Qatari-US talks to tackle Gulf crisis, bolster relations

US not looking to grant further Iran oil sales waivers, says offi cial

‘We won’t change our style against N Korea’

BUSINESS | SPORT | Page 1

GULF TIMES

published in

QATAR

since 1978

SUNDAY Vol. XXXIX No. 11062

January 13, 2019Jumada I 7, 1440 AH www. gulf-times.com 2 Riyals

ARAB WORLD | Charity

QC campaign to helpSyria blizzard victimsQatar Charity has launched a QR20mn campaign to provide aid to Syrian refugees in Lebanon’s Arsal and other areas who suff ered from blizzards and rain. The campaign aims to alleviate their suff ering. The campaign comes ahead of another expected blizzard next week. Qatar Charity was one of the first humanitarian organisations that managed to reach the aff ected refugee camps.

ARAB WORLD | Protest

Sudan death toll risesto 24, says offi cialAnti-government protests that have rocked Sudan since last month have left 24 people dead, an off icial said yesterday, without specifying how they died. Demonstrations that erupted in the provinces on December 19 after the government tripled the price of bread have escalated into nationwide anti-government rallies. “The total number of people who have died in incidents from December 19 until now is 24,” Page 4

BRITAIN | Austerity

Demonstrators call for new general election Thousands of protesters gathered in London yesterday to protest the British government, calling for an end to austerity measures and a new general election in light of the impending departure of Britain from the European Union. Politicians and union leaders from across the country came to attend The People’s Assembly Against Austerity, which drew 5,000 to 10,000 demonstrators, according to the organisers’ initial estimates. Page 11

AMERICA | Impasse

Govt shutdown breaks record; no end in sight A partial US government shutdown over President Donald Trump’s demand for $5.7bn to build a wall along the US-Mexico border entered its 22nd day yesterday, making it the longest shuttering of federal agencies in US history, with no end in sight. Trump, holed up in the White House with Congress adjourned for the weekend, warned of a much lengthier impasse and blamed the Democrats. Page 6

In brief

HE the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Aff airs Sheikh Mohamed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani met in Doha yesterday with Omani Foreign Minister Yusuf bin Alawi bin Abdullah, in the presence of Secretary-General of the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) Dr Abdullatif bin Rashid al-Zayani. During the meeting, they exchanged views on the GCC’s march and other issues of common concern.

Deputy PM meets Omani FM

Ashghal opens Qatar’s longest, deepest tunnel on Rayyan RoadBy Peter AlagosBusiness Reporter

The Public Works Authority (Ash-ghal) yesterday opened Qatar’s longest and deepest bi-direc-

tional tunnel as part of the construc-tion of the Al Rayyan Road Upgrade Project Phase 2.

The tunnel forms part of the newly-upgraded 2.1km stretch between Bu Erayen and Lebday Street, said Yousef al-Emadi, manager of Highway Projects Department, during a briefi ng held in the presence of Brigadier General Mohamed Maarafi ya, manager of Ministry of Inte-rior’s Traffi c Safety Department, and a number of offi cials and project engineers.

The new tunnel is a major link be-tween Bu Erayen and Lebday Streets, spanning the Al Mokafaha and Lebday Interchange. The tunnel is 1.5km long and sits 25m below ground level, making it the longest and deepest bi-directional tunnel in Qatar. At this initial stage, two

of four lanes in each direction will be de-livered, accommodating 8,000 vehicles per hour in each direction.

The tunnel forms part of the complex three-level Al Mokafaha interchange. At-grade (ground level) is a signal-lised junction, which facilitates traffi c movements in all directions, including Al Waab, Bani Hajer and Doha.

Beneath this is an underpass that allows road users to travel seamlessly between Doha and Bani Hajer. The tun-nel is beneath the underpass, both of which replace the old roundabout.

Project manager Jumah al-Bader noted that the newly-opened section

of the road and tunnel will reduce trav-el time between Bu Erayen and Lebday Street and Al Luqta and Al Waab by up to 65%, because of increased lane capacity and removal of the existing diversions, and will reduce traffi c con-gestion on 22 February Street.

Al-Bader said the construction of the new tunnel faced many challenges, which were all addressed. He said it was necessary to establish multiple traffi c diversions and the construction of two temporary signallised intersections to facilitate the progress of works.

Excavating 25m below ground level meant that the project team had to manage extremely large quantities of groundwater, he said.

He explained that the tunnel is fi tted with all the safety and security facilities and that a dedicated building was con-structed to serve as the central control room for monitoring and controlling all operating system. This built-in system will allow the safe operation of the tun-nel, according to al-Bader. Page 2

Arab wounds needto be healed fi rst,says former PM

Arab leaders have to fi nd ways to heal wounds and put the Arab world in its rightful place,

former prime minister and foreign minister of Qatar HE Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor al-Thani has said.

He also said the Arab world needs to reconsider its current policies and disagreements.

In an interview with Russia Today channel, he termed the Arab League as ‘non-existent”.

“The Arab summit needs to discuss one item: to heal Arab wounds and put the Arab world in its rightful place,” Sheikh Hamad said.

Asked about the Gulf crisis, he said it is intended at the present “to remain without escalation and without solu-tion”.

“The failure of the mediator to solve the Gulf crisis is due to the conflicting positions in Washington

and the intransigence of the par-ties,” he said.

“Qatar is fi ne despite the siege and is overcoming the fabricated crisis; the countries of the blockade have not come up with any evidence so far of the accusation that Qatar supports terror-ism.”

The former Qatari premier stressed the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) “has been destroyed and restoring confi dence needs many years”.

He pointed out that the crisis was unfounded, and those who fabricated it did not understand politics.

“The Gulf resolutions do not take into consideration the Gulf citizen and the interest of the nation,” he said, not-ing that the crisis has made the enmity tribal and historical. “Gulf dreams have also collapsed.”

According to him, the Saudi Crown Prince deserves to have advisers at a high level, alerting him to the serious-ness of the decisions he has taken.

On the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, he said: “Khashog-gi’s case will not be forgotten and needs justice and conscience.”

Khashoggi was killed at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul last October.

“Khashoggi’s case is appalling and requires a strong decision to show who is responsible and who has given in-structions to carry out that heinous operation.

“We wait for justice in Khashoggi’s case and Saudi Arabia will be black-mailed in this case,” he said.

Sheikh Hamad called for an immedi-ate end to the Yemen war, which he de-scribed as a “grave mistake”.

Qatari-US talks totackle Gulf crisis,bolster relations

The Second US-Qatari Strate-gic Dialogue to be held in Doha today will tackle the latest de-

velopments in the Gulf crisis and the international eff orts to solve them and the repercussions of the blockade of Qatar.

The Dialogue is co-chaired by HE the Deputy Prime Minister and Min-ister of Foreign Aff airs Sheikh Mo-hamed bin Abdulrahman al-Thani and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

According to information posted on the Ministry of Foreign Aff airs Twitter page, the Dialogue will focus on strengthening relationships and partnerships in the defence, security, economy and trading sectors.

Among the expected results of the meeting are: strengthening the es-tablished partnership between the two countries in combating terror-ism; opening new markets for Qatari investments in the United States; consolidation of military and defence

relations; enhancing co-operation in the fi elds of energy, ports and banks.

The Dialogue is also expected to lead to continued co-ordination and political consultation on various re-gional and international issues, ex-change of experiences to secure major sporting events in preparation for the Qatar 2022 World Cup and to meet the challenges of cybersecurity and cyber piracy.

In remarks to Qatar News Agency (QNA) last week, HE the spokesper-son for the Ministry of Foreign Aff airs Lolwah AlKhater said the Strategic Dialogue aims to strengthen co-op-eration with the US, an important ally.

Qatari-US relations are strong and built on common values and mutual respect, she said.

Senior offi cials from both sides will participate in the talks.

