His Majesty orders VAT review during trial phase

Saudi’s first robot gets first job at govt entityJeddah

Saudi Arabia’s first robot employee started work at one of the kingdom’s government entities and has been handed its job ID

as well as his required functions, Arab News reported yesterday.

The robot attended its first meeting on Sun-day morning at the Technical and Vocational Training Corporation (TVTC), in the presence of the kingdom’s Minister of Education Ahmed Al Issa, and the governor of TVTC Ahmed Al Fahaid.

The new employee Teqany’s job description includes customer service, conducting surveys and delivering messages. Welcoming the min-ister in typical robo-voice, Teqany promised to be the perfect employee, which was met with applause from the minister and his entourage.

Teqany has also been employed to welcome and usher in visitors at the 33rd Janadriyah Fes-tival, which opened last Thursday, during which Saudi Arabia celebrates its heritage and history.

The robot will contribute to serving customers through an electronic evaluation system, and the delivery of messages to visitors to exhibitions and activities of the TVTC.

This will help Saudi citizens to benefit from cutting-edge technology, which will achieve the kingdom’s “Vision 2030” reform plan, Al Issa said.

03Untrained hijama practitioners ‘putting people’s health at risk’

04An emerging wedding destination

05 A land of tolerance

8

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His Majesty orders VAT review during trial phase• The official urged all consumers to report all VAT violations to the National Call Centre by giving a ring on 80008001.

Manama

His Majesty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa has di-rected competent execu-

tive agencies to review the Value Added Tax (VAT) mechanisms during the trial phase.

HM the King stressed the ne-cessity of heeding citizens’ needs

and exempting basic goods and commodities which affect citi-zens’ income.

A meeting will be held to-morrow morning with Bahrain Chamber of Commerce and In-dustry (BCCI) to discuss the Value Added Tax (VAT) mechanisms during the trial phase.

The meeting follows royal di-rectives issued by His Majesty. Finance and National Econo-my Minister Shaikh Salman bin Khalifa Al Khalifa said that the meeting would be attended by Industry, Commerce and Tour-ism Minister Zayed Al Zayani.

In this regard, Mr Al Zayani, chaired an emergency meeting with the Consumer Protection Department on price control pro-cedures and the exemptions of ba-sic goods and services from VAT.

The Ministry of Industry, Com-merce and Tourism said that it is keen to strengthen consum-er’s confidence and to promote a more integrated and stable mar-ket following the implementation

of VAT beginning January 1, 2019, at a standard rate of five per cent.

The Assistant Undersecretary for Domestic Trade, Hameed

Yousif Rahma, affirmed that the ministry, in co-ordination with the National Bureau for Taxation (NBT), has implemented admin-istrative and legal mechanisms aimed at promoting the principles of a free market to enhance com-petition and transparency in addi-tion to mitigating unfair practices.

Mr Rahma went on noting that MOIC’s Companies Control Directorate has intensified its efforts in monitoring the perfor-mance of all commercial estab-lishments by closely observing the movement of all goods and service to enhance transparen-cy and to cultivate a culture of awareness and neutrality that complies with VAT regulations.

His Majesty

The directorate has implemented consumer

protection measures to prevent collusion,

overpricing and fraudulent commercial activities in addition to ensuring that VAT is not charged on zero-rated

goods and services. MR RAHMA

The management and staff of The Daily Tribune

wishes its readers a

Projects reviewed HRH Premier directs ministries to speed up the implementation of developmental projects

• The Prime Minister also gave directives to reduce traffic congestions in towns and villages by creating additional exits and expanding streets.

Manama

Th e C a b i n e t s e s s i o n chaired by His Royal Highness Prime Minis-

ter Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa yesterday reviewed the main developmental pro-jects being implemented in the Kingdom.

While reviewing the pro-grammes and projects imple-mented across the kingdom’s villages and towns to provide the

necessary facilities and infra-structure, HRH the Premier gave instructions to implement plans to build 1,200 housing units in Dar Kulaib and Hoorat Sanad.

The Prime Minister also gave directives to reduce traffic con-gestions in towns and villages by creating additional exits and expanding streets.

HRH the Premier also direct-ed ministries to determine the service projects that may be im-

plemented in co-operation with the private sector, including the possibility of the sector’s financ-ing of youth and sports centres.

Among other things, the Prime Minister gave directives to all ministries and government entities to follow up on the re-marks stated in the report of the National Audit Office, and to take prompt action against financial and administrative vi-olators, if any.

In this regard, the Premier emphasised the government’s keenness to consolidate control and auditing in all transactions, and to firmly address any short-comings that may lead to wast-ing public money.

The Cabinet expressed its solidarity with Saudi Arabia in the face of attempts to interfere into its internal affairs, discredit its leadership or status or un-dermine its sovereignty, citing the recent resolution of the US Senate that was based on false allegations.

Within the same context, the session lauded the “responsible stances” of the US Administra-tion, led by President Donald Trump, as well as its “commend-able” efforts to promote peace and combat terrorism through joint action with its allies in the region.

HRH the Premier chairs the Cabinet.

A Saudi official interacts with Teqany at a recently held expo.

1,200housing units will be allocated soon as per

the Premier’s directives.

The Christmas angel

A young woman dressed in an angel costume participates in a Parad Nwel (Christmas parade) in Port-au-Prince, Haiti.

American team to visit Turkey Washington

A US military delegation will visit Turkey this

week to discuss the with-drawal of American ground forces from Syria, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s spokesman said on Monday.

“They will discuss how to coordinate (the with-drawal) with their counter-parts,” Ibrahim Kalin told a news conference in Ankara after US President Donald Trump’s shock decision last week to order the pull-out of 2,000 troops.

The US has for years sup-ported the Kurdish-led Syr-ian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the fight against the Daesh terrorist group in Syria.

UN team head visits Hodeidah PortHodeidah

The head of the United Nations team tasked

with monitoring a fragile cease-fire in the flashpoint city of Hodeidah on Mon-day visited its lifeline docks, a port official said.

Retired Dutch gener-al Patrick Cammaert also called on Yemen’s warring sides to respect the hard-won truce agreed this month in Sweden, Hodeida port deputy director Yehya Sharafeddin said.

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Maliki statement rapped Foreign Affairs Ministry summons deputy chargé d’affaires of Iraqi Embassy to express protest

TDT | Manama

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned Ni-had Rajab Askar, deputy

chargé d’affaires of the Embassy of the Republic of Iraq to the Kingdom following a statement by former Prime Minister of Iraq Nouri Al Maliki, which amounted to intervening in the internal affairs of the Kingdom.

The Undersecretary for Re-gional and GCC Affairs, Waheed Mubarak Sayyar, expressed to the Iraqi diplomat Bahrain’s strong dismissal and disapprov-

al of the statements issued by Al Maliki, as blatant and unaccept-able interference in the internal

affairs of the Kingdom.Ambassador Sayyar brought

to the Iraqi diplomat’s atten-tion that such irresponsible statements represent a clear violation of the international conventions and principles of non-interference in the internal affairs of other states in addition to being against the nature of the brotherly and multi-level relations between the Kingdom and Iraq.

The Undersecretary affirmed that Mr Maliki’s participation in the inauguration of a Baghdad office for the so-called 14th of

February Youth Coalition that operate in Bahrain and is clas-sified as a terrorist organisa-tion along with his hostile state-ments is highly condemnable.

He also described Al Maliki’s attitude as a clear solidarity with those who seek to spread cha-os, violence and terrorism and exhibit hatred not only towards the Kingdom but also towards the Arab states and peoples.

Ambassador Sayyar stressed that the Kingdom, which always commits itself to an approach of non-interference in the internal affairs of other states, is keen to

provide all means of support and assistance to the sisterly states and totally rejects any form of in-terference in its internal affairs by any person or entity.

He also called on the Iraqi government to oppose such statements, refrain from host-ing similar seminars and rallies for organisations classified as terrorist organisations or har-bouring them on its territory.

He urged the Iraqi officials to take all necessary measures to stop such interventions in order to maintain relations between the two brotherly countries.

Al Maliki’s attitude shows a clear

solidarity with those who seek to spread chaos, violence and

terrorism and exhibit hatred not only

towards the Kingdom but also towards

the Arab states and peoples.

AMBASSADOR SAYYAR

Mr Al Maliki

A cultural evening was organised by the Indian Embassy on the occasion of the visit of Indian Youth Delegation to Bahrain. The event was attended by Ambassador Tawfeeq Al Mansoor, Assistant Undersecretary, Ministry of Foreign Affairs; First Deputy Speaker of Bahrain, Senior Government Officials, other Bahraini Dignitaries, Bahraini Youth delegations and members of the Indian Community in Bahrain. The cultural evening included address by Indian Ambassador Alok Kumar Sinha, Indian classical dance performances, musical performance by the students of University of Bahrain and dance performance by the members of visiting Indian Youth delegation.

Cultural evening

The Bahrain Exhibition Centre Hall 2A has opened Al Hawaj’s Shopping Bazaar, which is considered the best and primary destination for perfume and cosmetics in Bahrain. This event ends on December 29. Al Hawaj Shopping Bazaar provides a great shopping experience where customers can choose from a range of high-quality international perfumes, make-up, skin care products, watches, accessories and luggage as well as home electronics. This collection of exhibits is next to a wide range of world-famous brands: Swarovski, Samsung TCL, Samsonite and American Tourister In addition to a huge number of perfumes, cosmetics and skin care.

Shopping Bonanza

More than 40 students will participate in the dance drama choreographed by Guru Smt Hansul Gani on Thursday at 8.30 pm at the Indian Club. The dance drama is based on five elements - Earth, Water, Fire, Air and Space.

Dance drama

Gulf Air deploys Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner on Manila routeTDT | Manama

Gulf Air, the national carrier of the Kingdom of Bahrain, recently de-ployed its latest Boeing 787-9 Dream-

liner on the Bahrain-Manila route increas-ing the number of destinations served by the Dreamliner to four including London Heathrow, Casablanca Mohammed V Inter-national Airport and Bangkok Suvarnabhu-mi International Airport.

Being one of Gulf Air’s long-haul destina-tions, Manila route will now be permanently served by the state-of-the-art Boeing 787-9

Dreamliner to cater to passenger demands.Earlier this year in April, Gulf Air received

its first Dreamliner marking the airline’s fleet renewal programme. A total of five Dreamliners are now in service with an additional two being delivered in 2019 and three more to enter the fleet in 2020.

Gulf Air’s Boeing 787-9 Dreamliners offer 282 seats in a two-class configuration, with 26 Falcon Gold Class seats and 256 Econ-omy Class seats – a 32 per cent increase in capacity on the airline’s previous wide body offering.

The industry-leading technology of the

Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner boasts superior fuel efficiency, environmentally friendly operations and range flexibility that will facilitate Gulf Air’s planned network ex-pansion and fleet optimisation at a lower operating cost.

Passengers will enjoy many improvements with the 787 family such as the largest win-dows of any jet, air that is cleaner, more humid and at a higher pressure for greater comfort, large overhead bins with room for everyone’s bag, soothing LED lighting and technology that senses and counters turbulence for a smoother ride.


Untrained hijama practitioners ‘putting people’s health at risk’

Public urged to only approach practitioners qualified by the NHRA

• The 25 graduates of the course have received permission from the Kingdom’s health regulatory body to practise hijama at home.

• The initiative was launched with the main aim of ensuring the safety of the practice among those who commercially practice it at home.

TDT | ManamaMohammed Zafran

At home practitioners of hijama (cupping thera-py) who are untrained

and unaware of the best practic-es are putting people’s health as well as the environment at risk, according to experts.

Commercially practising hi-jama at home has become pop-ular because of its increasing local demand. The practitioners invite patients to their home where they offer the cupping sessions.

While some of them are trained by their family mem-bers or friends who have a wide experience in the skill, they may still lack know-how on some of the important steps to be taken for the procedure.

According to well-placed sources, at least 500 at home practitioners of hijama exist in Bahrain.

The National Health Regula-tory Authority Chief Dr Mariam Al Jalahma urged the public to make sure that at home prac-titioners are qualified by the NHRA before visiting them for treatment.

The NHRA has recently start-ed giving permission to at home practitioners to practise hijama at home if they take a course and

pass the tests. Excluding the profession-

ally licensed hijama practi-tioners who work at medical

facilities, currently, there are 25 qualified at home hijama practi-tioners who have received per-mission from NHRA to continue

the practice at home.“Since this procedure involves

blood there needs to be extra care to prevent spreading of dis-eases. It is not safe for untrained, unqualified practitioners to practise this. This is why we are giving the course to qualify peo-ple so that they know the best practices,” she told Tribune.

“We will be monitoring this while making sure that this is practised at the highest stand-ards possible,” she said. She urged the patients to make sure that they are visiting a qualified cupping therapist.

General Manager at Sharjah International Holistic Centre Dr Haiman Elnahal said that apart from the medical concerns, there are also environmental concerns.

“Those who are not qual-ified are unaware of the cor-rect practices and so they of-ten dispose the medical waste incorrectly. This is dangerous for the environment. There are correct practices as directed by the health authorities here in

disposing medical waste like blood,” he said.

“Concerns are also there about infections spreading from per-son to person or from the en-vironment to the patient due to incorrect hijama practices,” he said.

Recently, a first-of-its-kind initiative in the Middle East to certify ‘at home’ practitioners of hijama (cupping therapy) yield-ed its first batch of graduates after they went through an edu-cational course.

The six-day course sanctioned by the National Health Regu-latory Authority was organised by Al Salam Specialist Hospital and tutored by an expert from Sharjah International Holistic Health Centre.

The 25 graduates of the course have received permission from the Kingdom’s health regulatory body to practise hijama at home.

The initiative was launched with the main aim of ensuring the safety of the practice among those who commercially prac-tice it at home.

Cupping therapy is an ancient form of alternative medicine in which a therapist puts special cups on your skin for a few minutes to create suction.

www.uaeexchange.com/bhr

May this festive seasonbring you all happiness and prosperity.

Merry Christmas.

The man tried to escape but he was attacked by the duo, who robbed a

smartphone and golden bracelet from him.

PROSECUTORS

Health authorities will be monitoring

to make sure the profession is practised at

highest standards possible. DR AL JALAHMA

Those who are not qualified

are unaware of correct practices; they often dispose

medical waste incorrectly.

DR ELNAHAL

Court to hear robbery case TDT | Manama Ali Tarif

The First High Crimi-nal Court will today hear the robbery case

in which two Bahrainis are accused of robbing an Asian expatriate.

The incident which led to the case happened in Sitra a few months ago. According to prosecutors, the Asian man was on his way to catch public

bus from his accommodation facility when “two tall men ap-proached him”.

Claiming to be members of the CID department, they asked the man to hand over his CPR, the prosecutors added.

“The man tried to escape but he was attacked by the duo, who robbed a smartphone and golden bracelet from him.

“The duo as well brandished a hammer to threaten the sus-pect.”

According to prosecutors, the first accused has 37 crim-inal cases against him.

Vessel captains course begins TDT | Manama

The Coast Guard Com-mander has inaugurated the 13th course for vessel

captains at the Maritime Train-ing Wing.

It has 13 participants from the

Coast Guard, the Special Secu-rity Force, the National Guard and Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries.

The commander said the course was part of the Coast Guard’s annual training pro-gramme to improve the skills

of the participating personnel.The four-month course is

divided into two phases cov-ering the law on preventing collisions, maps, navigation devices, maritime emergen-cies, first aid, and vessel driv-ing training.


