoman said. Some 200 women gathered at the Wall in Jerusalem’s Old City to stage what has become a monthly protest by activists seeking to overturn a legal ban on them performing certain reli-

gious rituals at the sacred site, an AFP correspondent said. Media reports this week said Jewish Agency chairman Natan Sharansky was trying to find a compromise so the women could pray as they wish without offending more traditional worshippers.

“Five (women) who were wearing a tallit, which is barred by the Supreme Court, were taken for questioning,” police spokeswoman Luba Samri said. An ultra-Orthodox man who tried to set fire to a prayer pamphlet being held by one of the women was also taken for questioning, Samri said. Wearing a tallit, a fringed prayer shawl, is one of several practices traditionally reserved for men at the sacred spot in the Old City. A court in 2003 ruled that women could not perform such rituals there as this would constitute a danger to public order.

Under Israeli law, women are allowed to pray at the ancient wall, but in silence. The activists, who belong to a group called Women of the Wall, have been going the site to pray on the first day of every Jewish month for 25 years, sparking insults and curses from the men at the site. At the same time, they have been waging a protracted legal struggle over their right to pray out loud, to wear prayer shawls and to hold a Torah scroll at the site.

The AFP correspondent said that some of the women at yesterday’s protest were wrapped in tallits while others wore skullcaps. Religious men tried to drown out their singing and prayers by carrying out their own rites at a volume much louder than usual. The women say access to the Wall, the most sacred spot at which Jews can pray, is open to all streams of Judaism, including the Reform and Liberal branches which accord women an equal place alongside men.

The Jewish Agency, a body tasked with linking Israel to Jewish communities around the world, confirmed on its Facebook page Sharansky was working on a compromise plan. “Sharansky hopes his recommendations will be accepted and will decrease the heightened tensions at the Western Wall,” it said in a move aimed at making the site “a symbol of unity among the Jewish people, and not one of discord and strife”.

The site is venerated by Jews as the last remnant of wall supporting the Second Temple complex, which was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD. On its other side is the compound housing the Dome of the Rock and Al-Aqsa mosque, the third holiest site in Islam. Also known to Jews as the Temple Mount, the compound is a deeply sensitive location where clashes frequently break out between Palestinian worshippers and Israeli forces. — Agencies

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Israel grappling with fluid Syria situation Israel on guard as Golan goes from bloom to bloodshed TEL HAZEKA: The slopes of the Golan Heights, with springtime wild flowers now in full bloom, are dotted with discarded rusty tanks that are remnants of a 1973 war. For decades, the Israel-Syria front has been quiet but not anymore. Small Israeli military lookout posts abandoned for years have been put into action and regular military and Special Forces have replaced reservists at many points.

Israel is worried that the Golan, which it captured from Syria in 1967, will become a springboard for attacks on Israelis by jihadi fighters, who are taking part in the armed struggle against Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad. In recent months, battles between Assad loyalists and rebels have raged in some villages on the Syrian foothills of the Golan, with mortar shells and machinegun fire spilling across into Israeli-occupied territory. Israel, which returned fire in some of those incidents, believes that around one in 10 of the rebels are Sunni Muslim radicals.

“Tension in the Golan Heights is the highest it has been since 1974,” a senior Israeli military officer in the area told Reuters this week. “We simply do not know who will control the territory next to the border.” While the fall of Assad, an ally of Israel’s enemy Iran, could be in the Jewish state’s interest, a descent into chaos

on the Golan Heights would pose a new security challenge. Some 20,000 Israeli settlers live on the Golan and the strategic plateau overlooks Israeli towns and villages along the Sea of Galilee. On its southern borders, Israel has long faced rocket attacks from armed Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip and has watched with concern the rise of Islamist militancy in Egypt’s Sinai desert. One Israeli general, the commander of forces in the north, raised the possibility in an Israeli newspaper interview last month of creating a buffer zone in Syria, in cooperation with local forces wary of jihadist fighters, should Assad be toppled.

“Some very key decision-makers are opposed,” an Israeli official said. “(Army chief) Benny Gantz, for example, was the Israeli commander who literally closed the door on south Lebanon when we withdrew from the security zone there in 2000, and he has shown little interest in seeing a repeat on the Golan.” Alon Liel, a former diplomat who led secret peace talks with Damascus, said Israel had limited room for manoeuvre over Syria. “Israel is paralysed from a diplomatic perspective,” he said. “We may be strong militarily but any intervention in a neighbouring country would draw deep objection from both sides in Syria because Israel is so weak in the region diplomatically.”

SYRIA STRATEGY World powers trying to craft a Syria strategy, and weighing whether to arm the rebels, have been struggling to distinguish between mainstream fighters who might stabilise the country should Assad fall, and jihadi insurgents.

“There’s no unified position on that yet,” a senior Israeli official said. “No one really knows what post-Assad Syria would look like. No one really knows who the rebels are as a collective.”

Israel has been wary of being seen to take sides in the Syrian conflict and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu has avoided echoing calls from Israel’s main ally, the United States, for Assad to step down. One senior Western diplomat in Israel told Reuters Syria has been moving up a list of Israeli security concerns topped by Iran’s nuclear programme.

“Syria is starting to edge ahead of Iran as far as the (Israeli) military is concerned, but also among politicians, partly because of US reassurances over Iran but also because the situation in Syria is getting so alarming,” he said. One Israeli official said the fluid situation in Syria meant that Israel had to assess events there almost daily. “That makes for a far more intensive examination (by Israeli decision-makers),” the official

said. “Add to that the fact there is a new (Israeli) government, with new ministers who have little time to get up to speed on these things.”

One of Israel’s main worries is the possibility of Syria’s chemical weapons falling into the hands of Lebanese guerrilla group Hezbollah, with which it fought a 2006 war, or ending up in the hands of jihadis.

Israel has cautioned it will not allow that to happen. In an attack it has not formally confirmed, Israeli planes bombed an arms convoy in Syria in February, according to Western sources, destroying anti-aircraft weapons destined for Hezbollah.

END OF UNDOF? The green expanses and snowcapped mountains of the Golan are a major attraction for Israeli tourists who flock to the plateau. On a sunny spring day, a group of hikers admired the view as an elderly farmer slowly drove through his apple orchard. A few miles away, Israeli troops on patrol stopped their armoured vehicles near an old abandoned tank for a break. Asked if it was quiet that day, one soldier made a “so-so” hand gesture. “When it’s quiet, that’s when it’s scariest,” he said. In another sign Israel was keeping a close eye on the area, two drones, visible from the road, were parked in a fenced-in facility. Among

those battling against Assad’s forces are fighters from the Nusra Front, an Islamist militant group linked to AlQaeda and blacklisted by the United States as a “terrorist group”. Nusra Front forces, which include foreign fighters, have come to prominence in the revolt and last month fought in battles near the Israel-Syria ceasefire line.

Last month, Assad’s forces appeared to push back the rebels in the area. “There is a still a visible (Syrian army) troop presence there, though it is unclear whether they have significant control or even a unified central command,” an Israeli official said. Brigadier-General Yoav Mordechai, Israel’s chief military spokesman, told Army Radio last week that global jihad groups were fighting under the rebels, and “exploiting the anarchy”, some of them have moved into the Golan Heights. “In the future we will have to deal with terrorism from the Golan Heights, after 40 years of impressive and exemplary quiet,” Mordechai said. An Israeli military officer said new Defence Minister Moshe Yaalon had ordered “that no fire from Syria into Israel, be it deliberate or stray, is left without response.” Israel is building a new, 5-metre tall fence on the Golan beside the older, partly rundown barrier that runs along the 70 km front. — Reuters

Mubarak’s retrial eclipsed by political and economic woes Gamal, Alaa to be retried on corruption charges CAIRO: The retrial of former Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak begins tomorrow in Cairo, but the ousted strongman’s fate has been eclipsed by the deadly turmoil and economic woes gripping the country. Mubarak, his interior minister Habib Al-Adly and six security chiefs are to face court again over their complicity in the murder and attempted murder of hundreds of peaceful protesters on January 25-31, 2011. His sons Gamal and Alaa-once symbols of power and wealth-will be retried on corruption charges along with their father.

Business tycoon Hussein Salem is being tried in absentia. The hearing will be held at the police academy that once bore Mubarak’s name in a Cairo suburb, and a group of staunch supporters have said on social media websites that they will be there to stand by their former leader. The initial trial in August 2011 was a big moment for the country and the region because it was the first time an Arab leader deposed by his people appeared personally in court.

But the drama of those first days, which saw an ailing Mubarak wheeled into court on a stretcher, has since fizzled. There had been dozens of newspaper columns and talk show episodes dedicated to what was dubbed “the trial of the century”.

This time round, there is scant mention of Mubarak in the press or on television or even in private, save for the fact that earlier this week the public prosecutor extended his detention on corruption charges. Mubarak, who turns 85 in May, has suffered several health scares and the state news agency even reported him clinically dead at one point as he slipped into a coma. He is currently being treated at a military hospital in Cairo.

In January, Egypt’s highest court, the Court of Cassation, ordered a retrial for Mubarak after accepting an appeal against his life sentence, citing procedural failings. Adly had also been sentenced to life over his involvement in the deaths of the protesters, but controversially his security chiefs had been acquitted, sparking widespread anger and protests after the verdict in June. President Mohamed Morsi, who won elections last June on the Muslim Brotherhood’s ticket, had pledged new trials for former regime officials, including Mubarak, implicated in the protesters’ deaths.

But Morsi’s presidency has been plagued by unrest and deadly clashes between protesters and police, a revolt in the canal cities, sectarian violence and a devastating economic crisis, in what many fear is bringing Egypt to the brink of chaos. “The country is largely unlikely to pay attention to the trial,” said H A Hellyer, a non-resident fellow at the Brookings Institution. “There is the potential that the ruling party use the trial to deflect attention from the problems they are facing,” Hellyer said.

But despite the fact that what happens to Mubarak seems of little relevance to many, there is still widespread anger over the fact that no one has been held accountable for nearly 900 deaths during the 18-day uprising.

Mubarak’s epic fall from power, from the dictatorial head of the Arab world’s most populous nation to a defendant behind bars, was for many a promising sign the revolution which toppled him was on the right track. But the case against the former president verged on the farcical, with patchwork evidence and prosecution witnesses exonerating the defendants, according to legal experts. — AFP

HYDERABAD: Pakistani relatives and residents gather outside the residence of slain candidate, Fakhrul Islam, 46, who was a candidate for the secular Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), following an attack by gunmen in the southern city of Hyderabad yesterday. — AFP

Candidate shot dead KARACHI: A Pakistani grocer standing in historic polls next month was shot dead yesterday in a drive-by killing in the southern city of Hyderabad, police said. Fakhrul Islam, 46, a candidate for the secular Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), a coalition partner in the outgoing government, was killed by gunmen on two motorcycles when he left the shop he owned with his father. “He sustained four bullets in his head and abdomen and died on the spot,” police official Akhtar Hussain said. His father was not injured, but police said he was in “deep shock”. Islam was running for the Sindh provincial assembly in national and regional elections on May 11. The polls will mark the first democratic transition in the nuclear-armed country, which has been subject to extended periods of military rule. Islam was the first candidate for the elections to be assassinated and the killing was likely to fuel concerns that violence would mar the vote.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility. —Agencies

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Ukraine president flexes but resists EU over jailed rival KIEV: Despite winning rare praise from the West for freeing an opponent from jail, Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich is likely to resist extra pressure and the lure of trade deals to release his fiercest rival, exprime minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

Though he has pardoned former interior minister Yuri Lutsenko, a Tymoshenko ally, that will not be enough to satisfy European Union demands for democratic reform and clinch association and free-trade agreements with the 27-member bloc in November, at a summit in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius.

“I would not open a bottle of champagne yet for Ukraine and its future (after Lutsenko’s release).

There are plenty of doubts as to whether Ukraine will be able to implement other commitments,” said Olga Shumylo-Tapiola, visiting scholar of Carnegie Europe in Brussels. “I would say that the prospects of signing the agreements are still bleak,” she said. Both the EU and the United States urged Yanukovich to follow up on Sunday’s pardon of Lutsenko, who was serving four years for abuse of office, by addressing other cases of “selective justice” and what they say are politically motivated prosecutions - a clear call for Tymoshenko to be released.

But few commentators see any likelihood that Yanukovich, a 62-year-

old former electrician from the industrial east, will pardon Tymoshenko, who came close to beating him for the presidency in February 2010. “We can expect demands for the release of Tymoshenko to increase now,” said Volodymyr Fesenko, analyst of the Penta political think-tank, but added: “He (Yanukovich) is afraid of Tymoshenko, so she will stay in prison.”

The 52-year-old braided heroine of the 2004 “Orange Revolution” street protests that overturned an election rigged in Yanukovich’s favour is one and a half years into a seven-year sentence for abuse of office linked to a 2009 gas deal she brokered with Russia. The Yanukovich government says the deal saddled the country with an exorbitant price for gas imports. And rather than listen to Western pleas to show her leniency, justice authorities are piling up more cases against her, including one alleging involvement in the 1996 contract killing of a business rival and Ukrainian parliamentarian.

RE-ELECTION TRUMPS INTEGRATION The problem, as Western analysts see it, is that when it comes to deciding policy priorities, Yanukovich’s overriding ambition to secure re-election in 2015 takes precedence. “The ruling elite in Ukraine has two simple

aims: to consolidate power and to proceed with EU integration process as quickly as possible. The trouble is that the methods it uses to achieve the former make the latter impossible,” Jana Kobzova and Balazs Jarabik said in a joint European Council on Foreign Relations report. The freetrade agreement potentially on offer from the EU would open up a huge market for Ukrainian exports - steel, grain, chemicals and food products and provide a powerful spur for much-needed foreign investment. It would be a boon for a country that traditionally has relied on trade with big neighbour Russia.

With an EU deal clearly in the business interests of influential power brokers such as steel billionaire Rinat Akhmetov and others, Yanukovich has consistently set European integration as a foreign policy priority.

But he resorts nonetheless to playing the “Russia card”, suggesting that Ukraine could easily turn back to Moscow - which beckons with an invitation to join the Russia-led Customs Union - if it does not get an easier ride from its EU partners. Earlier this year, he reproached the EU for not giving Ukraine enough support in its negotiations with Russia to secure a cheaper price for gas.

HEAVYWEIGHT CHALLENGER Politically, Yanukovich is not as

strong as he was. Support for his Party of the Regions dipped in a parliamentary election last October, and a March poll shows his popularity has fallen by more than a percentage point against new potential presidential challengers such as world heavyweight boxing champion Vitaly Klitschko.

But despite drawing crowds of several thousands out in street rallies, the united opposition led by Klitschko, former economy minister Arseny Yatseniuk and far-right nationalist Oleh Tyahnybok, has largely failed to capitalise on Yanukovich’s unpopularity, analysts say. Ukraine is also still adrift on other parts of the EU reform agenda, such as reforming its election system, despite criticism by the OSCE watchdog last year, and overhauling a judiciary still heavily dependent on the country’s political masters.

Turmoil in parliament, often an arena for fist-fights between Yanukovich loyalists and opposition deputies, further undermines Ukraine’s hope of being taken seriously by Europe’s parliamentary democracies. Graft and rampant corruption throughout the former Soviet republic scare off all but the hardiest foreign investors, and the EU itself has refused to provide financial aid to Ukraine’s budget since 2011, citing weak procurement rules. — Reuters

14 killed in clashes with Mexico police Gunmen, federal police battle in Michoacan state MORELIA: At least 14 people died Wednesday in a series of clashes between gunmen and federal police in Michoacan state, a western area that has seen a surge of violence in recent years attributed to drug cartels, authorities said. Federal police said in a statement the first gunbattle began when officers aboard a helicopter spotted armed men traveling in four vehicles in the town of Gabriel Zamora.

The gunmen opened fire on the agents, who shot back and killed five assailants, the statement said. It said one of those killed was high in the leadership structure of a Michoacan-based drug cartel, but didn’t identify the group. Hours later in the town of Apatzingan, federal agents were accompanying a caravan of citizens commemorating the anniversary of the death of Mexican revolutionary Emiliano Zapata when gunmen fired shots at some of the participants.

Police killed one of the gunmen, authorities said.

The citizens continued on and were again attacked by gunmen who fired from an overpass, police said. Eight people died and another eight were wounded, including two police officers. The Knights Templar cartel, which controls much of Michoacan, has been fighting rivals along its borders with other states including Guerrero, where a variety of smaller cartels control drug smuggling and other criminal activities. The clashes came the same day that the Mexican government announced drug-related killings

from December through March had dropped 14 percent from the same period a year earlier. The Interior Department said 4,249 people were killed during the first four months of President Enrique Pena Nieto’s administration. It said 4,934 were killed between December 2011 and March 2012.

But Interior Secretary Miguel Angel Osorio Chong said that “it’s too early to assume victorious attitudes.”

The government of previous President Felipe Calderon stopped releasing figures of drug killings in September 2011. Osorio Chong said the federal government continued to keep a count. The Interior Department report said 184 law enforcement officials were killed between December and March, including soldiers, and federal and local police. Bloody clashes are still common in Mexico and there are times when it’s impossible to know how many people died because drug traffickers take their dead away before authorities reach the scene.

In the border city of Reynosa, there were at least four major shootouts between rival drug gangs in March. One of the clashes lasted several hours. People reported dozens of dead on social networks and at least 12 were corroborated by witnesses.

The official account, however, listed two dead. Osorio Chong said the state of Tamaulipas, where Reynosa is located, is one of the “most important spots for this administration” when it comes to security. — AP

SUWANEE: A police officer clears a path for an ambulance after an explosion and gunshots were heard near the scene where a man was holding four firefighters hostage in Suwanee, Ga. — AP

Frustrated gunman killed SUWANEE: An armed man who was having financial problems held four firefighters for hours in a suburban Atlanta home, demanding his cable and power be turned back on, before being shot dead when SWAT members stormed the house, authorities said Wednesday. The hostages had cuts and bruises from explosions that officers set off to distract the gunman before moving in, but they will be fine, a fire official said. Minutes before the police announcement on the resolution, a huge blast could be heard a quarter-mile away from the home, shuddering through the Suwanee neighborhood, setting off car alarms.

Earlier Wednesday, five firefighters responded to what seemed like a routine medical call and were eventually taken hostage by an unidentified suspect inside the house, police said. The gunman released one

of the firefighters to move a fire truck but held the other four. Dozens of police and rescue vehicles surrounded the home and a negotiator was keeping in touch with the gunman, police said. The situation remained tense until the blast rocked the neighborhood of mostly two-story homes and well-kept lawns.

Residents unable to get into their neighborhood because of the police cordon flinched and recoiled as the enormous blast went off.

Soon after the stun blast, officers exchanged gunfire with the suspect and a SWAT member was shot in the hand or arm, but should be fine, said Gwinnett County Police Cpl Edwin Ritter.

Ritter would not saw how the gunman was fatally shot, saying it was being investigated.

“The explosion you heard was used to distract the suspect, to get into the house and take care of business,” Ritter said in a news conference minutes after the resolution. — AP

International FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Venezuela election to test Chavez’s socialist legacy Opposition leader offers Brazil-style economic model CARACAS: The late Hugo Chavez’s selfdeclared socialist revolution will be put to the test at a presidential election on Sunday that pits his chosen successor against a younger rival promising change in the nation he polarized. Most opinion polls give his protege, acting President Nicolas Maduro, a strong lead thanks to Chavez’s endorsement and the surge of grief and sympathy over his death from cancer last month.

Maduro, a burly 50-year-old former bus driver, is promising to be faithful to Chavez’s socialist policies and he has copied his former boss’ fierce rhetoric throughout the campaign. “Do you want one of the rancid bourgeois to win?”

Maduro shouted at one of his closing rallies. “Or do you want a worker, a son of Chavez, a patriot and a revolutionary? You decide!” Waving posters of his late boss, the crowd sang back the campaign slogan: “Chavez, I swear to you, I’ll vote for Maduro!”

Opposition candidate Henrique Capriles, the 40-year-old governor of Miranda state, says Venezuelans need a change from the divisive politics of Chavez’s 14-year rule, and he is hoping a late surge will turn things in his favor. At stake is control of the world’s biggest crude oil reserves, economic aid to a host of left-leaning governments around Latin America, and the legacy of “Chavismo” socialism. At each of his campaign events, Maduro has played a video of Chavez giving him his blessing in an emotional last speech to the OPEC nation of 29 million people before he succumbed to cancer on March 5. If Maduro wins, he will face big challenges from day one as he seeks to control the disparate ruling coalition without his predecessor’s dominant personality or the robust state finances that helped the ailing Chavez win re-election just last October. Capriles would face an even tougher landscape if he wins as he would have to try to win over Chavez’s millions of ferociously loyal supporters, including suspicious employees at state-run companies that have long been tied to Chavez’s

movement. At every rally, Capriles has rejected Maduro’s claims that he plans to cancel the oil-funded social welfare projects, or slum “missions”, that were a highprofile cornerstone of the late president’s popularity with the poor. Capriles has drawn blood with scathing attacks on Maduro and others whom he denounces as “skin-deep revolutionaries.” He accuses them of betraying Chavez’s legacy by filling their pockets while paying only lip service to his ideology. Maduro, meanwhile, paints his rival as a pampered rich

ing up his modest roots at rallies, frequently calling onto stage fellow workers whom he recognizes. During a bitter, lightning campaign punctuated by highly personalized attacks from both candidates, Maduro has stressed his close ties to Chavez at every turn. He even said he was visited by the late leader’s spirit in the form a little bird.

In another surreal turn, Maduro also warned anyone thinking of voting for his rival that they would bring down a centuries-old curse upon themselves, playing

MERIDA: Venezuelan opposition candidate, Henrique Capriles Radonski, greets supporters during a campaign rally in Merida ahead of the upcoming April 14 election. — AFP kid who represents a wealthy and venal Venezuelan elite - and their “imperial” financial backers in Washington.

MADURO STRESSES TIES TO CHAVEZ A descendant of European Jews on his mother’s side, Capriles does come from a wealthy family, but has sought to project a man-of-the-people image riding into slums on his motorbike and nearly always wearing a baseball cap. Maduro, a former member of a rock band and a union activist, rose to be Chavez’s foreign minister and vice president, but has been play-

on the fertile mix of animist and Christian beliefs in Venezuela’s plains and jungles.

In a nation where Chavez’s confrontational rhetoric helped fuel deep mistrust between his supporters and the opposition, both political camps have repeatedly accused the other of dirty tricks and fomenting violent plans. Loyal “Chavistas” often accuse the opposition of plotting a re-run of a brief coup against Chavez a decade ago, while the Capriles camp says the government is shamelessly using state resources to try to ensure Maduro’s triumph. — Reuters

‘Emergency’ in Brazil state after flood of immigrants BRASILIA: Brazil’s northwestern state of Acre declared a “social emergency” Wednesday as it attempts to slow a wave of undocumented immigrants smuggled overland from neighboring countries. “More than a thousand illegal immigrants have entered over the past month,” said Nilson Moura, Acre’s secretary for justice and human rights.