AlKhater said the Qatari-US Stra-tegic Dialogue will include high-level discussions on a number of politi-

cal, economic, defence and cultural spheres and will witness the signing of a number of memorandums of un-derstanding (MoUs) that enhance co-operation in the interests of the Qatari and US peoples.

The first Strategic Dialogue, held in January 2018 in the US, was at-tended by HE the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Af-fairs, HE the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of State for Defence Affairs Dr Khalid bin Mohamed al-Attiyah, along with their excellen-cies ministers of energy, commerce and finance of both countries.

The inaugural Strategic Dialogue played a key role in further bolstering the solid Qatar-US partnership across many sectors. The two sides signed a number of agreements, MoUs and let-ters of intent in the fi elds of trade, in-vestment, technology, energy and co-operation in sport, education, health, arts and culture.

A view of the tunnel.

Strategic Dialogue to be held in Doha today

Restoring of confidence among GCC states may take many years, Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim tells Russia Today channel

HE Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim al-Thani

Serie A urged to cancel Jeddah matchEleven Sports Network, a licensee of Serie A in a number of territories and a major investor in Italian football has sent out a letter to Serie A Chief Executive Off icer demanding that the Italian Super Cup game between Juventus and AC Milan not be held in

Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.This follows beIN Media Group’s letter to Serie A urging them to change the venue of next week’s Italian Super Cup Final match as Saudi Arabia has been actively supporting a plague of piracy against world sport. Page 20

QATAR

Gulf Times Sunday, January 13, 20192

Ecuador envoy celebrates New Year with community members in Doha

Ivonne A Baki, Ecuador’s am-bassador to Qatar, attended a New Year celebration party

on Friday along with members of the Ecuadorian community in Qatar.

The party brought Ecuado-rian families together and was a chance to share inspirational stories about their stay in Qatar, as well as to enhance networking among them.

“I think everybody is good internally, everybody wants to do good for himself, his country and his family. We are all here for

the same purpose, to share ide-as, feelings and to enhance our unity and share happiness away from our home country. Qatar is our second home,” the envoy said.

The objective of the gathering was to unite all Ecuadorian com-munity members in Qatar and the event was attended by more than 70 Ecuadorians living in the country and working in diff erent sectors.

The ambassador expressed gratitude to everyone and stressed that such events should

be held more frequently during her stay in Qatar. After she deliv-ered her short message, a dinner featuring Ecuadorian delicacies was served, with special activi-ties for children being hosted as well.

The ambassador also seized the opportunity to encourage the community to be in continu-ous interaction with each other and to register themselves at the embassy to avail of consular services off ered by the mission to the community and be ac-quainted with upcoming events.

A moment from the party. PICTURE: Jayan Orma

Katara signs agreement with

International Amber Association

In a major initiative to pro-mote the amber industry in Qatar and worldwide, Katara

- the Cultural Village yesterday signed an agreement with Po-land-based International Amber Association (IAA) for co-oper-ation in various fi elds related to the industry.

The letter of intent was signed by Dr Khalid bin Ibrahim al-Su-laiti, general manager of Katara, and Mariusz Grzegorz Gliwinski, deputy president of the associa-tion, at the fi rst Katara Exhibi-tion for Kahraman beads that concluded yesterday.

Khalid al-Sayed, head of the exhibition, and other Katara of-fi cials were also present at the signing ceremony.

The IAA is a platform for amber merchants and manufacturers, artistes making amber artworks and collectors of natural amber and historic amber artifacts as well as researchers in this fi eld.

“The agreement will help Ka-tara benefi t from the experience and expertise of the association and its member organisations in various fi elds, particularly in technical aspects related to the amber industry. The agreement will be especially benefi cial in es-tablishing a dedicated centre for Kahraman amber at Katara as well as in holding future exhibitions and other related events,” said al-Sayed.

Under the terms of the agree-ment, both sides will co-operate in exchange of materials in edu-cation and research, publica-tions and information on amber, technical assistance in amber laboratory issues and exchange of employees, expertise and re-search scholars and promotion of amber culture, history and contemporary design.

The parties will discuss the opportunities and challenges presented and would enter into specifi c agreements in future.

Both sides will serve as a bridge for co-operation between diff erent organisations involved in the amber industry. The par-ties will also co-operate in or-ganising exhibitions, seminars

and high-level forums related to the industry.

The three-day exhibition at Katara drew thousands of amber enthusiasts, who had an oppor-tunity to see and buy the wide range of authentic Kahraman amber beads, ornaments and historic artefacts on display, Ka-tara said in a statement.

Amber merchants, traders,

artistes and experts from seven countries - Qatar, Turkey, Ku-wait, Lebanon, Russia, Poland and Lithuania- took part in the exhibi-tion, featuring about 80 stalls with a rich variety of amber products.

Most stalls also showcased rare and natural pieces of fossilised amber of diff erent colour, size and quality. The exhibition also introduced the diff erent styles

and perspectives in manufactur-ing Kahraman amber beads and ornaments, from authentic ma-terial, through a number of semi-nars and workshops.

The exhibition, the fi rst of its kind in Qatar and one of the big-gest in the region, is expected to give major boost to the Kahra-man amber industry in Qatar, the Gulf and worldwide.

Signing of the agreement.

Dignitaries at the exhibition.

First Katara Exhibition for Kahraman concludes

QFMA to hold training programme on combating fi nancial crimes

The Qatar Financial Markets Authority (QFMA), in co-operation with the Union

of Arab Securities Authorities (UASA), will hold a training pro-gramme on “Combating Finan-cial Crimes” on 4-5 February.

The programme’s topics cover specifi c issues related to com-bating fi nancial crimes such as money laundering, terrorist fi nancing, bribery, corruption and fraud, along with the prac-tical defences, and the manner in which laws, regulations and best practice continue to evolve

across the entire spectrum of as-sociated activities.

The training programme is expected to discuss the role of the private sector in combating such crimes, and aiming to en-able participants with the tools to examine them,

The programme has been de-signed to be highly interactive, and participants will be invited to discuss a number of real-life cases and practical experiences in order to gain an objective and practical understanding of the nature of fi nancial crimes.

The programme’s scope is suitable for professionals work-ing within the fi nancial services industry including compliance offi cers, money laundering re-porting offi cers, as well as those involved in regulation, law en-forcement, trade and commerce.

Participants will be given of-fi cial certifi cates issued by the UASA. They can also obtain a professional qualifi cation from the Chartered Institute for Secu-rities and Investment “CISI” af-ter passing the appropriate exam.

– QNA

Al Rayyan Road Upgrade Projectnow 88% complete, says AshghalThe Al Rayyan Road Upgrade

Project is 88% over and is set to be completed in the

fi rst quarter of the year, the Public Works Authority (Ashghal) an-nounced yesterday following the opening of Qatar’s longest and deepest bidirectional tunnel.

In a statement, Ashghal said the Al Rayyan Road Upgrade Project Phase 2 is “a critical” in-ner city project that will enhance 5.5km of Al Rayyan Road and Al Rayyan Al Jadeed Street to the west of Olympic Intersection.

Aside from increasing the lane capacity of the main carriageway to four lanes in each direction, the project will deliver four main interchanges and upgrade of a fl yover, including the tunnel.

The project will also provide upgraded service roads to benefi t businesses and residential areas, as well as dedicated pedestrian and cycle paths. Ashghal noted that the project scope includes the upgrade of utility infrastruc-ture, such as treated sewage ef-fl uent lines, storm water drain-age network, potable water line, and foul water networks, as well as landscaping and beautifi ca-tion works.

On key benefi ts to residential areas, Ashghal said the project caters to several residential ar-eas throughout the entire stretch from Doha to Bani Hajer, includ-ing Al Rayyan, Muraykh, Lebday, Luaib, Al Waab, Al Messila, Al Luqta, and Al Hetmi Al Jadeed.

Travelling on Al Rayyan Road Upgrade Project Phase Two will provide improved access to Al Furousiya Equestrian Complex

and Al Shaqab Horse Racing Academy, off ering further ben-efi ts to those availing sports fa-cilities in the area.