An emerging wedding destination The wedding held on Dec 15, attracted 800 guests from abroad, says BTEA

TDT | Manama

The Kingdom is all set to host many prominent weddings in the coming

months, thanks to its emergence as one of the most sought after wedding destinations in the re-gion.

The Bahrain Tourism and Ex-hibitions Authority (BTEA) has been putting in best efforts to promote the Kingdom as a des-tination for weddings and other happy occasions.

The last exotic wedding host-ed by the Kingdom was that of the son of a leading Indian businessman Sushil Mantri at Four Seasons Hotel Bahrain Bay.

The event attracted more than 800 guests who travelled on Bahrain’s national carrier, Gulf Air, from various Indian cities, including Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi and Chennai, and from other parts of the world.

The three-day wedding in-cluded a series of activities, the first of which was the arrival of the bride and groom in a tra-ditional Bahraini environment and means of transportation; the groom arrived on a pure-bred

Arabian horse accompanied by traditional Indian music and dancers, while the bride arrived to the scene of the wedding on-board a traditional boat at Bah-rain Bay.

After the ceremony, Bahrain’s skyline was adorned with a dis-

play of fireworks to celebrate the wedding and the Kingdom’s National holiday, commemo-rating the joy of both glorious occasions.

On the second day of the cele-brations, the guests were invited to a traditional souq (bazaar)

that was hosted at the hotel’s large halls, allowing guests to witness traditional Bahraini craftsmen at work, manufac-turing beautifully crafted prod-ucts made of gold and pearls, traditional women’s and men’s clothing; and enjoy traditional

sweets and beverages that were presented.

A special programme was or-ganised at the Bahrain Interna-tional Circuit to enjoy karting as a final farewell on the third day.

Highlighting the efforts of BTEA, Dr Ali Hasan Follad,

BTEA’s adviser, said, “BTEA has played a pivotal role in planning and organising this wedding, ensuring that the entire event ran smoothly from end to end.

“By co-ordinating with the authorities concerned, particu-larly, the Ministry of Interior, the Ministry of Information, and other organisations such as Bahrain Airport Company; we worked together diligently as a single team to organise the event’s logistics and ensure the selection of appropriate loca-tions.

“We are pleased to announce that we plan to host more prom-inent weddings this month, and over the course of the next four months, which will enhance Bahrain’s position as an ideal destination for weddings and other celebrations.

“The Kingdom boasts a so-phisticated tourist sector, com-prising four-star and five-star hotels catering to all tastes, offering a variety of upscale amenities in food, beverages and entertainment; and a vibrant tourism sector specialised in or-ganising wedding ceremonies and presenting unique wedding concepts,” he added.

The wedding rituals being carried out the venue.

The Kingdom will host more

prominent weddings over the course of next four months, which will enhance Bahrain’s

position as an ideal destination

for weddings and other

celebrations. MR FOLLAD

‘Special’ Christmas trees from recycled products

• Mr Thomas has been creating ‘unique Christmas trees’ since 2011. “Eight years ago, I began this adventure by making a Christmas tree out of laundry hangers.

TDT | Manama

A longtime resident from India who has been in the Kingdom for the past 37

years has changed the way we look at Christmas trees.

Thomas has decked and dec-orated Christmas trees mostly using recycled products while giving a novel message to the society.

Speaking to Tribune, Thom-as who works as a health club manager, said, “I want to give a message to the society about re-ducing waste by converting them into useful products.

“Every celebration leaves tonnes of waste, which is not at all a good thing. All celebrations should be carried out while ac-knowledging the need to protect the environment.

“I also urge everyone to help the poor and needy as it is our responsibility.”

Mr Thomas has been creating ‘unique Christmas trees’ since

2011. “Eight years ago, I began this adventure by making a Christmas

tree out of laundry hangers. “So far, I have made Christ-

mas trees using oyster shells, sea shells, coins, tennis balls, tree fi-

bres, cardboards and many other products.”

‘Unique Christmas trees’ created by Mr Thomas.

Call to ensure campers’ safetyManama

Southern Governor Shaikh Khalifa bin Ali Al Khalifa yesterday chaired a co-ordination meeting focused on establishing cooper-

ation among competent authorities to ensure campers’ safety during camping season.

The Governor stressed to intensify traffic patrols to reduce bad traffic behaviours and traffic violations, in addition to intensifying environment preservation-related campaigns.

He called on campers to comply with proce-dures and regulations imposed by competent au-thorities to ensure a smooth traffic movement and safety of other campers during camping season, chiefly the New Year’s holiday. The meeting at-tended by representatives of Traffic Directorate, Civil Defence Directorate, Southern Governo-rate Police, Supreme Council of Environment, Southern Municipality, Health Ministry, Tatweer Petroleum and Bahrain National Gas company.

VRS update available Manama

Gove r n m e n t e n t i t i e s have formally informed voluntary Retirement

Scheme (VRS) applicants about their status, in line with the cir-cular issued by the Civil Service Bureau (CSB) president.

“All human resource direc-torates falling under the CSB

authority will co-ordinate with the Social Insurance Organisa-tion to finalise eligible appli-cants procedures, especially those wishing to purchase ad-ditional years of service,” said Organisation and Budgeting director Jamal Abdulaziz Al Alawi.

The CSB has assigned a team

to ensure all successful candi-dates receive their end of ser-vice promotion, in accordance with the CSB directive 4 of 2013.

Mr Al Alawi urged all gov-ernment entities’ human re-source directorates to issue all successful candidates’ previous promotion differences and pre-vious final accounts.

Registration open for ‘Bal-Mahotsav’TDT | Manama

Samast Pariwar Milan (SPM), a group which

was formed in 2009 and has grown and gained high recognition among the Indian community over the period, is host-ing their annual talent competition for children of Bahrain.

The talent comple-tion organised under the banner ‘Bal- Mahot-sav’ will be held on 11th January 2019 from 9:00 am onwards at Al Mahd School.

Sandeep Parkhi, mem-ber of SPM, said, “All chil-dren are welcome to par-ticipate and use this as an opportunity to show-case the talent and unity among Indian communi-ties.

“This celebration aims at showcasing the talent and inculcating the habit of being united. Bal-Ma-hotsav will comprise knowledge enhancing competitions for children followed by the cultural programme and prize dis-tributions.”


Deputy King meets HRH the Premier

The Deputy King His Royal Highness Prince Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, the Crown Prince, met at Gudaibiya Palace yesterday His Royal Highness Prime Minister Prince Khalifa bin Salman Al Khalifa. They discussed local issues as well as regional and international developments. HRH the Deputy King and HRH the Premier stressed that international co-operation has become a necessity amid current challenges that require vigilance in handling them accurately to maintain regional security and stability. They pointed out that international partnership had succeeded to ward off terrorism. Yet, they added, there must be continuous coordination and prevention of misusing technology and advanced telecommunication means to undermine security in countries and affect their development march.

A land of tolerance HH Shaikh Isa bin Salman visits churches to mark Christmas festivities

Manama

On behalf of His Majes-ty King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa, His High-

ness Shaikh Isa bin Salman bin Hamad Al Khalifa, Chairman of the Isa bin Salman Educational Fund, yesterday visited the Na-tional Evangelical, Sacred Heart and St. Peter’s Jacobite Syrian Orthodox churches, as well as St Christopher’s Cathedral, to mark Christmas festivities.

His Highness noted Bahrain’s long history of promoting peace-ful coexistence between all faiths, highlighting in particular HM King Hamad’s role in build-ing on these efforts through the King Hamad Global Centre for Interfaith Dialogue and Peaceful Co-existence.

His Highness stressed that Bahrain continues to attach great importance to fostering

and promoting the principle of multiculturalism to ensure understanding and harmony among the Kingdom’s multi-fac-eted society.

His Highness concluded by

highlighting the importance of encouraging inter-faith dialogue and the values of moderation and respect amongst commu-nities.

Shaikh Khalid bin Ali bin

Abdulla Al Khalifa, Minister of Justice, Islamic Affairs and En-dowment, Jameel Humaidan, Minister of Labour and Social Development, Dr Shaikh Khalid bin Khalifa Al Khalifa, Chair-

man of the Board of Trustees of the King Hamad Global Cen-tre for Interfaith Dialogue and Peaceful Co-existence and other members of the centre were also present.

HH Shaikh Isa, Shaikh Khalid, Mr Humaidan and other officials being received at one of the churches yesterday.

Bahrain Indian School (BIS) celebrated Christmas with great excitement and ardour. Students sang carols, adding special charm to the celebrations. Special assemblies by tiny tots and senior students were conducted highlighting the birth of Jesus Christ, importance of giving gifts, and the importance of the festival as a whole. Students enjoyed the day as they shared food with their friends and played various games.

Christmas celebrations at BIS

Poll objections rejected Manama

The Court of Cassation chaired by Abdullah

Hassan Al Buainain has re-jected all the four objections raised against Bahrain’s par-liamentary and municipal election process.

The Royal Order was is-sued calling to the elections and forming the Higher Elections Commission head-ed by the Minister of Justice, Islamic Affairs and Endow-ments and including the membership of magistrates who oversaw the integri-ty of the national elections throughout all the election stages starting from the dis-playing of voters’ lists, candi-dates’ lists, until announcing the final results of the nation-al elections. All the election stages were closely moni-tored by the supervisory commissions that included men and women magistrates.

The Law on Exercising Po-litical Rights and the Munic-ipal Elections Law boosted the role of the judiciary of directly overseeing the integ-rity of the national elections.

Southern Governorate plans ‘go-green’ drive

TDT | ManamaMohammed Zafran

Authorities in the Southern Governo-rate have been taking measures to improve the greenery with plans to

plant 200 palm saplings. The drive will be carried out at Almuea-

skar Avenue, Zallak Avenue and Shaikh Salman Avenue.

A source from the municipality said that some of the palm saplings are being planted to replace trees that have been infected with certain diseases.

“The department of parks and gardens

always monitors the situation, sees what trees need to be removed and where new ones need to be planted.”

Palm trees are particularly vulnerable to damage causes by a kind of beetle known as Red Palm Weevil that eats away the tree causing irreversible damage.

The infested trees quickly deteriorate as the beetles multiply. Researchers in Bahrain have been taking various measures, including using the satellite imagery to spot such trees. Palm trees are often also used to beautify the streets with festive lights.

Last August, the Manama municipality also announced a similar green drive.

Nearly 200 palm saplings will be planted across the Southern Governorate.

NASA spacecraft hurtles toward historic New Year’s flyby

NASA is about to make history again, on New Year’s Day

AFP | Tampa, United States

A NASA spacecraft is hur-tling toward a historic New Year’s Day flyby of

the most distant planetary ob-ject ever studied, a frozen relic of the early solar system called Ultima Thule.

Four billion miles (6.4 billion kilometres) away, the unmanned spaceship, New Horizons, is poised to zoom by at 12:33 am (0533 GMT) on January 1, at a distance of just 2,200 miles (3,500 kilometres) from Ultima Thule.

That’s more than three times closer than New Horizons came to Pluto when it zipped by the dwarf planet in 2015.

So what is this strange object, which is named after a mythical, far-northern island in medieval literature and has its own rock anthem performed by Queen guitarist Brian May?

“This is truly the most primi-tive object ever encountered by a spacecraft,” said Hal Weaver, project scientist at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab-oratory.

Relatively small, scientists aren’t sure about its exact size.

But they believe it is about 100 times tinier than Pluto which measures almost 1,500 miles (2,414 kilometres) in diameter.

Ultima Thule is also in a freez-ing area of space, suggesting it may remain well preserved.

“Really, it is a relic from the

formation of the solar system,” said Weaver.

‘Attic’ of the solar system Ultima Thule (pronounced

TOO-lee) lies in the Kuiper Belt, a vast cosmic disc left over from the days when planets first formed.

Astronomers sometimes call it the “attic” of the solar system.

Scientists didn’t even know the Kuiper Belt existed until the 1990s.

The Kuiper Belt begins some three billion miles (4.8 billion kilometres) beyond the Sun, past the orbit of Neptune which is the furthest planet from the Sun.

“It is teeming with literally billions of comets, millions of objects like Ultima which are called planetesimals, the build-ing blocks out of which planets were formed, and a smattering -- a handful of dwarf planets the size of continents, like Pluto,” said Alan Stern, principal inves-tigator on New Horizons.

“It is important to us in plane-tary science because this region of the solar system, being so far from the Sun, preserves the orig-inal conditions from four and a half billion years ago,” Stern added.

“So when we fly by Ultima, we are going to be able to see

the way things were back at the beginning.”

High-speed, close encounter The New Horizons spacecraft

is speeding through space at 32,000 miles (51,500 kilometres)

per hour, traveling almost a mil-lion miles per day.

At that pace, if it strikes a piece of debris as small as a rice pellet, the spacecraft could be destroyed instantly.

“We don’t want that to hap-pen,” said Stern.

If New Horizon survives this flyby, it will do so while furious-ly snapping hundreds of pictures of Ultima Thule, in the hopes of revealing its shape and geology for the first time.

New Horizons sent back stun-ning images of Pluto -- including a never before seen heart shape on its surface -- in 2015.

This time, “at closest approach we are going to try to image Ulti-ma at three times the resolution we had for Pluto,” Stern said.

But the flyby “requires ex-tremely precise navigation. Much more precise than we have ever tried before. We might get it, and we might not,” Stern added.

Answers to come? Ultima Thule was first dis-

covered by the Hubble Space Telescope in 2014.

Scientists figured out in 2017 that Ultima Thule is not spher-ical but possibly elongated in shape. It may even be two ob-jects.

It does not project the re-peated, pulsing light scientists expect to see from a rotating cosmic object, raising puzzling questions.

06

world

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 25, 2018

Ultima Thule was first discovered by the Hub-ble Space Telescope in

2014

KNOW WHAT

An illustration of NASA’s New Horizons spaceship

Former Pakistan PM Sharif sentenced to seven years jail for graftAFP | Islamabad, Pakistan

Former Pakistani leader Nawaz Sharif was sen-

tenced to seven years in prison for corruption yes-terday, state media report-ed, the latest conviction in a series of allegations which saw him ousted from power last year.

Sharif, a three-time prime minister, has denied all the charges against him and claims he is being targeted by the country’s powerful security establishment.

Yesterday’s conviction, centred on family business-es in the Middle East, is his second stemming from a corruption investigation spurred by the Panama Pa-pers leak, and comes as new Prime Minister Imran Khan has vowed to tackle endem-ic graft in Pakistan.

Myanmar Reuters journalists appeal seven-year sentenceAFP | Yangon, Myanmar

Lawyers lodged an ap-peal yesterday to free

two Reuters journalists jailed for their reporting on Myanmar’s Rohingya crisis, decrying the sentence as a “mistake” that has already resulted in the pair being locked up for a year.

Wa Lone, 32, and Kyaw Soe Oo, 28, were arrested in December 2017 and lat-er sentenced to seven-year prison terms for what pros-ecutors said was a breach of official secrets law for the possession of classified material on security oper-ations.

Reuters disputed the charge and said the two were set up by police after probing the massacre of 10 Rohingya Muslims during a military crackdown.