One of Brazil’s smaller states, Acre borders the states of Amazonas to the north and Rondonia to the east. To its southeast is Bolivia, while Peru is on its south and west. Moura said the new arrivals have come from some of the poorest corners of the world, including Haiti and Bangladesh. Others have come from Senegal, the Dominican Republic, Nigeria and elsewhere, he said. Justice Minister Jose Eduardo Cardozo said the Haitians’ status would be adjusted so that they can work in Brazil. But the fate of the other immigrants was not immediately clear.

The Amazon rainforest state “has been turned into an interna-

tional travel route controlled by coyotes,” said Moura, referring to the smugglers who-often in exchange for exorbitant fees-guide the undocumented foreign migrants into Brazil. Officials said the migrants began as a trickle in December 2010 and quickly numbered 4,300 Haitians. Authorities in Acre said they now have detained some 1,300 immigrants at a facility in the town of Brasileia built to hold 200. “We have shortages of space and water, and illness,” Moura said, adding that he feared that the miserable conditions could lead to an epidemic of even more serious disease. Officials here said that they issued the emergency decree in hopes of procuring assistance from Brazil’s federal authorities.

“We’ve been really surprised by the arrival of the Africans,” Moura said. He noted that 53 Senegalese had arrived two days ago, and another 70 came on Wednesday alone. The migrants usually travel to Spain before reaching Ecuador and then being brought to Brazil thanks to “coyote” immigrant smugglers. — AFP

Uruguay approves same-sex marriage MONTEVIDEO: Uruguay’s legislatures voted yesterday to allow same-sex marriages nationwide, making it only the second Latin American country to do so. The vote, with 71 of the 92 members of the lower house backing the measure, was welcomed with cries of “freedom, freedom” and “equality” from members of the public who burst into applause.

The senate last week approved a bill legalizing marriage between “two people of different or the same sex.” “Tomorrow, we will have a more just, more equal society with more rights for everyone,” said Sebastian Sabini, a lawmaker from the Frente Amplio ruling coalition.

Uruguay’s move came after Argentina approved gay marriage in 2010. Same-sex marriage has been permitted in Mexico City, but not the rest of the country, since 2009.

The Catholic Church appealed during Easter week for the defense of the institution of marriage, but only eight opposition senators voted against the bill, while 23 voted in favor.

“Today, the Uruguayan state recognizes a form of love that is different from heterosexual love but just as valid,” said Federico Grana of the Ovejas Negras (Black Sheep) collective representing gays, lesbians and transvestites. “This victory is a victory for all social groups fighting for a fairer and egalitarian society.”

An emotional Michelle Suarez, the country’s first transsexual lawyer and author of the initial equal marriage bill, expressed “profound joy” at the “substantive” vote.

On May 1 Square in front of the Legislative Palace, dozens of supporters waved rainbow flags, while electronic music played in the background. “Last night, I could not sleep. I’m very excited,” said Roberto Acosta, 62, dressed in gold from head to toe and wearing a hat with gay pride colors. “It’s amazing to fight for so long and to win.”

Silvina, who declined to give her last name because her parents do not know her sexual orientation, said that more tolerance was still needed despite the milestone.

“Supposedly, we are a tolerant country. But I had rocks thrown at me just a few weeks ago just for laughing with someone in the street,” she said. “But I do hope this starts to make people aware of things now. At least the legal side of things will be taken care of.”

Over the past six years, Uruguay has legalized civil unions for homosexuals and the adoption of children by same sex couples, as well as opened the military to gays. The new law allowing same-sex marriage also includes other changes that apply to all regardless of sexual orientation, including some concerning divorce, inheritance and adoption.

The minimum age for legal marriage will increase to 16 for all instead of the current 12 for women and 14 for men.

Same-sex couples who adopt will be allowed to choose the order in which a child uses family names. The new law will take effect 90 days after its enactment. — AFP

Business FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Goodbye fluorescent bulb? Philips says yes

World food prices rise on dairy surge

PAGE 22

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GENEVA: Swiss Hugo Soder presents his invention - a sensory immersion capsule with mind modulator for hypnotherapy - during the opening day of the 41th International Exhibition of Inventions of Geneva. —AFP

Inventions, practical, oddball, showcased Geneva fair attracts 725 exhibitors from 45 countries GENEVA: The impeccably-dressed South Korean flipped a tyre sideways, and with a deft sweep snapped a curious, pastel-shaded device onto the hub. “Fitted in seconds,” he said with a flourish, drawing nods of approval from Swiss onlookers all too used to their annual battle to preserve their fingers as they fix snow chains during the Alpine winter. Welcome to the International Exhibition of Inventions in Geneva which bills itself as the biggest of its kind in the world.

Showcasing innovations from the plainly practical to the charmingly oddball all of which much be patented to be allowed a berth-the annual fair’s 41st edition kicked off this week and runs until Sunday. It has drawn 725 exhibitors from 45 countries, with lone inventors making up a quarter and the rest from small companies, research institutes and universities. “We only present new items, never seen before,” noted Jean-Luc Vincent, its founder and president.

Past success stories include flexible lighting for decorations, stairlifts for the disabled, inflatable neck cushions and clips to hold a glass to a plate at parties. A key goal of exhibitors-who pay an event fee of up to 1,200 Swiss francs (980 euros, $1,285), booth hire not included-is to hit markets. Industrialists and distributors make up almost half of the 60,000 visitors.”The rhythm of innovation is accelerating and the competition is out there, inciting companies to buy inventions from outside, rather than develop them themselves,” said Vincent.

Touring the fair offers insights into the inven-

tor’s art. Ryu Dae Ryeong, mastermind of the “Running Tortoise” snow chain, said the seed was planted in 2005 when he was a professional soldier in South Korea. “I was watching conscripts trying to fit chains in the winter. Then I came out of the army in 2010 and worked as a taxi driver, and I was the one having to fit chains,” Ryu said.

“It took me three shots to get the prototype right. Now I’m looking for a factory so we can start making them right away,” he added, saying he foresaw a price tag of 310 euros for a set but staying cagey on likely production costs. The inventors span the generations. Irishman James Dower, 77, sat astride his “Tilt and Turn”, a sturdy, petrol-powered tricycle whose trick is a flexible axle. “It’s a very simple design really. Nothing can

go wrong with it,” Dower said. “I’d been thinking about this from my young days. I’d had problems with three-wheelers, they’d topple when they turned. But four-wheelers needed suspension.

This is the solution.”Dower’s trike is mainly aimed at farmers-he cited advantages such as a cost of less than 2,500 euros, and the power to pull weights of a quarter of a tonne-but he said he saw potential for electric versions in urban areas.

“It’s not my first invention. I had one before, an automatic gate for pig stalls, way back in the 1970s.

But it didn’t really take off,” he added. At the other end of the age scale was 17-year-old Malaysian Hafizuddin Abdul Rahman, whose electricity system uses decomposing garden soil

Libya grants Egypt interest-free loan CAIRO: Libya has granted an interest-free loan of $2 billion to cash-strapped Egypt to help it battle its economic crisis, local media reported yesterday, citing an Egyptian finance ministry official.

The loan is to be repaid within five years, with a three-year grace period, the unnamed official is quoted as saying.

Cairo “on Wednesday signed an agreement with the government of Libya under which it will be granted an interest-free loan of $2 billion (1.53 billion euros) with the aim of boosting the state’s budget and its foreign reserves,” he said. The announcement comes as Cairo holds difficult talks with the International Monetary Fund over a loan of $4.8 billion as part of a financing programme to

lift Egypt’s economy out of crisis. The size of the loan may change, IMF officials have said, without elaborating.

Egypt’s authorities believe the loan will help restore investor confidence in the country, where unrest that accompanied the 2011 uprising that toppled President Hosni Mubarak has caused a significant drop in revenue from the once-lucrative tourism industry. Foreign reserves have plunged from $36 billion to some $13 billion in two years, and the budget deficit is increasing.

Energy-rich Qatar announced on Wednesday it would buy bonds from Egypt worth $3 billion over and above a previously announced aid package amounting to $5 billion. — AFP

in place of batteries. “We wanted to show that soil is a way to produce power. Dry cell batteries use toxic chemicals. And there’s an abundance of soil,” Rahman explained. “This started out as a school chemistry project. We invented it last April. I’m here to get experience. This is just my first invention, but my next one is still a secret,” he said.

The inventors are grouped by nation. In the French section, Paul Chavand’s enthusiasm for his “Rollkers” 10-kilometre-per-hour skates was infectious. “I got sick of new technology, so I decided to focus on good, old technology,” he said, explaining how he uses a similar concept to traction-powered toy cars to give power thanks to the wearer’s own weight and motion, while also preventing the feet from sliding back. Chavand said he invested 10,000 euros of his own money in the project and was leveraging 100,000 euros from investors.

“If we find a manufacturer, this could be on the market within 18 months,” he said. He bristled at the mad scientist label sometimes stuck on inventors. “We always get treated like we’re crazy. It really annoys me,” he said. The underlying message is that for every problem, there’s a solution. Indian P Mahalingam was pitching his “WeeWee”, a small tube that enables women to urinate standing up like men, with gains for hygiene, lower water use from flushes and discretion. “If I can talk to the corporates, people who are in sanitation, then I’ll have done what I’m looking for,” he said. — AFP

Business FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Dubai stocks may escape post-dividend slump Investors looking for laggards in various sectors DUBAI: A resurgence of the Dubai stock market’s rally this week suggests it may escape a slump which it traditionally suffers around this time of year, thanks to a belief that the emirate’s economy is still in the early stages of an upswing. The stock market has dropped during the month of May in four of the past five years, partly because investors tend to sell shares after annual corporate dividends are decided and paid. After taking profits on gains made in the early part of each year, some investors temporarily withdraw from the market, returning only after summer holidays.

This year the pattern may be different, however. The main market index has in the past two days shot up to levels last seen in December 2009, suggesting a lot of profits are getting ploughed back into the market rather than stored in bank accounts. “A lot of the dividends have started to arrive and shareholders have decided to put most of them back into the market,” said Mohammed Ali Yasin, managing director of Abu Dhabi Financial Services. “There is a great return opportunity for them.” He added, “The trend is different this year in terms of

performance. People are picking blue chips in anticipation of first-quarter earnings.”

REASONS TO BUY The market index is up 21 percent so far this year, which in normal times would be encouraging investors to take money off the table and wait for dips to buy stocks. At present, however, many people are looking for fresh reasons to buy. Some are seeking what they consider laggard stocks in sectors that have already risen strongly. Shares in Dubai Islamic Bank, for example, are up 14 percent in the past four days in heavy trading after they had underperformed bigger banks listed in the United Arab Emirates.

One trigger for this week’s surge was news that the bank had paid back 3.8 billion dirhams ($1.03 billion) in government aid that it received during the 2008 global financial crisis. Also, Dubai Islamic plans to buy out and delist mortgage lender Tamweel ; this could give it a potential capital gain of 650 million dirhams, according to Arqaam Capital. Another laggard which attracted heavy interest this week is construction firm Drake and

Scull. Its shares are up nearly 10 percent in the past four days, partly because of unconfirmed talk that the company could become a takeover target.

Many investors are focusing on the fact that Dubai’s main index is still a staggering 69 percent below the peak it hit in 2008, before the global crisis and Dubai’s own property market crash. With the emirate’s property prices now recovering, that discount looks unreasonable to some investors.

“Dubai’s market is not overbought and the trend looks healthy,” said Zeki Muderrisoglu, fund manager and senior technical analyst at NBAD Asset Management. “If you’re looking for a long-term view, it’s very positive over the next five years. We are at very low levels historically.”

RISKS There are risks for Dubai’s uptrend.

One is that first-quarter corporate earnings, to be released towards the end of April, may disappoint. Another risk is the attitude of foreign funds in an unstable global environment; they were slow to come back to Dubai as its rally began last year, and could be

quick to pull out in response to international trends.

Nevertheless, it would take a lot to knock the market back sharply in its current mood. Evidence of that came this week when shareholders in Emaar Properties, Dubai’s top property developer, voted on its annual dividend.

Last month the company’s management proposed a dividend of 10 fils a share, flat from the previous year. The stock, which is up more than 40 percent year-to-date, surged in recent weeks partly because investors were betting that the shareholder meeting might pressure management into hiking the dividend.

This did not happen; the meeting, held on Tuesday, confirmed the dividend at 10 fils.

But the stock price barely blinked at this disappointment, falling only 1.8 percent on Wednesday. “We should expect the market to take a breather, which would make sense, but at the same time it’s difficult to find sellers,” said Sebastien Henin, portfolio manager at The National Investor. “Maybe the rebound was too fast but they say never go against the trend, which is definitely positive.” — Reuters

Abu Dhabi’s Mubadala swings back into profit Revenues up 12% to 31.3 billion dirhams ABU DHABI: Mubadala, the Abu Dhabi investment fund with a mandate to boost the emirate’s local economy, swung to a net profit in 2012, helped by improved margins at some of its core businesses and lower impairments, it said yesterday. Oil-rich Abu Dhabi, capital of the United Arab Emirates is investing billions of dollars in industry, tourism and infrastructure locally as well as overseas through state-backed entities such as Mubadala.

However, earlier this month Mubadala signed a $2 billion loan refinancing with banks to replace a $2.5 billion loan agreed in 2010.

Spreads on Mubadala bonds widened slightly on Thursday with the $500 million 7.625 percent bond maturing 2019 bid at 128.5 cents to the dollar to yield 2.520, compared with 2.515 on Wednesday. A $750 million 5.5 percent bond maturing 2021 was bid at 117.5 cents to the dollar to yield 3.03 percent, compared with 2.962 percent on Wednesday.

The fund made a profit of 455 million dirhams ($124 million) in 2012, compared with a loss of 3.2 billion dirhams in 2011, when it booked heavy impairments on its financial portfolio. The fund, which has a local joint venture with General Electric and interests in the semiconductor, oil and gas, aerospace and real estate sectors in the region, increased its revenue by 12 percent last year to 31.3 billion dirhams, boosted, it said, by higher semiconductor sales and land sales.

Losses from financial investments fell to 1.43 billion dirhams last year after a loss of 3.03 billion dirhams in 2011, while impairments on the fund’s property portfolio dropped to 585.7 million dirhams from 653 million dirhams. “Our 2012 financial performance is a reflection of how we manage our portfolio, with certain key assets and projects reaching further maturity

and improved market conditions positively impacting the value of many of our financial investments,” said Chief Executive Khaldoon al Mubarak.

Mubadala’s total assets stood at 202.8 billion dirhams ($55.22 billion) at the end of the 2012, up from 177.1 billion dirhams a year ago.

Mubadala, one of few state-controlled vehicles to publish results, also owns stakes in listed local companies such as Tabreed and indebted developer Aldar Properties which received shareholder approval for a merger with rival Sorouh Real Estate in March. — Reuters

SINGAPORE: Travellers wait at the departures hall in Singapore Changi International airport yesterday. Singapore’s Changi Airport was named the World’s Best Airport for the fourth time in this year’s Skytrax World Airport Awards announced in Geneva yesterday. — AFP

Dubai’s DME drops fuel plans to focus on crude

DUBAI: The Dubai Mercantile Exchange has dropped plans to offer fuel oil trading to focus on increasing volumes of its Oman crude oil futures to the point where big Gulf oil producers want to price off them, the DME’s chief executive said. The exchange, which trades DME Oman Crude Oil Futures Contract (OQD), late last year was considering the introduction of fuel oil trading.

But after getting lukewarm feedback from customers, it has decided to stick to making Oman crude the price benchmark for Middle East crude sales to Asia. “We are going to focus on OQD. It’s really important that we continue to grow the market and we have been very successful, we’ve had six months of month-on-month growth,” Chief Executive Officer Christopher Fix said.

“I want to ensure that we continue along the development of crude and not right now split the market’s attention between crude and other products. So we do not have any formal plans right now to move forward with another product,” he said in an interview. Since joining the DME at the end of August 2012, Fix has focused on increasing the number of financial players - banks and hedge funds - that trade on the exchange.

Only around 9 percent of DME volumes are traded by financial players.

RBS Securities Inc. joined as a clearing member on Apr. 8 and the exchange now has 64 users, up from around 50 a year ago. Fix, who spent 20 years at BNP Paribas before joining the DME, said more financial players were in talks to join but declined to name any until they had officially

signed up. The DME’s previous chief executive focused on trying to persuade big national oil companies (NOC), especially Saudi Aramco, to price their multi-million barrel daily exports off DME Oman, rather than rival reference price Platts Dubai.

“We are interested in having a dialog with any NOC that is looking at pricing issues. That hasn’t changed. What’s changed is that we think the best way of attracting those potential users of the exchange is by having a better basis on the exchange itself,” Fix said. “When we have critical mass and we have the liquidity down the curve and we have better bid offer spreads and we have the better open interest, then producers are going to say ‘this is a better mousetrap, this is what I’m convinced about’,” he said. “The meaningful dialogues and meaningful look at making a decision towards changing the pricing will occur then.”

LONG TERM The fuel oil contract idea has been shelved, in part because of the headaches that large amounts of sanctioned Iranian fuel oil being traded around the region could cause. But if DME Oman can establish itself as the main benchmark for crude sales to Asia, where most Gulf oil goes, the DME will look again at expanding into other products. “We see ourselves as a major pricing source for east of Suez trade flows and in the future, as we develop, other products that can also fit into that game plan will be looked at,” Fix said when asked if the exchange might develop a liquefied natural gas (LNG) contract. —Reuters

Business FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

PC outlook darkens Sales slump deepens in Q1 SAN FRANCISCO: The ailing personal computer market is getting weaker, and it’s starting to look as if it will never fully recover as a new generation of mobile devices reshapes the way people use technology. The latest evidence of the PC’s infirmity emerged Wednesday with the release of two somber reports showing unprecedented declines in sales of desktop and laptop machines during the first three months of the year.

As if that news wasn’t troubling enough, it appears that a pivotal makeover of Microsoft’s ubiquitous Windows operating system seems to have done more harm than good since the software was released last October. “This is horrific news for PCs,” said BGC Financial analyst Colin Gillis. “It’s all about mobile computing now. We have definitely reached the tipping point.”

First-quarter shipments of PCs fell 14 percent worldwide from the same time last year, according to International Data Corp. That’s the deepest quarterly drop since the firm started tracking the industry in 1994. Another research firm, Gartner Inc., pegged the first-quarter decline at 11 percent. The deviation stemmed in part from the firms’ slightly different definitions of PCs. No matter how things are parsed, the PC market is in the worst shape since IBM Corp released a desktop machine in 1981. PC sales have now fallen from their year-ago levels in four consecutive quarters, a slide that has been accelerating even amid signs that the overall economy is getting healthier. PCs are going out of style because they typically cost more than smartphones and tablets, and aren’t as convenient to use. Most PCs sell for $500 to $1,500 while the initial out-of-pocket expense for a smartphone runs as low as $99 while an array of tablets sell for $200 to $300.

Apple’s late CEO Steve Jobs, whose company propelled the mobile computing revolution with the 2007 release of the iPhone, declared that the world was entering a “post-PC era” shortly after the iPad came out three years ago. In a June 2010 appearance at a technology conference, Jobs likened challenges facing the PC industry to what happened to trucks in the US decades ago as a shift away from farming caused more people to move into cities where they wanted to drive cars instead. “I think PCs are going to be like trucks,” Jobs predicted at the time. “Less people will need them.”

The traditional PC still has a long way to go before it becomes obsolete. Despite the dismaying start in the first quarter, more than 300 million PCs are still expected to be sold worldwide this year. Tablet computers, a category that was insignificant until the iPad came along, is catching up rapidly: Nearly 200 million of those deices could be sold this year.

Meanwhile, worldwide smartphone sales could surpass 1 billion units this year, Gillis predicted.

PC sales could be undermined even more during the next few years with the release of “wearable computing” devices that connect to the Internet through voice-activated equipment attached to glasses and wristwatches. The growing reliance on mobile devices is creating new opportunities and tensions throughout the technology industry. Internet companies such as Yahoo Inc. and Facebook Inc. that initially designed their digital services to be primarily consumed on PCs have been scrambling to tweak things so they work better on smartphones and tablets. —AP

Goodbye fluorescent bulb? Philips says yes AMSTERDAM: If you’ve worked in an office, you’re probably familiar with the soft glow of fluorescent tubes drifting from the ceiling. If Europe’s Philips brand is right, those lamps could soon be history.

Royal Philips NV, the Dutch consumer appliances giant, said Thursday that it has developed an LED light that will soon be far more efficient than the best fluorescents on the market. That should make it cheaper and greener, as well.

It’s a combination that will inevitably help the LED dominate the market for illuminating the world’s workplaces, according to the global leader in lighting sales. In an interview with The Associated Press ahead of the unveiling of the new light, a top executive said the prototype LED is headed to mass production and will hit the market in 2015. He claimed that in 10 years, LEDs will replace at least half of the world’s fluorescent bulbs, which have been the main source of workplace lighting since shortly after World War II. “This is a major step forward for the lighting world,” said Rene van Schooten, CEO of Philips’ light sources division. “It will bring an enormous savings in energy.”

Experts outside the Dutch company say they have long expected LEDs to eclipse fluorescents. If Philips’ predictions are correct, however, the arrival of the LED in office spaces will come faster than expected.

The potential impact in energy and cost savings, as well as pollution reduction, is significant - though toxic materials are used in manufacturing both fluorescents and LEDs. Lights suck up more than 15 percent of all energy produced globally, and fluorescent lights currently make up more than half of the total lighting market. In the United States alone, fluorescents consume about 200 terawatts annually, according to Philips’ estimates.

Cutting that in half would save $12 billion in electricity costs and lessen carbon dioxide emissions by 60 million metric tons per year, the company said.

Dr. Eugenia Ellis, a professor of engineering and architecture at Drexel University, who works with LED installations, said an efficiency improvement at the level Philips forecasts would be impressive. Cost savings from using LEDs can already be significant: Ellis gave the

NEW YORK: Three LED bulbs (from left to right) the GreenWave Reality, Philips Hue, and TorchStar, are arranged for a photo in New York. — AP example of a hospital recently saving $75,000 a year on energy bills by switching. In recent years, energy-efficient lights made by Philips, Siemens AG, General Electric Co, Cree Inc and others using LEDs, or light-emitting diodes, have made significant inroads in the home market, replacing many incandescent and halogen bulbs.

But because fluorescent bulbs are themselves highly efficient, LED lights have so far achieved only a small foothold in business and industry. LEDs are competitive in heavy use settings where their longer lifespans and a minor energy edge pay off. Philips says its new lamp will change all of that. The technical milestone the company claims to have achieved is the ability to produce 200 lumens of light per watt. A lumen is the standard measure of the amount of light a lamp casts in a given area.