Ashghal said the project

serves a number of key busi-ness districts, such as Al Shafi Street commercial area in New Al Rayyan, and creating easy ac-cess to Jarir Bookstore, Family

Food Centre, and Al Rawabi Food Centre.

The project will provide easy access to leisure facilities like Al Rayyan Park, educational insti-

tutions, such as Qatar Founda-tion and Education City, as well as good connectivity to three local metro stations: Al Messila Station, Al Rayyan Al Qadeem Station, and Al Shaqab Station.

Ashghal said project deliverables include Khalid bin Abdullah Al At-tiyah Interchange along Al Rayyan Al Jadeed Street and Al Furousiya Street, a three-level interchange, which includes one underpass, one signalised junction, and one bridge. It provides connectivity towards Bani Hajer, Doha, Aspire Zone, and Al Gharafa.

The Sheikh Khalid bin Ha-mad Al Thani Interchange along Old Al Rayyan Street and Huwar

Street, on the other hand, is a two-level interchange, which includes one underpass and one signalised junction, and pro-vides connectivity towards Edu-cation City, Old Al Rayyan, As-pire Zone, and Al Gharafa.

Similarly, the Al Mokafaha In-terchange along Al Rayyan Al Jadeed Street and Al Bustan Street is a three-level interchange, which includes one tunnel, one under-pass, and one signalised junction, and provides connectivity to-wards Bani Hajer, Doha, Al Bus-tan, Al Waab, and Al Luqta.

Lebday Interchange located at Old Al Rayyan Street and Al Bustan Street is a two-level in-

terchange, which includes one tunnel and one signalised junc-tion, and provides connectivity towards Old Al Rayyan, Educa-tion City, Al Waab, and Al Luqta, Ashghal said.

The Al Rayyan Flyover, which connects Al Rayyan Road and 22nd February Road, is a fl yover con-structed within an existing four level Al Rayyan Interchange and provides connectivity towards New Al Rayyan and Bani Hajer.

Also, the Al Messila Under-pass, which connects Al Rayyan Al Jadeed Road and Jasim bin Ha-mad Street, provides connectiv-ity towards Madinat Khalifa, Bani Hajer, and Doha, Ashghal said.

By Peter AlagosBusiness Reporter

Off icials mark the opening of the tunnel.

QATAR3Gulf Times

Sunday, January 13, 2019

Qatar to outperform on economic growth, govt spending: FitchBy Pratap JohnChief Business Reporter

Buoyed by “healthy” economic growth and “continued” fiscal support for infrastructure from the government,

Qatar will remain an “outperformer”, both regionally and globally, Fitch Solutions has said in a report.

Qatar ranks very high in Fitch Solutions Infrastructure Risk/Reward Index, which according to the researcher, was due to “strong government support” for con-struction and packed project pipelines.

Positive growth outlook and sustained government fiscal support for infrastruc-ture is keeping rewards scores elevated in markets in the Mena region, and among GCC countries in particular.

Fitch Solutions Mena Country Risk team has highlighted that economic growth will largely hold up across the region. This is one of its key themes for 2019.

“This will create opportunities for in-vestment and encourage government spending on infrastructure, supporting strong rewards scores across the region,” the report said.

Qatar and some other GCC countries in-

cluding Oman are “pursuing more fiscally expansive and growth-supportive” policies in order to continue driving economic di-versification and job creation.

This will include government investment in large-scale infrastructure projects such as the Oman’s $6 .4bn Liwa Plastics Indus-tries Complex.

“We expect Qatar, Oman and others to continue leading the regional rankings on industry rewards, where all currently score above 75 out of 100.”

An “improving” security situation in regional conflict zones will also benefit infrastructure risk and reward scores for Mena countries, Fitch Solutions noted.

A reduction in violence in countries in-cluding Yemen, Libya, Iraq and Syria is an-other of Fitch Solutions 2019 key themes chosen by its Mena Country Risk Team, which it expects to benefit the construc-tion industry and support an improvement in RRI scores in these countries and their neighbours.

While construction activity in Yemen will remain in contraction in 2019, Fitch Solutions is forecasting an acceleration in growth in Iraq and Libya as violence dies down and reconstruction efforts get un-derway.

“We expect a more gradual improvement in risks scores over the coming quarters as the security situation on the ground im-proves, with potential for significant in-creases over the long term on currently low scores of 1.9 out of 100 for Yemen, 5.3 for Libya and 15.6 for Iraq. Greater stabil-ity will also benefit the region more wide-ly, with Jordan in particular likely to see a boost in investment and economic growth as the Syrian conflict exerts less of a nega-tive influence on the country.”

Fitch Solutions believe that Iraq in par-ticular has the potential for the greatest improvement in its RRI score over coming quarters.

“With IS having now lost its territorial presence in the country, the security situa-tion is stabilising and allowing reconstruc-tion efforts to get underway. Iraq’s con-struction sector, it said, will benefit from aid assistance from multilateral lending institutions as well as Chinese financing and greater public funding for reconstruc-tion, supporting growth and opportunities in infrastructure.

“We are forecasting a growth of 10% in the construction sector in 2019, driving a high industry rewards score of 74 .1 out of 100,” Fitch Solutions said.

Sheikha Hind attends US discussion on education and women’s rights

HE Sheikha Hind bint Hamad al-Thani, Vice Chairperson and CEO

of Qatar Foundation (QF), has participated in the latest ‘Off The Record’ discussion in New York City, US.

The talk, titled ‘A Discussion of Education, Women’s Rights and the Blockade’, was mod-erated by journalist Magalie Laguerre-Wilkinson from US news programme 60 Minutes.

Speaking about her partici-pation in the event, HE Sheikha Hind said: “This discussion has provided a valuable opportu-nity to outline and promote the vision and mission of Qatar Foundation to the world, on an impactful international plat-form that focuses on address-ing global and international challenges in education and other areas through collabora-tion.

“Innovation in education is one of the key elements of QF’s mission. Our participation in this event has illustrated how we are an exemplar of high-quality education provision, and how we have created a multidisciplinary, cross-cul-tural educational and research environment. This environ-ment is built on equality of opportunity, and equipping

young people with the skills that enable them to address national and global challenges and make a positive impact on the world.”

QF’s commitment to em-powering women in education is refl ected by the fact that the number of female students en-rolled in engineering courses at Texas A&M University at Qatar, a QF partner university, has reached an all-time high of almost 50% in the current academic year, while overall female enrolment at Carnegie Mellon University in Qatar – also a QF partner university – stands at 63%. Across QF, 40%

of the organisation’s leadership is female.

Sheikha Hind’s participation in the ‘Off The Record’ event formed part of a four-day visit to the US, which concluded on January 11.

As part of the trip, she met with senior offi cials from the home campuses of QF’s inter-national partner universities, as well as infl uential thought lead-ers, innovative think tanks and leading policy-makers in edu-cation and research, and toured Weill Cornell Medicine, part of Cornell University, to meet stu-dents and learn more about its innovative research initiatives.

HE Sheikha Hind’s participation in the ‘Off The Record’ event formed part of a four-day visit to the US, which concluded on January 11.

HE Sheikha Hind bint Hamad al-Thani during the discussion.

Health ministry in vaccination drive

The Ministry of Public Health launched yester-day its annual vaccina-

tion campaign against Tdap, focusing on students in year 10.

The campaign is being done in co-operation with the Min-

istry of Education and Higher Education, and with the Pri-mary Healthcare Corporation. The fi rst day of the campaign will begin today in private and expat schools, and will continue to February 24. Students of pub-

lic schools will have their vac-cinations from February 17-26. The ministry organised a work-shop for nurses that provided them with the necessary training that would guarantee the suc-cess of the campaign.

QFBA hosts diplomatic delegation from Somalia

The Qatar Finance and Business Academy (QFBA) recently hosted,

in co-ordination with Ministry of Foreign Aff airs, a high-level diplomatic delegation from Somalia.