France’s Louvre planning Pierre Soulages retrospective next yearAFP | Paris

France’s master of black Pierre Soulages an-

nounced yesterday that he will be the subject of a vast retrospective at the Lou-vre museum in Paris next year, and possibly an ambi-tious show in New York as well.

“ T h e y ’ re b o r row i n g works from the Nation-al Gallery in Washington, the MoMa in New York, the Tate in London. All the great museums are making loans,” Soulages said in an interview to mark his 99th birthday.

Protests, strike pose mounting challenge for Sudan presidentAFP | Khartoum, Sudan

Doctors in Sudan went on strike yesterday, feeding

into deadly protests against bread prices that represent one of the biggest challenges President Omar al-Bashir has faced in nearly three decades in power.

A gathering of professionals from various sectors had issued a call on Sunday to strike as fresh protests hit cities -- in-cluding Omdurman, close to the capital Khartoum -- late into the evening.

The strike “started at 08:00 am (0600 GMT) in the morning” and hospital workers were the first to take part, said Moham-med al-Assam, a member of a committee of doctors.

The committee said in a statement that it would submit an official demand on Tuesday for the “president’s immediate resignation in response to the uprising by the Sudanese peo-ple... (and the) formation of a transitional government”.

The protest movement has hit around a dozen cities since

Wednesday, after the govern-ment tripled the price of bread, in a country beset by economic crisis.

Eight people have died in demonstrations in the eastern cities of Al-Gadaref and Atbara during clashes with security forces, according to officials and witnesses.

But others have spoken of higher death tolls.

Opposition leader Sadiq al-Mahdi said on Saturday that

22 people had died, denouncing what he called “armed repres-sion” against a legitimate pro-test movement.

- ‘Political roots’ -Mahdi, Sudan’s last demo-

cratically elected prime minis-ter, was overthrown in a coup that brought Bashir to power in 1989.

Pushed into exile several times, Mahdi returned to his homeland on Wednesday, the day protests began.

A Sudanese man hands a bag of bread to a customer at a bakery in the capital Khartoum

Thousands evacuated after ‘loud crack’ in Sydney towerAFP | Sydney

Australian police evacuat-ed thousands of people

in west Sydney late Christmas Eve, after residents reported hearing a “loud crack” from a 38-storey building.

About 3,000 people from in-side the tower and in nearby buildings were told to leave late yesterday, with engineers investigating after the apart-ment complex moved “one or two millimetres”.

“Police received a call to a loud crack on level 10 of the building located behind us,” New South Wales Fire and Rescue acting superin-tendent Greg Wright said from outside the Opal Tower complex.

Police “identified there was a crack in the building”, he added, alerting emergency services.

“Firefighters will be mov-ing through the building with engineers and paramedics to asses what the damage is, and a way forward,” he told report-ers.

It was unclear when resi-dents would be allowed back

into the building, with a tem-porary shelter set up at a near-by hall.

“I have been told by en-gineers it (the building) has moved one or two millime-tres,” detective superinten-dent Philip Rogerson told reporters, without going into detail.

A police spokesperson said the building was 38 storeys high.

The apartment tower locat-ed in Sydney’s Olympic Park complex was recently built, opening this year with 392 apartments, according to na-tional broadcaster the ABC.

More than 200 people have been evacuated from the Opal Tower at Sydney Olympic Park in Sydney, Australia


Hunt for survivors as tsunami death toll climbs to 373

• Indonesia tsunami caused by collapse of volcano, experts confirm

• Rescue effort in the devastated region is likely to last a week

AFP | Carita, Indonesia

Dozens of filled body bags were hauled away from buildings flattened by

Indonesia’s volcano-triggered tsunami yesterday, as the death toll climbed to 373 and search teams pushed on with the grim hunt for corpses.

Rescue teams used their bare hands, diggers and other heavy equipment to haul debris from the stricken area around the Sunda Strait, as thousands were evacuated to higher ground.

Experts warned that more deadly waves could slam the devastated region after Satur-day night’s disaster, as questions swirled over why the killer wave caught a disaster-prone coun-try’s monitors completely off guard.

The powerful tsunami swept over popular beaches on south-ern Sumatra and western Java and inundated tourist hotels and coastal settlements.

Some 1,459 people were in-

jured with another 128 missing, disaster agency spokesman Su-topo Purwo Nugroho said, giving an updated toll late yesterday.

“The lack of a tsunami early warning system caused a lot of victims because people did not have the time to evacuate,” he said.

Hundreds of buildings were destroyed by the wave that left a tangled mess of corrugated steel roofing, timber and rubble at Carita beach, a popular spot for day-trippers on the west coast of Java.

Beachside cottages at one re-sort were flattened while the dining room’s mud-caked floor was strewn with smashed chairs and tables, utensils and spilled cups of ice cream.

In the lobby, a Christmas tree

remained standing, surrounded by fallen holiday ornaments and toppled-over flower pots.

“The military and police are searching the ruins to see if we can find more victims,” said Dody Ruswandi, a senior official at the disaster agency, adding that the rescue effort was likely to last a week.

‘No time to evacuate’ Indonesia’s disaster agency ini-tially said there was “no tsunami threat” even as the wave crashed ashore.

It was later forced to issue a correction and an apology as it pointed to the area’s lack of early warning systems.

Unlike those caused by earth-quakes, which usually trigger alert systems, volcano-triggered tsunamis give authorities very little time to warn residents of the impending threat.

Experts say Saturday’s disas-ter was most likely caused by a moderate eruption of the Anak Krakatoa volcano in the Sun-da Strait that triggered either a large and very fast moving flow of molten rock into the sea or a sudden and massive submarine landslide -- both would displace large amounts of water, resulting in a tsunami.

The evidence so far suggest-ed that a section of the volca-no collapsed and slid into the ocean, triggering a tsunami, said Dwikorita Karnawati, head of Indonesia’s meteorological agency.

It was the third major nat-ural disaster to strike Indone-sia in the space of six months, following a series of powerful earthquakes on the island of Lombok in July and August and a quake-tsunami in September that killed around 2,200 people in Palu on Sulawesi island, with thousands more missing and presumed dead.

It also came less than a week before the 14th anniversary of the 2004 Boxing Day tsunami, one of the deadliest disasters in history that killed some 220,000 people in countries around the Indian Ocean, including some 168,000 Indonesians.

The vast archipelago nation is one of the most disaster-hit na-tions on Earth due to its position straddling the so-called Pacif-ic Ring of Fire, where tectonic plates collide.

Mount Anak Krakatau erupts

Anak KrakatoaAnak KrakatoaToday a small volcanic islandAltitude: 300 mIn a "state of semi-continuous eruptive activity"

INDIANOCEAN

Sources: Geoportail, International Tsunami Society, maps4news.com/©HERE Schematic representations

Before 1883Krakatoa is on the island of Rakata

Volcaniccrater

1883Explosion of Krakatoa, killed 36,000Formed huge undersea crater

I N D O N E S I A

"The child" of Krakatoa, in Indonesian, formed a�er the explosion of Krakatoa in 1883Anak KrakatoaAnak Krakatoa

2 km

Anak Krakatoa emerged from thecaldera (cauldron-like hollow) of Krakatoa

Around 1928

People survey outside a flooded shopping mall

Anak Krakatoa

BandarLampung

LampungSelatan

LampungTimur

Pandeglang

Serang

20 km

The volcanic tsunami in Indonesia

Sources: Indonesian authorities, PAM, Reliefweb.com, BIG

Map : maps4news.com, Columbia Uni, Facebook Connectivity Lab, CIESIN

Affected zones

Populated zones

Toll as of Dec 24 (06:30 GMT):

Dead...................... at least 281Wounded .................... + 1,000Missing .......................... + 50Buildings destroyed ............... 661

Height of waves

SundaStrait

Kaliandabeach

Carita beach

Tanjung Lesungbeach

Lebak

Pesawaran

Tanggamus

Kelumbayan

Katibung

Sidomulyo

Kalianda

RajabasaSebuku

Anyar

Cinangka

Carita

Jiput

MenesLabuan

Pagelaran

Panimbang

Cigeulis

Cibaliung

Cimanggu

Sumur

Sebesi

Forests, national parks

Ujong Kulonnationalpark

The tsunami is believed to havebeen caused by a submarine landslideor a fast flow of lava into the sea after an eruption.The volcano is in a state of "semi-continuouseruptive activity"

INDONESIA

Recorded by two stations at Serang

Local time

20h 21 22 23 0h 1 2

Dec 22 Dec 23

4 m

2 m

3 m

1 m

Altitude: 300 m

Cilegon

Wreckage and debris are seen at the State Islamic University in Palu

KNOW WHAT

The disaster came less than a week before the 14th anniversary of the

2004 tsunami that killed some 220,000 people

in countries around the Indian Ocean, including some 168,000 Indone-

sians


C I V I L I A N ’ S T R I B U N E

The scenes of border guards firing tear gas

into Mexico and migrants in sewage-filled water

next to the United States should not be something

we become accustomed to seeing.

Hon. Chairman Najeb Yacob Alhamer | Editor-in-Chief Mahmood AI Mahmood | Deputy Editor-in-Chief Ahdeya Ahmed | Chairman & Managing Editor P Unnikrishnan | Advertisement: Update Media W.L.L | Tel: 38444692, Email: [email protected] | Newsroom: Tel: 38444680, Email: [email protected] & circulation: Tel: 38444698/17579877 | Email:[email protected] | Website: www.newsofbahrain.com | Printed and published by Al Ayam Publishing

IOAN GRILLO

When I was in Tijuana last month, a heavy rainstorm poured

down on the Benito Juárez sports park, where more than 6,000 Central American migrants were crowded into tents, under tarps or simply sleeping on the mud.

The rain mixed with sewage that was leaking from broken toilets, forming putrid puddles that seeped into the tents and prompted a vain scramble for dry spaces. I saw one young mother squatting in filthy water, trying to comfort her sick baby. The city government eventually closed the park because of the unsanitary conditions.

The men, women and chil-dren who have traveled north in a stream of caravans in recent months have grabbed attention because it is unusual for people to move through Mexico togeth-er in such large numbers. It’s even more unusual for them to have to seek temporary shelter in such awful conditions. There are refugee camps in many plac-es in the world, but that one ex-isted right next to the Ameri-can border, where its occupants could literally see California, is disturbing.

I’m worried that such scenes will come to seem normal. The Trump administration’s an-nouncement on Dec 20 that it will make some asylum seekers wait in Mexico while their court cases are resolved in the United States makes this very likely.

Mexico has increasingly be-

come a transit country for ref-ugees and migrants — especial-ly those fleeing gang violence and government crackdowns in Central America. This puts it in a similar position to Turkey and Italy, where the passage of refugees and migrants has caused enormous domestic problems.

Those fleeing Central America often face a level of violence akin to what we think of as occurring in war zones. I have talked to refugees who have been shot, raped, extorted, kidnapped and had their houses burned down by gangs allied with corrupt po-lice officers. The latest move could potentially cause hun-dreds of thousands of them to pile up along the Mexican side

of the border. With thousands of asylum applications being made every month, and with a huge backlog in United States immi-

gration courts, migrants’ cases could take years to resolve.

The new Trump administra-tion rule would strand them in crime-stricken Mexican states. Two Honduran teenagers from the caravan were murdered in Tijuana, officials said Dec 18.

It also raises the question of who will support the refugees, who are being helped here by churches, charities and some local governments that already complain they are short on mon-ey. “How is Mexico suddenly going to support hundreds of thousands of non-Mexicans for years?” asked the Washington Office on Latin America, a hu-man rights advocacy organisa-tion, in a statement on its web-site in response to the Dec 20

announcement.Homeland Security Secretary

Kirstjen Nielsen claims the move will prevent people from using asylum applications to get into the United States and slip into the shadows. “Aliens trying to game the system to get into our country illegally will no longer be able to disappear into the United States, where many skip their court dates,” she said on Dec 20.

Studies show, however, that the vast majority of asylum-seek-ers show up for their hearings.

The move may well be chal-lenged in United States courts. But will Mexico also oppose it? On Dec 20, it sent mixed signals. The Foreign Ministry initially said in a statement it would ac-

cept those with United States court dates, but then the head of Mexico’s immigration institute said it was legally and logistically impossible to do so.

Since President Andrés Ma-nuel López Obrador took pow-er on Dec 1, he has been trying to develop a long-term strate-gy for the crisis. On Dec 10, his foreign minister promised that Mexico will invest $30 billion in Central America over five years in a “Marshall Plan” aimed at curbing the march northward, including increasing jobs in southern Mexico. He has said he is looking to work with Wash-ington on such a plan.

Co-operation on finding a re-gional solution to the causes of the exodus would be a big step forward. But Mexico should not agree to house United States asy-lum-seekers as part of any bigger deal. This would leave refugees in a painful, drawn-out limbo. The growth of long-term refugee camps along the border could also cause resentment among Mexicans, who are already ques-tioning their obligations toward the caravan members. And it could lead to more conflict be-tween frustrated refugees and border guards that snarl bor-der crossing points, hurting the millions of people who rely on cross-border commerce and travel.

The scenes of border guards firing tear gas into Mexico and migrants in sewage-filled water next to the United States should not be something we become ac-customed to seeing. This should not become our new normal.

(Ioan Grillo is the author of “Gangster Warlords: Drug Dollars, Killing

Fields, and the New Politics of Latin America” and a contributing opinion

writer.)

TO MAKE YOUR CHILDREN CAPABLE OF HONESTY IS THE BEGINNING OF EDUCATION. JOHN RUSKIN

QUOTE OF THE DAY

The Mexican border as refugee campThe Trump administration plans to send asylum-seekers back to Mexico. What will happen to them there?

Improving tsunami warning system is need of the hour

Deadly tsunamis have occurred in all ocean basins and lead to extreme economic costs due

both to direct infrastructural damage as well as the expense and loss of economic productivity during coastal evacuations.

Minimising both the fatalities and costs of tsunamis requires timely and accurate characterisation of their predicted impacts.

The primary tsunami detection systems now in operation consist of seismic stations and tide‐gauges on land, and the DART buoy sea‐floor pressure sensor system in the deep ocean.

GPS currently contributes to tsuna-mi warning efforts through real‐time, high‐rate, land‐based networks, by providing rapid estimates of the seis-mic displacements from underwater earthquakes.

The application of GPS on ocean‐platforms, however, has focused on

the development of GPS‐buoy systems. Several such systems are now run-

ning in demonstration mode in the near‐shore region of Japan and show promise for providing short lead‐time warnings for locally generated

tsunamis. A more broadly applicable deep‐

water GPS‐buoy system, however, like the existing DART network, would be extremely costly to build and main-tain, limiting the number of units that

could be deployed, and thus requiring careful site selection based on our best estimate of the hazard.

It is suggested that the commercial shipping fleet, in contrast, represents a vast existing infrastructure with

excellent spatial coverage across most of the globe that could be exploited to construct an extremely cost‐effective tsunami detection network in the deep oceans.

K Joseph

Debris littered a property badly damaged by a tsunami in Carita, Indonesia. A man reacts after identifying his relative among the bodies of tsunami victims.


C I V I L I A N ’ S T R I B U N E

The scenes of border guards firing tear gas

into Mexico and migrants in sewage-filled water

next to the United States should not be something

we become accustomed to seeing.


IOAN GRILLO

When I was in Tijuana last month, a heavy rainstorm poured

down on the Benito Juárez sports park, where more than 6,000 Central American migrants were crowded into tents, under tarps or simply sleeping on the mud.