According to Mark Hand, a technology expert at Philips competitor Acuity Brands Inc, that’s about twice the output per watt of the best fluorescent tubes currently on the market; he estimated the best LED lamps may get up to 120 lumens per watt.

Cree already advertises an LED lamp it says reaches 200 lumens per watt under some circumstances. Van Schooten said the

Philips lamp is different. It will be the first on the market that reaches that level of efficiency and functions across a normal range of temperatures and is capable of consistently producing the same amount of warm white colored light as comparable fluorescent tubes.

Essentially, Van Schooten said, “if you walk into the room, you don’t say, ‘what a funny lamp.’” US Department of Energy projections published in April 2012 showed the government had expected the industry would only achieve efficiencies of 160 lumens per watt for LED lamps by 2015. Philips’ Van Schooten said that initially, prices of its LED tubes will still be higher than fluorescent lights. But taking into account electricity costs, the increased efficiency in 2015 will make them cheaper to own within a year, as opposed to three years at present.

And further manufacturing savings and efficiency improvements to LED lights will come with each generation of technology.

“The case is rather compelling, but of course it takes some time to replace existing infrastructure,” Van Schooten said.

Philips lighting sales in 2012 amounted to 8.4 billion euros ($11 billion) in a total global market that consulting firm McKinsey puts at 70 billion euros.—AP

Japan’s liquidity surge lifts stocks LONDON: World shares extended their rally into a fourth day yesterday supported by Japan’s aggressive monetary easing and signs of a growing recovery in China, while the dollar held near a four-year high against the yen. News the US Federal Reserve may scale back its massive bond purchases later this year supported the dollar, while failing to dampen sentiment in share markets that has taken the S&P 500 share index to a record high.

“Given the Japanese have kick-started a new wave of quantitative easing, that’s going to be the tide that lifts all boats,” said Commerzbank economist Peter Dixon. US stock futures for both the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 point to the potential for

more records to be set when Wall Street opens. Since the Bank of Japan unveiled its radical stimulus programme a week ago, the dollar has gained about 7 percent, yields on major government bonds have fallen and the MSCI’s world equity index has hit levels last seen in June 2008.

“The stronger-than-expected Japanese liquidity surge has led us to reassess our views on risky assets,” said Salman Ahmed, Fixed Income strategist at Lombard Odier Investment Managers. “However, we continue to believe that European concerns remain serious and the US earnings season has the potential to produce a curve-ball after four years of sustained growth.”

The market’s latest gains have been

helped by evidence of an economic recovery in China - notably signs of growing domestic demand and easier credit - and also by indications from the European Central Bank last week that it may cut rates.

CHINESE CREDIT Data out yesterday showed Chinese banks made 1.06 trillion yuan ($171.2 billion) of new, local currency loans in March adding to the positive signal from trade figures on Wednesday which revealed a sharp rise in imports. The fresh loans figure “shows that there is ample funding in the Chinese economy to support growth and is positive for sentiment”, said Dariusz Kowalczyk, senior economist for ex-Japan Asia at

Credit Agricole CIB in Hong Kong.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose 0.9 percent after the Chinese data, helping lift the world equity index 0.5 percent, a day after posting its second best gain of the year.

Japan’s Nikkei share average rose to its highest level since July 2008 due to the central bank’s unprecedented stimulus measures, which are set to eclipse even the Fed’s aggressive bond buying plans. Europe’s FTSE Eurofirst 300 index, which saw its biggest daily rise in three months on Wednesday, had extended the gains by 0.4 percent by midday, while London’s FTSE 100, the Paris CAC40 and Frankfurt’s DAX were between 0.3 and 0.5 percent higher. —Reuters

Business FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Bitcoin economics: A primer on a volatile currency NEW YORK: Bitcoin, the virtual currency composed of digital bits, is based on cutting-edge mathematical schemes that guard against counterfeiting. But it’s also based on an old idea, now dismissed by mainstream economists, about how a currency should operate - an idea that could be setting bitcoins up for an abrupt plunge. Bitcoin was started in 2009 as a currency free from government controls, an entirely digital means of exchange for a digital age. It’s a rapidly growing phenomenon that has taken root as a payment method on some websites for both legal and illegal goods.

Each “coin” has been worth less than $10 for most of the currency’s history, but this week the value surged past $200 - with the recent bailout crisis in Cyprus seen by many as one of the triggers of the surge. Wednesday saw a “flash crash,” as the value dipped close to $100 before recovering. The meteoric rise in value is also linked to what some economists say is the biggest problem with the currency: The supply of bitcoins increases only slowly, at a rate that’s coded into the system.

That’s a contrast to a regular paper currency like the dollar, whose supply is managed by a central bank like the US Federal Reserve. The Fed engineers the dollar

World food prices rise ROME: Global food prices rose 1 percent in March, the United Nations’ food agency said yesterday, pointing to a surge in dairy costs, while cereals prices were little changed and seen facing downward pressure in coming months. Food prices spiked over the summer of 2012 fuelled by a historic drought in the United States and dry weather in other major producers.

Prices eased slightly towards the end of last year but have been nudging higher again for the past two months. The Food and Agriculture Organisation’s (FAO) price index, which measures monthly price changes for a basket of cereals, oilseeds, dairy, meat and sugar, averaged 212.4 points in March, up 1 percent from 210.7 in February and its highest since October 2012. “All the dynamic this month comes from the dairy,” said FAO senior economist Concepcion Calpe. “In general the situation is relatively calm.” FAO’s dairy price sub-index jumped 22 points in March to 225.3, one of its largest changes ever recorded. The rise was fuelled mainly by prolonged hot, dry weather in Oceania which has hit pastures and led to milk production falling off steeply and a subsequent decrease in processing of dairy products, which include butter, cheese and milk powder.

FAO’s dairy products index is based on prices in the world’s largest dairy exporter New Zealand, which have climbed as buyers bid against each other to meet commitments. A usual spring surge in milk production in Europe has also been slowed down by unfavourable weather limiting pasture growth, FAO said. When pastures are hit by dry weather, cows produce less milk or need supplementary feedstuffs, which push up costs. Cereals prices on the other hand were little changed, and Calpe said they could see declines in coming months due to the prospect of a strong recovery in output.

“We are optimistic for the coming crops. The previous year was particularly bad so barring something dramatic the direction should be upwards for production,” she said. “If this is what happens we could see prices trending downwards.”

Grain prices, which touched record highs late last summer, have been under pressure recently as acreage dedicated to crops has increased, reserves look fatter than previously thought, and livestock producers have cut herd sizes due to high feed costs.

FAO maintained its forecast for world wheat production in 2013 at 690 million tonnes, up 4.4 percent from last year. It expected world cereal stocks at the close of seasons ending in 2013 to approach 500 million tonnes. The Rome-based agency also raised its estimate of world cereal output in 2012 to 2.309 billion tonnes, up 3 million tonnes from a forecast made in March, but still 2 percent below record production in 2011. Other food types included in the index showed mixed trends. Oils and fats prices fell 2.5 percent from February due to a favourable supply outlook, and meat prices also fell on adequate export supplies and a small reduction in feed prices.—Reuters

supply to increase slightly faster than the growth of the economy, which means that the value of the dollar falls slightly every year, in the phenomenon known as inflation. New bitcoins are “mined” or generated by computers. They get harder to generate all the time, which means the inflow of fresh bitcoins keeps falling. There are about 8 million bitcoins in circulation today, and the maximum that can be generated is 21 million. By 2032, 99 percent of those will have been created.

Since the supply of bitcoins grows so slowly, any increase in demand leads to higher prices. That’s widely seen as a disaster when it happens to a real-world currency. As money becomes more valuable, our incentive is to hold onto the money instead of spending it slowing down the economy. “What we want from a monetary system isn’t to make people holding money rich; we want it to facilitate transactions and make the economy as a whole rich. And that’s not at all what is happening in Bitcoin,” Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman wrote in 2011.

When the supply of money is fixed or increasing only slowly, deflation can feed on itself. Investors will look at the rising price of the coins and conclude that

they’re set to rise further. So they buy more, sending the price even higher. This goes on until the market is sated. In the ideal outcome, the value of the currency then stabilizes at the new high level. In the worst case, the value plunges.

This boom-bust cycle has already happened once before for Bitcoin. It hit nearly $31 in June 2011 then crashed, hitting $2 five months later. In essence, Bitcoin is similar to the “gold standard,” the monetary system in force before modern central banking started to take root in the 1930s. Under the gold standard, each unit of currency was worth a certain amount of gold, leaving governments few means to increase the amount of currency in circulation.

No country uses the gold standard today, but some libertarians want to revive it, and see Bitcoin as a modern-day alternative or complement. “If you wipe away the misguided economics courses that we have, deflation doesn’t have to be a negative,” says Jon Matonis, a board member of the non-profit Bitcoin Foundation, created last year to foster and protect the system. “It’s not a bad thing when a citizen’s purchasing power increases.”— AP

EU tackles Cyprus fallout and banking union at Dublin talks Germany raises concerns on ECB bank supervision DUBLIN: Fallout from the messy bailout of Cyprus will top the agenda of a two-day EU finance ministers meeting in Dublin beginning today, with focus also on growing German reluctance over euro-zone banking reform. Unease surrounding the rescue package for Cyprus grew on Wednesday after Reuters and other news organisations obtained documents detailing how the bailout will be financed and how much of the total Cyprus is now expected to contribute. Whereas Cyprus was originally meant to come up with 7 billion euros, and the European Union and International Monetary Fund would provide 10 billion, the documents show the total package will now cost 23 billion euros, with Cyprus providing 13 billion of that. What’s more, Cyprus is expected to sell 400 million euros worth of its gold reserves, and will have to raise corporate tax and capital gains tax rates at a time when its economy is forecast to contract more than 12 percent in the next two years.

The complete winding up of one Cypriot bank, Popular, and the writing-off of a large portion of secured debt and uninsured deposits in the largest bank, Bank of Cyprus, will raise a total of 10.6 billion euros, the documents showed. While the details of the programme have already been agreed between Nicosia and the EU and IMF, Finland’s finance minister said on Wednesday there was still the potential for minor adjustments.

There is likely to be intense debate over whether the bailout has been successfully put together.

“Some details might still be changed today,” Jutta Urpilainen told reporters in Helsinki, emphasising that she did not mean the headline figures but the internal numbers. The Dublin meeting, an informal gathering of all 27 EU finance ministers at which no decisions are expected, will also examine the deepening problems in Slovenia and debate how to press ahead with setting up a fully-fledged “banking union” across the euro-zone countries and wider EU. In the long-run, it is the banking union debate that is most critical since it touches on issues such as how to resolve bad banks,

NICOSIA: A man withdraws money from an ATM machine as people queue for transactions at a Bank of Cyprus branch in central Nicosia. — AFP how to put in place a single deposit-guarantee scheme and how to establish a single resolution fund. In June last year, EU leaders agreed that establishing a banking union was an essential next step in breaking the “doom loop” between big, problem banks and indebted sovereign governments, so as to avoid one dragging the other down.

But momentum towards banking union has slackened, especially among some German officials, as the complexities and potential difficulties of the plan have come into clearer focus. Berlin’s greatest concern, as the euro-zone’s largest and most successful economy, is being left on the hook to finance an endless series of banking bailouts across the euro-zone. “The Germans have raised obstacles all the way along,” said one EU official, frustrated by the perceived footdragging. “Everyone is getting fed up with them.” German officials say they are fully engaged in the debate and are only concerned about ensuring that the right steps are taken at the right time - an overly hasty approach to creating a banking union will not be good in the long run, they say. But

other EU officials suggest there is a reluctance on Germany’s part to get stuck into potentially divisive legislation before elections set for September, so as not to damage Chancellor Angela Merkel’s chances of reelection.

One of the more sensitive issues to be discussed today and tomorrow will be a proposal from Ireland, which holds the rotating presidency of the EU, to impose losses on interbank deposits held by troubled banks as another way of resolving banking sector difficulties. The proposal, parts of which have been seen by Reuters, has already caused concern in France and Italy and could be destabilising for financial markets since it could cause interbank lending to suspect banks to freeze up. Dirk Schoenmaker of the Duisenberg School of Finance who will take part in the discussions with ministers on the issue, has suggested countries put up to the equivalent of 10 percent of their economic output to help resolving bank problems. In his presentation, seen by Reuters, Schoenmaker underlines the urgency of the situation facing Europe’s banks. —Reuters

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

THEY ARE THE 99!

99 Mystical Noor Stones carry all that is left of the wisdom and knowledge of the lost civilization of Baghdad. But the Noor Stones lie scattered across the globe - now little more than a legend. One man has made it his life’s mission to seek out what was lost. His name is Dr. Ramzi Razem and he has searched fruitlessly for the Noor Stones all his life. Now, his luck is about to change - the first of the stones have been rediscovered and with them a special type of human who can unlock the gem’s mystical power. Ramzi brings these gem - bearers together to form a new force for good in the world. A force known as ... the 99!

THE FASCINATING STORY OF THE 99 The Story Do Far: Jabbar, Raheema and Wakila travel to an Ethiopian city, where a series of thefts is being blamed on a man who feeds hyenas…

The 99 ® and all related characters ® and © 2013, Teshkeel Media Group, Inc. All rights reserved.

www.the99.org

Opinion FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Mayflower, meet Exxon When oil spilled in an Arkansas town

By Edward McAllister

W

arren Andrews had just finished putting up balloons for his stepdaughter’s 18th birthday party at their suburban home in Mayflower, Arkansas, when his wife came inside and said something was wrong. After stepping out of his house, and taking one glance, he immediately dialed 911. “I don’t know what’s going on, but I’ve got a river of oil coming down the street at me,” Andrews told the operator. Five minutes later, the slick of noxious black crude spewing from a ruptured Exxon Mobil pipeline was eight feet wide, six inches deep and growing fast.

Within half an hour, a representative from Exxon Mobil Corp was on the scene.

By the next day, Exxon’s agents had contacted the evacuated residents and were writing checks for their living expenses.

Three days after the spill on the afternoon of March 29, 120 workers had descended on the town, a number that would eventually swell to more than 600 from across the country, including company doctors, communication specialists and wildlife experts.

Now, nearly two weeks after the 5,000barrel spill occurred on Good Friday, a picture has emerged of a giant oil company thrust into a small blue-collar community, intricately managing not just the cleanup of a major spill, but also using its large check book to try to win over the townsfolk and seek to limit the fallout. At stake is not just the reputation of the world’s largest publicly traded oil company, but the spill’s impact on a fractious national debate about the effect of shipping increasing amounts of tarry Canadian crude across the United States. “We are trying to make sure that people are not financially impacted by this,” said Exxon spokesman Alan Jeffers.

“We will honor all valid claims.”

The incident in Mayflower, 25 miles north of Little Rock, pales in comparison to the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989, when hundreds of thousands of barrels of crude spilled from an Exxon oil tanker into Alaskan waters. It’s too early to estimate the financial cost from Mayflower to Exxon, but it is likely to be a drop in the bucket for the $400 billion company. But the spill has stoked a national debate about the safety of carrying crude in pipelines across the United States just as politicians weigh whether to approve the mega Keystone XL pipeline that will help to link the oil sands of Alberta, Canada, with oil refineries on the U.S. Gulf Coast. And although significant pipeline spills happen every three days on average in the United States, according to federal data, rarely do they occur in a town and rarely in these volumes.

Round Numbers As efforts to clean up the sprawling mess grew over the Easter weekend, a parallel response was developing behind the scenes, one in which Exxon oversaw every issue surrounding the spill - from sick children at the local school and oiled ducks in the creek, to the residents displaced from 22 homes. When eight students, who were vomiting and complained of headaches, were sent home from Mayflower

Elementary School on the Monday morning after the spill, an Exxon Mobil doctor arrived quickly on the scene. The doctor quelled concerns about the air quality around the school, which is just a block south of the spill site, according to school principal Candie Watts. “The doctor explained that some students would have greater sensitivity than others, but because of the air tests done, there was no cause for alarm,” Watts said.

Exxon has given the school $15,000 to pay for a party planned after state exams next week. The money will also help pay for a playground upgrade, new computers and an electronic announcement sign, Watts said. Exxon has also offered to put money towards a new school science and math program, she said. “We do have a room that was built to be a science lab, but we’ve never been able to supply it with resources or a teacher,” Watts said. “We would like to speak with them about that.”

management communications at PR consultancy Agincourt Strategies, said Exxon’s Mayflower play book is not unique. “It is their instinct to pay first and ask questions later,” said Baron. “That is par for the course for the oil industry majors. They don’t want to alienate people whose backyard they’re working in.”

Act of Desperation It remains to be seen if the oil giant succeeds in its efforts to placate Mayflower residents and stem liabilities. The cause of the pipe’s rupture is still under investigation and some residents said they are seeking legal advice, or will consider doing so in the future if house prices plunge. The area had been one of the most desirable parts of town. As an oil spill through a town is very rare, it is difficult to find a precedent for the outcome of any legal proceedings. Exxon has not so far offered to pay for affected houses or any loss in their value, according

An ‘oiled’ duck recovered near the Bell Slough State Wildlife Management Area in Mayflower, Arkansas is rescued April 1, 2013 and prepared to be taken to HAWK Center, a wildlife rehabilitation group assisting ExxonMobil after a pipeline ruptured and dumped several thousands of barrels of oil. — AP Exxon confirmed it was paying for the party. It could not immediately confirm if any discussions were being held about the math and science program. Meanwhile, Exxon was quickly in contact with the residents in the North Woods housing development who had been evacuated from their homes and were staying in nearby hotels. Company agents sat down with residents, estimating their cost of living and cutting checks for each family in weekly amounts, including for hotel rooms, meals and gasoline. “They said if it didn’t cost what I gave you, take the rest and keep it in your pocket,” said Andrews, the Mayflower resident. “If I said something cost $140, he said $200. He said he liked round numbers.”

Exxon bought Andrews a lift chair for his disabled mother-in-law and offered to pay for any damage the oil caused to his two vehicles, which he expected would come to about $500.

Exxon confirmed it was paying for the living expenses of displaced residents and that they could pocket any leftover money if the checks were larger than needed.

Gerald Baron, an expert on emergency

to its spokesman Jeffers. When asked if Exxon plans to compensate for any loss in housing value, he said only that “valid claims” will be addressed.

Mayflower, with a predominantly white, Republican population of 2,234, is normally a quiet, commuter town off Interstate 40, with a few one-storey stores, a diner, a Baptist church and a couple of gas stations along its one main strip. But the peace was shattered after the oil spill, as heavy machinery and trucks and workers tried to halt the flow of crude along the storm drains and creeks that cross the town’s center. The pipeline can carry more than 90,000 barrels a day of crude from Illinois to Texas.

The loss in pipeline tariffs - which amount to more than $5 per barrel, according to government data - could cost Exxon more than $3 million a week while the pipeline is shut, based on Reuters calculations. It is unclear when it will reopen. The response to the spill was initially a local effort, as emergency responders rushed to keep the oil from running into Lake Conway, a prized local fishing spot that

attracts tourists from across Arkansas.

Less than an hour after the rupture was discovered on Exxon’s Pegasus pipeline at 2.45 pm CT (1945 GMT) on March 29, Faulkner County Judge Allen Dodson was overseeing the construction of makeshift dams out of piles of gravel, sand and plywood sourced from nearby stores. “There is no oil in that open water. It’s the locals that got it done,” said Dodson, who described their efforts as “an act of desperation”.

Exxon soon sent in contractors from oil clean-up specialists United States Environmental Services (USES) with absorbent booms. USES hired air quality monitors from a private firm and they were taking measurements shortly after 5 pm CT. Secure behind an eight-foot chain link fence topped with barbed wire, the joint command center comprised a makeshift warehouse and a fleet of mobile units.

Inside, Exxon representatives worked with town, state and federal officials. Security guards monitored the entrance, refusing entry to anyone without clearance, and reporters were directed to an Exxon Mobil phone line.

By mid-week, in the marshy woods around the compound, hundreds of workers in yellow hazmat suits bagged up brush and leaves blackened by the spill. Pumps sucked up oil into large tankers. Lawns were being dug up in the North Woods area. One of the workers said they were told not to stand near the road while wearing their hazmat suits for fear that it would alarm residents. Exxon contractor Wildlife Response Services from Seabrook, Texas, took charge of affected wildlife on the Tuesday after the spill, replacing a nearby volunteer organization that initially dealt with oiled birds. In all, 23 ducks, a river rat and five turtles have died because of the spill, Exxon said on April 8.

The company has defended itself against any criticism from environmentalists about its handling of the spill. On a blog on April 5, Exxon listed a number of “whoppers” that it claimed had been said, including that the company had ordered a no fly zone over the spill. All the while, Exxon imprinted itself on town life. Orders for more than 500 sandwiches were placed from a Subway store one day and a local deli the next - the equivalent of catering for about a quarter of the town’s normal population. “They are spreading the love around town,” said Julie Jeffery, owner of Julie Ann’s deli in Mayflower just after serving up 500 sandwiches and burgers for the responders.

Disaster Area While many in town have applauded Exxon’s cleanup efforts and even welcomed their presence, the effects of the spill will linger - at least for a while. Many of the homeowners in North Woods told Reuters they had been unaware that Exxon’s pipeline, which was built in the late 1940s, ran just yards from their houses, buried in the woods near where local children played.

Exxon said it is required by regulators to notify people every two years who are within 650 feet of the pipeline. “We go beyond that to 1,300 feet,” Jeffers said. — Reuters

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013 www.kuwaittimes.net

A woman looks at a suspension giant lamp by 'I Dogi Group' factory, displayed at the Milan's Design Fair, in Milan, Italy,Tuesday, April 9, 2013. The Milan furniture and design week fair is a six-day event which ends next Sunday. —AP

FOOD FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Spring ahead with greens

N

utritionists love the idea of going green, especially if you start with your diet. They might look as plain as Clark Kent, but green plants are packed with Superman strength that do everything from fight cancer to help maintain healthy blood pressure. We culled a top five list after consulting with our experts: Nancy Maslonka, executive chef at Medical City Dallas Hospital and Medical City

Childrenís Hospital; Tom Shroeder, executive chef at Baylor University Medical Center (working with Stephanie Dean, registered and licensed dietitian at Baylor Outpatient Nutrition Counseling); and Amber Odom, registered and licensed dietitian at Cooper Clinic in Dallas.

These foods are readily available in your local market, and theyíre good fresh or frozen. For those who want to grow them, start planting now or try in the fall.

(Extreme summer heat is not kind to greens.) Hereís our list, along with our expertsí tips on easy ways to slip them in your daily diet.