The 12-member delegation visited the country to learn more about Qatar Financial Centre (QFC) and its subsidiaries.

QBA head of Sales and Mar-keting Dr Mohamed al-Emadi, who received the delegation, said: “QFBA off ers training for the entire professional segment of the fi nancing sector, includ-ing staff from the most junior to the most executive level. We identify the needs within the economy in general and the

specifi c needs of the relevant organisations to design a prod-uct that they deem fi t for their organisational growth.

“QFBA has a wide range of courses, including short courses and those that pre-pare students for interna-tional professional tests, as well as four-year university programmes. These under-graduates come under North-umbria University, though we issue our own certificates for our training programmes. We also have various custom-designed courses for on-job training as well as experiential training.”

During a presentation be-fore the visiting delegation,

QFC Product Development manager Leila al-Jufairi said: “Qatar boasts one of the strongest and fastest grow-ing economies in the Mena region, and the Qatar Finan-cial Centre’s unique platform continues to facilitate ease in business set-up for entities wishing to expand to Qatar and beyond.

“The QFC operates in line with international best prac-tice and standards off ering word class regulation, a fair and transparent tax regime, and an English common law frame-work. The value of our unbeat-able framework is recognised by regulated fi nancial services institutions worldwide.”

QFBA and QFC off icials with the high-level delegation from Somalia.

Volvo XC40 claims ‘2018 Women’s World Car of the Year’ accolade

The XC40 from Volvo Cars was recently honoured as the Supreme Winner

of the 2018 Women’s World Car of the Year (WWCOTY) award, adding to the list of awards won by the SUV.

This recognition is the only car award in the world entirely voted by women motoring writ-ers. Thirty-four jurors from 27 countries selected Volvo’s fi rst compact SUV as the best new car of the year for women. In two anonymous rounds of votes, the XC40 prevailed against fi ve competing models.

The world’s only automobile award dedicated to women re-fl ects the growing importance of women as an independent cus-tomer group as well as their pur-chasing power. Automakers are considering criteria important to women when buying a car, shown in the WWCOTY deci-sion making process. The award

is measured by safety, price per-formance, appearance, storage space, child-friendliness, com-fort and environmental foot-print, as well as colour options and desirability.

Doha Marketing Services Company (Domasco) is the ex-clusive distributor of Volvo Cars in Qatar and customers can test

drive a new XC40 by visiting the Volvo showroom on Khalifa Street near the National Mosque and TV Intersection.

Faisal Sharif, managing direc-tor of Domasco, said: “Since its launch, the XC40 has been rec-ognised with well-known acco-lades internationally and in the region, highlighting its universal

appeal. The award reaffi rms Vol-vo’s dedication to put in place a high-class car that suits women and the entire family with the right combination of design, connectivity and safety.”

Safety and driver assistance features on the XC40 include Volvo Cars’ Pilot Assist system, City Safety, Run-off Road pro-tection and mitigation, Cross Traffi c alert with brake support and the 360° Camera that helps drivers manoeuvre their car into tight parking spaces, according to a press statement issued in Doha by Domasco.

The XC40 also off ers ingen-ious interior design and stor-age ideas with more functional storage space in the doors and under the seats, a special space for phones including induc-tive charging, a foldout hook for small bags, plus a removable waste bin in the tunnel console, the statement added.

The Volvo XC40.

QIIB conducts evacuation drill at Grand Hamad Street branch

Within the framework of its emergency re-sponse plan and as a

reinforcement of its safety and security standards, QIIB has conducted an emergency evacu-ation drill at its main branch on Grand Hamad Street, enacting a virtual fi re scenario in the pres-ence of the Civil Defence and Emergency Medical Service per-sonnel.

The drill simulated all proce-dures that should be followed during fi res, including the ac-tivation of fi re alarms for the evacuation of employees work-ing in the building as per QIIB-approved safety and security protocols.

QIIB’s emergency response team implemented the security and safety procedures, including the instructions that they were trained to perform.

They supervised the evacua-tion operations inside the build-ing by guiding employees to the emergency exit, making sure they used the allocated routes, stopping elevators, and directing employees to predetermined as-sembly points for emergencies, as well as ensuring the evacua-tion of all personnel from their offi ces and departments after sounding the fi re alarms.

Ibrahim al-Tamimi, QIIB head (Administrative Services), said: “It was a useful drill and an es-sential security and safety pro-

cedure that we are keen to carry out periodically to ensure our readiness for emergencies in case of occurrence.

“This drill proves that our staff members are very well aware of the dangers, as they showed a quick and organised response.

It also refl ects the active and ef-fective co-operation among the bank’s staff at all levels, whether among the security and safety team or employees themselves and the various departments and sections concerned.

“Such emergency drills are an important part of our risk man-agement process. We are happy to say that all drills conducted in terms of risk management prove our advancement and keenness to achieve more in this fi eld.

“In addition to the training and information we provide and the various drills that we con-duct in all QIIB buildings, we are keen to provide all security and safety equipment to prepare for and prevent any dangers or sud-den events. The bank’s buildings are equipped with fi re alarms, emergency exits, fi re extinguish-ers, and signage in all the corri-dors to indicate the closest exits of the building, in line with the best international standards.”

Al-Tamimi also thanked the members of the Civil Defence and Emergency Medical Service personnel who participated in the drill.

He also thanked QIIB security and safety team and all employ-ees who were present at the bank and carried out the evacuation procedures. This, al-Tamimi said, confi rms the bank’s readi-ness to deal with potential emer-gencies.

The drill simulated all procedures that should be followed during fires, including the activation of fire alarms for the evacuation of employees working in the building as per QIIB-approved safety and security protocols.

REGION/ARAB WORLD/AFRICA

Gulf TimesSunday, January 13, 20194

Presidential runner-up asks court to cancel resultAFPKinshasa

The runner-up in DR Congo’s presidential election, Martin Fayulu, has appealed to the

Constitutional Court to annul the provisional result which awarded victory to his opposition rival Felix Tshisekedi, his lawyer said yester-day.

The request was fi led on Friday ahead of a 48-hour deadline for any appeals against the shock result to replace long-term President Joseph Kabila.

“The request seeks the annul-ment of the result declaring Felix Tshisekedi president,” Toussaint Ekombe told reporters outside the court.

The move came as the pro-Kabila FCC coalition announced it had won a majority in legislative elections, which took place at the same time as last month’s presidential poll.

Supporters of the outgoing presi-dent won nearly 350 seats in the 500-seat National Assembly, ac-cording to Communications Min-ister Lambert Mende. About 130

seats went to opposition lawmak-ers, he said. The developments were the latest twist in a long-running political crisis which erupted two years ago when Kabila refused to step down at the end of his constitu-tional term in offi ce, sparking mas-sive protests which were brutally repressed.

On December 30, after repeated delays, voters fi nally went to the polls in an election pitting two op-position candidates, Fayulu and Tshisekedi, against Kabila’s hand-picked successor, Emmanuel Rama-zani Shadary.

Opinion polls had indicated Fay-ulu was the clear favourite, although

most observers predicted a result rigged in favour of Shadary.But the shock result declared Tshisekedi the victor with 38.57%, while Fayulu came second with 34.8%.

The court now has eight days to consider the request. “I got more than 61% of the vote compared with the others, who each got 18%,” Fay-ulu said.

“Between them, they didn’t get more than 40 percent.”

At stake is political stewardship of the notoriously unstable central African nation, which has never known a peaceful transition of pow-er since independence from Belgium in 1960.

Fayulu has denounced the result as an “electoral coup” engineered by Kabila in which Tshisekedi was “to-tally complicit”.

Explaining the appeal, the 62-year-old said election chief Cor-neille Nangaa had “broken electoral law” and that only a recount would establish the truth of what hap-pened at the ballot box.

On Friday, the former oil execu-tive said he didn’t expect the result to be annulled but that the court would approve a recount.