The rain mixed with sewage that was leaking from broken toilets, forming putrid puddles that seeped into the tents and prompted a vain scramble for dry spaces. I saw one young mother squatting in filthy water, trying to comfort her sick baby. The city government eventually closed the park because of the unsanitary conditions.

The men, women and chil-dren who have traveled north in a stream of caravans in recent months have grabbed attention because it is unusual for people to move through Mexico togeth-er in such large numbers. It’s even more unusual for them to have to seek temporary shelter in such awful conditions. There are refugee camps in many plac-es in the world, but that one ex-isted right next to the Ameri-can border, where its occupants could literally see California, is disturbing.

I’m worried that such scenes will come to seem normal. The Trump administration’s an-nouncement on Dec 20 that it will make some asylum seekers wait in Mexico while their court cases are resolved in the United States makes this very likely.

Mexico has increasingly be-

come a transit country for ref-ugees and migrants — especial-ly those fleeing gang violence and government crackdowns in Central America. This puts it in a similar position to Turkey and Italy, where the passage of refugees and migrants has caused enormous domestic problems.

Those fleeing Central America often face a level of violence akin to what we think of as occurring in war zones. I have talked to refugees who have been shot, raped, extorted, kidnapped and had their houses burned down by gangs allied with corrupt po-lice officers. The latest move could potentially cause hun-dreds of thousands of them to pile up along the Mexican side

of the border. With thousands of asylum applications being made every month, and with a huge backlog in United States immi-

gration courts, migrants’ cases could take years to resolve.

The new Trump administra-tion rule would strand them in crime-stricken Mexican states. Two Honduran teenagers from the caravan were murdered in Tijuana, officials said Dec 18.

It also raises the question of who will support the refugees, who are being helped here by churches, charities and some local governments that already complain they are short on mon-ey. “How is Mexico suddenly going to support hundreds of thousands of non-Mexicans for years?” asked the Washington Office on Latin America, a hu-man rights advocacy organisa-tion, in a statement on its web-site in response to the Dec 20

announcement.Homeland Security Secretary

Kirstjen Nielsen claims the move will prevent people from using asylum applications to get into the United States and slip into the shadows. “Aliens trying to game the system to get into our country illegally will no longer be able to disappear into the United States, where many skip their court dates,” she said on Dec 20.

Studies show, however, that the vast majority of asylum-seek-ers show up for their hearings.

The move may well be chal-lenged in United States courts. But will Mexico also oppose it? On Dec 20, it sent mixed signals. The Foreign Ministry initially said in a statement it would ac-

cept those with United States court dates, but then the head of Mexico’s immigration institute said it was legally and logistically impossible to do so.

Since President Andrés Ma-nuel López Obrador took pow-er on Dec 1, he has been trying to develop a long-term strate-gy for the crisis. On Dec 10, his foreign minister promised that Mexico will invest $30 billion in Central America over five years in a “Marshall Plan” aimed at curbing the march northward, including increasing jobs in southern Mexico. He has said he is looking to work with Wash-ington on such a plan.

Co-operation on finding a re-gional solution to the causes of the exodus would be a big step forward. But Mexico should not agree to house United States asy-lum-seekers as part of any bigger deal. This would leave refugees in a painful, drawn-out limbo. The growth of long-term refugee camps along the border could also cause resentment among Mexicans, who are already ques-tioning their obligations toward the caravan members. And it could lead to more conflict be-tween frustrated refugees and border guards that snarl bor-der crossing points, hurting the millions of people who rely on cross-border commerce and travel.

The scenes of border guards firing tear gas into Mexico and migrants in sewage-filled water next to the United States should not be something we become ac-customed to seeing. This should not become our new normal.

(Ioan Grillo is the author of “Gangster Warlords: Drug Dollars, Killing

Fields, and the New Politics of Latin America” and a contributing opinion

writer.)

TO MAKE YOUR CHILDREN CAPABLE OF HONESTY IS THE BEGINNING OF EDUCATION. JOHN RUSKIN

QUOTE OF THE DAY

The Mexican border as refugee campThe Trump administration plans to send asylum-seekers back to Mexico. What will happen to them there?

Improving tsunami warning system is need of the hour

Deadly tsunamis have occurred in all ocean basins and lead to extreme economic costs due

both to direct infrastructural damage as well as the expense and loss of economic productivity during coastal evacuations.

Minimising both the fatalities and costs of tsunamis requires timely and accurate characterisation of their predicted impacts.

The primary tsunami detection systems now in operation consist of seismic stations and tide‐gauges on land, and the DART buoy sea‐floor pressure sensor system in the deep ocean.

GPS currently contributes to tsuna-mi warning efforts through real‐time, high‐rate, land‐based networks, by providing rapid estimates of the seis-mic displacements from underwater earthquakes.

The application of GPS on ocean‐platforms, however, has focused on

the development of GPS‐buoy systems. Several such systems are now run-

ning in demonstration mode in the near‐shore region of Japan and show promise for providing short lead‐time warnings for locally generated

tsunamis. A more broadly applicable deep‐

water GPS‐buoy system, however, like the existing DART network, would be extremely costly to build and main-tain, limiting the number of units that

could be deployed, and thus requiring careful site selection based on our best estimate of the hazard.

It is suggested that the commercial shipping fleet, in contrast, represents a vast existing infrastructure with

excellent spatial coverage across most of the globe that could be exploited to construct an extremely cost‐effective tsunami detection network in the deep oceans.

K Joseph

Debris littered a property badly damaged by a tsunami in Carita, Indonesia. A man reacts after identifying his relative among the bodies of tsunami victims.


TOP

4TWEETS

04

01

General Directorate of Anti-corruption

and economic and Elec-tronic Security calls upon the public to not respond to phone calls from local and interna-tional numbers of indi-viduals or organisations claiming of conducting a survey

@moi_bahrain

03

Sincere politics has been a thankless job

in India - as a nation, we are still democratically immature.

@porinju

Scathing reaction from active military to Syria

& Afghanistan withdraw-als. From current Spe-cial Ops officer recently in Syria “No logical way for our commanders in the fight to explain this to our partners. We just lost all our influence. We surrendered all our ini-tiative”

@jimsciutto

02

When you care for others, you mani-

fest an inner strength de-spite any difficulties you face. Your own problems will seem less significant and bothersome to you. Reaching beyond your own problems and tak-ing care of others, you gain confidence, courage and a greater sense of calm.

@DalaiLama

Disclaimer: (Views expressed by columnists are personal and need not necessarily reflect our

editorial stances)

1991Mikhail Gorbachev resigns as President of the Soviet Union (the union itself is dissolved the next day). Ukraine’s referendum is finalized and Ukraine officially leaves the Soviet Union.

2003UTAGE Flight 141, a Boeing 727-223, crashes at the Cotonou Airport in Benin, killing 151 people.

2004The Cassini orbiter releases Huygens probe which successfully landed on Saturn’s moon Titan on January 14, 2005.

2012An Antonov An-72 plane crashes close to the city of Shymkent, killing 27 people.

TODAY DAY IN

HISTORY

Caruth and the first wave of trauma theory

Although the experience may never be narrated or identified clearly, it acts like a tumour in consciousness that wounds the self

NASRULLAH MAMBROL

Although Sigmund Freud subsequently abandoned it, his theories were key

ideas informing the first devel-opment in trauma studies schol-arship. Early in his career, he assumed that a history of sexual seduction in childhood was re-sponsible for the neurotic symp-toms he observed in his patients. Gradually, however, he moved away from a one-to-one formu-lation of the relationship of the external to the internal world, to embrace a more nuanced para-digm of conscious/unconscious functioning. As a result, he fo-cused on the role of unconscious fantasies in neurotic conflicts and inhibitions.

Theories of trauma’s effects on the individual psyche are often employed to explore the indi-vidual experience of a collec-tive traumatic event in a text, thus creating a link between the experience of individuals and cultural groups or between the personal and political worlds. A flood of scholarship in the 1990s arose to examine the concept of trauma and its role in literature and society most prominently by Cathy Caruth, Shoshana Felman, and Geoffrey Hartman. This first wave of criticism popularised the concept of trauma as an unrepre-sentable event that revealed the inherent contradictions within language and experience.

In the traditional trauma mod-el pioneered by Cathy Caruth, trauma is viewed as an event that fragments consciousness and pre-vents direct linguistic representa-tion. The model draws attention to the severity of suffering by sug-gesting the traumatic experience irrevocably damages the psyche. Trauma is an unassimilated event that shatters identity and remains outside normal memory and nar-rative representation. Fragmen-tation or dissociation is viewed as the direct cause of trauma, a view that helps formulate the notion of transhistorical trau-ma, which suggests that trau-ma’s essential or universal effects on consciousness and narrative recall afford the opportunity to connect individual and collective traumatic experiences. Traumat-ic experience and its inherent dissociation thwart the applica-tion of determinate value to that experience because the level of fright destroys the mind’s ability to comprehend it and linguisti-cally code it.

Although the experience may never be narrated or identified clearly, it acts like a tumour in consciousness that wounds the self. The traumatic experience exerts a negative and frequently pathological effect on conscious-ness and memory that prevents the past from becoming incor-porated into a life narrative. This model emphasises the suffering caused by an external source that makes internal changes to the mind and irreversibly changes

identity. The critical emphasis on trauma’s unspeakability rests on the claim that extreme experi-ence fractures both language and consciousness, causing lasting damage and demanding unique narrative expressions. The event is absent in normal conscious-ness but preserved just beyond the limits of understanding in a timeless, wordless state and con-tinues to inflict pain on the psy-che. Trauma’s strange absence yet ghostlike presence in conscious-

ness, its lack of normal integra-tion into memory and narration, casts a shadow that indirectly points toward trauma’s meaning and the truth of the past.

This trauma model figures most prominently in Cathy Caruth’s Unclaimed Experience: Trauma, Narrative, History (1996) which takes a particular interpretation of Freud’s trauma theories to forward a larger poststructur-al concern with the referential limits of language and history. The analysis set the tone for the critical debate regarding trauma’s significance in literature and the relation between individual and cultural trauma. Caruth argues that trauma’s latency and dissoci-ation disrupts the ability to fully understand or represent a trau-matic experience. Both individu-al traumatic experiences and col-lective historical extreme events are ultimately never known di-rectly but only through an inter-rupted referentiality that points to the meaning of the past only as a type of reproduction or perfor-mance (Caruth 1996: 11). The idea that a traumatic experience can never be known other than as a recurring absence indicates both the dissociative nature of trauma and its linguistic abnormality. In this book Caruth examines the “rhetorical potential” of recur-ring figures in texts that capture the splintered referentiality that points to the “knowing and not knowing” of the traumatic past, which in turn reveals the “trau-matic nature of history” itself (1996: 4, 18).

Caruth relies on a neurobio-logical approach to explain trau-ma’s effect on consciousness and memory, particularly the work of psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk who argues that the neu-robiological response to trauma elicits a universal response—a “speechless terror” that fore-closes the possibility of narra-tive recall in memory since the event cannot be “organised on a linguistic level” (Van der Kolk and Van der Hart 1996: 172). The

notion of trauma’s unspeakability indicates a causal view of trauma and dissociation, as well as a view of memory as a storehouse of experience wherein traumatic memory is stored differently and unavailable for normal narrative recall since it remains dissoci-ated from consciousness (1996: 160, 163). Narrative recollection marks normal memory and re-mains crucial for identifying and assimilating the past.

Connecting the individual and collective experiences of trauma forwards the notion of trauma’s universal effects upon identity and memory, particularly the fragmentation or dissociation of consciousness. Dissociation and the inherent latency of trauma create a temporal gap in which the meaning and value of the experience are indeterminate. Caruth explains that trauma is “a shock that appears to work very much like a bodily threat but is in fact a break in the mind’s ex-perience of time” (Caruth 1996: 61). The dissociative break in time causes both the emotion-al suffering and the inability to identify or “locate” the meaning of the event. Yet, the unrepre-sentable past continues to orbit consciousness to create a type of absence that itself points to the event even while not being able to accord epistemological or ethical determinacy. The impact of an unrepresentable and unknowable traumatic experience upon the individual psyche is applied to the collective emotional experi-ence of cultural groups to suggest that history fails to adequately represent traumatic events such as war or genocide, since any rep-resentation is a type of fiction (1996: 15, 49, 76).

The idea of trauma’s unrepre-sentability remains a core con-cept in the wave of scholarship that followed Caruth’s wake in the following two decades. The emphasis in Caruth’s model on the intrinsic relationship be-tween the individual and cul-tural group as well as the disso-ciative and silencing effects of trauma continues in criticism that maintains the conceptual base of the traditional model but widens the theoretical frame-work to include feminist, race, and postcolonial theory. J Brooks Bouson, Suzette Henke, Deborah Horvitz, Michael Rothberg, and Laurie Vickroy all employ the traditional Freudian‐Caruthian concept of trauma and its de-ferred impact in criticism that often examines the relationship between individual and cultural traumatic experience.

(Nasrullah Mambrol is an academician and blogger.)

Connecting the individual and collective experiences of trauma

forwards the notion of trauma’s universal

effects upon identity and memory, particularly

the fragmentation or dissociation of

consciousness.

10

business


UK retailers axed 150,000 jobsAFP | London

Troubled UK high-street retailers shed almost 150,000 jobs this year, hit

by high business property tax-ation, flagging growth and ris-ing online sales, a study showed yesterday.

Some 148,132 jobs were axed as 20,000 shops and restaurants closed, according to Britain’s Press Association news agen-cy which published data from the Centre for Retail Research (CRR).

And more gloom is forecast next year as retailers continue to struggle in anticipation of Britain’s departure from the Eu-ropean Union.

“While parliament is obsessed with Brexit, business rates and low growth are killing the high street,” said Professor Joshua Bamfield, who is director of the CRR consultancy.

“We feel that 2019 is going to be a repeat of these dire figures unless or until the government takes action to provide a level playing field for both online re-tailers and the high street.”

This year, a string of major British retailers fell victim to fierce online competition, rising business taxes and stretched household budgets -- all coming amid Brexit uncertainty.

One major casualty, British budget chain Poundworld, col-lapsed earlier this year with the loss of some 5,100 jobs.

Department store chain De-benhams meanwhile decided

to shut about one third of its shops. That came after its UK rival House of Fraser was res-cued from collapse having been bought by retailer Sports Direct.

Property specialist Altus Group argues that rising busi-ness rates -- a taxation which is levied on non-domestic proper-ty use -- have piled on pressure.

Despite the gloom, official data showed last week that retail

sales rebounded in November as shoppers bagged Black Friday bargains.

Sales jumped 1.4 percent com-pared to October, the Office for National Statistics calculated, with non-food items helped by heavy price discounts.

But the outlook for consumers is weak. Consumer confidence dived to a five-year low in De-cember, according to a GfK sur-

vey published last Friday.“Consumer surveys show that

people are not feeling confident about the future, despite an in-crease in wages,” said Stephen Beer, chief investment officer at Epworth Investment Man-agement.

“This is partly due to interest rates going up and the mood mu-sic from the Bank of England.”

The central bank last week froze its main lending rate at 0.75 percent faced with “intensi-fied Brexit uncertainties”.