SPINACH Popeye was wild about spinach for its iron; it turns out thatís the least of what this nutrient-dense green has to offer. Itís a dizzying blend of: Vitamin A, which helps vision and skin, gene regulation, growth, immunity against infection and nerve development.

Vitamin B, which aids in healthy skin, hair, eyes and liver, helps keep the bodyís nerve and blood cells healthy, and helps prevent birth defects.

Vitamin C for wound healing, prevention of scurvy and to aid iron absorption, and strong cartilage, bones and teeth.

Vitamin E, which helps neutralize the harmful free radical molecules that can cause a variety of illnesses and diseases from heart disease and strokes to certain kinds of cancer.

Vitamin K, which helps in clotting and bone metabolism.

All that and it has calcium, which contributes to healthy bones and teeth, muscle contraction, heart rhythm, blood coag-

ulation, maintenance of cell membranes and helps protect against high blood pressure; iron, which plays a key role in carrying oxygen to cells; lutein, which helps prevent age-related macular degeneration in the eyes; and magnesium, which promotes healthy brain function and strong bones and muscles.

Tips for using it: Mix it with the lettuce

soup or stew or layer it in lasagna or a casserole.

in your salad or substitute it for the lettuce in your sandwich. Puree and use it as a replacement for oil in brownie mixes or blend it in breakfast smoothies with bananas and blueberries or apples and pineapple. For breakfast, try cooking it with scrambled eggs or toss it in an omelet with diced tomatoes and goat or feta cheese. For dinner, add it to your favorite

plus a few more tasty nutrients including potassium, which is important in brain and nerve function, muscle contraction, protein utilization and water balance. Potassium also helps maintain a normal blood pressure, aids in the healthy functioning of the smooth muscles in your heart and intestines,and helps prevent muscle soreness after a workout. Tips for using it: Kids love

KALE If you really want to put some greens on your plate, you canít do better than colcannon, a dish of kale mixed with mashed potatoes. Kale is also packed with the vitamins A, B9, C and K, and calcium and lutein,

FOOD FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

kale chips, made from small pieces baked in the oven - much healthier than potato chips for lunches. It works well chopped and added to a slow-cooking potato or vegetable soup, stew or chili. As with spinach, itís a good addition to omelets or stir-fry.

COLLARD GREENS If we didnít love collard greens for being a Southern comfort food, we would be sold on this cooking tip - use it as a wrap instead of tortillas! Collard greens are bursting with vitamins A, B, C and K, plus lutein and zeaxanthin, an antioxidant that, like lutein, is believed to slow macular degeneration related to aging. Itís one of the best plant-based sources of calcium and a surprisingly high source of protein, which helps the body burn fat instead of muscle for healthier weight loss. Collards support the natural metabolism; aid in wound healing; help keep hair, skin, bones and nails healthy; and help form hormones, enzymes and immune system antibodies.

Tips for using it:Slow-cook them Southernstyle with a turkey leg or ham hock for added flavor. You can also steam them with carrots and zucchini and a little garlic or add them to soups and stews.

SWISS CHARD This is a personal favorite of Dallas Morning News gardening editor Mariana Greene. She buys transplants in rainbow colors and plants them in large pots. Then she harvests the big leaves as desired and cuts them into long, thin strips to saute and mix with fresh spinach. Swiss chard is filled with vitamins A, C and K, calcium, iron, lutein, potassium and zeaxanthin.

Tips for using it: Try the baby variety raw in a salad; mature Swiss chard is better suited to being sauteed with onions, garlic and seasonings, braised, or stewed low and slow. It can be slipped into lasagna or served sweet-and-sour with the addition of raisins and vinegar.

BROCCOLI These cute little miniature trees may not

have been a favorite of President George H.W. Bush, but they have inspired many others, including Molly Katzen, who named one of her cookbooks ìThe Enchanted Broccoli Forestî (after her tasty recipe for a casserole in which broccoli stands up just like little trees).

Not only is broccoli full of vitamins A

and B and calcium, but one cup contains 100 percent of the daily requirement of vitamins C and K. Tips for using it: This can be a fun snack for kids who enjoy dipping it in light cheese, yogurt or other healthy dips. Add it to whatever you may be steaming (topped with freshly squeezed lemon juice) or stirfrying. You can also toss it in with whatever youíre baking with a sprinkle of fresh parmesan cheese in the final minutes.

Learn how to make sesame roasted broccoli with this recipe fromNancy Maslonka, executive chef at Medical City Dallas Hospital and Medical City Childrenís Hospital.

NUTRIENTS FROM FOODS VS SUPPLEMENTS The advantage to getting vitamins and minerals in foods is that too much can be toxic, and you rarely get toxic amounts from foods. For instance, vitamin A is crucial for cell development, which can help prevent an early miscarriage. However, an excess of vitamin A may lead to a miscarriage or birth defects. In addition, the body seems to better utilize nutrients in their natural state than from supplements.

Similarly, potassium, which is so important in helping to maintain a normal blood pressure and the healthy functioning of smooth muscles in the heart and intestines can, in excess, lead to heart palpitations or gastrointestinal distress.

SESAME ROASTED BROCCOLI 1 pound broccoli florets (or broccolini) 1 table spoon olive oil 1 tablespoon sesame oil Salt and pepper to taste 1 teaspoon sesame seeds 1\2 teaspoon red pepper flakes Preheat the oven to 400 F. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.

Toss the broccoli with the olive and sesame oils and season with salt and pepper.

Spread in a single layer on prepared pan and roast for 4 to 5 minutes, until the broccoli starts to turn golden brown on the florets.

Remove from oven and toss with sesame seeds and red pepper flakes.

Season to taste with salt and pepper.

KALE CHIPS 6 cups fresh kale 1 tablespoon olive oil 1 teaspoon kosher salt Preheat oven to 400 F. Spray a baking sheet with olive oil.

Wash and cut kale into 2- to 3-inch pieces.

Spread kale out on prepared baking sheet in a single layer.

Mist the kale with olive oil spray and lightly sprinkle with salt.

Bake for 10 minutes, or until edges are crisp and begin to turn brown. Be careful not to burn.

SPINACH SMOOTHIE SURPRISE 1\2 whole fresh pineapple (cored and peeled) 2 whole carrots (each 5.5 inches long or 1.8 ounces) 2 stalks celery (each 7 inches long or 1.4 ounces) 2 small apples (about 5.4-ounces each, any type, unpeeled, stem and seeds removed) 3 cups fresh spinach (loosely packed) 1\2 cilantro bunch Put all ingredients in a juicer. (The sweetness of the fruit hides the spinach flavor, so itís easier to get the nutritional benefits even if you donít care for the flavor of spinach.)

Makes 2 servings. — MCT

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Tr a v e l FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Dreams of Africa are alive in the

A Mokoro is the perfect way to travel through the water ways of the Okavango Delta in northern Botswana.

By Anne Z Cooke and Steve Haggerty

I

f you’ve paid for an African safari but you’re still not clear about the details, bad on you. Making the same mistake, I didn’t dig into the heart of the adventure before I headed to Southern Africa for my first wildlife safari, because I was always too busy. Bad on me! By the time we reached the Okavango Delta, in northern Botswana, we’d been on the go for 24 hours, rocketing through nine time zones, three airplanes and four airports. Jet lagged and yawning, I ached for a hot shower and a good bed.

But when Botswana’s big animals call, every moment counts. I’d barely unzipped my bag and put my toothbrush on the sink when they announced the afternoon game drive, starting at 4:30 pm. No problem, I thought. I’ll sleep late tomorrow. Until they explained that the next morning’s game drive would start - as usual - at 6 am sharp.

So why was I so clueless? Like most travelers who dream of Africa, we’d seen countless wildlife documentaries, thrilled to the scenery and yearned to experience those distant sights and sounds in person.

Beyond that we didn’t really know what to expect. What’s the Okavango Delta? The Okavango River, flowing southeast into northern Botswana from Angola and Namibia, has no outlet, either to other rivers or to the ocean. When annual spring floods reach the Delta, they slow down and spread out, refilling lagoons and marshes and turning woodland mounds into islets

and this watery paradise into a self-contained sanctuary.

To protect this remarkable natural area, the Botswana government limits tourism by awarding guest concessions to qualified tour outfitters. Each company leases a specific numbered area and builds (or takes over existing structures) one or more lodges and guest tents. There are a few permanent lodges, built back in the day.

But newer lodges and guest tents are required to be semi-permanent structures

bolted onto raised (and sometimes terraced) wood decks that can be moved every few years.

A typical day: Your wake-up call arrives at 5:45 am when a kitchen staffer knocks on your door, bearing a tray with tea or coffee and toast. Bolting it down, you hurry to the main lodge, grabbing a piece of fruit or a sweet roll to go. By 6 am, you, your guide and four to six other visitors are sitting in an open-topped ORV, heading away from camp in search of elephants, giraffe,

After a morning game drive, guests enjoy a leisurely breakfast in northern Botswana. — MCT photos

antelope, rhinos, hippos, big cats, African buffalo, snakes and warthogs. Why so early? Simple. This is when the animals are awake and active.

At 9 am, or so, you’ll stop for a trailside breakfast. By 10 or 11 am, as the day heats up and the animals head to the shade to sleep, the vehicles return to the lodge for lunch. Afterward, until 4:30 pm, when the day begins to cool and the second game drives leave, you’ll have time to meet your fellow guests, take a guided walk, read, browse in the gift shop, send Internet messages, swim in the pool or nap.

By 4:30 pm, you’ve donned a lightweight shell, sprayed on the mosquito goo, and are out on the prowl again. As the sun drops in the west, male lions stretch and wake up, lionesses hunt, leopards steal through the underbrush and hyenas make the rounds to recent kills, hoping for leftovers. Antelope and zebras, waterbuck and bushbuck, kudus and impalas step out of the shade to graze. As dusk falls, lucky visitors will hear male lions roar and hyenas cackle, a raucous chorus of yips, howls and barks.

By 8 pm - or later, if you’ve followed a leopard drag an impala up into a tree you’ll be dragging back into camp, tired but happy and ready for dinner. These leisurely and often lavish four-to-five course meals, served with wine, are entirely social, a chance to compare wildlife sightings, share personal histories and exchange email addresses. As the evening wears on, the elephants grow larger.

31

Tr a v e l FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

After digesting the lodge manager’s command that you are never to walk alone at night, from your tent or to the lodge, a camp guide walks you back to your bed, leaving you with strict instructions to stay inside until the next morning. As the night turns dark and you fall asleep, you may hear huffing or rustling as animals prowl among the cabins. As there are no fences, they are free to check the swimming pool, rub up against the trees and walk past your tent. Soon you realize that they’ve turned the tables and you’re the one in the zoo.

On the day you move to the next lodge on your itinerary, you’ll join the morning game drive as usual then head for the grassy air strip nearby. The plane, a highwing eight-seater, lands just before lunch, drops off new guests and picks you up. In 30 minutes or less you’re at your next lodge in time for lunch.

Zoo etiquette: Talk softly, sit still and don’t stand while you’re on a game drive, especially when lions and elephants are close to the vehicle. Swap seats with your drive mates or quietly lean out of the way to let them take photos.

Surprising as it seems, the animals pay little attention to tents or vehicles and don’t seem to realize that the contents you and yours - are edible.

Never leave the camp area on your own to walk along a river or pond; Nile crocodiles, Africa’s deadliest killers, lie in wait there for prey. Never walk alone after dark through the camp or from your tent. Your guide will walk you home after dinner.

Trip tips: You can plan and book your own trip sight unseen, relying on Internet sources. But most North Americans choose instead to book a trip to Botswana - or to any destination in Africa - with a tour operator, somebody with representatives in the US and employees at the destination. A typical Botswana itinerary includes several different lodges and the flights between them, plus the round-trip flight from Johannesburg, in South Africa. Once you’re there, nearly everything is included, from game drives and guided walks to lodging, meals, beverages and laundry service.

Most tour companies naturally prefer to book guests into their own lodges. But they can book you into any lodge you might

Small islands dot the Okavango Delta in northern Botswana. request; it is, in fact, a common practice. If you are interested in staying at a specific lodge, insist that it be included in your itinerary. Packing light: Since small planes enforce space and weight restrictions, bring no more than you can fit into a medium-size duffel (approximately 36-by-18 inches), plus a small carry-on for your camera, money, passport and toiletries. Safari lodges provide frequent laundry service so two changes of clothes is enough. Basics include two pairs of long pants, two pairs of shorts, short and

On an early morning game drive we spot a group of zebra in northern Botswana.

long-sleeve shirts, underwear, light jacket, tennis shoes, a bathing suit, big-brimmed foldable hat and binoculars. Safari guides swear that beige clothing (not white) makes you least visible to wildlife, and helps to repel mosquitoes.

The best tour companies - Cox & Kings, Ker & Downey, & Beyond (formerly CCAfrica), Sanctuary, Abercrombie & Kent and Wilderness Travel, for example - employ reservationists who are familiar with the lodges. Ask these questions: Will the compa-

ny’s local representatives meet you at the airport? Do they provide a hotel and transportation, if necessary? Do they book your connecting flight to Botswana? Are your lodge stays confirmed? If your plane is delayed, who’s the contact person?

Pay for your trip before leaving home, in US dollars. Book your own flight - or use miles - from the US to Johannesburg, South Africa. And buy trip insurance, including emergency evacuation from Botswana to a hospital in South Africa. —MCT

On safari drives, elephants always have the right-of-way in northern Botswana.

Health FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

C

old remedies are almost as common as the common cold, and many are nearly as ancient. The use of chicken soup as a congestion cure dates back centuries. But is longevity any guarantee that a cold remedy works? Do effective cold remedies even exist? Here’s a look at some common cold remedies and what’s known about them.

Cold remedies: What works If you catch a cold, you can expect to be sick for one to two weeks. But that doesn’t mean you have to be miserable. These remedies may help: • Water and other fluids. Water, juice, clear broth or warm lemon water with honey helps loosen congestion and prevents dehydration. Avoid coffee and caffeinated sodas, which can make dehydration worse.

• Salt water. A saltwater gargle - 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon salt dissolved in an 8-ounce glass of warm water - can temporarily relieve a sore or scratchy throat.

• Saline nasal drops and sprays. Over-the-counter saline nasal drops and sprays combat stuffiness and congestion. In infants, experts recommend instilling several saline drops into one nostril, then gently suctioning that nostril with a bulb syringe. To do this, squeeze the bulb, gently place the syringe tip in the nostril about 1/4 to 1/2 inch (about 6 to 12 millimeters) and slowly release the bulb. Saline nasal sprays may be used in older children.

Unlike nasal decongestants, saline drops and sprays don’t lead to a rebound effect - a worsening of symptoms when the medication is discontinued - and most are safe and nonirritating, even for children.

• Chicken soup. Chicken soup might help relieve cold and flu symptoms in two ways. First, it acts as an anti-inflammatory by inhibiting the movement of neutrophils - immune system cells that participate in the body’s inflammatory response. Second, it temporarily speeds up the movement of mucus, possibly helping relieve congestion and limiting the amount of time viruses are in contact with the nose lining.

• Over-the-counter cold and cough medications in older children and adults. Nonprescription decongestants and pain relievers offer some symptom relief, but they won’t prevent a cold or shorten its duration, and most have some side effects. If used for more than a few days, they can actually make symptoms worse.

Experts agree that these medications are dangerous in children younger than age 2. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is evaluating the safety of over-the-counter cold and cough medications in older children.

Keep in mind that acetaminophen (Tylenol, others) can cause serious liver damage or liver failure if taken in doses higher than recommended. It’s common for people to take Tylenol in addition to flu medications that may also contain acetaminophen, which can lead to acetaminophen overdoses. Read the labels of any cold medication carefully to make sure you’re not overdosing.

If a cough lasts after your other cold symptoms have resolved, see your doctor. In the meantime, try soothing your throat with warm lemon water and honey and humidifying the air in your house. Don’t give honey to infants.

• Antihistamines. First-generation (sedating) antihistamines may provide minor relief of several cold symptoms, including cough, sneezing, watery eyes and nasal discharge. However, results are conflicting and the benefits may not outweigh the side effects.

• Humidity. Cold viruses thrive in dry conditions - another reason why colds are more common in winter. Dry air also dries the mucous membranes, causing a stuffy nose and scratchy throat. A humidifier can add moisture to your home, but it can also add mold, fungi and bacteria if not cleaned properly. Change the water in your humidifier daily, and clean the unit according to the manufacturer’s instructions. If your infant has a cold, sitting in a steamy bathroom for a few minutes before bedtime may also help.

Cold remedies: What doesn’t work The list of ineffective cold remedies is long. A few of the more common ones that don’t work include: • Antibiotics. These attack bacteria, but they’re no help against cold viruses. Avoid asking your doctor for antibiotics for a cold or using old antibiotics you have on hand. You won’t get well any

faster, and inappropriate use of antibiotics contributes to the serious and growing problem of antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

• Over-the-counter cold and cough medications in young children. OTC cold and cough medications may cause serious and even life-threatening side effects in children. The FDA warns against their use in children younger than age 2. The Consumer Healthcare Products Association has voluntarily modified con-

some popular cold remedies, such as vitamin C and echinacea.

Here’s an update on some common alternative remedies: • Vitamin C. It appears that for the most part taking vitamin C won’t help the average person prevent colds. However, taking vitamin C before the onset of cold symptoms may shorten the duration of symptoms. Vitamin C may provide benefit for people at high risk of colds due to frequent exposure - for example, chil-

sumer product labels on OTC cough and cold medicines to state “do not use” in children under 4 years of age, and many companies have stopped manufacturing these products for young children. The FDA is evaluating the safety of these medications in older children.

• Zinc. The cold-fighting reputation of zinc has had its ups and downs. That’s because many zinc studies - both those that find the mineral beneficial and those that do not - are flawed. The highest quality randomized trials generally show no benefit. In studies with positive results, zinc seemed most effective taken within 24 hours of the onset of symptoms. Taking zinc with food may reduce side effects, including a bad taste and nausea.

Intranasal zinc may result in permanent damage to the sense of smell. The FDA issued a warning against using three zinc-containing nasal cold remedies because they had been associated with a long-lasting or permanent loss of smell (anosmia).

dren who attend group child care during the winter.

• Echinacea. Studies on the effectiveness of echinacea at preventing or shortening colds are mixed. Some studies show no benefit. Others show a significant reduction in the severity and duration of cold symptoms when taken in the early stages of a cold. One reason study results have been inconclusive may be that the type of echinacea plant and preparation used from one study to the next have varied considerably. Research on the role of echinacea in treating the common cold is ongoing. In the meantime, if your immune system is healthy and you aren’t taking prescription medications, using echinacea supplements is unlikely to cause harm.

Cold remedies: What probably doesn’t hurt In spite of ongoing studies, the scientific jury is still out on

Take care of yourself Although usually minor, colds can make you feel miserable. It’s tempting to try the latest remedy, but the best thing you can do is take care of yourself. Rest, drink fluids and keep the air around you moist. Remember to wash your hands frequently. www.mayoclinic.com

Lifestyle FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

This undated photo provided by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York shows Georges Braque’s 1908 ‘Arbres a l’Estaque (Trees at L’Estaque),’ which is one of the paintings in the collection of Leonard Lauder he has donated to the museum. — AP photos

Fernand Leger’s 1914 ‘Le fumeur (The Smoker)’ .

A

Pablo Picasso’s 1913 ‘Nude Woman in an Armchair (Eva).

remote farming town known as the “Cotton Capital of Australia” is set to hit the global stage next month after French electro-pop duo Daft Punk picked it for the global launch of their new album. Wee Waa, with a population of just 1,653 about 500 kilometers (310 miles) north-west of Sydney, will host the official launch of Random Access Memories Daft Punk’s first album in eight years, local officials said. The album will be released on May 21 but it is set to be played for the first time anywhere in the world at an exclusive 4,000-ticket party at the annual Wee Waa agricultural show on May 17.

Daft Punk themselves will not be attending, but the Wee Waa Show Society are claiming it as a major coup for the event, whose highlights are usually a pet show and wood-chopping contest.

“This year’s event will be highly anticipated with the announcement of Daft Punk, a French band with millions of fans worldwide, having chosen the Wee Waa Show to become the official global site for the launch of their new album,” the region’s tourism authority said.

“The Wee Waa Show will host a playback of the new album to a packed audience for the global launch party. It is expected people will travel from far and wide to attend the show.” Ticket sales will be handled by The Crossing Theatre in Narrabri-the nearest sizeable town-and go online this Friday at a mere Aus$35 (US$38).

Members of the Wee Waa Show Society will be guaranteed a ticket to the official Sony Music event, which is being described as an “album playback show” because the French outfit will not be present or performing live.

“We’re still pinching ourselves. We don’t know why, but why not?” society president Brett Dickinson told ABC radio. “They just wanted somewhere that was different to what Daft Punk does.

They’re known for breaking down barriers and being creative and Wee Waa is uniquely Australian so they just said lets go to Wee Waa.”—AFP

Auction includes Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw shoes

S

Pablo Picasso’s 1914 ‘Le verre d’absinthe (The Absinthe Glass),’ a 9 1/2 inch high sculpture.

arah Jessica Parker is auctioning three pairs of shoes from her Carrie Bradshaw days to raise money for a New York high school. Her “Sex and the City” shoes from Prada, Jonathan Kelsey and Dolce Vita will be sold alongside Elvis Presley’s brown leather boots, Shaquille O’Neal basketball shoes - size 22 - and pink platforms that Britney Spears wore on tour.

The auction benefits LaGuardia High School of Music, Art and the Performing Arts, according to statement Wednesday from Gotta Have Rock and Roll, a memorabilia company. It will also feature Madonna’s leopard-print boots, Sylvester Stallone’s fur ones and Eminem’s white sneakers. The sale starts on Apr 24.—AP

File photo shows actress Sarah Jessica Parker at amfAR’s New York gala at Cipriani Wall Street in New York. Parker. — AP

Lifestyle FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

S

haron Stone has counter-sued her Filipina former nanny, who is pursuing the US actress for wrongful dismissal and harassment including racist abuse, new court documents show. In a breach-of-loan-agreement action filed in Los Angeles Superior Court this week, the “Basic Instinct” star says Erlinda Elemen owes $9,500 of a $12,500 loan she made to her in 2010. Elemen, who worked as a live-in nanny for Stone until she was sacked in 2011, repaid $3,000 between August 2010 and January 2011, but then stopped repayments to the 55-year-old actress.

Her lawyers announced last year that she was suing the actress. A judge has ruled that the former nanny had provided enough evidence to support her charges of harassment, failure to prevent harassment, retaliation and wrongful dismissal. Stone’s lawyers sought to have the casewhich has a tentative trial date of July 30 — dismissed, arguing that comments by the actress did not amount to harassment. “All we have is that Ms Stone made comments about Filipino food, Filipino accents,” said lawyer Daniel Gutenplan. When the lawsuit was announced in May, the actress’s publicist slammed the legal action as “absurd,” claiming the ex-nanny was simply trying to “cash in” on Stone.