Yemeni refi nery fi re spreads to second storage tankReutersAden

A fi re at a refi nery in Yemen’s southern port city of Aden spread to a second storage tank

yesterday, injuring six people, sources at the refi nery said.

They told Reuters that civil defence forces had failed to contain the fi re sparked by an explosion on Friday.

The cause of the blast is still un-known. Aden is under the control of the internationally recognised gov-ernment, which is backed by a Sau-di-led and Western-backed coali-tion and which is battling the Houthi movement that seized the capital Sanaa in 2014.

The United Nations launched peace talks last month to try to end the nearly four-year-old war that has killed tens of thousands of people, devastated the economy and left mil-lions facing severe hunger.

But tensions have resurged since then.

A Houthi drone attack on Thursday on a government military parade in Lahaj, a province next to Aden, killed several people.

Saudi state television said on Friday the coalition destroyed a base used by Houthis to direct their unmanned air-craft.

The Houthis deny receiving help from Tehran and say they are fi ghting against corruption.

Democratic Republic of Congo opposition presidential candidate Martin Fayulu (second right), files an appeal with his legal team at the Constitutional Court in Kinshasa, yesterday, challenging the results of the presidential election.

At least eight people were killed in Nigeria when a petrol tank-er veered off the road, caught fire and exploded as people tried to recover fuel, the emergency services said yesterday.The vehicle crashed in the Odukpani area of the southeastern state of Cross River, just north of the state capital, Calabar, at about 5:00pm (1600 GMT) on Friday. Local residents rushed to collect the leaking fuel before it caught fire, triggering the tanker blast. The sector commander of the Federal Road Safety Corps in Cross River, Chidiebere Benjamin Nkwonta, said: “We met eight charred bodies on arrival at the scene. “Fifteen other people were severely burnt and in a life-threatening situation. They were taken to the hospital before we got there. I was also informed that out of the 15, some of them later died but I do not have the exact figures of the number that died.” Nkwonta, how-ever, dismissed local reports that up to 60 people were killed as “grossly over-exaggerated”.Cross River state police spokes-woman Irene Ugbo said earlier she could not confirm the exact death toll but added: “The casualties are high.” The blast could have been sparked by the clashing of steel containers used to scoop up the petrol, she added. One local resident, Akpan Imon, said at least 18 people were killed. “I counted 18 bodies including women and children burnt beyond recognition,” he said.

At least eight dead in tanker blastTRAGEDY

Firefighters try to cool down oil storage tanks adjacent to a tank engulfed by fire at the Aden oil refinery one day after an explosion in the refinery in Aden, yesterday.

Clashes erupt between rebels and government forces in Hodeidah despite truce

Clashes erupted between Houthi rebels and gov-ernment forces in Yemen’s flashpoint port city of Hodeidah yesterday, dealing a new blow to a fragile truce, an AFP correspondent reported. Artillery and machine-gun ex changes rocked the southern part of Hodeidah in early morning before tapering off later in day, the correspondent said. The rebel-held port city, which is a lifeline for the delivery of desperately need-ed humanitarian aid, was for months the main front line in the Yemeni conflict after government forces

supported by Saudi Arabia and its allies launched an offensive to capture it in June.But last month the warring parties agreed a ceasefire for Hodeida during UN-sponsored talks in Sweden.The United Nations has said the truce has largely held since it came into force on December 18 but there have been delays in the agreed pullback of rebel and government forces. The Houthis control most of Hodeidah while government forces are deployed on its southern and eastern outskirts.

Anti-government protests that have rocked Sudan since last month have left 24 people dead, an official said yesterday, without specifying how they died. Demonstrations that erupted in the provinces on December 19 after the government tripled the price of bread have escalated into nationwide anti-government rallies, with protesters calling for President Omar al-Bashir to resign. “The total number of people who have died in incidents from December 19 until now is 24,” Amer Ibrahim, head of a panel set up by the prosecutor’s office to investigate the violence during these rallies told reporters. Authorities had earlier said that 22 peo-ple, including two security personnel, had been killed in the unrest. Ibrahim said that two additional protesters who were being treated in hospital in Gadaraf, an impover-

ished agricultural town, had passed away, taking the overall death toll to 24. He did not give details on the cause of the protesters’ deaths. Rights groups have put the overall death toll much higher, with Human Rights Watch saying that at least 40 people have been killed in clashes during the demon-strations, including children and medical staff. Protesters have staged hundreds of demonstrations so far but riot police and security agents have broken up their rallies with volleys of tear gas. Rights groups and the European Union have said that security forces used “live ammunition” on protest-ers. The European Union said Friday that the “use of force by security forces against civilians — including the use of live ammuni-tion — has led to further casualties over the last few days”.

Turkey yesterday welcomed the latest statement made by Washington’s top diplomat over Ankara’s right to defend itself from “terrorists” after the US withdraws from Syria. “We find correct his statement about the removal of the elements that concern Turkey,” Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said in a speech in the southern Turkish province of Antalya. Cavusoglu spoke on the phone yesterday with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who was

in Abu Dhabi as part of a regional tour, and they discussed “the steps that need to be taken” in Syria, he said. The latest com-ments follow tensions between the US and Turkey over the fate of Washington’s Syrian Kurdish allies in the fight against Islamic State group militants. Pompeo had earlier said Washington recognised “the Turkish people’s right and (Turkish President Recep Tayyip) Erdogan’s right to defend their country from terrorists”.

Death toll from Sudan protests rises to 24: official

Turkey hails Pompeo comments over Syria situation

UNREST

CONFLICT

AMERICAS


The partial US government shut-down entered a record 22nd day yesterday, as President Donald

Trump remains steadfast in his de-mand for $5.7bn to build a Mexico bor-der wall and Democrats in Congress determined to refuse the funds.

The president issued a series of tweets yesterday in an eff ort to defend his stance and goad Democrats to re-turn to Washington and end what he called “the massive humanitarian cri-sis at our Southern Border”.

“Democrats could solve the shut-down in 15 minutes!” he said in one tweet, adding in another: “We will be out for a long time unless the Demo-crats come back from their ‘vacations’ and get back to work. I am in the White House ready to sign!”

However, most lawmakers left town on Friday and will not return before tomorrow, leaving little chance for any solution to the stalemate before then.

The impasse has paralysed Wash-ington – its impact felt increasingly around the country – with the presi-dent retaliating by refusing to sign off on budgets for swaths of government departments unrelated to the dispute.

As a result, more than 800,000 fed-eral employees – workers as diverse as Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents, air traffi c controllers, and mu-seum and park personnel – did not re-

ceive paycheques on Friday.The shutdown became the longest

on record at midnight on Friday (0500 GMT yesterday), when it overtook a 21-day stretch in 1995-1996 under president Bill Clinton.

On Friday, however, Trump backed off a series of previous threats to end the deadlock by declaring a national emergency and attempting to secure the funds without congressional ap-proval.

“I’m not going to do it so fast,” he said at a White House meeting.

Trump described an emergency declaration as the “easy way out” and said that Congress had to step up to the responsibility of approving the $5.7bn he says is needed.

“If they can’t do it ... I will declare a national emergency. I have the abso-lute right,” he said.

Until Friday, Trump had suggested numerous times that he was getting closer to taking the controversial deci-sion.

One powerful Republican ally, Sen-ator Lindsey Graham, tweeted after talks with Trump: “Mr. President, De-clare a national emergency NOW.”

But the president himself acknowl-edged in the White House meeting that an attempt to claim emergency powers would likely end up in legal battles go-ing all the way to the Supreme Court – as other Republicans and some of his advisers have reportedly cautioned him.

Opponents say that a unilateral presidential move would be constitu-tional overreach and set a dangerous precedent in similar controversies.

The stand-off has turned into a test of political ego, particularly for Trump, who came into offi ce boasting of his deal-making powers and making an aggressive border policy the key-stone of his nationalist agenda.