Pedestrians walk past the entrance to a Poundworld Plus discount store in Orpington, south-east London

KNOW WHAT

The UK central bank last week froze its

main lending rate at 0.75 per cent faced

with “intensified Brexit uncertainties”

Display VAT registration, final price list: Ministry• VAT comes into effect on 1 January 2019

• Ministry to intensity VAT monitoring

• Register for VAT at www.nbt.gov.bh

TDT | Manama

All commercial outlets reg-istered in the Kingdom

should display their VAT regis-trations as well as final price list of all goods and services - inclu-sive of tax in a prominent place clearly visible to consumers pri-or to levying the 5 per cent VAT, said the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Tourism.

The Tax Invoice should in-clude the full price, followed by the total price to be paid and the amount of tax charged, the statement said.

Making the announcement in light of VAT which comes into effect on 1 January 2019, the ministry said it will con-tinuously monitor markets to

ensure stability.As per the new regulations

issued, all commercial estab-lishments in the Kingdom are required to comply with VAT regulations by registering on website of the National bureau of Taxation (www.nbt.gov.bh).

VAT will be effective in Bah-rain on 1 January 2019 at a standard rate of 5 per cent.

Explaining, Assistant Under-secretary of Domestic Trade Hameed Rahma said the Minis-try in coordination with the Na-tional Tax Authority of the Gulf has initiated administrative and legal procedures to prevent un-fair commercial practices.

The regulations, Rahma

said, is aimed at ensuring the principles of free market and transparency in the market to mitigate unfair practises.

Ministry’s inspection center will remain active to ensure that there are no violation or illegal commercial practices, the statement said.

Rahma confirmed that MO-IC’s Companies Control Direc-torate has intensified its efforts in monitoring the performance of all commercial establish-ments by closely observing the movement of all goods and service.

The Directorate has imple-mented consumer protection measures to prevent collusion, overpricing and fraudulent commercial activities in addi-tion to ensuring that VAT is not charged on zero-rated goods and services.

The Assistant Undersecre-tary said that the VAT is a joint and urged all consumers to re-port all VAT violations to the Na-tional Call Center (80008001).

All investors are urged to register their businesses by vis-iting NBT’s website (www.nbt.gov.bh).

Hameed

BAB welcomes Moody’s outlook on BahrainTDT | Manama

Bahrain Associat ion of Banks yesterday welcomed

Moody’s decision to upgrade its outlook for Bahrain to stable from negative, while maintain-ing its sovereign issuer rating at B2.

BAB said it is expecting Stand-ard & Poor’s and Fitch Ratings to take similar steps soon.

“All indicators confirm the improvement of financial and economic conditions in the Kingdom of Bahrain with the low liquidity risk, especially after the $ 10 billion Gulf aid package,”said Adnan Yousif, CEO of BAB.

“Moody’s outlook for Bahrain also demonstrates the impor-tance of the great economic re-

forms that the Honorable Gov-ernment has been implement-ing in recent years,” he added.

“Today, we are more deter-mined to make more efforts to introduce the Kingdom of Bahrain as a premier destina-tion for foreign investment and to promote Bahrain’s balanced economic policy, which focuses

on diversifying the economy and encouraging the private sector.” Yousif said.

Dr. Waheed Al Qassim, CEO of BAB said, “Bahrain’s fiscal and monetary policies have strengthened financial stability in the Kingdom and contribut-ed to mitigating the negative effects of economic challenges.”

Adnan Ahmed Yousif Dr. Wahed al qasem

Ant Financial in talks to buy UK payments firm WorldFirst Reuters | London

Ant Financial Servic-es Group, Chinese

e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Limited’s fintech affiliate, is in ad-vanced talks to buy British currency exchange startup WorldFirst in a deal that could be worth more than 500 million pounds ($632.5 million), Sky News reported yesterday, citing sources.

Ant Financial, China’s biggest online payments platform, has been in talks with WorldFirst for several months, according to the report.

“We don’t comment on market rumors,” an Ant Fi-nancial spokesperson said, when asked about report.

WorldFirst did not imme-diately respond to a request for comment.

The Sky News report also said that it was unclear whether existing investors would retain a stake in WorldFirst.

GPIC, Gulf Air in deal to boost cooperation

TDT | Manama

The Gulf Petrochemical In-dustries Company (GPIC)

and Gulf Air announced signing a Memorandum of Understand-ing (MoU) as part of a plan to develop bilateral relations.

Gulf Air’s Deputy Chief Ex-ecutive Officer Capt. Walid Al-Alawi signed the deal with GPIC President Dr Abdulrah-

man Jawahery at a ceremony held at GPIC headquarters.

The MoU is part of a plan for further cooperation and coor-dination between the two sides.

After the signing, Dr. Jawah-ery accompanied Capt. Al-Ala-wi on a tour of the Company and visited the Learning and Leadership Academy and the e-Learning Center.

They toured the Princess

Sabeeka Garden for Aromat-ic Plants and the Medicinal Herbs Park, set up to preserve rare medicinal herbs used in the past for therapeutic purposes.

They also saw the Charity Fish Farm, which contributes to support Bahrain’s fisheries. Capt. Al-Alawi later planted a palm tree to commemorate the visit.

Gulf Air DCEO and other officials during the visit to GPICVista Equity Partners to buy MindbodyReuters | London

Mindbody Inc, a maker of software to help run

fitness and yoga studios, said yesterday it agreed to be bought by private equity firm Vista Eq-uity Partners in a deal valued at about $1.9 billion in cash, about three years after going public.

Mindbody shareholders will receive $36.50 per share in cash, representing a premium of about 68 percent to the com-pany’s closing price as of Friday. The stock was trading at $36.30 before the opening bell.

Since it went public in June 2015, the maker of business management software for fit-

ness boutiques, spas and beauty salons has generated a steady rise in revenue. For 2017, it re-ported revenue of $182.6 mil-lion.

The deal includes a 30-day “go-shop” period, which allows Mindbody’s board and advisers to consider alternative offers, the company said.


Shutdown could drag into 2019The US government shutdown could stretch into January as Trump keeps pushing for border wall funds

• A partial government shutdown entered its third day yesterday, and could last into the new year.

• President Donald Trump and Democrats appear no closer to breaking an impasse over funding for the president’s proposed border wall

• The Senate will not convene again until Thursday

AFP | Washington

The partial US government shutdown gridlocked Washington for a third

day yesterday, with the White House budget director saying it could persist into the new year and the next Congress.

A budget deal to end the par-tial shutdown -- which forced several key US agencies to cease operations starting on Saturday -- appears a distant prospect as Congress adjourned for the weekend ahead of Christmas.

“It’s very possible that this shutdown will go beyond the 28th and into the new Con-gress,” White House budget di-rector Mick Mulvaney said of the impasse over funding for the wall that President Donald Trump wants to build on the US-Mexico border.

But while trying to pin the blame on Democrats, Mulvaney,

speaking on “Fox News Sunday,” acknowledged that Trump’s ad-amance on the wall played a role.

“This is what Washington looks like when you have a pres-ident who refuses to sort of go along to get along,” Mulvaney said.

It is the third partial gov-ernment shutdown of the year, even though Trump’s Republi-can Party still controls both the House of Representatives and the Senate.

Democrats will take control of the House on January 3, giv-ing them greater leverage in the shutdown talks.

‘A long stay’ Trump canceled his holiday vacation to Florida due to the budget wrangling.

The president has dug in on his demand for $5 billion for the border wall, a signature cam-paign promise that he repeated-ly said Mexico would fund.

“The only way to stop drugs, gangs, human trafficking, crim-inal elements and much else

from coming into our Country is with a Wall or Barrier,” he said Sunday on Twitter. “Drones and all of the rest are wonderful and lots of fun, but it is only a good old fashioned Wall that works!”

But Democrats believe they have a stronger hand in the fa-ceoff against a president who said he would be “proud” to force a shutdown -- rarely pop-ular among the broader public -- in the name of tighter border security.

In the absence of a deal, feder-al funds for dozens of agencies lapsed on Saturday, leaving some 400,000 federal workers on fur-lough. A similar number were deemed essential -- including Border Patrol officers, health inspectors and airport security workers -- and are remaining on the job without pay.

With most lawmakers home for the holidays, and few evident signs of flexibility on either side, it was hard to discern the out-lines of any resolution.

“The Democrats offered us $1.6 billion a couple weeks ago,

then they offered the president $1.3 billion this week,” said Mulvaney, who is set to become Trump’s acting chief of staff in January. “That’s a negotiation that seems like it’s going in the wrong direction.”

He was speaking on ABC’s “This Week.”

Senator Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, blamed the shutdown on a “remarkable two-week temper tantrum” by the president, who he said could reopen the government if he would “abandon the wall.”

Another Democrat, Senator Chris Coons, said on CBS that now “there is, frankly, no path towards his getting $5 billion in American taxpayer money to meet his campaign promise of a ‘big, beautiful wall’ with Mexico.”

‘It’s juvenile’ Even some Republicans ex-pressed consternation over what they dubbed an avoidable crisis.

“The Democrats easily would support more border funding, border security, they’ve said that” if a broader deal could be reached, Republican Senator Bob Corker said on CNN.

“This is something that is unnecessary. It’s a spectacle and, candidly, it’s juvenile,” said Corker, speaking in his final days

before stepping down from Con-gress.

“This is a made-up fight so that the president can look like he’s fighting.”

Corker suggested that a deal could be reached if Trump were prepared to give ground on Democrats’ demand to pro-tect the status of the “Dream-ers” -- Latinos who, as children, arrived illegally in the United States with their parents.

Mulvaney said Trump was “willing to discuss a larger im-migration solution,” but that citizenship for the “Dreamers” was not a popular idea among many Republicans.

‘Acting like children’ The year-end holidays have

masked many of the shutdown’s visible effects, but they will gradually spread.

Visitors to the capital’s park-like National Mall, home to at-tractions including war memo-rials and the towering Washing-ton Monument, were among the first to feel it.

Several criticized the shut-down, which added to an air of chaos in a capital still reel-ing from Defense Secretary Jim Mattis’s resignation last week over Trump policies.

Jeffrey Grignon, a Wisconsin health care worker, said politi-cians of both parties “need to stop acting like children.”

But another visitor, Howard Vander Griend of Tennessee, predicted Trump will come out a winner: “I think he will get what he wants, and I think that’s a good thing.”

About three-quarters of the government, including the mil-itary, is fully funded through September 2019.

The US Capitol stands past ‘Caution’ tape in Washington on Thursday

This is what Washington looks

like when you have a president who refuses to sort of go along to

get alongMICK MULVANEY

McLaren Automotive voted most admired car company• Mike Flewitt collects prestigious inspirational leadership award

TDT | Manama

Mike Flewitt, Chief Exec-utive Officer of luxury

sportscar and supercar compa-ny McLaren Automotive, has collected a prestigious award for inspirational leadership as McLaren was also voted Brit-ain’s most admired car com-pany.

Lord Heseltine, founder and owner of Haymarket Media Group, presented Flewitt and McLaren Automotive with the Management Today awards at a gala dinner in London which also saw the company placed sixth overall on the list of the UK’s most admired companies.

The awards are a key part of Management Today’s BMAC survey, a peer-review study of corporate reputation as seen by a company’s closest critics – its competitors and financial influencers. This year’s survey involved interviews with 234 board representatives, analysts and City commentators.

Having started his career in

the automotive sector in 1983 as a production operator for Ford Motor Company in his native

Liverpool, Mike Flewitt joined McLaren Automotive in 2012 as Chief Operating Officer before rapidly being appointed as CEO the following year.

Last month, Flewitt wel-comed The Duke and Duch-ess of Cambridge along with the Crown Prince of Bahrain to open the company’s sec-ond-ever production facility, the McLaren Composites Pro-duction Centre in the Sheffield region which will create over 200 new jobs by the time the facility is fully operational. It will help take the total work-force to an expected 2, 500 by the end of 2025.

Mike Flewitt collects award

KNOW

BETTER

Mike Flewitt joined McLaren Automotive in 2012 as Chief Operat-ing Officer before rap-idly being appointed as CEO the following year Subramanian K.V, who bids adieu after 43 years of service at to Kavalani

& Sons with his family, friends and coworkers during a farewell luncheon held in his honour yesterday. Popularly known as Mani, Subramanian is a native of Palakkad, Kerala and has been a part of Kavalani & Sons since its diversification into a general trading company in 1976.

Hyundai sees Russia auto market growth slowing in 2019Reuters | Moscow

South Korea-based car-maker Hyundai Motor

Co. expects growth in the Russian auto market to slow sharply next year, the head of its Russian branch said on Monday.

Automakers have warned Russia’s plan to raise value added tax in 2019 would hit car sales, which have only just started to recover from four years of stagnation.

Hyundai forecasts car sales in Russia will grow 5-6 percent in 2019, after an expected increase of 12.8 percent this year, the com-pany’s Russian managing director Alexei Kalitsev told reporters.

Hyundai plans to keep its 10 percent market share in Russia next year and in-crease sales to 190,000 cars from 180,000 in 2018.

Isolated Turkmenistan launches first messaging app

AFP | Ashgabat, Turkmen-istan

The repressive central Asian nation of Turk-

menistan, where the likes of Facebook and Whatsapp are banned, on Monday launched its first messag-ing app.

The privately developed BizBarde app will “allow the exchange of messagers, files, photos and videos,” the state Yaslyk television station said.

“The dream to create the first Turkmen messenger came to me a long time ago,” CEO Eziz Beknazarov said.

“Many people did not believe in this idea but I brought together a group of specialists and program-mers for this project and, after a year and a half of hard work, the first Turk-men messenger has become reality.”

US regional bank Cadence offers more shares to buy State Bank

Reuters | Washington

Regional lender Cadence Bancorp said yesterday

it will offer 4.3 million ad-ditional shares to buy State Bank Financial Corp in a deal valued at $849 million, well below the $1.4 billion it offered in May.

State Bank shareholders will receive 1.271 shares of Cadence class A common stock for every share held, up from 1.160 in the pre-vious offer. The new offer is valued at about $21.84 based on Cadence’s Friday close and represents a 7.3 percent premium to State Bank’s close on the day.

Since May, shares of Ca-dence and State Bank have both fallen about 40 per-cent, in line with the decline in broader financial sector.

Saudi banks reboundArqaam Capital calls tax deal positive for Saudi banks

• Dubai’s Emirates NBD falls sharply in thin trade

• Union Properties jumps on proposed share buy-back

• Egypt drops but foreign investors are net buyers

Reuters | Dubai

Saudi Arabia’s stock index rose yesterday as banks rebounded after a sell-off

triggered by news of a deal with tax authorities, while Dubai dropped to a five-year low, pres-sured by a slide in Emirates NBD.

The Saudi index was up 0.4 per cent with Samba Financial Group gaining 1.7pc and Alinma Bank adding 2.0pc. Ten of 12 banking stocks rose.

The sector weakened on Sun-day after banks agreed with Is-lamic tax authorities to resolve a dispute over increased liabilities that will result in one-off pay-ments, although many banks had already made provisions for much of the liabilities.

Months of uncertainty over the settlement unsettled some investors, but analysts at Arqa-am Capital said the 16.5 billion riyal ($4.4 billion) settlement was a “non-event” for banks fundamentally, with a cumu-lative impact of just 3pc on shareholders’ equity and 60 ba-sis points on capital adequacy ratios in coming years.