The lawsuit claimed the star equated being Filipino with being stupid, and ordered her not to speak in front of her children so they would not “talk like you.” Stone also banned Elemen from reading the Bible in the actress’s home, even though the live-in nanny looked after the

File photo, Ben Affleck poses with his award for best picture ‘Argo’ during at the Oscars at the Dolby Theatre, in Los Angeles. — AP

actress’s three children and frequently traveled with them.

Elemen, who was hired in October 2006 and was promoted to head live-in nanny two years later, was dismissed in February 2011, after Stone learned she was paid overtime when traveling with the children and on holidays. In 2011, the actress was ordered to pay $232,000 in compensation to a worker who injured his knee after slipping and falling in her backyard in 2006. — AFP

Sharon Stone

B

en Affleck took home the best picture Oscar at this year’s Academy Awards for his Iran hostage drama “Argo.” But what everyone really remembers is that emotional, slightly uncomfortable acceptance speech.

Everyone, apparently, except Affleck. “I barely remember the Oscar speech,” the actor-director said when asked about it at Tuesday’s premiere of his latest film. “Certainly, the most important thing for me, in a way, was to honor my wife and to let people know how much I love her.” During his speech Affleck choked up while thanking his wife, Jennifer Garner, for working on their “marriage for 10 Christmases.”

“I think you can tell what people care about really by their actions - by what they invest in, by what they work on,” he explained. “It’s hard to tell somebody that you care about them when you’re never around them and you don’t see them and talk to them. So that was what I was trying to get across. Although I don’t know how articulate I was.”

Affleck was joined by co-stars Olga Kurylenko and Rachel McAdams for the Los Angeles premiere of Terrence Malick’s romantic rumination “To the Wonder,” which opens Friday.

Affleck, 40, admitted that seeing the celebrated director in action was indeed a wonder to behold. “I think that you know he’s a director who does really unusual stuff, really interesting stuff, and somebody who works outside the typical Hollywood norm. And that’s interesting to other directors, certainly to me, because you go like ‘wow, what would happen of you experiment with this?’” The film stars Affleck as an American whose relationship with a woman he met overseas turns cold, leaving him drifting back toward a childhood love.

“To the Wonder” was the last review written by celebrated film critic Roger Ebert, who died Tuesday, and it sent “shivers” down Affleck’s spine. “I thought it was a profound honor,” he said. “To have this be the last movie that he reviewed and to have it viewed through this sort of transcendental lens of a man at the end of his life is as important as anything that’s ever happened around movies in my career.” — AP

T

he bickering parents of Broadway’s most expensive show have made up in court at least - and that removes a huge cloud above the future of “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark.” Producers and fired director Julie Taymor hashed out a settlement that was announced Wednesday, and both sides released statements hoping the superhero show could now soar beyond Broadway. Taymor, the original “SpiderMan” director and co-book writer, was fired in 2011 after years of delays, accidents and critical backlash to a show whose price tag ballooned to $75 million.

Taymor slapped the producers, led by Michael Cohl and Jeremiah J. Harris, as well as Glen Berger, her former co-book writer, with a federal copyright infringement lawsuit, alleging they violated her creative rights and hadn’t compensated her for the work she put into the show. The producers’ filed a counterclaim asserting the copyright claims were baseless. Though settlement talks had been ongoing, a final deal hadn’t been hammered out, and Manhattan federal Judge Katherine Forrest had set a May 27 trial date, which has now been made moot.

The settlement means a legal quagmire has been removed and frees producers to consider options, including a tour or a new home for the show if it ever needs to leave Broadway. No details about the settlement or how it was reached were revealed. It was clear that prolonged and embarrassing court hearings would further injure the property.

Taymor, in a statement, said she had hope “for the continued success of Spider-Man, both on Broadway and beyond.” The producers said they looked forward to spreading the show “in new and exciting ways around the world.”

The show, which features music by U2’s Bono and The Edge, opened in November 2010 but spent months in previews and then retooling before officially opening a few days after the Tony Awards in June

2011. It has become a financial hit at the box office. Taymor’s lawsuit sought half of all profits derived from the sale, license, transfer or lease of any rights in the original “SpiderMan” book along with a permanent ban of the use of her name or likeness in connection with a documentary film that was made of the birth of the musical without her consent.

It also sought a jury trial to determine her share of profits from the unauthorized use of her version of the superhero story, which it said was believed to be in excess of $1 million. In the run-up to a legal showdown,

story that had wandered into darker and mythological themes, while Bono and The Edge reworked the songs. More flying stunts were added, and the romance between Peter Parker and Mary Jane returned to center stage. The use of four comic-book fans who framed the plot and represented Taymor, Bono, The Edge and Berger were cut. The role of a villainous spider-woman named Arachne was scaled back, and the Green Goblin’s role was enhanced. Taymor had alleged that the show hadn’t been reimagined after her firing and that what audiences are seeing at the Foxwoods Theatre is

File photo shows Julie Taymor arriving at the opening night performance of the Broadway musical ‘Spider-Man Turn Off the Dark’ in New York. — AP papers revealed a behind-the-scenes atmosphere that was secretive and slightly paranoid. Taymor alleged that Berger was told to quietly work on changes to the story without Taymor’s knowledge - called “Plan X” that in an email Berger complained led him to lead a “double life” working with and against Taymor.

After Taymor left, writer Roberto AguirreSacasa, director Philip William McKinley and choreographer Chase Brock cleaned up a

essentially the same show she directed. On opening night, Taymor received a standing ovation and kisses from cast members, as well as from Bono and The Edge. The three were all smiles and posed for pictures together on the red carpet.—AP

Lifestyle FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Malawi labels Madonna an ‘uncouth’ bully in scathing attack

T

he Malawi government has branded pop star Madonna an “uncouth” bully who exaggerates her charitable work in the country and demands preferential treatment when she visits. Malawi President Joyce Banda’s government accused the “Material Girl” of bullying officials after she complained about her latest trip to the southern African country this month. “Among the many things that Madonna needs to learn as a matter of urgency is the decency of telling the truth,” said an 11-point statement from Malawi’s State House.

Media reports said Madonna and her children were forced to join a check-in queue and go through security with ordinary passengers at a Malawi airport when they left the country.

The “Holiday” singer dismissed Malawi’s com-

South Korean singer Psy performs his hit single ‘Gangnam Style’ during a Chinese New Year concert. — AFP

Psy’s ‘Gentleman’ the only launch worth

worrying about

E

ven Kim Jong-Un’s threats of nuclear war can’t divert world attention from the main event on the Korean peninsula this week-the launch of Psy’s hugely anticipated follow-up to his global hit “Gangnam Style”. The new single “Gentleman” will hit online music stores worldwide Friday and finally answer the question of whether “Gangnam Style” and its invisible horse-riding dance was more than just a one-hit wonder. The 35-year-old rapper will follow up the release with a promotional concert in Seoul for 50,000 fans. Little is known about the new single, which will be released in 119 nations, or the crucial music video that will accompany it.

It was the video of “Gangnam Style”, and in particular Psy’s signature horse-riding dance, that pushed him to global stardom last year after it was posted on YouTube and turned into a viral sensation. A satire on the luxury lifestyle of Seoul’s upscale Gangnam district, it has become the most-watched YouTube video of all time, registering more than 1.5 billion views since it debuted last July.

The song topped charts around the world, and inspired a horde of online tributes and parodies, as well as flash mobs of thousands of dancing fans in cities like Paris and Milan.

Psy has promised a “Psy style” take on a traditional Korean dance for the new “Gentleman” video. “I’ve been working and reworking on it continuously and I think the latest version will be the final one,” Psy told a South Korean TV news program earlier this month. “This is another very rousing song... The dance is one known to all Koreans but new to foreigners. This will be presented in Psy style,” he said.

Psy’s agency in South Korea, YG Entertainment, said it was not clear when the video-featuring several big-name South Korean comedians and another female singer-will be unveiled. Shooting only wrapped up on Tuesday, a YG spokeswoman said. “The pressure is huge... a lot of effort went into this,” she told AFP. “0nights3dayz of video shooting... still gotta shoot a lot more & it’s 5am now...but happy and fun!!!” Psy told his nearly 2.5 million Twitter followers on Monday. The big release comes at a delicate time, with military tensions soaring on the Korean peninsula, and North Korea expected to carry out a provocative missile launch at any moment. The North has even advised foreigners living in South Korea to consider leaving the country, to avoid being caught in a “thermo-nuclear war”. South Koreans who have lived with the North’s hostile rhetoric for decades have remained largely unfazed by the crisis, and discussion of Psy’s new single completely overshadowed Pyongyang’s threats on news portals and chat rooms. “What a crazy guy (Kim Jong-Un) is... you should shake the world in a good way like Psy did, instead of shaking the world with threats of a nuclear war,” tweeted one fan, @saenuli. —AFP

US Pop Star Madonna flanked by her Malawian adopted children, David, right, and Mercy, and Yasinta Chapomba, Executive Director for Mphandula Childcare Centre speaks to media during her visit to the centre at Namitete, Malawi. —AFP

ments as “lies” in a statement on the website of her Raising Malawi foundation. “I’m saddened that Malawi’s President Joyce Banda has chosen to release lies about what we’ve accomplished, my intentions, how I personally conducted myself while visiting Malawi and other untruths,” Madonna said.

Malawi said Madonna expected the government to be forever chained in an “obligation of gratitude” towards her for adopting two Malawian children and contributing to the construction of classrooms in the country. “Kindness, as far as its ordinary meaning is concerned, is free and anonymous. If it can’t be free and silent, it is not kindness; it is something else,” the statement said. “Blackmail is the closest it becomes.” —Reuters

Capsule reviews of new movie releases

“4

2” - Jackie Robinson was the ideal class act to break the barrier and become the first black player in Major League Baseball.

Writer-director Brian Helgeland’s Robinson biopic is a class act itself, though not always an engaging act. It’s such a familiar story that any faithful film biography almost inevitably will turn out predictable, even a bit routine. With an earnest performance by Chadwick Boseman as Robinson and an enjoyably self-effacing turn by Harrison Ford as Brooklyn Dodgers boss Branch Rickey, “42” hits every button you expect very ably. It riles with its re-creations of the heartless, ignorant racism to which Robinson was subjected. It uplifts with its depictions of Robinson’s restraint and fortitude. It inspires with its glimpses of support and compassion from teammates and fans. Yet like a sleepy, lowscoring ballgame, the film is not the jolt of energy and entertainment we wish it could be.

The story plays out safely and methodically, centering on his rise to the majors from 1945- 47 and letting that time unfold with slow, sturdy momentum. Helgeland’s dialogue becomes preachy at times, and the film often languishes in soapiness. Boseman and Ford forge a nice bond, while Christopher Meloni is a delight in a short appearance as Dodgers manager Leo Durocher. Alan Tudyk delivers perfectly in an ugly role as a rival manager hurling racial slurs at Robinson. PG-13 for thematic elements including language. 128 minutes. Two and a half stars out of four.

— David Germain, AP Movie Writer “To the Wonder” - More than any other of Terrence Malick’s films, his latest distills his distinctive approach. There’s hardly any dialogue at all, just the story of a French-speaking Ukrainian single mother, Marina (Olga Kurylenko), and her up-and-down romance with Neil (Ben Affleck). He’s a kind of sample-taking environmental scientist of polluted bluecollar areas who brings Marina and her 10-year-old daughter, Tatiana (Tatiana Chiline), from vibrant, sundrenched Paris to his home in an austere suburban development in Oklahoma. The particular events and ruptures in Neil and Marina’s relationship aren’t closely followed, only the familiar tidal swells of

This undated photo provided by Magnolia Pictures shows Ben Affleck and Olga Kurylenko in a scene from, ‘To the Wonder.’ — AP

This film image released by Warner Bros Pictures shows Chadwick Boseman as Jackie Robinson, left, and Harrison Ford as Branch Rickey in a scene from ‘42.’ —AP love and loneliness.

During a separation, a local former flame (Rachel McAdams) also drifts in, forming an evanescent triangle. What this is, then, is a straightforward, abstractly rendered rumination on love, mostly from Marina’s perspective. “What is this love that loves us?” she wonders. The state of bliss she finds with Neil - on a train to Paris, on the shores of Mont Saint-Michel, on the plains of Oklahoma is inevitably, mysteriously fleeting. Malick places these questions in a spiritual con-

text. Javier Bardem plays a tangentiallyrelated priest who wanders heavily among the unfortunate.

The lead performances don’t pull it off, and the film is missing something to bind it. But if it’s a failure, it’s the best kind. It strives, in a superficial medium, to communicate something universal about our inner nature. Cinema is a cathedral for Malick, and in it, light is heavenly. R for some sexuality and nudity. 113 minutes.

Three stars out of four.

— Jake Coyle, AP Entertainment Writer

Lifestyle FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

French reality TV star patents shampoo comments W

hen French reality TV star Nabilla uttered the words “hello? I mean hello?” in horror after learning that fellow female contestants had not brought shampoo with them on a show, she had no idea they would become so popular.

But after they went viral on the web, spawning countless parodies and even inspiring several ad campaigns, both the reality TV show’s production company and the brunette herself decided to register the expression as a trademark.

Nabilla Benattia is taking part in the fifth installment of “The Angels of Reality TV”-a show that groups together candidates and stars of other, previous reality TV shows and is filmed in the United States.

“Hello? I mean hello? You’re a girl and you don’t have shampoo, hello? Hello! Do you receive me? You’re a girl and you don’t have shampoo. It’s as if I tell you, you’re a

Lima

girl and you don’t have hair,” she says in shock in one episode. The sequence, posted on YouTube last month (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iyW55FIAn2g), has

been viewed millions of times.

The comments spawned countless parodies-some becoming as popular as Nabilla’s initial comments, such as one video where she calls a visibly irate Hitler-and a few ad campaigns. Ikea was quick to capitalize on the gimmick to promote its “Hallo” cushion in the southern city of Marseille, putting up a store sign saying “Hello? I mean hello? You’re a chair and you don’t have a cushion? Hello? Hello!”

The discount stores DIA, meanwhile, launched the slogan “hello? It’s as if I tell you you’re a hen and you’re not made out of chocolate”, days before Easter.

According to the website of France’s intellectual property institute, “La Grosse Equipe”-the production firm behind the show-has since registered the entire expression and several variations as a trademark, as has the reality TV star herself. —AFP

Fashion Week

Models wear creations by Agatha Ruiz de la Prada, of Spain, during Lima Fashion Week in Lima, Peru, yesterday.

Paul McCartney still UK’s richest musician

L

et it be - as in billionaire. Paul McCartney remains Britain’s wealthiest musician, according to the Sunday Times Rich List. The newspaper estimated yesterday that the ex-Beatle shares a 680 million-pound ($1.05 billion) fortune with his third wife, Nancy Shevell, whose family owns a US trucking company.

McCartney has topped the musicians’ list every year since it was first compiled in 1989. Composer Andrew Lloyd Webber is ranked second, with an estimated 620 million-pound fortune. Adele topped a parallel list for musicians under 30. She is judged to be worth 30 million pounds. The full ranking of musicians will be published Sunday. The overall Rich List - a widely respected measure that draws on public records of property, shares and other assets - will be released April 21. —AP

Lifestyle

Gul Ahmad

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Pakistan Nauman Arfeen

Fashion Week

Shamaeel Ansari

Pakistani models present creations by Deepak Perwani on the second day of Fashion Pakistan Week in Karachi yesterday. The fifth edition of the Fashion Pakistan Week showcases spring and summer collections from some 27 mainstream and upcoming designers. —AFP photos

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

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Bayan

25388462

Mazda 3, model 2012, running 14,000 km, price KD 2,850, negotiable. Mobile: 66109046. (C 4372) 8-6-2013 CHANGE OF NAME I, ABUL HASANSA DULI RAHMATH ALI, holder of Indian Passport No: G3925520, issued at Kuwait, on 13.11.2007 permanent resident of 3/81 A, middle street, SP Pattinam (Post), Ramnad dist., Tamil Nadu and presently working at Sharq - Kuwait, do hereby change my name from ABUL HASANSA DULI RAHMATH ALI to ABUL HASAN RAHMATH ALI with immediate effect.

(C 4375) 11-4-2013

ter’s name as Luna Shashati Paul.

(C 4370) SITUATION VACANT A family is looking to hire a cook with experience in Kuwaiti and Indian cuisines.

Tel: 99005438. (C 4373) 10-4-2013

Prayer timings Fajr:

04:04

Shorook

05:26

Duhr:

11:49

Asr:

15:23

Maghrib:

18:12

Isha:

19:32

No: 15776

I, Tarun Kanti Paul and I, Mithu Paul parents of Supriti Paul, her Passport No. J6954961 hereby will change our daughter’s name as Zeta Supriti Paul.

(C 4369) I, Tarun Kanti Paul and I, Mithu Paul parents of Swaswati Paul, her Passport No. J6954985 hereby will change our daugh-

Kuwait SHARQIA-1 GET LUCKY (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) SHARQIA-2 SKY FORCE (DIG-3D) THE CROODS (DIG-3D) SKY FORCE (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) SHARQIA-3 OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) MUHALAB-1 DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) MUHALAB-2 OBLIVION (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) MUHALAB-3 THE CROODS (DIG-3D) SKY FORCE (DIG-3D) NO FRI BAADSHAH (DIG) (Telugu) SKY FORCE (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) FANAR-1 OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG)

2:00 PM 4:15 PM 6:30 PM 8:45 PM 11:00 PM 1:00 AM 1:45 PM 3:45 PM 5:45 PM 7:45 PM 10:00 PM 12:05 AM 12:30 PM 3:00 PM 5:30 PM 7:45 PM 10:15 PM 12:45 AM 12:45 PM 3:00 PM 5:15 PM 7:30 PM 9:45 PM 12:05 AM 1:00 PM 3:30 PM 5:30 PM 8:00 PM 10:00 PM 12:30 AM 2:00 PM 4:15 PM 4:15 PM 6:15 PM 8:15 PM 10:30 PM 12:45 AM 1:45 PM 4:30 PM

KNCC PROGRAMME FROM THURSDAY TO WEDNESDAY (11/04/2013 TO 17/04/2013) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) FANAR-2 DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) FANAR-3 GET LUCKY (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) MARINA-1 GET LUCKY (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) MARINA-2 OBLIVION (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) AVENUES-1 THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN (DIG) OLYMPUS HAS FALLEN (DIG) AVENUES-2 GET LUCKY (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG) GET LUCKY (DIG)

7:00 PM 9:30 PM 12:05 AM 12:45 PM 3:00 PM 5:15 PM 8:00 PM 10:15 PM 12:30 AM 2:00 PM 4:15 PM 6:15 PM 8:30 PM 10:45 PM 12:45 AM 12:30 PM 2:45 PM 5:00 PM 7:15 PM 9:45 PM 12:05 AM 1:00 PM 3:30 PM 5:30 PM 8:00 PM 10:00 PM 12:30 AM 1:00 PM 3:30 PM 6:00 PM 8:00 PM 10:15 PM 12:30 AM 12:45 PM 2:45 PM 4:45 PM 6:45 PM 8:45 PM 10:45 PM 12:45 AM

AVENUES-3 THE CROODS (DIG-3D) THE CROODS (DIG-3D) THE CROODS (DIG-3D) KON-TIKI (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) 360º- 1 G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) 360º- 2 THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) THE INCREDIBLE BURT WONDERSTONE (DIG) 360º- 3 THE CROODS (DIG-3D) THE CROODS (DIG-3D) THE CROODS (DIG-3D) OZ THE GREAT AND POWERFUL (DIG-3D) SNITCH (DIG) SNITCH (DIG) AL-KOUT.1 SKY FORCE (DIG-3D) SKY FORCE (DIG-3D) SKY FORCE (DIG-3D) JURASSIC PARK (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) G.I. JOE: RETALIATION (DIG-3D) AL-KOUT.2 DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) THE PLACE BEYOND THE PINES (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) KON-TIKI (DIG) DEAD MAN DOWN (DIG) AL-KOUT.3 OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG)

1:45 PM 3:45 PM 5:45 PM 7:45 PM 10:00 PM 12:15 AM 1:15 PM 3:30 PM 5:45 PM 8:15 PM 10:45 PM 1:00 AM 2:15 PM 4:15 PM 6:15 PM 8:15 PM 10:15 PM 12:15 AM 12:45 PM 2:45 PM 4:45 PM 6:45 PM 9:15 PM 11:30 PM 1:30 PM 3:30 PM 5:30 PM 7:30 PM 10:00 PM 12:15 AM 1:15 PM 3:30 PM 6:00 PM 8:15 PM 10:30 PM 12:45 AM 1:45 PM 4:15 PM 6:45 PM 9:15 PM

Pe t s FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Beauty in the beast When told her dog Ace would need cosmetic surgery, Jennifer Scaturro of Arnold, Maryland, was surprised. But the surgery for an inturned eyelid stopped Ace from having cotinually watery eyes and rubbing his eyes with the back of his paws. — MCT photos

Cosmetic surgery for the canine set A

ce, a youthful Labrador, bounds across his lawn, fielding tennis balls and hurrying them back to his owner. His tail wags. His coat is thick and shiny. He barks with enthusiasm. To the naked eye, Ace is a strapping example of dogdom. Who would guess that he’s had work done? An eye job, in fact. Ace is one of thousands of dogs that have had plastic surgery. A little nip. A little tuck. Eye lifts. Nose jobs. Exactly the sorts of procedures people get. But unlike cosmetic surgery for humans, dogs and cats aren’t doing it to look better at their high school reunion.

“We call it cosmetic surgery just because it’s altering an animal’s facial features,” said Dr Jules Benson, vice president of veterinary services at Petplan, a pet insurance provider. “It changes the look of an animal, but you are doing it to prevent further disease and to better the health of the animal.”

Ken and Jennifer Scaturro of Arnold, Md, brought Ace to their veterinarian two years ago because his eyes wouldn’t stop watering. They’d tear and tear. And they’d see him rubbing at his face with his front paws. When the vet said Ace might have in-turned eyelids, a common condition called entropion, and directed the family to a plastic surgeon, they had never heard of such a thing for pets.

Plastic surgery? What next - teeth whitening and Perrier in his water bowl? “I almost thought I was getting scammed a bit,” said Jennifer Scaturro. “I had no idea. But then I thought, ‘People who have skin cancer go to a cosmetic surgeon.’ It seemed reasonable.” The eye specialist confirmed Ace had entropion, causing his lashes to constantly brush the surface of his eyes. It’s painful and, if untreated, could lead to permanent eye damage. Plastic surgery was the best option, they were told.