In two of his tweets yesterday, Trump pushed back on a media report that his White House was “chaotic” with no plan or strategy to end the shutdown.

“The Fakes always like talking Cha-os, there is NONE...” he tweeted. “I do have a plan on the shutdown.”

“But to understand that plan you would have to understand the fact that I won the election, and I promised... a Wall at the Southern Border. Elections have consequences!”

Democrats, meanwhile, seem deter-mined at all costs to prevent the presi-dent from getting the wall he has often promised in his campaign-style rallies.

Both Democrats and Republicans agree that the US-Mexican border presents major challenges, ranging from the violent Mexican drug trade to the plight of asylum-seekers and poor migrants seeking new lives in the world’s richest country.

But Trump has turned his single-minded push for more walls into a po-litical crusade that opponents say is a stunt to stoke xenophobia in his right-wing voter base while willfully ignor-ing the border’s complex realities.

Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader in the House of Representatives, said money should be spent on border se-curity but not on walls.

“We need to look at the facts,” she said.

Govt shutdown is now longest in US historyTrump says shutdown could be resolved ‘in 15 minutes’

AFPWashington

An 18-year-old Saudi who fl ed her family this week, saying that she feared for her life, ar-

rived in Toronto’s international air-port yesterday after Canada granted her asylum, where Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland welcomed her as a brave new Canadian.

Rahaf Mohamed al-Qunun grabbed international attention this week after she barricaded herself in a Bangkok airport hotel room to resist being sent home to her family, which denies any abuse.

Al-Qunun refused to meet her father and brother, who arrived in Bangkok to try take her back to Saudi Arabia.

She arrived at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport yesterday morn-ing, smiling and wearing a hoodie em-blazoned with the word Canada in red,

and donning a blue UNHCR cap.Freeland, who received Qunun at the

airport, told reporters that al-Qunun is “a very brave new Canadian”.

“Rahaf wanted Canadians to see that she has arrived at her new home,” Freeland told reporters. “But she had a very long and tiring journey and so would prefer not to take questions to-day.

“And she is now going to go to her new home.”

Al-Qunun, who had initially in-tended to seek asylum in Australia, chose Canada instead because Aus-tralia took too long assessing whether to grant her asylum.

“(Australia) takes too long. That’s why I went to Canada,” she told Reu-ters in a direct message before board-ing her fl ight to Toronto.

Saudi teen welcomed as ‘brave new Canadian’

ReutersToronto

Al-Qunun smiles as she is introduced to the media at Toronto Pearson International Airport, alongside Freeland.

AMERICA7Gulf Times


President Donald Trump blasted the FBI yesterday, insisting that it acted “for no reason & with no

proof” when it opened an investigation into whether he was acting on Russia’s behalf after he fi red the agency’s direc-tor, James Comey, in May 2017.

The New York Times reported that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) launched the previously undis-closed counterintelligence investi-gation to determine whether Trump posed a national security threat, at the same time that it opened a criminal probe into possible obstruction of jus-tice by the president.

The FBI investigation was subse-quently folded into the broader probe by Special Counsel Robert Mueller into Russia’s meddling in the 2016 elec-tion and possible collaboration by the Trump campaign.

No evidence has publicly emerged that Trump was secretly in contact with or took direction from Russian of-fi cials, the Times said.

“Wow, just learned in the Failing New York Times that the corrupt former leaders of the FBI, almost all fi red or forced to leave the agency for some very bad reasons, opened up an inves-tigation on me, for no reason & with no proof, after I fi red Lyin’ James Comey, a total sleaze!” Trump tweeted.

According to Trump, “the FBI was in complete turmoil... because of Comey’s poor leadership” and the way he handled the investigation into Hil-lary Clinton’s use of a private server to

send some government e-mails.“My fi ring of James Comey was a

great day for America,” Trump claimed, describing the former FBI director as “a Crooked Cop who is being totally pro-tected by his best friend, Bob Mueller”.

The Times said that the FBI had been suspicious of Trump’s ties to Russia during the 2016 campaign.

However, it held off on opening an investigation until the president sacked Comey, who refused to pledge alle-giance to Trump and roll back the nas-cent Russia investigation.

Trump has repeatedly criticised the Mueller investigation as a “witch hunt” and views it as an attempt to besmirch the legitimacy of his presidency.

His press secretary, Sarah Huckabee-Sanders, said in a statement yesterday that the latest charges are “absurd”, adding: “James Comey was fi red be-cause he’s a disgraced partisan hack ... (and) President Trump has actually been tough on Russia.”

Mueller, meanwhile, has issued doz-

ens of indictments and steadily chalked up convictions of some of the presi-dent’s close associates – including his former national security adviser, his former personal lawyer, and his ex-campaign chief.

The ex-national security adviser, Michael Flynn, pleaded guilty to lying to investigators about his Moscow ties.

The lawyer, Michael Cohen, has been sentenced to three years in prison for multiple crimes, including felony vio-lations of campaign fi nance laws that prosecutors allege were carried out un-der Trump’s direction.

And Trump’s former presidential campaign chair, Paul Manafort, has been convicted in one case brought by Mueller and pleaded guilty in another, over fi nancial crimes related to his work in Ukraine before the 2016 campaign, and for witness tampering.

Mueller’s grand jury investigation, meanwhile, has been extended by a judge beyond its original 18-month mandate.

Trump raps FBI probe triggered by Comey fi ringAFPWashington

Trump: has repeatedly criticised the Mueller investigation as a ‘witch hunt’.

ASIA


Thai security forces kill two linked to school shootingTwo insurgents believed

to be tied to a motorcy-cle drive-by shooting at a

school in Thailand’s south were shot dead yesterday, police said, as Unicef warned of trauma for children near the scene of the lunchtime violence.

Since 2004 clashes between Malay-Muslim rebels and the Buddhist-majority Thai state that annexed the area over 100 years ago have killed nearly 7,000 people, mostly civilians of both faiths.

The confl ict rarely makes global headlines but is a re-ality for residents of border provinces where security forc-es maintain a large footprint, aided by poorly paid defence “volunteers” drawn from local communities.

The four men killed in Thurs-day’s shooting were all Mus-lims and were guarding a school in Pattani province when the

attackers struck just before lunchtime with students mere metres away.

Pattani provincial police commander Piyawat Chal-ermsri said that two people with alleged ties to the school violence were killed in a shoot-out yesterday morning.

Though he did not give infor-mation about their identities or affi liation, he said he was “con-fi dent that they are the same group who carried out the at-tack Thursday” by driving by on motorbikes.

Authorities have also de-tained one suspect and are questioning fi ve others, while a military source said an eight-year-old had been grazed by a bullet but not seriously injured.

Unicef Thailand representa-tive Thomas Davin said Friday that one child at the Bukoh school attack was reportedly injured by debris and some who may have witnessed the attack could face long term psychological trauma.

“This attack has undoubt-

edly put the schoolchildren, the teachers and school personnel in harm’s way. It has put chil-dren at grave risk of injury or death,” he said.

“Such violence could also aff ect parents’ willingness to send their children to school - potentially to the detriment of many children’s learning and future development.”

The 15-year insurgency has seen scores of teachers killed, slain for their perceived col-laboration with the Thai state, which led to the use of armed guards at schools.

The death toll in the confl ict dropped to a record low last year as Thailand’s junta tightened its security operations.

But recent weeks have seen an uptick in violence, as rebels show they remain able to carry out more pinpointed operations.

In a rare statement dated January 4 the main rebel group - the Barisan Revolusi Nasional (BRN) - swore to “keep fi ght-ing” while warning people not

to help or support the state.But Thai authorities as well

as the Malaysian facilita-tor of the talks have recently expressed confidence they

will make progress soon.Former 4th Army command-

er Udomchai Thammasarorat said at the Foreign Correspond-ents Club in Thailand on Friday

that he “wants to fi nd a solution to exit from the violence” and he has urged the southern army commander to try and ensure public safety.