“We remain overweight on Saudi banks and view this settle-ment as a positive event ahead of even more pivotal catalysts, Arqaam said, pointing to Saudi Arabia’s inclusion in emerging market indexes next year and an expected rise in domestic

interest rates.Amana Insurance plunged

9.9pc in fairly active trade. The stock has surged more than 50pc in the last few months.

Dubai’s index fell 0.7pc to a five-year low, bringing its loss-es year-to-date to 27pc. The market has been hit hard by slumping real estate prices in the United Arab Emirates, as well as the economic slowdown in Saudi Arabia.

Emirates NBD, Dubai’s big-

gest bank, shed 5.6pc in thin trade. Dubai Financial Market, operator of the exchange, lost 4.2pc and DAMAC Properties was down 1.4pc.

But Union Properties jumped 5.3pc after saying it would hold a board meeting on Thursday to consider buying back 10pc of its shares, in order to resell them later.

The Egyptian blue-chip in-dex fell 1.3pc, mirroring a slump in emerging markets generally.

Egypt’s largest lender, Com-mercial International Bank, slid 2.5pc while El Sewedy Electric lost 2.6pc.

However, foreign investors were net buyers of Egyptian stocks by a small margin, ex-change data showed.

EFG Hermes gained 3.1pc. GEMS Education, which has a 50/50 joint venture agreement with EFG Hermes, exercised an option to buy a 50pc stake in four schools in Egypt. Vortex Energy, a European renewable energy platform managed by the private equity arm of EFG Hermes, signed a deal to divest 49pc of its wind power port-folio.

Qatar’s index was up 0.3pc with Islamic bank Masraf Al Rayan rising 1.9pc. But Mazaya Qatar Real Estate Development lost 2.0pc, giving up Sunday’s gains, when it rose after saying it would study the possibility of merging with Al Bandari Real Estate Co.


Closing BellSAUDI ARABIA he index gained 0.4pc to 7,765 points

EGYPT The EGX 30 Index lost 1.3pc to 12,784 points

DUBAI The index fell 0.7pc to 2,460 points

ABU DHABI The index was flat at 4,818 points

QATAR The Index added 0.3pc to 10,368 points

KUWAIT The index edged up 0.1pc to 5,304 points

BAHRAIN The index was down 0.1pc at 1,313 points

OMAN The index was up 0.2pc at 4,346 points

A man checks market indices listed on a digital display board at the Saudi Stock Exchange

Tesla to pay customers for missed tax credits: MuskReuters | Los Angeles

Tesla Inc chief executive Elon Musk said the elec-

tric car company will reim-burse customers if delays to car deliveries cause them to miss out on a significant tax credit.

Under a major tax overhaul passed by the Republican-con-trolled US Congress late last year, incentives in the way of tax credits that lower the cost of electric vehicles are available for the first 200,000 such vehicles sold by an auto-maker. The tax credit is then

reduced by 50 per cent every six months until it phases out.

Earlier this year, Tesla said orders for cars placed by Oct. 15 would be eligible for the full tax credit of $7,500 and that customers would receive their cars by the end of the year. From Jan. 1, 2019, the tax credit drops to $3,750.

With only a few days of 2018 remaining, some customers still waiting for their vehi-cles have used social media to complain about the delays and what they called a lack of communication by the company.

Tesla Inc. founder Elon Musk speaks at the unveiling event by “The Boring Company” for the test tunnel of a proposed underground transportation network across Los Angeles County, in Hawthorne, California

South Korea to fine BMW $10 mn over engine fires responseAFP | Seoul

South Korea said yesterday it will fine German automak-

er BMW 11.2 billion won ($10 million) for allegedly dragging its feet in recalling cars with faulty engines linked to dozens of engine fires.

BMW vehicles bursting into flames made headlines in South Korea earlier this year, with media reporting more than 40 cases in 2018 and parking lots refusing to accept BMW cars over fears they could catch fire.

The auto giant recalled more than 170,000 vehicles in South Korea with a faulty exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) cooler, which the firm blamed for the fires.

In August, it announced a re-call for Europe and some Asian countries -- including South Korea -- of 480,000 cars affect-ed by the same problem, before expanding it to more than one million additional diesel cars two months later.

“BMW announced earlier that it had become aware of the con-nection between the faulty EGR cooler and the fire only on July 20 this year,” the South Kore-an transport ministry said in a statement, announcing the results of a five-month probe.

US satellite service offers to sell minority stake to RussiaReuters | Moscow

US satellite start-up OneWeb has offered to sell a minority

stake to Russia, a move it hopes will allay Moscow’s concerns about the company’s plan to create a worldwide internet network using satellites, three sources familiar with the mat-

ter said.Russia’s Federal Security

Service (FSB) said in October it was against the project servic-ing Russia for security reasons and feared it could be used to gather intelligence and damage national security.

Russia is an important mar-ket for OneWeb’s project be-

cause it has many remote ar-eas where high-speed broad-band is not available. OneWeb also needs the assistance of Russian space agency Ros-cosmos to send satellites into orbit.

OneWeb has offered the Russian government the op-tion of buying a 12.5-per cent

stake in the company in ex-change for approving its re-quest for a frequency band in the country, said the three sources, including one in the Kremlin.

The offer was made at a meet-ing with Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev earlier this year, they added.

A logo BMW is seen during the company’s annual news conference

Cameroon rebels issue ‘virtual revolutionary currency’AFP | Yaounde

Anglophone separatists in Cameroon yesterday an-

nounced they had launched a virtual currency, the Amba-Coin, to help fund their cam-paign for independence and provide humanitarian aid.

The bitcoin-like curren-cy, based on the blockchain software principle, is named after the “Republic of Amba-zonia,” a self-declared inde-pendent state in Cameroon’s Northwest and Southwest Regions.

“The People of Ambazo-nia has created AmbaCoin, a tradeable digital token that

can be used as a currency, a representation of an asset, a virtual share, a proof of patri-otic citizenship,” according to the currency’s website.

“All sales of the AmbaCoin will be directed to fund the Ambazonian Cause, to assist Refugees & Internally Dis-placed Persons, to rebuild homes destroyed by occu-pying military forces, and to defend communities from the repressive regime of La Re-publique Du Cameroun.”

According to a clock on the currency’s website, the Am-baCoin became operational on Friday.

It said there had been more than 28,000 pre-orders for the currency, a figure that could not be verified independently.

Buying one “amba” for the “Ambazonian Crypto Bond” costs 25 US cents.

In October 2017, radical an-glophone leaders declared a “Republic of Ambazonia” in two regions that were incor-porated into predominantly French-speaking Cameroon in 1961.

Electricity and Water Affairs Minister Dr. Abdulhussain Mirza receives Bahrain’s Ambassador to France Dr. Mohammed Abdul Ghaffar Abdullah. The Minister praised the role of the two countries in the fields of electricity, water and energy. They also discussed the results achieved in the consolidation of relations between the two countries after the visit of His Majesty King Hamad to France earlier.

25US cents is the cost

for buying one “amba” for the “Ambazonian

Crypto Bond”

13 TUESDAY, DECEMBER 25, 2018

I, BAIJOO GOPINATHAN S/O KATALLAPARAMBIL KUMARAN GOPINATHAN, holder of Indian Passport NO P3207190 dated on 14-03-2017 issued at BAHRAIN, having permanent residence at (full address in India)KATALLAPARAMBIL HOUSE, PARAPPUKARA P.O TRISSUR DIST KERALA, presently residing at (full address in Bahrain) Flat no 3, Bldg. 1229, Block 333, Zinj will henceforth be known as (Given Name) BAIJOO (Surname) GOPINATHAN. Objection(s) if any may be forwarded to Embassy Of India, P.O box No 26106, Al-Seef, Kingdom Of Bahrain

I, NISHA BAIJOO GOPINATHAN W/O BAIJOO GOPINATHAN, holder of Indian Passport NO J6463453 dated on 17-08-2011 issued at BAHRAIN, having permanent residence at (full address in India) KOTTEKKATE , HIGH SCHOOL ROAD JUNCTION, CHENTRAPPINI P.O TRICHUR presently residing at (full address in Bahrain) FLAT NO 3, BLDG. 1229, BLOCK 333, ZINJ will henceforth be known as (Given Name) NISHA BAIJOO (Surname) GOPINATHAN. Objection(s) if any may be forwarded to Embassy Of India, P.O box No 26106, Al-Seef, Kingdom Of Bahrain

I, MOHAMMAD NAVEED ANJUM S/O MOHAMMED ALI, holding Indian Passport No. H4921207, dated 04.05.2009 issued at BANGALORE having permanent residence at (full address in India) ROOM NO. 09 NEW MUSLIM HOSTEL, I MAIN SARASWATHIPURAM presently residing at (full address in Bahrain) FLAT 13, ENTRANCE 3674, ROAD 187, TUBLI 701, BAHRAIN will henceforth be known as (Given name) MOHAMMAD NAVEED (Surname) ANJUM. Objection(s) if any, may be forwarded to Embassy of India, P.O Box 26106, Bldg 1090, Road 2819, Block 428, Al Seef, Kingdom of Bahrain.

ZERO (PG-15) (HINDI/DRAMA/COMEDY/ROMANTIC) NEW

SHAH RUKH KHAN, ANUSHKA SHARMA, KATRINA KAIFSTARTING FRIDAY 21st

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: 11.00 AM + 2.00 + 5.00 + 8.00 + 11.00 PM.CITYCENTRE DAILY AT 10.30 AM. + 10.45 AM. + 11.45 AM. + 1.30 + 2.00 + 3.00 + 4.45 + 5.15 + 6.15 + 8.00 + 8.30 + 9.30 + 11.15 PM. + 11.45 PM. + (12.45 MN. THURS./FRI.)DAILY AT (VIPII): 10.30 AM. + 1.45 + 5.00 + 8.15 + 11.30 PM.SEEF (I) DAILY AT: 11.00 AM. + 12.00 + 1.00 + 2.00 + 3.00 + 4.00 + 5.00 + 6.00 + 7.00 + 8.00 + 9.00 + 10.00 + 11.00 PM. + 12.00 MN. + (1.00 AM. THURS./FRI.)SAAR DAILY AT : 10.45 AM. + 1.45 + 4.45 + 7.45 + 8.15 PM. + (10.45 PM. + 11.15 PM. THURS./FRI.)WADI AL SAIL DAILY AT: 11.15 AM + 11.45 AM. + 2.15 + 2.45 + 5.15 + 5.45 + 8.15 + 8.45 + 11.15 + 11.45 PM

BUMBLEBEE (PG-13) (ACTION /ADVENTURE/SCI-FICTION) NEW

HAILEE STEINFELD, JOHN CENA, JORGE LENDEBORG JR.

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: 10.45 AM. + 1.15 + 3.45 + 6.15 + 8.45 + 11.15 PM.DAILY AT (VIP): 12.15 + 2.45 + 5.15 + 7.45 + 10.15 PM.CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 11.30 AM. + 2.00 + 4.30 + 7.00 + 9.30 + 12.00 MN. + (1.00 AM.THURS./FRI.)DAILY AT (IMAX 3D): 11.00 AM. + 1.30 + 4.00 + 6.30 + 9.00 + 11.30 PM.DAILY AT (VIPI): 10.30 AM. + 1.00 + 3.30 + 6.00 + 8.30 + 11.00 PM.SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 11.15 AM. + 12.15 + 1.45 + 2.45 + 4.15 + 5.15 + 6.45 + 7.45 + 9.15 + 10.15 + 11.45 PM. + (12.45 MN. THURS./FRI.)SAAR DAILY AT : 11.00 AM. + 1.30 + 4.00 + 6.30 + 9.00 + (11.30 PM. THURS./FRI.)WADI AL SAIL DAILY AT: 11.15 AM. + 1.45 + 4.15 + 6.45 + 9.15 + 11.45 PM.

ANCHOR’S UP (G) (ANIMATION/ADVENTURE) NEW

MARIE BLOKHUS, ANDERZ EIDE, MARCUS GUNNARSEN

(KIDS CINEMA): 10.45 AM. + 12.30 + 4.30 PM.CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 11.15 AM. + 1.00 + 2.45 + 4.30 PM.SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 11.00 AM + 12.45 + 2.30 PM

MAARI (2) (TAMIL) (NEW) STARTING FRIDAY 21st

DHANUSH, SAI PALLAVI,TOVINO THOMAS, VIDYA PRADEEP, KRISHNA KULASEKARAN

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: 10.45 AM. + 1.45 + 4.45 + 7.45 + 10.45 PM.SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 11.30 AM. + 2.30 + 5.30 + 8.30 + 11.30 PM.AL HAMRA DAILY AT 11.30 AM. + 5.45 + (12.00 MN. FRI.)

SEETHAKAATHI (PG-13) (TAMIL) (NEW)

VIJAY SETHUPATHY, PARVATHY NAIR, REMYA NAMBEESAN

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: 12.30 + 3.45 + 7.00 + 10.15 PM.

AQUAMAN (P-15) (ACTION/ADVENTURE)

JASON MOMOA, AMBER HEARD, NICOLE KIDMAN

OASIS JUFFAIR: 10.30 AM. + 1.30 + 4.30 + 7.30 + 10.30 PM.CITYCENTRE DAILY AT : 10.30 AM. + 12.00 + 1.00 + 3.00 + 4.00 + 6.00 + 7.00 + 9.00 + 10.00 + 12.00 MN.(1.00 AM. THURS./FRI.)SEEF (II) DAILY AT 11.45 AM. + 2.45 + 5.45 + 8.45 + 11.45 PM. + (12.45 MN. THURS./FRI.)SAAR DAILY AT : 11.00 AM. + 2.00 + 5.00 + 8.00 PM. + (11.00 PM. THURS./FRI.)WADI AL SAIL DAILY AT: 11.30 AM. + 2.30 + 5.30 + 8.30 + 11.30 PM.

RALPH BREAKS THE INTERNET (PG) (ANIMATION/ADVENTURE/COMEDY)

JOHN C. REILLY, SARAH SILVARMAN, GAL GADOT

OASIS JUFFAIR: DAILAY AT: (KIDS CINEMA): 2.15 + 8.45 PM.SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 11.15 AM. + 1.30 + 3.45 + 6.00 + 8.15 + 10.30 PM.

9-SPIDER MAN INTO THE SPIDER

VERSE (PG) (ANIMATION/ACTION/ADVENTURE) NEW

HAILEE STEINFELD, NICOLAS CAGE, MAHERSHALA ALI

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: (KIDS CINEMA): 6.15DAILY AT: (3D)(KIDS CINEMA): 11.00 PM.CITYCENTRE DAILY AT : 11.00 AM. + 1.30 + 4.00 + 6.30 + 9.00 + 11.30 PM.SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 12.00 + 4.30 + 9.00 PM.SAAR DAILY AT : 12.45 + 3.15 + 5.45 PM.WADI AL SAIL DAILY AT: 1.30 + 6.15 + 11.00 PM.

CREED II (PG-13) (DRAMA/ACTION/SPORT)

TESSA THOMPSON, MICHAEL B. JORDAN, SYLVESTER STALLONE

DAILY AT: 3.00 + 8.15 PM.CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 12.45 + 3.30 + 6.15 + 9.00 + 11.45 PM.

KANAA (PG-13) (TAMIL) NEW STARTING THURSDAY 7.00 PM ONWARDS

AISHWARYA RAJESH, SATHYARAJ, SIVAKARTHIKEYAN, DARSHAN, BLADE SHANKAR,

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: 12.15 + 5.30 + 10.45 PM.SEEF (I) DAILY AT: 11.30 AM. + 2.30 + 5.30 + 8.30 + 11.30 PM.