So the Scaturros spent $674 on a puppy eyelift, a procedure so subtle it’s hard to detect, even squinting at before-and-after pictures. But one that nevertheless changed their Ace’s life. “I can’t even imagine having eyelashes in my eyes every single day,” Jennifer Scaturro says. “I think it made his quality of life so much better. His eyes have been great.”

Stories circulate in the pet world about dogs and cats getting slimmed by liposuction and de-wrinkled with Botox. There’s a vet in Brazil who has built a reputation for helping a pet’s droopy ears stand at attention with silicone injections. And for decades, owners aghast after stripping their dog’s manhood have substituted Neuticles for the real thing.

In the United States, purely aesthetic surgeries are rare and generally frowned upon, Benson says. The American Kennel Club forbids cosmetically enhancing a show dog except in cases of breed standards - like tail docking. The Humane Society Veterinary Medical Association campaigns against tail docking, ear cropping, debarking, declawing and any operation an animal doesn’t medically need. But using plastic surgery for just that has become common.

By far, most pets getting cosmetic surgery are getting eyelifts to correct entropion and nose jobs to fix breathing problems seen regularly in the smooshed-nose, brachycephalic breeds such as pugs and French bulldogs.

In 2011, Petplan’s top year for plastic surgery, the company paid 79 claims for 53 pets to have cosmetic work done. Most of them had either entropion or brachycephalic surgery. The company only covers medically necessary procedures - customers who want synthetic dog testicles are on their own. Petplan’s plastic surgery claims dropped more than 27 percent in 2012. But the company expects owners to continue choosing it for their pets.

“As an industry, we’re getting much better at addressing life issues sooner than we ever have been before,” Benson says. “More and more people are taking the step, saying is this something we can do.” Dr Jennifer Hyman, a veterinarian for Eye Care for Animals in Annapolis, Md., performed Ace’s eye job - and has done dozens of others just like it.

Before becoming an eye specialist, she performed several brow lifts as a general practitioner, including one on a Shar-Pei whose trademark wrinkles were irritating his corneas and another on a bloodhound with facial skin so droopy it shrouded his eyes like curtains. She helped a breathing-impaired pug with a nose job, shortening his soft palate and widening his nostrils.

And yes, if an owner insisted, and she was operating anyway, Hyman would grudgingly agree to Neuticles, knowing a dog could take or leave those particular private parts. “We all laugh at the idea of Neuticles, but we also feel like they’re pretty harmless, too,” she says. “It makes the people feel better. I don’t think the dogs really care.” —MCT

Stars

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Aries (March 21-April 19)

Send requests through channels and things will flow more easily. Feelings and desires may tug and roil around you, and trying to cut an even balance may be a challenge. Today’s beginnings may mature into tomorrow’s turmoils, so don’t fly off the handle and don’t jump into something you’re not sure of. Let the waters settle until tomorrow, then decide on it. This is an excellent time to discuss your feelings and clear the air on any grievances you may be holding on to from the past. It is easy for you to talk about your feelings now, and also to listen sensitively to not only what others are saying but also what they are feeling.

Taurus (April 20-May 20)

For a day or so you may be under pressure to start new projects or finance situations that require spending a bit of money. It may seem quite urgent, but it’s a time when everything seems a bit more intense, so you may do well to stand back and take a second look before jumping in with both feet. This is an excellent time to eliminate whatever is unnecessary and outworn in your life especially if it’s an unhealthy relationship which keeps you from going after what you really want in life. You are also more perceptive than usual. You can see other people’s true colors more clearly and you may discover a secret or the hidden aspect of some situation.

Gemini (May 21-June 20)

The everyday care of the smaller necessities in life are highlighted today. Learning new and more satisfying ways to address your personal habits and those of others will give you a fresh outlook on the world and how the world views you. This is a good time to speak up and clear the air of any grievances you have been holding on to for some time in your personal relationships.

By dealing with any issues you’ve been holding onto and allowing your partner to do the same leaves you the space to move forward and find some new understandings in area’s you may have thought were never going to change.

Cancer (June 21-July 22) Your craving for love and affection, as well as beauty and pleasure, is strong now and you act on feelings and creative impulses more than usual. If you are unhappy with some aspects of your personal life, these issues will arise at this time and there may be anxiety or tension in a close relationship. Fondness and appreciation for your past takes on greater importance for you now.

Making your relationship situation more pleasant and productive plays a part in this. You may feel the need for more harmony in your most intimate emotional relationships.

Leo (July 23-August 22) This is a good time to establish yourself today, both physically and emotionally. Pick a preferred pace that you can live up to, and your energy level will actually rise and your accomplishments grow with the energy available. Wise, intuitive decisions make you fuel like it’s all about to come together. The party is underway and for the moment, you are in control. Strut your stuff and don’t stand still, because it’s you that’s getting the attention.

Just have some amount of restraint as any gossip that ensues from this time could follow you around like a dark cloud.

Virgo (August 23-September 22) Rebelliousness, recklessness, impatience, a sudden burst of anger or your need to break free from rules and restrictions may create a lot of disruption in your life right now. Though you are unusually energetic, it is hard for you to get anything done.

You are happiest now when you do something creative and daring, which doesn’t involve trying to cooperate or conform to others’ wishes and needs. Sex and money count for plenty now, maybe a little too much. Wanting something or someone seems to take on special importance for you, just take caution because it may even be obsession. Try to distinguish between wants, needs, and obsessive desire before making a move on anyone.

Libra (September 23-October 22) Your thoughts are dreamy, fantastic, and faraway right now.

Your imagination and intuition is heightened, which benefits any creative or artistic work you may do. However, your practical reasoning ability and your ability to focus on the here-and-now are diminished. Your judgment regarding concrete matters is a bit fuzzy at this time, so you may wish to delay making important decisions. The energy to do what it takes to get what you want is what it’s about today, so take a risk and enjoy the rewards of your efforts. Seek out mutually beneficial ideas so things are less of a struggle than if you go after something just for the thrill of the challenge.

Commitments begun now will turn out well and satisfying for all.

Scorpio (October 23-November 21) You are alert, mentally sharp and clear, and your ability to comprehend new concepts is heightened. Also, you can verbalize and articulate your ideas very well at this time. Intellectual curiosity is high as well. This is a good time to make plans and strategies or begin a course of study. This time period is harmonious and pleasant. Relationships are particularly pleasant and productive now, and you may find partnerships formed now work out very well. This could be a good day to run into someone new that excites you and sends your heart into a bit of a palpitation.

Sagittarius (November 22-December 21)

Circumstances surrounding your social life could become a tad complicated, particularly if you allow a pushy newcomer to rearrange that well-established time-table or to tread on those sensitive egos that believe they rule the roost. Be on guard for a cold shoulder from someone you thought was finally warming up to you too. Your thoughts are dreamy, fantastic, and faraway right now. Your imagination and intuition is heightened, which benefits emotional commitments and thoughts of romance. However, your practical reasoning ability and your ability to focus on the here and now are diminished. Your judgment regarding concrete matters is a bit fuzzy at this time, so you may wish to delay making important decisions.

Capricorn (December 22-January 19)

You’re restless just now and you’ll be active, needing stimulus and also a variety of different characters to keep you interested. You’ll probably be bored, especially with your daily routine and this is going to cause you to seek out new experiences and a different sort of social life. You are at cross purposes with the people in your environment who are most able to benefit you, this includes a current lover or partner. You tend to come on too strong, to be oblivious to others’ needs and intentions, or to act inappropriately now. You feel an urgency to take positive steps to achieve your goals, but be certain that you are not overstepping yourself, as this can cause considerable bad feelings at this time.

Aquarius (January 20- February 18)

Though you are unusually energetic, it is hard for you to get anything done. You tend to fly off the handle and to scatter your forces. You are happiest now when you do something creative and daring, which doesn’t involve trying to cooperate or conform to others’ wishes and needs. Up and down emotions with energies running high make for uncomfortable moments today, so avoid hasty choices or impulse buying. If tempers flare, just don’t go there, spare yourself and others the hassle. Commitments made now will tend to partake of this atmosphere, so have the patience to wait a little before moving ahead.

Pisces (February 19-March 20)

Your physical drive and energy level are high now, and you can accomplish a great deal fairly easily. You are inclined to take the initiative or to strike out on your own, and you are likely to be successful at what you attempt at this time. Sharing time with those close to you is likely to be very attractive to you at this time. Quality time spent with your family will reenergize you and reaffirm much of your sense of purpose. Renewing your sense of belonging to something good is sure to put smile on your face and a little snap in your walk.

COUNTRY CODES Afghanistan 0093 Albania 00355 Algeria 00213 Andorra 00376 Angola 00244 Anguilla 001264 Antiga 001268 Argentina 0054 Armenia 00374 Australia 0061 Austria 0043 Bahamas 001242 Bahrain 00973 Bangladesh 00880 Barbados 001246 Belarus 00375 Belgium 0032 Belize 00501 Benin 00229 Bermuda 001441 Bhutan 00975 Bolivia 00591 Bosnia 00387 Botswana 00267 Brazil 0055 Brunei 00673 Bulgaria 00359 Burkina 00226 Burundi 00257 Cambodia 00855 Cameroon 00237 Canada 001 Cape Verde 00238 Cayman Islands 001345 Central African Republic 00236 Chad 00235 Chile 0056 China 0086 Colombia 0057 Comoros 00269 Congo 00242 Cook Islands 00682 Costa Rica 00506 Croatia 00385 Cuba 0053 Cyprus 00357 Cyprus (Northern) 0090392 Czech Republic 00420 Denmark 0045 Diego Garcia 00246 Djibouti 00253 Dominica 001767 Dominican Republic 001809 Ecuador 00593 Egypt 0020 El Salvador 00503 England (UK) 0044 Equatorial Guinea 00240 Eritrea 00291 Estonia 00372 Ethiopia 00251 Falkland Islands 00500 Faroe Islands 00298 Fiji 00679 Finland 00358 France 0033 French Guiana 00594 French Polynesia 00689 Gabon 00241 Gambia 00220 Georgia 00995 Germany 0049 Ghana 00233 Gibraltar 00350 Greece 0030 Greenland 00299 Grenada 001473 Guadeloupe 00590 Guam 001671 Guatemala 00502 Guinea 00224 Guyana 00592 Haiti 00509 Holland (Netherlands)0031 Honduras 00504 Hong Kong 00852 Hungary 0036 Ibiza (Spain) 0034 Iceland 00354 India 0091 Indian Ocean 00873 Indonesia 0062 Iran 0098 Iraq 00964 Ireland 00353 Italy 0039 Ivory Coast 00225 Jamaica 001876 Japan 0081 Jordan 00962 Kazakhstan 007 Kenya 00254 Kiribati 00686

Kuwait 00965 Kyrgyzstan 00996 Laos 00856 Latvia 00371 Lebanon 00961 Liberia 00231 Libya 00218 Lithuania 00370 Luxembourg 00352 Macau 00853 Macedonia 00389 Madagascar 00261 Majorca 0034 Malawi 00265 Malaysia 0060 Maldives 00960 Mali 00223 Malta 00356 Marshall Islands 00692 Martinique 00596 Mauritania 00222 Mauritius 00230 Mayotte 00269 Mexico 0052 Micronesia 00691 Moldova 00373 Monaco 00377 Mongolia 00976 Montserrat 001664 Morocco 00212 Mozambique 00258 Myanmar (Burma) 0095 Namibia 00264 Nepal 00977 Netherlands (Holland)0031 Netherlands Antilles 00599 New Caledonia 00687 New Zealand 0064 Nicaragua 00505 Nigar 00227 Nigeria 00234 Niue 00683 Norfolk Island 00672 Northern Ireland (UK)0044 North Korea 00850 Norway 0047 Oman 00968 Pakistan 0092 Palau 00680 Panama 00507 Papua New Guinea 00675 Paraguay 00595 Peru 0051 Philippines 0063 Poland 0048 Portugal 00351 Puerto Rico 001787 Qatar 00974 Romania 0040 Russian Federation 007 Rwanda 00250 Saint Helena 00290 Saint Kitts 001869 Saint Lucia 001758 Saint Pierre 00508 Saint Vincent 001784 Samoa US 00684 Samoa West 00685 San Marino 00378 Sao Tone 00239 Saudi Arabia 00966 Scotland (UK) 0044 Senegal 00221 Seychelles 00284 Sierra Leone 00232 Singapore 0065 Slovakia 00421 Slovenia 00386 Solomon Islands 00677 Somalia 00252 South Africa 0027 South Korea 0082 Spain 0034 Sri Lanka 0094 Sudan 00249 Suriname 00597 Swaziland 00268 Sweden 0046 Switzerland 0041 Syria 00963 Taiwan 00886 Tanzania 00255 Thailand 0066 Toga 00228 Tonga 00676 Tokelau 00690 Trinidad 001868 Tunisia 00216 Turkey 0090 Tuvalu 00688 Uganda 00256 Ukraine 00380 United Arab Emirates00976

Stars

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Word Search

Yesterdayʼs Solution

C R O S S W O R D 1 5 7

ACROSS 1. (of securities) Not quoted on a stock exchange.

4. Arrange or combine in pairs.

12. Inflammation of the urethra of unknown cause.

15. (in golf) The standard number of strokes set for each hole on a golf course, or for the entire course.

16. A complex red organic pigment containing iron and other atoms to which oxygen binds.

17. A port in southwestern Scotland.

18. A federal agency established to coordinate programs aimed at reducing pollution and protecting the environment.

19. Wild sheep of semidesert regions in central Asia.

20. In or associated with the process of passing from life or ceasing to be.

22. Small room on a ship or boat where people sleep.

24. Before noon.

25. A gonadotropic hormone that is secreted by the anterior pituitary.

27. Type genus of the Alcidae comprising solely the razorbill.

28. Tropical woody herb with showy yellow flowers and flat pods.

30. A fine grained mineral having a soft soapy feel and consisting of hydrated magnesium silicate.

32. Medium-sized tree having glossy lanceolate leaves.

35. Being or moving higher in position or greater in some value.

37. English writer of macabre short stories (1863-1943).

40. Unequivocally detestable.

42. Either of two folds of skin that can be moved to cover or open the eye.

44. A soft silvery metallic element of the alkali earth group.

45. A radioactive gaseous element formed by the disintegration of radium.

46. A very attractive or seductive looking woman.

48. Aromatic bulb used as seasoning.

51. Used of a single unit or thing.

52. The organ of sight (`peeper' is an informal term for `eye').

53. The birds of a particular region or period.

56. A mountain peak in the Karakoram Range in northern Kashmir.

58. Medium-sized larch of Canada and northern United States including Alaska having a broad conic crown and rust-brown scaly bark.

59. A white soft metallic element that tarnishes readily.

61. In bed.

62. A slight indication.

67. An associate degree in nursing.

70. A bag used for carrying money and small personal items or accessories (especially by women).

74. Bright with a steady but subdued shining.

77. A legal document codifying the result of deliberations of a committee or society or legislative body.

78. The seat within a bishop's diocese where his cathedral is located adv.

79. The condition of having no arms.

81. Any of numerous hairy-bodied insects including social and solitary species.

82. A machine-readable version of a standard dictionary.

83. Worthy of high praise.

84. An anxiety disorder characterized by chronic free-floating anxiety and such symptoms as tension or sweating or trembling of light-headedness or irritability etc that has lasted for more than six months.

Daily SuDoku

DOWN 1. An organization of countries formed in 1961 to agree on a common policy for the sale of petroleum.

2. Thin fibrous bark of the paper mulberry and Pipturus albidus.

3. Decapod having eyes on short stalks and a broad flattened carapace with a small abdomen folded under the thorax and pincers.

4. A republic in West Africa on the Gulf of Guinea.

5. The sense organ for hearing and equilibrium.

6. A medium for oil-paints.

7. (Islam) The man who leads prayers in a mosque.

9. Departing or being caused to depart from the true vertical or horizontal.

10. A light strong gray lustrous corrosion-resistant metallic element used in strong light-weight alloys (as for airplane parts).

11. Either extremity of something that has length.

12. Horny plate covering and protecting part of the dorsal surface of the digits.

13. Make synchronous and adjust in time or manner.

14. The capital and largest city of Mongolia.

21. West Indian evergreen with medium to long leaves.

23. A person of subnormal intelligence.

26. A pilgrimage to Mecca.

29. Iraqi leader who waged war against Iran and who invaded Kuwait (born in 1937).

31. A workplace for the conduct of scientific research.

33. A city in southern Turkey on the Seyhan River.

34. Tropical American tree bearing a small edible fruit with green leathery skin and sweet juicy translucent pulp.

36. Deciduous South African tree having large odd-pinnate leaves and profuse fragrant orange-yellow flowers.

38. An unbroken or imperfectly broken mustang.

39. Marked by quiet and caution and secrecy.

41. The chief solid component of mammalian urine.

43. A distinguished female operatic singer.

47. A prosthesis that replaces a missing leg.

49. Capital and largest city and economic center of Peru.

50. Two items of the same kind.

54. A large family of trees, shrubs, vines, and herbs bearing bean pods.

55. A particular environment or walk of life.

57. Leather with a napped surface.

60. The blood group whose red cells carry both the A and B antigens.

63. (South African) A camp defended by a circular formation of wagons.

64. Lacking leadership.

65. A Bantu language spoken by the Kamba people in Kenya.

66. Any of several tall tropical palms native to southeastern Asia having egg-shaped nuts.

68. A genus of temperate and arctic evergreen trees (see spruce).

69. Held back.

71. Any of numerous local fertility and nature deities worshipped by ancient Semitic peoples.

72. Fleshy and usually brightly colored cover of some seeds that develops from the ovule stalk and partially or entirely envelopes the seed.

73. 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.

75. (informal) Roused to anger.

76. A bachelor's degree in theology.

80. A rare polyvalent metallic element of the platinum group.

Yesterdayʼs Solution

Yesterday’s Solution

Sports FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Chiefs face Reds test to stay top of Super 15 SYDNEY: Waikato Chiefs will have to overcome a losing run against the Queensland Reds this weekend if they are to preserve their lead at the top of rugby’s Super 15.

The Reds, the 2011 winners, have won their last three encounters with the defending Super Rugby champions and travel to Hamilton tomorrow where they have won the last two meetings. The Chiefs are leading the overall Super 15 standings on points differential after frontrunners ACT Brumbies were held to a surprise draw at home last weekend by South African newcomers Southern Kings.

“They’ve got lots of names on the field and have a similar game plan,” Chiefs winger Lelia Masaga said.”The Reds were the underdogs at one time and now have been champions. The Reds have beaten us three times and we’ve struggled to maintain the performance that we need.”

Reds’ director of coaching Ewen McKenzie is looking at the game to gauge the season prospects of his team.

“We intend to defend that record having already enjoyed a couple of good wins the last two times we’ve travelled over there,” McKenzie said.

“You benchmark yourself against the best side and they’re the incumbents and they are performing well.

“These are the games you really find out about your character as a team, also your character as individuals.”

Reds and Wallabies scrum-half Will Genia rates the Chiefs an even better team this season, even as they attempt to defend their title without World Cup winner Sonny Bill Williams, who has switched back to Australia’s National Rugby League.

“Our best chance is to keep the ball for long periods and starve them of possession but they are the kind of side when they do have the ball they like to throw it

around so you can force mistakes,” Genia said.

Fullback Jesse Mogg and flyhalf Matt Toomua are back and blindside flanker Jordan Smiler will make his Super Rugby debut for the Brumbies against the Otago Highlanders in Dunedin on Friday. The Brumbies haven’t beaten the Highlanders in New Zealand since 2009.

Highlanders coach Jamie Joseph has dropped halves Aaron Smith and Colin Slade for Japanese scrum-half Fumiaki Tanaka and No.10 Hayden Parker among six changes to his winless team.

Northern Bulls have been bolstered by the return of experienced campaigners Akona Ndungane and Flip van der Merwe for their South African derby with the in-form Central Cheetahs in Pretoria on Saturday. Ndungane has recovered from an eye socket injury and will start for the three-time champions, while Van der Merwe has recovered from an injured chest muscle. —AFP

Potter wins par-three crown, Wozniacki flops AUGUSTA: Ted Potter set the stage for the 77th Masters by winning the traditional eve-of-tournament Par-3 Contest on Wednesday, while tennis star Caroline Wozniacki provided comic relief. The 29-year-old American debutant carded a five-under 22 on the nine-hole par-three layout, which lies adjacent to the famed Augusta National course. That left him in a five-way tie for the lead along with Matt Kuchar, Phil Mickelson, Nick Watney and Ernie Els. Potter then sealed a solo win on the second hole of the ensuing playoff against just Kuchar and Mickelson, the two others having opted out. By winning, Potter invited the curse of the Par-3 contest to fall upon his head as, since 1960 when the family and friends knockabout was first held, no winner has gone on to win the green jacket four days later.The glamour team of the day, however, was undoubtedly Rory McIlroy with his tennis-playing girlfriend Wozniacki on the bag, which produced the unlikely scenario of autograph hunters surrounding both player and caddie.

McIlroy and Wozniacki have been dating for the last 18 months and the Ulsterman has already tried his hand at his girlfriend’s sport, playing a point against Maria Sharapova, opposing Wozniacki in an exhibition match in New York. The Dane, a former world number one, has often been seen at McIlroy’s side at tournaments when her own playing schedule allows, but this time she actually tried her hand at hitting a shot competitively.

As it turned out her swing was not up to the standard of her serve as her feeble effort off the tee at the ninth barely covered 10 yards before plopping into the water. That still produced a consolation high-five from the watching McIlroy. “Excited to be @mcilroyrory’s first ever female caddie today,” tweeted Wozniacki, who is not the first women’s professional tennis star to caddie in this event.

Chris Evert was on her then-husband Greg Norman’s bag in 2009.

Chinese prodigy Guan Tianlang was also in action ahead of his date with history on Thursday when, at just 14, he becomes the youngest-ever player at the Masters. At the other extreme of the age span was the grouping of three former legends of the gameArnold Palmer (83), Gary Player (77) and Jack Nicklaus (73).—AFP

AUGUSTA: Ted Potter Jr. of the United States is congratulated by Matt Kuchar of the United States on winning the Par-3 Contest prior to the start of the 2013 Masters Tournament at Augusta National Golf Club in Augusta, Georgia. — AFP

AUGUSTA: Tim Clark, of South Africa, watches his second shot on the second hole during the first round of the Masters golf tournament yesterday, in Augusta. — AP

Woods and McIlroy set for Masters title bid AUGUSTA: With a resurgent Tiger Woods once again on the prowl and Rory McIlroy seemingly back in form, golf fans eagerly await the start of the 77th Masters which is now only hours away at Augusta National. The year’s opening major is always the most heavily anticipated of the four and, with a myriad of captivating storylines bubbling during the tournament buildup, this latest edition is rich with promise.

Though four-times champion Woods has been installed as a hot favourite after winning three times in his first five starts on the 2013 PGA Tour, the general feeling among the players is that the 93-man field bristles with potential winners.