AFPBangkok

A girl plays with a weapon on the top of an army vehicle during Children’s Day celebration at a military facility in Bangkok yesterday.

Nepal and India review progress in relations

Recent developments in India-Nepal ties across various sectors came up

for discussion during a meet-ing between Indian External Af-fairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Nepalese Foreign Minister Pradeep Kumar Gyawali in New Delhi.

“The two ministers reviewed recent developments in bilateral ties across diverse sectors, in-cluding progress achieved on the three transformative initiatives launched in 2018 in the areas of agriculture, railways and inland waterways as well as pace of im-plementation of ongoing bilater-al development and connectivity projects,” the Indian external af-fairs ministry said in a statement.

“They expressed satisfaction at the signifi cant progress made in diff erent sectors of coopera-tion as a result of intensifi ed bi-lateral exchanges at all levels in recent months,” it said.

According to the statement, the two leaders reiterated their commitment to maintain the new momentum and to further strengthen the traditionally close and friendly ties between the two countries.

India reset its ties with Nepal last year through a visit by Prime Minister Modi, his fi rst after K P Sharma Oli became the prime minister.

During the visit, both sides agreed to boost trade and eco-nomic links, connectivity via air, land and water, people-to-people ties, with Modi declaring that India will work like a Sherpa in the Himalayan nation’s devel-opment endeavours.

This happened after there was a chill in India-Nepal ties during Oli’s earlier stint between Octo-ber 2015 and August 2016 when a border blockade blamed on New Delhi crippled Nepal’s economy.

There were also perceptions that Oli was leaning more to-wards China than India.

IANSNew Delhi

Grab appeals Vietnamese court ruling in taxi company dispute

Ride-hailing company Grab said yesterday it had fi led an appeal

against a Vietnamese court ruling last month that ordered it to pay 4.8bn dong (about $207,000) in compensation to a local taxi operator.

The 18-month-long legal bat-tle between the two companies is a rare case of a taxi fi rm suing a ride-hailing rival over lost revenue.

“Grab requested the Ho Chi Minh City People’s Court to reverse the fi rst instance judg-ment and dismiss the case,” Grab said in an e-mailed statement.

Late last month, the court ordered Singapore-headquar-tered Grab to pay the sum to Vi-etnam Sun Corp, better known as VinaSun, which had sought 41.2bn dong in compensation for what it said were Grab’s un-fair business practices.

The court found that Grab violated Vietnamese regula-

tions because it operates as a taxi company, and not just as a technology fi rm.

Grab said yesterday, how-ever, it does not carry out a transportation business and does not violate local laws.

“VinaSun could not prove its actual damages and/or the causal link between any of Grab’s alleged violations and VinaSun’s alleged damages,” Grab said in the statement.

VinaSun did not immedi-ately respond to a request by Reuters for comment.

ReutersHanoi

EU holding country ‘hostage’ with tariff threats: Cambodia PM

Cambodian Prime Minis-ter Hun Sen blasted the European Union yes-

terday for holding the coun-try “hostage” with threats to axe trade preferences after it held elections with no credible opposition.

The EU threatened in Oc-tober to withdrawal the du-ty-free Everything But Arms scheme (EBA), which benefi ts exports from Cambodia’s gar-ment and footwear sector, the largest formal employer.

The multi-billion dollar sector employs hundreds of thousands of labour-ers and is seen as one of the 66-year-old’s few vulner-able positions in a coun-try he has run for nearly 34 years by building up vast patronage networks.

In recent months he has re-quested pardons for activists and eased up on the crippled opposition, which was banned in a Supreme Court ruling ahead of the July vote swept by

Hun Sen’s ruling Cambodian People’s Party.

The moves were seen as concessions to avoid any loss of the trade preferences but Hun Sen has baulked at the idea of his hand being forced, and said so in his most direct comments on the issue yet in a meeting with former Irish prime minister Enda Kenny in Phnom Penh.

After bringing up several historical grievances with the bloc he said it was mak-ing another mistake by “us-ing EBA as a threat to sanc-tion Cambodia ... and take about 16mn Cambodians as

hostage of the so-called EBA.”Hun Sen’s spokesman con-

veyed the remarks to report-ers. They were also posted on the leader’s offi cial Facebook page and quickly picked up by state-friendly media.

He asked Kenny to pass along his message to the EU.

Hun Sen is known for fi ery speeches that toss aside dip-lomatic niceties, but he usu-ally avoids calling out the trade scheme by name.

Last month he rapped West-ern governments for push-ing “democracy and human rights” on the country in com-ments believed to be tied to the EU threat.

Removing the preferences is a long, drawn out process that would take several months.

The ruling party swept all seats in the July vote turning Cambodia into a one-party state.

The Southeast Asian coun-try enjoys the economic sup-port of China, which in turn relies on its smaller ally to sup-port it in regional disputes over control of the potentially re-source-rich South China Sea.

AFPPhnom Penh

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen: “Using EBA as a threat to sanction Cambodia ... and take about 16mn Cambodians as hostage of the so-called EBA.” Protesting garment workers ransack factories

Workers in Bangladesh yesterday staged dem-onstrations and ran-

sacked nearly a dozen factories in protests over disparity in their new wage structure.

In Tongi, one of the key ap-parel industrial hubs on the outskirts of capital Dhaka, at least nine factories were report-edly vandalised by the protesting workers.

Equipped with sticks, workers also vandalised two more facto-ries in Dhaka’s Mirpur area.

Against this backdrop, scores of factories in Dhaka and in the apparel hubs on the outskirts of the capital city suspended their production.

Dozens of people including workers and law enforcers were injured in incidents of violence yesterday as police charged ba-tons and used water cannon to disperse the protesters in places.

A tripartite committee with representatives from the govern-ment, union leaders and factory owners has already been formed to resolve the ongoing unrest.

Tens of thousands garment workers have been staging demonstration since Sunday.

IANSDhaka

Police off icers tell the garment workers who protest for higher wages to go to their workplace in Dhaka yesterday.

QATAR9Gulf Times


Qatar Charity sets up four sewing workshops in SudanQatar Charity (QC), with the support of benefactors in Qatar, has managed to set

up four sewing workshops to train the mothers of orphans and underprivileged women, promote their products and provide them with 89 sewing machines.

The sewing workshops were set up as part of 164 income-generating projects, which were implemented by Qatar Charity through its office in Sudan during 2018 at a total cost of more than QR1mn, benefiting hundreds of families in need.

The four workshops, implemented at a cost of QR338.9, aim at rehabilitating and training the beneficiaries in sewing and embroidery arts for one year, then giving them sewing and embroidery machines along with necessary operating accessories.

Through its economic empowerment projects, Qatar Charity seeks to alleviate the suffering of poor families by providing a decent job that provides them with a stable income. Such projects will help lift them out of poverty and preserve their human dignity.

A workshop was set up at the Sheikha Aisha bint Hamad bin Abdullah Al Attiyah Model Orphans City in the River Nile State, where the workshop included 31 different sewing machines along with accessories and 20 pieces of cloths, benefiting mothers of orphans living in the city.

Another workshop set up in the White Nile State included 17 sewing machines along with accessories in addition to two workshops in the Khartoum State, which included 33 sewing machines along with accessories, benefiting more than 150 families.

Rabab Hussein, director of the Khartoum workshop, said the sewing workshop was set up in a densely populated area, where most of the people are poor, who need such projects that help them live a decent life, adding that the workshop aims at training women in producing.

The trainees expressed their pleasure and thanked the benefactors in Qatar for their generous donation, which contributed to providing a source of income for their families.

Hocine Kermache, director of QC’s office in Sudan, said this project was considered as one of the important income-generating projects implemented by Qatar Charity in Sudan, as this project involves training women and teaching them the methods to market and promote their products, in addition to giving them sewing machines.

He also pointed out that the beneficiaries were previously given normal sewing machines individually, while they now get electric sewing and embroidery machines and overlock machine in addition to accessories.