KEDARNATH (PG-15)(HINDI/DRAMA/ROMANTIC)

RAJINIKANTH, AKSHAY KUMAR, AMY JACKSON

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: 2.45 + 8.15 PM.

JOSEPH (PG-15) (MALAYALAM) JOJU GEORGE, MALAVIKA MENON,

JAMES ELIYA

OASIS JUFFAIR DAILY AT: 12.00 + 5.30 + 11.00 PM.CITYCENTRE

ASHER (15+) (CRIME/DRAMA) NEW

FAMKE JANSSEN, RON PERLMAN, RICHARD DREYFUSSCITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 11.15 AM. + 3.30 + 7.45 + 12.00 MN.

ANNA AND THE APOCALPSE (15+) (COMEDY/ MUSICAL /HORROR) NEW

ELLA HUNT, MALCOLM CUMMING, SARAH SWIRE

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 1.15 + 5.15 + 9.15 PM.SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 11.45 AM. + 3.45 + 7.45 + 11.45 PM.

RALPH BREAKS THE INTERNET (PG) (ANIMATION/ADVENTURE/COMEDY)

JOHN C. REILLY, SARAH SILVARMAN, GAL GADOT

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 11.30 AM. + 1.45 + 4.00 + 6.15 + 8.30 + 10.45 PM.WADI AL SAIL DAILY AT: 11.15 AM. + 4.00 + 8.45 PM.

SECOND ACT (PG-15) (COMEDY) NEW

JENNIFER LOPEZ, VANESSA HUDGENS, MILO VENTIMIGLIACITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 1.00 + 5.15 + 9.30 PM.SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 2.30 + 7.00 + 11.30 PM.

JOHNNY ENGLISH STRIKES AGAIN (PG) (COMEDY/ACTION/ADVENTURE)

ROWAN ATKINSON, OLGA KURYLENKO, EMMA THOMPSON

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 12.00 + 2.00 + 4.00 + 6.00 + 8.00 + 10.00 + 12.00 MN

ROBIN HOOD (PG-15) (ACTION/ADVENTURE)

TARON EGERTON, EVE HEWSON, JAMIE FOXX

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 10.45 AM. + 3.00 + 7.15 + 11.30 PM.

HUNTER KILLER (PG-15) (ACTION/THRILLER)

GERARD BUTLER, GARY OLDMAN, COMMON

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 6.15 + 8.45 + 11.15 PM.

THE POSSESSION OF HANNAH GRACE (18+) (THRILLER/HORROR)

SHAY MITCHELL, STANA KATIC, LOUIS HERTHUM

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 11.15 AM. + 3.15 + 7.15 + 11.15 PM.

EL BADLAH (PG-13) (ARABIC/COMEDY)

TAMER HOSNY, AKRAM HOSNI, MAJED EL MASRY, AMINA KHALIL

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 1.30 + 5.45 + 10.00 PM.

ODIYAN (PG-13)(MALAYALAM) NEW

MOHANLAL, PRAKASH RAJ, MANJU WARRIER

CITYCENTRE DAILY AT: 11.30 AM. + 2.30 + 5.30 + 8.30 + 11.30 PM.

VOX LUX (15+) (DRAMA/MUSCIAL) NEW

NATALIE PORTMAN, JUDE LAW, RAFFEY CASSIDY

SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 10.45 AM. + 3.00 + 7.15 + 11.30 PM.

REMI, NOBODY’S BOY (PG) (ADVENTURE/ DRAMA/FAMILY) (NEW)

NATALIE PORTMAN, JUDE LAW, RAFFEY CASSIDY

SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 1.45 + 5.45 + 9.45 PM.

CHRISTMAS ELF (DRAMA) (NEW) KIM SHAW, SEAN PATRICK THOMAS, NICHOLLE TOM

SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 1.00 + 5.15 + 9.30 PM.

LITTLE MISS DOLITTLE (PG) (ADVENTURE/FAMILY) (NEW)

PERI BAUMEISTER, AYLIN TEZEL, CHRISTOPH MARIA HERBST

SEEF (II) DAILY AT: 4.15 + 6.30 + 8.45 + 11.00 PM.

SEETHAKAATHI (PG-13) (TAMIL) (NEW)

VIJAY SETHUPATHY, PARVATHY NAIR,REMYA NAMBEESAN

SEEF (II) DAILY AT:10.30 AM. + 1.30 + 4.45 + 8.00 + 11.15 PM. AL HAMRA DAILY AT: 2.30 + 8.45 PM.

AUTORSHA (PG-15)(MALAYALAM) NEW

AISHWARYA RAJESH, SATHYARAJ, SIVAKARTHIKEYAN, DARSHAN, BLADE SHANKAR,

SEEF (I) DAILY AT: 3.15 + 8.45 PM.

SINGAMSILUKKUVARUPATTI SINGAM (PG-15) (TAMIL) (NEW) STARTING THURSDAY 7.00 PM ONWARDS

VISHNU VISHAL, REGINA CASSANDRA, OVIYA, YOGI BABU, ANANDARAJ

SEEF (I) DAILY AT: 12.30 + 6.00 + 11.30 PM.

PADI PADI LECHE MANASU (PG-15) (TELGU) (NEW) STARTING FRIDAY 21st

SHARWANAND, SAI PALLAVI

SEEF (I) DAILY AT: 10.45 AM. + 4.45 + 10.45 PM.

ANTARIKSHAM 9000 KMPH (PG-15) (TELGU) (NEW) STARTING FRIDAY 21st

VARUN TEJ, ADITI RAO HYDARI, LAVANYA TRIPATHI, SATYEDEV

SEEF (I) DAILY AT: 1.45 + 7.45 PM.

CHANGE OF NAME

FEMALE CLEANER WANTEDSituation vacant for female Pilipino cleaner. Apart from an attractive pay, benefits include free accommodation, overtime compensation and work visa. Individuals with flexible visa are also eligible for the position. Kindly contact Mob: 66996306, E-mail: [email protected]

Khloe defends herself on social mediaANI | Washington

American reality star Khloe Kardashian has always been defending herself from haters

on social media, and Khloe had to it again!

On Friday, the 35-year-old star posted a black and white picture with her moth-er Kris Jenner when an Instagram user commented, “Would you keep IG if all photo editing apps were gone forev-er??” To this, she fired back, “Would you? Sometimes I wonder why people comment if it adds no value to one’s life?”

She continues, “Maybe I’m just dif-ferent...but I don’t care to be negative

or passive aggressive. Our world is toxic enough as it is. It is sad people care to

criticize something like an editing app,” said the reality star.

Later, another user Imply-ing Khloe that she heavily edited the photo, comment-ed, “’Let it go, babe. Say something nice or just let it go. Don’t add to the hatred in the world. How does this serve you, love?”

This is not the first time that Khloe has reacted on receiving negative com-ments.

Deby Ryan engaged to Twenty One Pilots’ Josh DunIANS | Los Angeles

Actress Deby Ryan has got engaged to Twenty One

Pilot’s drummer Josh Dun.Dun on Sunday took to In-

stagram to share the news with his fans. He posted pho-tographs of him proposing to a tearful Ryan with a diamond engagement ring, reports eon-line.com.

“I found a tree house in the woods in New Zealand and pro-posed to my girl. She is my dude for life. I love you Debby,”

Dun captioned

the photographs.While Ryan tweeted: “I said

yes! Well technically I said ‘No Way’ twice but I meant yes.”

Deby Ryan and Josh Dun

Nicole Kidman looks happy to be homeIANS | Sydney

Australian actress Nicole Kidman and her hus-

band Keith Urban shared a laugh during a church out-ing in Australia with daugh-ters Sunday Rose and Faith Margaret.

They have been enjoy-ing a leisurely time Down Under ahead of the festive season.

On Sunday, Kidman and Urban looked every inch the doting parents as they enjoyed an outing with their two children, reports daily-mail.co.uk.

‘No one is going to outdo Julie Andrews’IANS | Los An-geles

Actress Emily B l u n t s a y s

she decided not to emulate actress Jul-

ie Andrews’ iconic portrayal of the titu-lar role when filming “Mary Poppins Re-turns”.

In an interview to The Sydney Morn-ing Herald, the ac-tress said she steered

more towards the book for in-spiration than the famous film, reports dailymail.co.uk.

“No one is ever going to out-Julie Julie Andrews. And I think this is just going to be my version of her,” she said.

Blunt said that while it was an intimidating role to step into, she was trying to treat it as busi-ness as usual.

“I am trying to approach her as I would any other character, not get caught up in the white noise of ‘Oh my God you’re

Mary Poppins!’”However, the star confessed

that the first challenge she thought of when she landed the role, had nothing to do with the 1964 original but with working alongside children.

“Someone says ‘Do you want to do Mary Poppins?’ and you go ‘yeah!’ - and then you realise all your scenes are with chil-dren. But basically our kids are particularly brilliant. They’ve become my littlest friends re-ally.”

Khloe Kardashian

Emily Blunt

14

sports


Klopp taking nothing for granted despite Liverpool lead

AFP | London

Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp has said the fact his side top the Premier

League table heading into the busy holiday period counts for little.

The Anfield club are four points clear at the summit going into their Boxing Day clash at home to Newcastle, with cham-pions Manchester City second and Tottenham Hotspur six points adrift in third place.

Liverpool, however, have not won the English title in the Premier League era -- their last domestic Championship crown came back in 1990.

And with Tottenham hav-ing hammered Everton, Liver-pool’s local rivals, 6-2 on Sunday, Klopp does not expect to have things all his own way during the rest of the season.

“You (the media) make these stories about who is in and who is out,” said Klopp.

“I saw the game against Ever-ton who played absolutely more than okay and then they (Spurs) hit pretty much everything and it was really impressive how

Tottenham did.“The same will happen to Ar-

senal and Chelsea. No decision is made, why should it be? No-body should feel safe, no one should feel out of the race. It is not a time to think about it.

“For me they (Tottenham) were never out so why should people be surprised they are now in? A lot of teams are in whatever you call the title race and that is how it should be.”

The German added: “That is maybe only the difference to last year when pretty much nobody was in any more at this time and that is good for all supporters out there.

“Being unbeaten in the league until December is not something I had too often in my life. We did really well so far, and we have to do even better from now on. That’s the challenge for us.”

Liverpool fans know only too well that being top at Christmas is no guarantee of the league title.

There may have only been two occasions in the past 10 years where the team top on Decem-ber 25 failed to win the Premier League but in both instances it

was Liverpool, in 2008 and 2014, who could not complete the job.

Only James Milner among Liverpool’s current squad knows what it’s like to win the Premier League, having been a member of Manchester City’s victorious

squads in 2012 and 2014.But Klopp, who won the Bun-

desliga title with Borussia Dort-mund in 2011 and 2012, insisted: “I know that all players who have won the title, at one time it was their first time.

“You don’t know what is more important, is it experience, po-tential, attitude, desire or joy, being completely fresh having never had it before?

“Experience is always good if you are young enough to use it. We have to use all experience from the last games, especially from the last season, and that’s much more important.

“Character is always very important but with these boys there is no doubt about that be-cause we achieved already in the past big things: finals, good positions in the league.”

Jurgen Klopp, the Liverpool manager reacts during a match

Being unbeaten in the league until December is not

something I had too often in my life. We

did really well so far, and we have to

do even better from now on. That’s the

challenge for usJURGEN KLOPP

Mooy ruled out of Australia’s Asian Cup defenceReuters | Melbourne

Huddersfield Town mid-fielder Aaron Mooy

has been ruled out of Aus-tralia’s Asian Cup defence after a thorough assessment of his knee ligament injury, Football Federation Austral-ia (FFA) said yesterday.

The injury sustained by Mooy was first flagged by Huddersfield but the FFA said Mooy was desperate to feature in the Jan. 5-Feb. 1 tournament and had re-quested a second opinion.

The 28-year-old under-went an independent re-view of his knee injury under the supervision of the Socceroos’ high per-formance coordinator Phil Coles before it was decided to allow the player to con-tinue his rehabilitation at Huddersfield.

FK Austria Wien midfield-er James Jeggo will replace Mooy in coach Graham Ar-nold’s 23-man squad, having made 11 appearances in the Austrian top division.

“It is disappointing to lose Aaron for the tournament however it was important that we left no stone un-turned in exploring every option to get Aaron on the pitch for Australia in the UAE,” Arnold said.

Chimaev targets Al Selawe after Brave 20TDT | Manama

Khamzat Chimaev took the fight in short notice against

Sidney Wheeler to headline the main event of Brave 20 at the Gachibowli Indoor Stadium in Hyderabad, India.

The bout took place in a weight class above his fighting weight category of the welter-weight division.

The bout took an unexpected turn as Chimaev finished the Middleweight from the USA in a mere 35 seconds of the first round. The bout started with an explosive takedown from Chimaev who locked his op-ponent from the mount to rain a barrage of punches from the top.

The bout concluded as Chi-maev celebrated his second win in Brave Combat Federation. In his promotional debut held dur-ing Brave 18 held at the King-

dom of Bahrain, the Swedish prospect finished undefeated Austrian star, Marko Kisic with-in the first round by TKO.

After proving his dominance

over the Middleweight star from the United States of America, Chimaev made his ambitions clear at Brave Combat Feder-ation.

The Swedish breakout star put the Welterweight world champion, Jarrah Al Selawe in the crosshairs. It had been announced that Al Selawe will move to the newly an-nounced Super-Welterweight division as the inaugural champion.

The statement from Chimaev after Brave 20 had made it clear that he will be joining the Su-per-Welterweight division and had added joined the ranks of the stars who are closing in to have their world championship title opportunity.

Khamzat Chimaev

11 nations represented at first edition of global MMA in SaudiTDT | Manama

Brave Combat Federation has confirmed that the

first International Mixed Martial Arts event taking place in the Kingdom of Sau-di Arabia under the patron-age of His Highness Sheikh Khalid bin Hamad Al Khalifa will showcase athletes from 11 nations.

The fight night will show-case 11 professional fights on 28th December at the King Abdullah Sports City Indoor Sports Hall in Jeddah, Sau-di Arabia. The event will be broadcasted live on Abu Dhabi Sports. In 2018, the initiative

from the Kingdom of Bah-rain brought International Mixed Martial Art events for the first time to six nations including Indonesia, Morocco, Colombia, Pakistan, South Af-rica and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

The main event will be head-lined by Jeremy Kennedy from Canada and Marat Magome-dov from Russia. Marat Ma-gomedov represents the KHK MMA Fight Team established by HH Shaikh Khalid bin Ham-ad Al Khalifa.

Another iconic fight at the event will be when Hamza Kooheji from Bahrain will face Yayong Wang from China.

Mudabbar edge Central cafe TDT | Manama

Mudabbar beat Central cafe by 4 wickets in a

CBA Division C T-20 League match.

Central cafe won the toss and elected to bat first. Pranesh became the top scorer with 20 runs and they put a total of 114 runs at the end of 20 overs. Chasing the target Mudabbar opener went to pavilion with cheap runs after which Nasir scored a quick 42 runs in 28 balls that helped Mudabbar to reach the target in 12th over to win the match by 4 wickets.