“We all know what Tiger’s capable of doing,” said Australian world number seven Adam Scott, who has finished in the top 10 for the last two years at the Masters with its spectacular setting amid Georgian pines and blooming azaleas. “He’s always a threat at any golf tournament, but he’s far from just running away with it at the moment. He’s just returned to No. 1 and that’s just a number at the end of the day. “There are so many players playing well.

It’s just not a foregone conclusion.” Twice former champion Bernhard Langer believes that up to 60 players are capable of slipping into the coveted green jacket on Sunday.

“Who would have necessarily thought that Charl Schwartzel would win (in 2011) or even Bubba (Watson) last year? They are all great players but they weren’t necessarily mentioned among the favourites that week,” Langer told Reuters. “Then you have Tiger, Phil (Mickelson), Rory and a bunch of other guys. There are a lot of players who can win and pull it off if they get hot. “I think at least 50, maybe 60, players could win this week,” added the 55-year-old German, who claimed his two green jackets at the Masters in 1985 and 1993. Most eyes, however, will be firmly focused this week on world number one Woods who is bidding to win his first major

title in five years, and his first green jacket since 2005.

His quest to eclipse the record 18 majors won by fellow American Jack Nicklaus had stalled on 14 but now that he has regained full fitness after being plagued by lingering knee injuries and personal strife he appears to be back on track. “I feel comfortable with every aspect of my game,” Woods told reporters earlier this week. “I feel that I’ve improved and I’ve got more consistent, and I think the wins show that.

“That’s something that I’m proud of so far this year, and hopefully I can continue it this week.” Watson, who beat South African Louis Oosthuizen in a playoff last year after conjuring a miraculous shot from pine straw as he hooked a wedge 40 yards through the air for his ball to settle 10 feet from the pin, regards Woods as a hot favourite.

“He’s playing good, so he would be the guy right now,” said the American left-hander. “He’s playing the best. He’s number one in the world, that’s all you need to look at.” As for world number two McIlroy, he will be eager to atone for his nightmarish final-round meltdown at the 2011 Masters when he squandered a four-shot overnight lead with a closing 80. The Northern Irishman will also be champing at the bit to prove that his relatively poor form earlier this season, following his switch in club manufacturers, was simply a temporary phase, though he gave himself a welcome boost by finishing second at last week’s Texas Open.

“Every time you come here to Augusta, you’re wanting to win that green jacket, and every time you don’t it’s another chance missed,” said McIlroy, while adding that anything less than a win this week would be a disappointment. “I have no ill memories of this place at all. I absolutely adore the golf course and it’s great to be here. Everything’s been going well and I’m looking forward to the week.”—Reuters

Sports FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Bruins extend Devils’ woes Coyotes downed Oilers to remain in the playoff NEWARK: The Boston Bruins regained first place in the NHL’s Northeast Division with a 5-4 victory over the reeling New Jersey Devils on Wednesday. Gregory Campbell scored twice in a three-goal first period as the Bruins won for the fifth time in six games.Boston scored three times against Martin Brodeur in the opening 8:12, took a four-goal lead and then held on. Daniel Paille and Campbell capped the outburst with short-handed goals in a 3:21 span.

Zdeno Chara and Tyler Seguin also scored and backup goaltender Anton Khudobin made 24 saves as the Bruins (56 points) moved a point ahead of the Montreal Canadiens with nine games to play in the lockout-shortened season.

New York’s Mats Zuccarello scored the lone goal in the shootout as the Rangers overcame another two-goal performance by Toronto’s Phil Kessel to beat the Maple Leafs 3-2. At Anaheim, California, Matt Duchene had a goal and an assist as the NHLworst Colorado Avalanche won 4-1 to prevent the Ducks from clinching a playoff spot. Two days after criticizing his teammates’ work ethic and focus, Jean-Sebastien Giguere made 21 saves in his first win in nearly two months for Colorado, which snapped a five-game skid. Anaheim could have finalized its postseason plans, but Jonas Hiller stopped just 12 of 16 shots behind a porous Ducks defense.

Rangers 3, Maple Leafs 2, SO Mats Zuccarello scored the lone goal in the shootout, and the York Rangers overcame another two-goal performance by Toronto’s Phil Kessel.

The Rangers moved back into seventh place in the Eastern Conference.

Zuccarello, called out before the game by Rangers coach John Tortorella to score more, connected in the second round of the tiebreaker against James Reimer. Henrik Lundqvist turned aside all three Toronto shooters, and the Rangers (20-16-4) moved into a flat-footed tie with the New York Islanders, who had claimed seventh on Tuesday. The area rivals will meet Saturday on Long Island. The Ottawa Senators also are even with the Rangers and Islanders with 44 points at the bottom of the East race. Toronto has 49 points.

Avalanche 4, Ducks 1 Matt Duchene had a goal and an assist, and the NHL-worst Avalanche prevented Anaheim from clinching a playoff spot. Two days after ripping his teammates’ work ethic and focus, Jean-Sebastien Giguere made 21 saves in his first win in nearly two months for Colorado, which snapped a five-game skid. The Avs responded to their veteran goalie’s criticism with their most impressive victory in a month, scoring three goals in the second period of just their third road win all season to snap a 14-game winless

streak away from Denver. Teemu Selanne scored his 674th career goal for the weary Pacific Division leaders, who had won five of seven. Anaheim could have finalized its postseason plans, but Jonas Hiller stopped just 12 of 16 shots behind a porous Ducks defense.

Coyotes 3, Oilers 1 David Moss and Boyd Gordon each had a goal and an assist as the Coyotes stayed firmly in the playoff picture.

Antoine Vermette also scored for the Coyotes, 5-1-2 in their last eight games. They sit in ninth place in the Western Conference, one point back of the idle Detroit Red Wings for the final playoff berth. Nail Yakupov responded for the Oilers, who are sliding out of contention, having lost four in a row. They trail Detroit by four points. Phoenix and Edmonton each have eight games remaining.

Canucks 4, Flames 1 Roberto Luongo, in a surprise start, made 40 saves and Maxim Lapierre scored the go-ahead goal. Andrew Ebbett centered a pass that Lapierre swatted behind Miikka Kiprusoff from the top of the crease, breaking a 1-1 tie with 9:23 left in regulation. Up until that goal, most of the play in the third period was in Vancouver’s end, where Luongo was sharp, turning aside dangerous chance after chance.

Calgary outshot the Canucks 41-29, including 18-9 in the final 20 minutes.

Alex Burrows, Mason Raymond and Daniel Sedin also scored for Vancouver, winner of nine of its last 12. The Canucks, who began a five-game road trip, opened a six-point lead atop the Northwest Division over Minnesota.

Curtis Glencross with his team-leading 15th had the lone goal for Calgary, which has lost six of its last seven. — Agencies

ANAHEIM: Ben Lovejoy #6 of the Anaheim Ducks is pursued by Cody McLeod #55 of the Colorado Avalanche for the puck in the second period at Honda Center on Wednesday in Anaheim, California. The Avalanche defeated the Ducks 4-1. — AFP

NHL results/standings NY Rangers 3, Toronto 2 (SO); Boston 5, New Jersey 4; Vancouver 4, Calgary 1; Phoenix 3, Edmonton 1; Colorado 4, Anaheim 1.

Eastern Conference Atlantic Division W L OTL GF GA PTS Pittsburgh 30 10 0 132 98 60 NY Islanders 20 16 4 117 120 44 NY Rangers 20 16 4 99 96 44 New Jersey 15 15 10 96 111 40 Philadelphia 17 19 3 107 122 37 Northeast Division Boston 26 9 4 113 85 56 Montreal 25 9 5 122 94 55 Toronto 22 13 5 123 112 49 Ottawa 19 14 6 96 88 44 Buffalo 16 18 6 106 122 38 Southeast Division Washington 21 17 2 120 112 44 Winnipeg 20 19 2 102 121 42 Tampa Bay 17 20 2 124 116 36 Carolina 16 21 2 102 126 34 Florida 13 20 6 96 132 32 Western Conference Central Division Chicago 30 5 4 129 83 64 St. Louis 22 14 2 107 98 46 Detroit 19 15 5 99 101 43 Columbus 17 16 7 95 104 41 Nashville 15 18 8 96 110 38 Northwest Division Vancouver 23 11 6 109 96 52 Minnesota 22 15 2 103 98 46 Edmonton 16 17 7 102 111 39 Calgary 14 21 4 103 138 32 Colorado 13 22 5 94 125 31 Pacific Division Anaheim 27 9 5 124 103 59 Los Angeles 22 14 4 115 101 48 San Jose 20 12 7 98 98 47 Phoenix 18 16 6 108 107 42 Dallas 19 17 3 109 118 41 Note: Overtime losses (OTL) are worth one point in the standings and are not included in the loss column (L)

Australia in a spin over Pakistani refugee MELBOURNE: Mired in gloom following a test drubbing in India, Australian cricket has turned to Canberra’s halls of power for succour, asking the country’s top immigration official to act as a de facto selector ahead of back-to-back Ashes series this year.

Desperate times call for desperate measures, and Australia’s bid to secure a passport to England for Fawad Ahmed, a 31-year-old Pakistani refugee with just 13 first-class matches under his belt, has underscored the anxiety felt Down Under as the national team prepares to do battle with the ‘Old Enemy’.

While Australia’s humiliation in India, their first 4-0 series loss in more than 40 years, was stinging enough, defeat by England in one or both of the Ashes series would be simply unforgivable.

Embittered cricket lovers in the once-mighty test nation have waited over two years for vengeance after England’s 3-1 thrashing of the hosts in the 2010-11 series on home soil, which followed a 21 loss away in 2009. Hence, the determination to leave no stone unturned, and in Ahmed, the resource-rich nation hopes to have unearthed the rarest of commodities Down Under - a world class spin bowler. Born in Swabi, a rural district fringed by the Hindu Kush mountains and the Indus river, the legspinner has taken 39 first class wickets at an average of 32.20 since making his debut for

Abbottabad in 2005. The modest resume has not discouraged Australia’s cricket board, however, who are petitioning immigration minister Brendan O’Connor to fast-track Ahmed’s citizenship and allow him to be available for selection before the first Ashes series gets underway in July. Without the minister’s sign-off, Ahmed could still play a part in England, but would not become eligible until Aug. 18, according to cricket’s global governing body, the ICC. That would be three days before the fifth and final test at the Oval - too long to wait for Cricket Australia.

“Biomechanically, he is like an Anil Kumble who really spins the ball,” former Australia test spinner Stuart MacGill told local media this week, referring to the tall Indian spinner who captured 619 test wickets in a brilliant career.

“I had (former test batsman) Damien Martyn face him and he thinks he’s the best Australian spinner he’s seen since Warney.

“I think he is definitely worth a place in the Ashes squad.” Shane Warne retired with 708 test wickets after helping Australia whitewash England 5-0 in the 2006/07 Ashes series. Australia have lost both Ashes series since and have searched in vain for a successor to the peerless blond legspinner, churning through 12 slow bowlers and discarding almost all of them quickly. — Reuters

Sports FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

34 charged in probe of illegal sports betting OKLAHOMA CITY: A federal indictment unsealed Wednesday accuses 34 people and 23 companies, many of them registered in Central America, of operating an illegal sports bookmaking business that solicited more than $1 billion in bets.

The 95-page indictment, handed up by a federal grand jury in Oklahoma City on March 20, accuses the defendants of operating from San Jose, Costa Rica, and Panama City to take bets almost exclusively from gamblers in the US. The indictment says that since 2003 the operation known as Legendz Sports used the companies to operate as payment processors, launder gambling funds and make payouts to customers. It alleges a conspiracy and accuses the defendants of violat-

ing federal racketeering and money laundering statutes as well as operating an illegal gambling business. The indictment also accuses the defendants of violating illegal gambling statutes in several states, including Oklahoma, California, Colorado, Florida, Nebraska, New York and Texas. “Legendz Sports solicited millions of illegal bets totaling over $1 billion on sports and sporting events from gamblers in the United States,” the indictment alleges. As part of the conspiracy, Legendz Sports operated Internet websites and telephone gambling services from facilities located in Panama, the indictment says.

US Attorney Sanford Coats of Oklahoma City said the charges culminated a multiyear investigation by the FBI and Internal

Revenue Service. “The defendants cannot hide the allegedly illegal sports gambling operation behind corporate veils or state and international boundaries,” Coats said.

The acting chief of the Justice Department’s criminal division, Mythili Raman, said the government is determined to crack down on illegal online gambling by US citizens, regardless of where the business operates or where the defendants live.

“These defendants allegedly participated in an illegal sports gambling business, lining their pockets with profits from over a billion dollars in illegal gambling proceeds,” Raman said.

Among the individual defendants listed in the indictment is Bartice Alan King, 42, of Spring, Texas, who’s accused of conspir-

ing with others to operate gambling services that took wagers almost exclusively from US gamblers. The enterprise allegedly used bookies in the US to illegally solicit and accept sports wagers as well as settle gambling debts. The 34 individual defendants were allegedly employees, members and associates of the Legendz Sports enterprise, the indictment says. Bob Troester, a spokesman for the US Attorney’s Office in Oklahoma City, said King remained at large Wednesday but that 22 other defendants including King’s former wife, Serena Monique King, had been taken into custody.

If convicted, the defendants face up to 20 years in prison for racketeering, up to 20 years for conspiring to commit money

FIA must take clear stance on Bahrain Hill concerned for sport’s reputation SHANGHAI: Former world champion Damon Hill has called on Formula One’s governing body, the FIA, to take a stance and address concerns within the sport about next week’s Bahrain Grand Prix. Hill, Britain’s 1996 champion who is now a television pundit, supported last year’s race after initially urging the authorities to reconsider holding it while the country was in the grip of civil unrest and violent protest.

Hill, speaking ahead of this weekend’s Chinese Grand Prix at a briefing in London organised by British opposition Labour parliamentarian Richard Burden, told F1 reporters he still had reservations and was concerned for the sport’s reputation.

“The question really is whether or not F1 going to Bahrain is actually going to be...furthering brutal repression of people by being an endorsement of the way in which repression has been meted out,” he said. “(Last year) I took the view that the sport and the governing body of the sport should be ensuring that they are not hijacked for the wrong reasons.

I’m not entirely sure that they’ve cleared that point, to be honest.”

The grand prix was cancelled in 2011 following a bloody crackdown on a pro-democracy uprising but went ahead last year, despite calls by activists in Bahrain and campaigners abroad for teams not to race, while police and youths staged nightly clashes with teargas and petrol bombs.

Formula One supremo Bernie Ecclestone, who will be in Bahrain for the fourth race of the season, told Reuters last week that he had no concerns about it becoming a target for

SHANGHAI: Mercedes driver Nico Rosberg of Germany answers questions during the drivers press conference ahead of the Chinese Formula One Grand Prix in Shanghai, China, yesterday. — AP protesters. Hill felt Jean Todt, the French president of the Paris-based International Automobile Federation, was mistaken if he believed the best approach was to say nothing.

“That is a mistake because actually he is being political because he’s being used, or sport is perceived as being used, by its engagement in the economy and the reputation of the country,” he said.

“He (Todt) has not said anything that has distanced the sport from things it would find distasteful and upsetting, which I believe everybody in the sport would actually like to do.

“I think the vast majority of the people in Formula One would like to say ‘we don’t want to come here to make

things worse for people. We would like you to enjoy Formula One, we think Formula One’s got lots of positive things to offer but please don’t on our behalf round people up and brutalise them’. “I don’t see that being political. That’s more ethical than political.”

Hill was speaking before a report

by Human Rights Watch on Wednesday that police in Bahrain had arrested 20 opposition activists in towns near the Sakhir Formula One circuit.

The Bahrain government, which resumed reconciliation talks with the opposition in February for the first time since 2011, denied any arrests had taken place. — Reuters

laundering, up to 10 years for money laundering and up to five years for operating an illegal gambling business.

In addition, the indictment seeks forfeiture of at least $1 billion in numerous assets including real estate, bank accounts, brokerage and investment accounts, certificates of deposit, IRAs, domain names, an aircraft, a gas lease and several vehicles. Troester said the investigation is not related to illegal gambling charges against Teddy Mitchell, 58, who is awaiting trial on a federal indictment that accuses him of making millions of dollars by hosting illegal high-stakes poker games at his Oklahoma City home and by illegally taking bets on sporting events. “This is a completely separate case,” Troester said. — AP

Webber did not deserve to win, says Vettel SHANGHAI: Formula One world champion Sebastian Vettel met a barrage of questions about his failure to obey team orders yesterday with an unrepentant smile and cold contempt for Red Bull team mate Mark Webber. Facing a scrum of reporters crammed into his team’s hospitality centre at the Chinese Grand Prix, Vettel showed little apparent remorse for his failure to obey instructions by snatching victory from Webber in Malaysia last month.

There was no ‘war’ between the team mates, he said, but no real trust either. The Australian, added the German in a 20-minute long explanation, had not deserved to win. Vettel said he had not understood the order to hold station, issued in coded form as ‘multi-21’, but would probably have ignored it even if he had fully comprehended.

“Had I understood the message, then I think I would have thought about it, reflected on what it means, what the team wants me to do, to leave Mark in first place and me finishing second. And I think I would have thought about it and probably done the same thing because Mark doesn’t deserve that.”

Pressed by Reuters on why he felt Webber, who had obeyed instructions to turn down the engine and look after the tyres, had not deserved to win, Vettel replied bluntly: “I don’t like to talk ill of other people. It’s not my style. I think I said enough. The bottom line is that I was racing, I was faster, I passed him, I won.”

The tone of the encounter was set from the first question enquiring of Vettel how he felt to be the ‘bad guy’ after previously being the ‘good guy’. “I don’t consider myself the bad guy,” replied the 25-year-old, who said on Wednesday that he had apologised to the team after the race for his act of disobedience but not for winning. “I don’t think I did something that was particularly bad.” Asked whether he could still count on Webber’s support later in the season, Vettel smiled: “Being completely honest, I never have support from his side. I’ve got a lot of support from the team and I think the team is supporting both of us the same way.

“I respect him a lot as a racing driver but I think there were more than one occasions in the past where he could have helped the team and he didn’t. “I wouldn’t call it trust to be honest,” he said of their pairing. “I think we have a professional relationship.” Webber and Vettel have been team mates since 2009 and their time together has been punctuated by flare-ups, with the 36year-old Australian accusing Austrian-owned Red Bull of favouring the German. —Reuters

Sports FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Premier League approves goal-line technology

LONDON: The Premier League has approved the use of goal-line technology in the English top flight from the 2013-14 season onwards, it was announced yesterday. British-based firm Hawk-Eye was chosen to supply the technology at a meeting attended by the chairmen of the 20 Premier League clubs.

“I’m for it and all the other clubs are for it. They are all in favour,” Stoke City chairman Peter Coates told Sky Sports television. “(Hawk-Eye) were the preferred bidders and I am sure they got it right.”

Hawk-Eye, a camera-based system that tracks the movement of the ball and notifies the referee as soon as it has crossed

the goal-line, will now be installed at all Premier League grounds.

The Football Association also intends to install a system at Wembley Stadium in time for the traditional pre-season opener, the Community Shield, in August. HawkEye, which was bought by electronics giant Sony in 2011, already provides balltracking systems for tennis and cricket.

Earlier this month, world governing body FIFA chose German firm GoalControl, which uses another camera-based system, to provide the technology at the Confederations Cup, which takes place in Brazil.

GoalControl is also in the running to

provide the system for the World Cup next year, although no announcement has been made on the provider. Goal-line technology has been introduced in a bid to eliminate controversies that occur when officials fail to notice that the ball has crossed the goal-line during matches.

One recent high-profile example occurred at the 2010 World Cup in South Africa, when England midfielder Frank Lampard was denied a goal in his side’s last-16 encounter with Germany despite his shot having clearly crossed the line.

The technology was used for the first time at last year’s Club World Cup in Japan, when systems developed by both

Hawk-Eye and GoalControl were deployed. Former Arsenal and FA vicechairman David Dein has long campaigned for the technology to be introduced and said it has widespread backing from match officials.

“The Premier League will be the first league in Europe to introduce it,” he said at the Soccerex conference in Manchester, northwest England.

“I have been on this campaign for six or seven years and now it’s going to happen. The referees need help, the camera will always beat the eye, and every referee in the Premier League is in favour of it.” — AFP

Stars rest as Heat clinch playoff home-court edge Bryant has 47 in Lakers’ 113-106 win

WASHINGTON: Defending NBA champion Miami, playing without its top stars, clinched this season’s best NBA record and a home-field advantage in the playoffs with a 103-98 victory Wednesday at Washington.

Ray Allen scored 23 points to lead the Heat, who lacked LeBron James due to a sore right hamstring, Dwyane Wade with a knee bruise and ankle sprain, Chris Bosh with the flu and Udonis Haslem with a sore right ankle.

The Heat set a new team record for victories in a single season with 62 and ensured they will finish atop the San Antonio Spurs, the leaders of the NBA Western Conference, for the top playoff seed.

At 62-16, Miami had already clinched the top Eastern Conference mark. Rashard Lewis scored 17 points for the Heat. while Shane Battier added 15 points and Mike Miller had 14 points and eight rebounds for Miami. The Wizards, led by A.J. Price’s 23 points and 17 from John Wall, saw their nine-game home win streak snapped.

Washington fell to 29-50.

SUNS 102, MAVERICKS 91 P.J. Tucker scored 17 points, including two key baskets in the closing minutes, and Phoenix helped eliminate Dallas from postseason contention for the first time since 2000. The Suns blew a 14-point lead in the second quarter and almost did it again in the fourth before hanging on to snap a 10-game losing streak that was their longest in 16 years.

The loss, coupled with the Lakers’ victory at Portland later Wednesday, meant a 12-season streak of playoff trips for the Mavericks (38-40) officially ended.

NETS 101, CELTICS 93 Deron Williams had 29 points and 12 assists to lead Brooklyn over Boston.

Brook Lopez scored 21 points and Joe Johnson added 20 for Brooklyn, which won for the 12 time in 18 games overall and beat the Celtics for the third time in four meetings this season.

The Nets moved closer to wrapping up fourth place in the Eastern Conference and clinching home-court advantage in the first round.

Brooklyn owns a 3 1/2-game edge over idle Chicago with four games left to play in the regular season.

Paul Pierce led Boston with 23 points, Jeff Green added 11 and Kevin Garnett had 11 points and eight rebounds in his second game back after missing the previous eight with an inflamed left ankle.

HAWKS 124, 76ERS 101 Josh Smith had 28 points and 12 rebounds, John Jenkins added 21 points and Atlanta blitzed Philadelphia. Mike Scott contributed 17, Al Horford had 16 and Jeff Teague 13 for the Hawks, who snapped a three-game losing streak and improved to 43-36. The Hawks pulled into a tie with the Chicago Bulls for fifth place in the Eastern Conference playoff chase. The Hawks recently clinched their sixth straight playoff berth but were coming off losses to the Sixers, New York Knicks and San Antonio.