Brief Score: Mudabbar 118/6 in 12 overs (Nasir 42, Ganesh 3/27) beat Central Cafe 114/8 (Pranesh 20) by 4 wickets

Other match scoresYoung Star 144/2 in 16.1

overs (Sohail 56, Atif 50) beat Tornado A 139/10 (Jinesh 26, Remsaan 3/14) by 8 wickets

ACL Red Mountain 147/6 in 20 overs (Jan 42, Saeed 29, Shabir 2/27) beat Rebel CC 132/9 (Yaseer 31, Naeem 2/19) by 15 runs

Shahzad Zafar 169/7 in 20 overs (Asita 74, Majid 30, Irfan 43/3) beat Falcon CC 136/9 (Ir-fan 22, Asita 3/27) by 33 runs

Karnataka Royals 159/5 in 20 overs (Janardhan 68, Ga-jendra 33, Jijo. C 2/31) beat Unique CC 148/9 (Jijo.C 34, Prasanth 33, Janardhan 2/22) by 11 runs

Euro Bahrain 176/7 in 19.2 overs (Asim 92, Imran 29, Suneer 2/22) beat LuLu 172/6 in 20 overs (Biju 69, Pradeep 32, Asim 3/21) by 3 wickets

End of the Messi-Ronaldo era? Football rings changes in 2018

Mbappe became the first teenager to score in a World Cup final since Pele

• Luka Modric won the Ballon d’Or after driving Croatia to the World Cup final

• Gareth Bale came off the bench to score twice as Real Madrid beat Liverpool in the Champions League final

AFP | Paris

One of the enduring images from 2018 will remain Kylian Mbappe consoling Lionel Messi

in the Russian city of Kazan, just after the final whistle in France’s 4-3 win over Argentina in the last 16 of the World Cup.

This was to a large extent Mbappe’s year, as the teenage superstar exploded on the world stage by scoring twice in that game, the first World Cup brace by a teenager since Pele in 1958.

Still just 19 at the time, Paris Saint-Germain forward Mbappe also became the first teenager to score in a World Cup final since Pele as France won the trophy for the second time by beating Luka Modric’s Croatia 4-2 in the final on a dark and damp Sunday in Moscow.

The World Cup itself was a joy to watch, a richly entertaining tourna-ment full of memorable games and concluding with the highest-scoring

final since 1966.From Spain’s 3-3 draw with

Portugal in the group stage, featuring a Cristiano Ron-

aldo hat-trick, to Belgium’s 2-1 quarter-final win over

Brazi l and Croa-

tia’s epic semi-final defeat of England in extra time, it was stud-ded with memo-rable matches.

B u t i t w a s much more than t h a t . “ M a y b e this is one of the weirdest World Cups,” said Cro-atia coach Zlatko Dalic.

His team’s re-markable run to the final and the premature exits of Ger-many, Spain and Argen-tina showed that inter-n a t i o n a l f o o t b a l l can still be unpredictable.

It will also probably be remembered as the tour-nament that marked the end o f Me s s i a n d Ronaldo’s dreams of lifting the World Cup.

They were elimi-nated on the same day in the last 16, and 2018 could

be remembered as the year when the Mes-si-Ronaldo era ended.

Both enjoyed prolific years, with the Argen-tine driving Barcelona to a Spanish league

a n d

cup d o u b l e

a n d R o n a l d o winning another Cham-

pions League with Real Madrid before moving to Juventus in the transfer of the year.

Modric takes Ballon d’Or However, their numbers

are down on the phenom-enal figures of past years, and instead it was the imp-ish playmaker Modric who won the Ballon d’Or, and

FIFA’s best player award, on the strength of his role in Madrid’s Champions League triumph and Cro-atia’s World Cup run. He was also the best player in Russia.

Ronaldo and Messi had shared the Ballon d’Or between them for the last decade, winning five each.

Ronaldo was second this time, while Messi was fifth, behind Antoine Griezmann and Mbappe.

“Nobody has the right to compare themselves to them. They are among the best in the history of the sport,” Modric told France Football. “To fol-low on from them is incredible, and I am proud of it.”

Crowned the best young player, Mbappe will hope the future belongs to him.

At club level, his PSG side are among the teams desperate to end Real’s run of three straight Champions League titles.

The Spaniards beat Liverpool in this year’s final in Kiev with Gareth Bale scoring twice, and will hope to retain the trophy next year with the final in Madrid.Meanwhile, there is lots to look for-

ward to at international level in 2019.

Nations League finals The new UEFA Nations League has

been an instant hit. It will conclude with the four-team finals in Portugal in June, with the hosts facing Switzerland and England playing the Netherlands in the last four.

“We want to go beyond where we went last summer, and we’re in the mix for what is a really important staging post in our development,” said Eng-land manager Gareth Southgate of that competition.

However, the main international events in 2019 are elsewhere.

The first 24-team Asian Cup takes place in the UAE in January and Feb-ruary, before Brazil hosts the Copa America and the United States defend

the CONCACAF Gold Cup.France are hoping to win another

World Cup, as they host the 24-team women’s tournament in June and July, with the USA the defending champions.

And a decision is expected soon on whether Egypt or South Africa host the 24-nation Africa Cup of Nations in June and July after the Confederation of African Football stripped Cameroon of the tournament due to delays in their preparations.


Nobody has the right to compare themselves to

them. They are among the best in the history of the sport. To follow on from them is incredible, and I

am proud of itLUKA MODRIC

5Ballon d’Or awards have been won by

Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi over the

past decade

(FromL) 2018 Ballon d’Or awarded for best player of the year, Men’s Ballon d’Or Real Madrid’s Croatian midfielder Luka Modric, Women’s Ballon d’Or Olympique Lyonnais’ Norwegian forward Ada Hegerberg and Under-21 Ballon d’Or (Kopa trophy) Paris Saint-Germain’s French forward Kylian Mbappe pose at the end of the 2018 Ballon d’Or award ceremony at the Grand Palais in Paris

Tottenham in the race? It’s all about consistency says PochettinoReuters | Liverpool

Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino says

his in-form team could be title contenders this season if they can find the consistency that has eluded them in the past.

Spurs, who are third, deliv-ered a sensational performance as they romped to a 6-2 win over Everton at Goodison Park on Sunday to move just two points behind second-placed Manches-ter City and six behind leaders Liverpool.

The emphatic way in which Spurs won, with an outstanding exhibition of passing and move-ment, raised the inevitable ques-tion of whether the title race is simply between Juergen Klopp and Pep Guardiola’s teams or if Pocchetino’s side are now part of a three-horse race.

“No, I still believe Liverpool and Manchester City are the real contenders and favourites to win the Premier League. We

are there but (so are) Chelsea, Arsenal and Manchester Unit-ed,” said Pochettino.

“I think there is still a long

way for me to say we are real contenders. Football is about being consistent of course. If we are able to be consistent and

play in the way we did tonight I think yes maybe we could then be a real contender but there is still a long way,” he added.

Harry Kane and Son Heu-ng-min struck twice as Spurs responded to falling 1-0 down with a devastating display and Pochettino said his team need to deliver such results throughout the rest of the campaign if they want to topple the league’s top two.

“Now we are close but we need to be cautious, go step-by-step, game-by-game. We need to be conscious about that, we need to fight a lot, and there is still a long way, (we need to) work and to be consistent,” said the Argentine, who has guided Spurs to a top-three finish for the past three seasons.

“Being involved in four com-petitions will be tough but we are going to try. The men-tality today was clear and we need to always think about the next game and try to win every game and to be in the best condition to fight for big things.”

Captain Harry Kane took a little more upbeat tone.

“Everybody’s been talking about Liverpool and Manches-ter City, and we’ve been getting on with it and doing well, like we normally do,” said the England striker.

“It’s important we carry that on now. The games are coming thick and fast but they’re games we can definitely win.

“We’ve had a good month and hopefully we can take that into January now - and February - and we’ll see where we’re at come April time,” he said.

Spurs have a relatively easy festive season — they host Bournemouth on Boxing Day and Wolves on December 29 before a trip to lowly Cardiff City on New Year’s Day.

Wins in those games could leave them very interested ob-servers when City and Liverpool face each other at the Etihad on Jan. 3.

Dele Alli of Tottenham Hotspur is challenged by Jordan Pickford of Everton

Cristiano Ronaldo

Paine loving heated Kohli battle

Tim Paine and Virat Kohli had some testy exchanges in the Perth Test, which at one point required the umpires to intervene

AFP | Melbourne

Australia skipper Tim Paine said yesterday he is relishing his some-

times heated battle with ani-mated Indian counterpart Virat Kohli, and promised “intense, hard” cricket in the crunch Box-ing Day Test at.

The pair had some testy ex-changes in the second Test at Perth, which at one point need-ed the umpire to intervene.

And Kohli offered only a frosty handshake at the end of the game, which Australia won to level the four-Test series 1-1, refusing to meet Paine’s eye in a move blasted by some as dis-respectful.

But Paine said he appreciated that Kohli never liked to lose.

“A lot was made of my battle with Virat in the second Test, and for the past few years when I haven’t been playing interna-tional cricket, he was one guy I loved watching,” he said in a column for Melbourne’s Herald Sun.

“Now to be out in the middle going head-to-head with him in a Test series is something I’m really relishing.”

Paine said he was not annoyed “in the slightest” by Kohli look-ing straight past him at the handshake.

“Virat is someone who is pre-pared to wear his heart on his sleeve and like all professional

athletes, hates to lose,” he said.“I like the way Virat plays. I

don’t know him personally but I’ve always admired -- not only his obvious skill as a player -- but the passion and aggression

he plays with. People like to see that and he gets fans through the gates.”

Kohli’s antics in Perth, where he also failed to acknowledge the crowd’s applause after he was controversially given out in the first innings for 123, brought a stunning rebuke from veteran Bollywood star Naseeruddin Shah.

Middle-order puzzle He described him as “not only

the world’s best batsman but also the world’s worst behaved player”, with the mass-circula-tion Hindustan Times saying it articulated what many Indian cricket fans had been thinking.

His behaviour when the Mel-bourne Test begins on Wednes-

day will closely watched, but he has the backing of coach Ravi Shastri who on Sunday called Kohli “an absolute gentleman”.

Australian coach Justin Langer said yesterday his big-gest selection headache was whether to persist with mid-dle-order batsman Peter Hand-scomb or recall all-rounder Mitch Marsh to ease the pres-sure on pace spearheads Mitch-ell Starc, Josh Hazlewood and Pat Cummins.

“In a perfectly balanced side you’ll have someone who can bowl some overs so Mitch be-comes an attractive commodity on a wicket probably unlike Ad-elaide and Perth,” he said, where the surface offered fast bowlers plenty of opportunities.

Pant out as Karthik returns to India’s ODI fold

Reuters | Mumbai

Ex p e r i e n c e d D i n e s h Karthik has pipped young

Rishabh Pant for the spot of second wicketkeeper-batsman in India’s one-day interna-tional squad for their match-es against Australia and New Zealand.

The 21-year-old Pant was the backup to former captain and regular stumper Mahen-dra Singh Dhoni during India’s home five-match series against West Indies.

Pant played three of the five matches as a specialist bats-man and scored 17 and 24 in the second and third ODIs. Karthik, 33, has played 86 ODIs and was part of India’s Asia Cup squad but was left out for the West Indies matches.

“After returning from Aus-tralia post the test series, Rish-abh Pant will play for India A in the five-match one-day series at home against Eng-land Lions,” the Indian cricket board said in their statement while announcing the squad.

Karthik was inconsistent and could not convert starts into big scores at the Asia Cup

and finished with a total of 146 in six matches, missing the opportunity to secure the number four spot India have been looking to fill ahead of the 50-over World Cup next year.

But Karthik could well have sealed the spot with captain Virat Kohli and coach Ravi Shastri confirming recently that India’s period of exper-imenting with their ODI side is over with five months left before the World Cup in Eng-land.

After the conclusion of the ongoing four-test series against Australia, India will play a three-match one-day international series in January.


Kohli failed to acknowl-edge the crowd’s applause in Perth after he was con-troversially given out in the first innings for 123

KNOW WHAT

145runs were only scored by Dinesh Karthik in

six matches at the Asia Cup

Umpire Chris Gaffaney (2nd L) talks to India’s captain Virat Kohli (2nd R) as Australia’s batsman Tim Paine (R) looks on

India’s Dinesh Karthik during nets

India’s batsmen must help bowlers: RahaneReuters | Melbourne

India’s batsmen must step up and help their bowlers if the

world’s top-ranked test side are to win more consistently away from home, vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane said yesterday ahead of the third test against Australia.

India, who last lost a test se-ries at home in late 2012 against England, suffered defeats in South Africa and England this year due to a lack of batting support.

Their openers have struggled in Australia in the first two tests and the lack of runs at the top has intensified pressure on the middle order of a team which has a lengthy tail.

“The batsmen definitely need to step up,” Rahane, who has scored 164 from his four innings including two fifties, told re-porters ahead of Wednesday’s third test.

“When we discuss the batting unit, that point is very impor-tant. Especially when we are abroad, the bowlers have been taking 20 wickets since South Africa, so if the batsmen help the bowlers the results will be favouring us.”

India scored 250 and 307 on a difficult pitch in their victory in the opening test at Adelaide but surrendered meekly in their

second innings at Perth, where they were all out for 140 chasing 287 for a 2-0 series lead.

Rahane, who has played 54 tests, hopes he can convert his half-centuries into hundreds and contribute more with the bat.

“It (century) will definite-ly come. I’m really sure it will come in this test match with the way I am batting since Ade-laide,” he said.

“I think I will get two hun-dreds but it will be important for me not to think about it and continue the way I am batting. If I can read the situation well and bat accordingly it will be better for the team. Personal milestones can come later.”

The touring side’s players took a three-day break leading up to the Boxing Day test at the Melbourne Cricket Ground and Rahane said India would look to

make a fresh start.“We will now look at it as a

two-test series going ahead,” said the 30-year-old. “We got a break after the first two tests, which was very important be-cause sometimes the inten-sity of the test match is too much.

“Break can be good or bad, but for our team it is a good thing and we will have a fresh start in the Melbourne test.”

India’s Ajinkya Rahane during nets

Newcastle need ‘another miracle’ to stay up: BenitezAFP | London

Rafael Benitez believes it will be “another miracle”

if his Newcastle side retain their Premier League status.

The Spanish manager said finishing 10th last season was an extraordinary perfor-mance but added that would be matched simply by beating the drop this term give the fact that the Magpies’ relegation ri-vals had all outspent the north-east side in pre-season.

Newcastle’s position has also been complicated by owner Mike Ashley being frustrated in his wish to sell the club.

“We have to be realistic and understand that we will be in the bottom half during the whole season,” said Benitez ahead of the Boxing Day clash

away to his former side Liv-erpool who are looking to ce-ment their lead at top of table.

“For me, it is almost clear and if we can be better than three teams, it will be another miracle.

“It was a miracle last year. People were thinking, ‘Oh, you finished 10th...’, but with a cou-ple fewer wins, we could have been in the bottom five, so it was a miracle.

“If we do the same this year with teams spending even more money than last year, it will be a miracle.”

He added: “I know what is coming now and I know where we are. You can see the team -- the team is trying a lot of things, but still it’s not enough sometimes to get the points, and it will be like that.

Newcastle United’s manager, Rafael Benítez, with Mohamed Diamé (left) and Florian Lejeune during a practice session (file photo)

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