Thaddeus Young led the reeling Sixers with 28 points, while Nick Young had 19 off the bench.

MAGIC 113, BUCKS 103, OT Nik Vucevic had a career-high 30 points and 20 rebounds, Tobias Harris added 30 points and 19 rebounds, and Orlando rallied for an overtime victory over Milwaukee.

The Magic overcame a five-point deficit in the final minute of regulation, sending it to OT on a 3-pointer by Harris with 1.9 seconds left.

Vucevic and Harris combined for nine points in the extra period to help Orlando snap a five-game losing streak.

Monta Ellis led the Bucks with 21 points, and John Henson and Mike Dunleavy each added 17. Henson also had 25 rebounds for Milwaukee, which lost its 14th straight game in Orlando.

LA Lakers 113, Trail Blazers 106 Kobe Bryant scored a season-high 47 points as the Los Angeles Lakers pulled closer to a playoff berth with a 113-106 victory over the short-handed Portland Trail Blazers on Wednesday.

The Lakers moved a game up on the Utah Jazz for the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference.

Portland, missing the playoffs for the second straight season, has lost nine straight, the most since an 11-game skid in the 2005-06 season. Rookie Damian Lillard led the Blazers with a career-high 38 points.

Pau Gasol had 23 points, seven rebounds and nine assists, while Dwight Howard added 20 points and 10 rebounds for the Lakers.

Bryant was 18 of 18 from the free throw line.

NUGGETS 96, SPURS 86 Wilson Chandler scored 29 points and Corey Brewer had 28 as Denver overcame a slow start to post its franchise-record 21st straight home win.

The Nuggets (54-24) also tied their franchise record for victories in an NBA season, with four games remaining, including two at home, where they improved to a league-best 36-3.

Andre Iguodala recorded a triple-double with 12 points, 10 assists and 13 rebounds for the Nuggets, who haven’t lost at home since Jan. 18 against Washington. They broke the old mark of 20 straight home wins set by Doug Moe’s 1984-85 team.

the Buffalo Braves. The Clippers improved to 31-9 at home, three days after clinching their first Pacific Division title in franchise history.

Nikola Pekovic scored 20 points and Derrick Williams had 13 points and 10 rebounds for the Timberwolves, who got swept 4-0 by the Clippers for the first time since 1992-93.

DENVER: Denver Nuggets guard Anre Iguodala, right, picks up a loose ball as San Antonio Spurs guard Patty Mills, of Australia, covers in the fourth quarter of the Nuggets’ 96-86 victory in an NBA basketball game in Denver on Wednesday. — AP Goran Dragic led the Suns with 21 points and 13 assists, while Luis Scola had 11 points and a season-high 15 rebounds.

Shawn Marion led the Mavericks with 22 points and nine rebounds. Dirk Nowitzki scored 21 points and Vince Carter had 18.

CLIPPERS 111, TIMBERWOLVES 95 Blake Griffin and Chris Paul led seven players in double figures with 19 points apiece, and Los Angeles beat Minnesota for its franchise-record 31st home win of the season.

Paul added 11 assists, and Willie Green had 15 points in breaking the old mark of 30 wins by the 1974-75 team, when it was known as

PISTONS 111, CAVALIERS 104 Andre Drummond scored a career-high 29 points and Detroit won a second straight game for the first time in two months.

Greg Monroe’s basket with 38.8 seconds remaining gave Detroit a 105-103 lead and the Pistons, who hadn’t won consecutive games since Feb. 8-9, swept the four-game season series from the Cavaliers.

Detroit has beaten Cleveland six straight times.

Drummond also grabbed 11 rebounds, while Monroe scored 23 points and Rodney Stuckey added 18. Kyrie Irving scored 27 points, including 21 in the second half, but missed a 3-pointer that would have given the Cavaliers the lead with 21 seconds left. The All-Star guard was playing on the second night of back-to-back games for the first time since returning from a shoulder injury.

KINGS 121, HORNETS 110 John Salmons had 22 points, and Jason Thompson and Marcus Thornton each added 20 to help Sacramento snap a four-game losing streak.

The Kings led by 17 at the half and surpassed the 100-point mark early in the fourth quarter when they stretched the lead to 28 points against the struggling Hornets.

The victory halted a season-high five-game home losing streak for the Kings, who have a 20-20 record at Sleep Train Arena. The Kings haven’t had a .500 or better home record since the 2007-08 season, when they went 26-15. Isaiah Thomas had 15 points and DeMarcus Cousins 11 for the Kings. Eric Gordon scored 23 points for the Hornets. — AP

Sports FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Premier League preview

United refocus on title assault after City blip LONDON: A chastening home defeat to Manchester City has given Premier League leaders Manchester United all the incentive they need to win against Stoke City on Sunday and move closer to sealing a 20th English league title.

Champions City cut United’s lead to 12 points after Monday’s 2-1 win at Old Trafford, though with seven games remaining the Premier League trophy appears destined to be prised from their grasp by their neighbours.

City manager Roberto Mancini has already conceded the title to United but a fired-up Stoke, dragged into a relegation battle by a dismal run of form, will be desperate to take at least a point from Alex Ferguson’s men in the 1305 GMT kickoff.

If Mancini is already planning for next season, his City players have not quite given up hope that United might still slip up. “In our dressing room, we think it is mathematically still possible,” said City midfielder James Milner, whose side face Chelsea in an FA Cup semi-final on Sunday.

“Hopefully we’ve put a bit of doubt in there. It could be a bit of a stumble. If this rocks them, then great,” he added in reference to Monday’s derby victory. The loss was United’s first in the league since Nov. 17 and ended a run of six games without conceding a goal.

Ferguson promised his side would “have a go” on Sunday and have three wins and a draw from their last four trips since Stoke

returned to the top flight. Stoke, in 15th but only three points above the drop zone, have just one league win this year.

“With the supporters right behind us, the spirit of the club will take us through,” said goalkeeper Asmir Begovic. Sunderland sit one place above the drop zone and a highlycharged atmosphere is certain when they head a few miles north to take on bitter rivals Newcastle on Sunday (1100).

Sunderland are level on 31 points with 18th-placed Wigan Athletic and after a run of nine games without a win, new manager Paolo Di Canio has told his players they have to “fight a war” at St. James’ Park.

“I’m looking forward to the game and every match we’re in now is a cup final,” said defender Danny Rose.

“I’ve heard from the staff and the lads that it’s a hostile atmosphere and I’m looking forward to it. We shouldn’t be in this position but we have to try and forget about that and do our best over the next six games.”

On Saturday (1400) 16th-placed Aston Villa, on 33 points, host Fulham while bottom club Reading host Liverpool and second-last Queens Park Rangers travel to Everton, in what is swiftly becoming the pair’s last chance at a miraculous escape from relegation.

Arsenal can further unhinge Tottenham Hotspur’s pursuit of a top four spot knowing a victory at home to Norwich City (1400) on Saturday would lift them a point above their north London rivals into fourth. — Reuters

German League preview

Hamburg running out of excuses, warns coach BERLIN: Hamburg SV players will be battling for a European spot as well as their jobs when they take on fellow Europa League hopefuls Mainz 05 tomorrow.

Coach Thorsten Fink has seen his team slump to three straight defeats, including an embarrassing 9-2 demolition by newlycrowned champions Bayern Munich. The defeats have put some distance between Hamburg and the Europa League spots they have been chasing all season and have triggered a furious reaction from Fink.

“There are no more excuses,” Fink told reporters after a long talk with his players on Wednesday. “Everyone has to see how they can improve.” As a first measure Fink stripped Heiko Westermann of the captaincy and handed the armband to Dutch international Rafael van der Vaart for the remaining six league games.

“I think he can handle this role better at the moment,” said Fink, piling further pressure on the Dutchman, who has yet to shine after his return to Hamburg this season.

Fink also promised changes in the summer and those changes would be determined by each of his players’ commitment starting tomorrow.

“What I now want to see is who will bleed for the club, who will give it everything they have for the club and its people, the people who work here. “Those who will keep working will stay on in the summer. The others can start looking for a new club.”

Former European champions Hamburg, the only club never to have been relegated to the second division since the creation of the Bundesliga 50 years ago, have been battling it out in the lower half of the league in the past few seasons.

They are currently in 11th place on 38 points after winning just one of their last six games, with Mainz a point ahead in eighth. “I have thought long about it and if we do not change some things now then we will not move forward,” said Fink. “We are going to Mainz to get that good result.”

With the Bundesliga title already secured, leaders Bayern Munich could be forgiven for taking their foot off the pedal after also clinching a Champions League semi-final spot on Wednesday with a 4-0 aggregate win over Italy’s Juventus.

With their treble season still on track, coach Jupp Heynckes is expected to rest several key players when they host Nuremberg in their Bavarian derby, Bayern’s first home appearance as the new league champions.

Dortmund, who won last season’s title, have also moved into the Champions League last four but are eager to tighten their hold on second place on their trip to bottom-placed Greuther Fuerth.

Bayern Leverkusen, in third place six points behind, travel to improving Schalke 04, who are fourth, with both teams battling for a Champions League spot for next season. — Reuters

Chan dazzles at Team Trophy despite spill TOKYO: World champion Patrick Chan fell and stumbled after two big jumps but still dominated the men’s short programme while hosts Japan took the lead after the first day of the World Team Trophy yesterday.

With a 5.80-point lead going into the final free skate on Friday, the 22-year-old Canadian was quick to praise the six-nation event as a dry run for a similar team competition due to make its Olympic debut in Sochi next year.

“I’ve always complained that a lot of swimmers can get eight medals at one Olympics and figure skaters only get one chance to get one medal,” said Chan, who won a third straight world title four weeks ago. “So this is a great opportunity. I think it is gonna be really a lot of fun and a lot of motivation to want to skate well,” Chan said. Chan fell after his opening quadruple toeloop and stumbled when he landed his next jump, a triple axel.

But he followed a planned triple lutz with a triple toeloop which he had missed in the opening combination attempt, skating to “Elegie in E-Flat Minor” by Sergei Rachmaninoff.

He also hit a maximum level-four in three spins and one step sequence to collect 86.67 points, with Japan’s Daisuke Takahashi second on 80.87 and Russian Konstantin Menshov third on 80.60.

“It was difficult to get concentrated,” Chan said, pointing to early practice and an afternoon opening ceremony. “Hopefully, I won’t make the same mistakes tomorrow.”

Russia’s 16-year-old Adelina Sotnikova, the European silver medallist, took the women’s short programme with 67.13 points. Japan’s Akiko Suzuki was second on 66.56 and 17-year-old American Gracie Gold third on 60.98.

The third World Team Trophy, with $1 million in prize money, brings together selected skaters from the six countries that scored the highest combined points at major senior and junior competitions in the past 2012-2013 season. Each nation can field two entries in both the men’s and women’s singles and one each in the pairs and ice dance. Japan, which won the second edition in 2012, led the first day with 47 placement points with the United States second on 47 and Russia third on 41.

TOKYO: Russia’s Adelina Sotnikova performs in the women’s short program at the World Team Trophy figure skating competition in Tokyo yesterday.— AFP First place in each category is awarded 12 placement points with less points given to lower finishes. When tied on points, teams with better individual standings are placed higher.

Canada stood fourth on 34 points as Olympic ice dance champions Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir were absent from the squad. Instead Kaitlyn Weaver and Andrew Poje competed for Canada and placed second behind the US couple of Madison Chock and Evan Bates in the

short dance. Japanese-Americans Cathy and Chris Reed, skating for Japan, came in third.

Canada finished runners-up to the United States in the inaugural World Team Trophy in 2009 and third behind Japan and the US last year. Both events were held in Tokyo. The event launched in 2009 was intended to be two-yearly. But the second edition was postponed for a year because of Japan’s March 2011 earthquake-tsunami. — AFP

Sports FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

New rankings low for Brazil, high for Ecuador BERNE: Five-times World Cup winners and 2014 hosts Brazil hit a new low in the FIFA rankings yesterday as they dropped to nineteenth while Ecuador moved into the top 10 for the first time.

Brazil’s 4-0 win over Bolivia at the start of this month, their first since Luiz Felipe Scolari took the reigns for a second stint, failed to stop the rot after draws against Italy and Russia at the end of March.

Part of Brazil’s decline is because they are not involved in World Cup qualifiers

and friendlies count for fewer points under the complicated calculations system.

However, results have been far from impressive - especially against top sides.

They are the fifth-best South American team in the rankings behind Argentina, Colombia, Ecuador and Uruguay.

Venezuela (36), Panama (38), Albania (48), Equatorial Guinea (59), Tajikistan (112) and Afghanistan (139) all joined Ecuador in achieving their highest-ever position.

The rankings continued to make embar-

rassing reading for Asian football with Japan, the confederation’s best-placed team, dropping three places to 29th. South Korea (42) and Australia (46) are their only other teams in the top 50.

Ivory Coast are Africa’s best-placed team at 12th with Mexico, in 14th, leading the way for CONCACAF. There was no change in the top three where Spain lead from Germany and Argentina. Croatia moved to fourth to equal the position they achieved after finishing third at the 1998 World Cup.

Bhutan, San Marino and Turks and Caicos Islands stayed level at the bottom.

1.

(1) Spain 2.

(2) Germany 3.

(3) Argentina 4.

(9) Croatia 5.

(7) Portugal 6.

(6) Colombia 7.

(4) England 8.

(5) Italy 9.

(8) Netherlands 10. (11) Ecuador. — Reuters

SPANISH LEAGUE PREVIEW

Suffering Malaga to focus on La Liga

MONTERREY: Monterrey’s Severo Meza (L) vies for the ball with LA Galaxy’s Michael Stepens (R) during their CONCACAF Champions League second leg semi-final match at Tecnologico stadium in Monterrey, Nuevo Leon state yesterday. — AFP

FRENCH LEAGUE PREVIEW

Lyon in downward spiral as European hopes fade PARIS: Olympique Lyon’s worst run for 20 years in the top flight has left the seven-times Ligue 1 champions on the verge of missing out on a Champions League spot for the second year in a row. Lyon, who host mid-table Toulouse on Sunday, have slipped from second to fourth in the standings after losing three league games in succession for the first time since 1993.

They trail second-placed Olympique Marseille, who occupy the last direct Champions League qualifying spot, by four points with seven games left. Third-placed St Etienne are ahead of Lyon on goal difference with 53 points and can open a provisional three-point lead over their rivals when they visit mid-table Valenciennes today.

“Something is being broken and I am quite worried,” Lyon coach Remi Garde told reporters after OL suffered a humiliating 2-0 defeat at lowly Stade Reims last weekend.

“I see there is less enthusiasm in the team and when an effort is being made it is more individual than collective.” Lyon, French soccer’s shining light in the last decade when they won seven league titles in a row from 2001, played in the Champions League for 12 straight years but were in the Europa League this term after finishing fourth in Ligue 1 last season. To stay in touch with St

Etienne and hold off fifth-placed Lille, whose remarkable rise has taken them within a point of Lyon, Garde’s struggling team will need Bafetimbi Gomis and Lisandro Lopez to rediscover their scoring touch.

Gomis has netted only twice this year while Lisandro has scored three times since January with OL losing all three games.

St Etienne, on the other hand, have been able to rely on their trusty Gabon striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, seven of whose 17 league goals this season have come in 2013 helping Les Verts to establish a 16-game unbeaten run.

Lille, who won seven of their last eight league games, are on a high as they entertain Marseille on Sunday looking to benefit from any slip up by St Etienne or Lyon.

“We will have no pressure because we are coming back from so far behind,” Lille midfielder Florent Balmont told the club website (www.losc.fr).

OM, though, have shown they have the ability to win ugly, having ground out 10 1-0 league victories this season. Nice, sixth on 51 points, are one point behind Lille and also eyeing third place as they prepare to host strugglers Sochaux on Sunday. — Reuters

MADRID: After the shock of Tuesday’s cruel Champions League exit, Malaga face a La Liga clash at home to relegation-battling Osasuna tomorrow that could be crucial to their chances of qualifying for next season’s edition of Europe’s elite club competition.

The Qatar-owned club, making their Champions League debut, are still fuming after Bundesliga side Borussia Dortmund struck twice in added time to seal a 3-2 victory and their passage to the last four.

Several Dortmund players were in offside positions in the buildup to the winning goal and Malaga have said they will lodge a formal complaint with governing body UEFA about the performance of the match officials.

Coach Manuel Pellegrini and his players must put that to one side for the visit of Osasuna as they seek to recapture fourth spot from Real Sociedad, who beat them 4-2 in San Sebastian last weekend and play at Rayo Vallecano on Sunday.

“Being within touching distance of winning the tie and then conceding that third goal they must be hurting,” Osasuna goalkeeper Andres Fernandez told a news conference on Wednesday.

“But we need to ignore all that and be focused and switched on so that we can get a vital three points,” he added.

With eight games remaining, Malaga are sixth on 47 points, two behind Valencia, who play at resurgent Espanyol on Saturday, and four adrift of Sociedad.

Real Betis also have 47 points in seventh and play city rivals Sevilla today, while Osasuna are five points above the relegation places in 15th. Even if Malaga qualify for the Champions League or the Europa League, they may not be able to take up their place after earning a UEFA ban from continental competition due to delays in payments to creditors.

The Costa del Sol club are appealing the sanction at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) with a decision expected in coming weeks.

While the fight for lucrative European places hots up, Barcelona are closing in on a fourth title in five years and can take a step closer to dethroning champions Real Madrid with a win at Real Zaragoza on Sunday.

Barca are 13 points clear of their arch rivals at the top, with Atletico Madrid a further three points back in third.

Coach Tito Vilanova is likely to field a considerably weakened team at Zaragoza to keep key performers fresh and avoid any more injuries ahead of the Champions League semi-final, first legs in two weeks time.

Lionel Messi may be rested after coming off the bench to help Barca past Paris St Germain on Wednesday.

The Argentine World Player of the Year returned from a hamstring strain to play the final half an hour at the Nou Camp but was clearly not fully fit.

Vilanova’s Real counterpart Jose Mourinho is also likely to rest players for the Madrid club’s game at Athletic Bilbao on Sunday after they also made it into the Champions League semi-finals.

Real have given up on the domestic league title but still have a chance of winning two trophies as they are through to the King’s Cup final to face Atletico. — Reuters

FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

United refocus on title assault after City blip Page 46

www.kuwaittimes.net

DUBAI: A motocross rider shows his skills during a training session outside Burj Khalifa on the eve of the 2013 Red Bull X-Fighters World Tour in the Gulf emirate of Dubai yesterday. — AFP

Stars rest as Heat clinch playoff home-court edge Page 45

Local FRIDAY, APRIL 12, 2013

Man commits suicide after killing brother KUWAIT: An expat seemed to have fatally attacked his brother and then committed suicide by jumping from a high-rise in Sharq. Police reached the site after receiving a call about a man committing suicide and saw a dead body lying there. The haris informed them that the man was an American of Indian origin who had arrived recently in Kuwait and was living with his brother. Policemen then went to the fourth floor flat where they found another body with its head smashed. It was found that the body was of the brother of the man who had committed suicide.

Police found a mortar along with bloodied gloves in the flat.

Preliminary investigations revealed that the two brothers were involved in some financial disputes, and during an argument, the American picked up the mortar and hit his brother five times on the head, then smashed the window and hurled himself.

Lovers caught A Nepalese maid who let her lover sneak into the house when the family members of her sponsor were asleep was caught along with the man. The woman of the house was alerted by loud noises coming from the maid’s room and asked her husband to check out. The sponsor went to the room and found the two in a compromising position. He called the police who arrested both of them.

Youth shoots maid Sabah Al-Nasser police are questioning a youth about an incident in which his neighbor’s maid was shot with a low caliber gun. The maid was clearing the trash when she was hit in the abdomen. A police patrol went to the area accompanied by an ambulance. The injured maid was rushed to a hospital while the adolescent was taken to the police station, accompanied by one of his relatives, for questioning.

Man nabbed after chase In a dramatic chase sequence, Mubarak Al-Kabeer traffic officers arrested a wanted man who tried to speed away as officers gave him chase, and even made a last ditch attempt to escape on foot when a tyre of his car burst. Brig Ihsan Al-Owayesh had noticed the car being driven without number plates. He informed the operations room and a patrol was sent but when it approached the vehicle, the driver increased the speed, ignoring orders to pull over. — Al-Watan

KUWAIT: As traffic came to a halt yesterday on the Fifth Ring Road at around 2.30 pm and the three lanes were moving at a snail’s pace, traffic law violators were vrooming in the emergency lane with scant regard for even the speed cameras.

Kuwait participates in human trafficking meet First regional conference held on forced labor

AMMAN: Kuwait General Labor Union Secretary General Fares Al-Sawwagh takes part in a two-day human trafficking conference. — KUNA

AMMAN: A total of 12 Arab nations including Kuwait, besides several labor exporting countries, gathered in Amman to take part in the first regional conference on human trafficking.

They stressed on the importance of concerting effort to apply national regulations and abide by international standards that help in fighting the human trafficking and forced labor phenomena. The participants included representatives of governments, as well as workers and workers’ unions. They called for establishing a fund dedicated to supporting victims of forces labor, and to covering legal costs for those who get involved in court cases to help them defend their rights.

Kuwait was represented by Kuwait General Labor Union Secretary General Fares Al-Sawwagh in the two-day conference, which concluded its activities Wednesday night. The conference, organized by the International Labor Organization, is a great chance to exchange expertise and visions, and present the Kuwait General Labor Union views, besides explaining the Kuwaiti regulations related to human trafficking, Sawwagh told KUNA. The participants discussed the results of a study prepared by the International Labor Organization regarding the relation between labor migration and human trafficking, he said. They shed light on the challenges hampering the protection of workers’ rights in the Middle East, he added. — KUNA

UNHCR lauds Kuwait’s humanitarian work KUWAIT: The visiting United Nation Higher Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Astrid Stort has applauded Kuwait’s pioneering role in humanitarian work, particularly the support to refugees. In a press statement during her visit to the Kuwait Red Crescent Society (KRCS) headquarters, Stort spoke highly about the major role of KRCS in offering humanitarian and relief aid for the refugees and displaced people in conflicts and disasters-stricken areas around world, especially those displaced by the ongoing Syrian crisis.

For his part, KRCS Chairman Barjas Al-Barjas hailed the highly fruitful coordination and cooperation with the UNHCR. Barjas urged the UN organization to send experts to offer training to relief work volunteers in Kuwait. He reiterated that Kuwait will continue its support to Syrian refugees to help ease their sufferings. — KUNA

KUWAIT: Kuwait Red Crescent Society Chairman Barjas Al-Barjas meets visiting United Nation Higher Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Astrid Stort yesterday. — KUNA