Compared to 2017, economic empowerment projects witnessed an increase in the number of completed projects in 2018, reaching 164 projects, while 64 income-generating projects were implemented in 2017.

These projects consisted of four sewing workshops, 27 grain mills in different areas of the White Nile State, and 17 sheep and dairy cows farming projects in addition to transportation vehicles, cameras and other projects.

ASIA/AUSTRALASIA


Huawei fi res staff er held in Poland on spying chargesHuawei said yesterday it has

fi red a Chinese employee who was arrested in Po-

land on espionage allegations, as China’s telecom giant distanced itself from the case amid West-ern concerns that it could act as a proxy for Chinese security services.

This week’s detention of Wang Weijing follows the December arrest of Huawei’s chief fi nancial offi cer in Canada and US eff orts to black-list the company internationally over security concerns.

While China’s government has vociferously defended Hua-wei chief fi nancial offi cer (CFO) Meng Wanzhou and demand-ed her release, the fi rm swiftly sacked Wang, who works at its representative offi ce in Poland.

“His alleged actions have no relation to the company,” Huawei said in a statement yesterday.

“In accordance with the terms and conditions of Huawei’s la-bour contract, we have made this decision because the incident in

question has brought Huawei into disrepute,” it said.

“Huawei complies with all ap-plicable laws and regulations in the countries where it operates, and we require every employee to abide by the laws and regulations in the countries where they are based.”

A Polish man was also arrested for alleged espionage along with Wang on Tuesday. Both men are suspected of having “worked for Chinese services and to the detri-ment of Poland,” said Polish spe-cial services spokesman Stanislaw Zaryn.

He said their apartments and workplaces were searched, adding that the Polish suspect had worked “for several state institutions”.

The Chinese foreign ministry said on Friday it was “highly con-cerned” about the case and later said it was seeking to arrange a consular visit for Wang as soon as possible.

The Chinese embassy in Poland has also asked Warsaw to “eff ec-tively ensure the legitimate rights and interests, and humanitarian and safe treatment of the person involved.”

According to the LinkedIn pro-fi le of “Stanislaw Wang” – Wang’s Polish name, according to Polish media TVP – the detained Hua-wei employee worked at the Chi-nese consulate in Gdansk, Poland prior to his tenure at the Chinese tech fi rm.

At Huawei, Wang worked as a public relations director for more than fi ve years before moving into his current role as sales director in 2017.

He is a graduate of the Beijing University of Foreign Studies.

His case is the latest setback for Huawei.

Its CFO Meng Wanzhou was arrested in Vancouver on Decem-ber 1 on request from the United

States, which has accused her of fraud related to violations of Iran sanctions.

Meng is the daughter of Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei, a former Chinese People’s Liberation Army engineer.

Following her arrest two Cana-dians were detained in China on grounds of endangering national security, in what has largely been seen as retaliation.

Meng’s arrest sparked a surge of patriotism in China with compa-nies encouraging staff to buy Hua-wei smartphones – and several companies even off ering employ-ees subsidies to buy phones from the home-grown company.

Huawei in December said it

expects to see a 21% rise in rev-enue for 2018 despite what it called “unfair treatment” around the world, as several countries banned its telecommunications technology.

Last month, Britain’s largest mobile provider BT said that it would remove Huawei equipment from its cellular network after the foreign intelligence service called the company a security risk.

Australia and New Zealand have also enacted similar bans, leav-ing Canada the only country in the “Five Eyes” intelligence net-work not to take steps against the Chinese fi rm.

Last month, a senior EU offi -cial warned that the bloc should be “worried” about Huawei and other Chinese fi rms.

Huawei has rejected Western concerns, saying there was “no evidence” that it poses a threat to the national security of any country.

Huawei’s business is thriving in many places. Last year the com-pany said it had signed memo-randums of understanding for 5G equipment with 45 operators in Asia, Europe and North America.

AFPBeijing

The Huawei logo is pictured at one of their units.

Malaysian state chooses new sultan

A Malaysian state announced it had a new sultan yes-terday, who is expected to

be elected king after the former monarch abdicated following his reported marriage to a Russian former beauty queen.

Tengku Abdullah Shah has re-placed his father, Sultan Ahmad Shah as the ruler of Pahang state, the offi cial Bernama news agency said, citing a senior palace offi cial.

Local reports said the move was designed to pave the way for Sultan Abdullah to be chosen as the next king of Malaysia by the Council of Rulers, who will chose

a new king on January 24. Malaysia is a constitutional

monarchy with a unique arrange-ment where the national throne changes hands every fi ve years be-tween rulers of the country’s nine states. Pahang state is due to pro-vide the next ruler.

The country was thrown into shock on Sunday when reigning king Sultan Muhamed V abdicated unexpectedly after just two years of rule, following reports that he married an ex-beauty queen in Russia in November during a pur-ported two-month medical leave.

The abdication was the fi rst for the country since its independ-ence from British rule in 1957.

Royal offi cials have not com-mented on the reported wedding,

AFPKuala Lumpur

Tengku Abdullah Shah, centre, walking after a meeting in Kuala Lumpur.

or said what condition prompted the former king to take the leave.

Sultan Abdullah Shah, 59, is a popular fi gure in the sports scene and is currently president of the Asian Hockey Federation and a council member of football’s world governing body, FIFA.

While their role is ceremonial, Ma-laysia’s royalty command great respect, especially from Malaysia’s predomi-nantly Muslim Malays, and criticising them is regarded as off ensive.

Portraits of the king and queen adorn government buildings throughout the country. The king

is also the symbolic head of Islam in the nation, as well as the nomi-nal chief of the military.

Malaysia’s sultans trace a lineage back to the Malay sultanates of the 15th century. The king is referred to as Yang di-Pertuan Agong, or “He Who Is Made Lord”.

20 trapped in China mine

Twenty people were trapped under-ground in northwest China after the roof of a coal mine collapsed,

state media reported. Xinhua news agency said the accident

occurred in Shenmu, Shanxi province, around 6pm (1000 GMT).

The news agency did not report any casualties but said rescuers had been dis-patched to the scene.

China is the world’s largest producer and consumer of coal and its mines are regarded as some of the most dangerous in the world.

Xinhua reported 217 mine accidents in 2017 with 375 fatalities, in the latest avail-able data.

DPABeijing

1mn cigarettes found under tea imported to AustraliaMore than a million smuggled cigarettes have been found under loose tea imported to Melbourne, police said yesterday.Australian Federal Police said in a statement that two men had been charged over the alleged cigarette smuggling operation.The containers were falsely labelled Black Tea from the United Arab Emirates.The illegal tobacco imports were worth more than A$10mn ($7.2mn), police said.“This seizure and the disruption of this syndicate will have a significant impact on the supply of illicit tobacco supply in Melbourne,” said Border Force acting commander Colin Drysdale. (DPA)

This handout picture taken and released yesterday by the National Agency for Disaster Countermeasure (BNPB) shows Ibu mount spewing volcanic ash into the sky in West Halmahera, in North Maluku province of Indonesia.

Volcanic eruption

Australia denies mass immigrant hunger strike

Australia has denied that hundreds of immi-grants have gone on a

mass hunger strike at a facility in Melbourne, while insisting conditions at the facility are not “inhumane or brutal.”

Days after detainees and activists declared a hunger strike in a protest against liv-

ing conditions, the Australian Border Force said there was no “mass hunger strike” at Mel-bourne Immigration Transit Accommodation.

“While some detainees are refusing to attend regular meal times as part of a protest, they continue to eat and drink in other parts of the facility,” the border force said in a statement.

But activist Ian Rentoul of the Refugee Action Coalition said the “hunger strike protest”

was now in its fourth day.Detainees launched the pro-

test over complaints of pris-on-like conditions and limited privacy.

Thirty-year-old New Zea-lander John Vaofusi, who lost automatic residency rights af-ter being convicted for assault, earlier told AFP said he would continue the hunger strike “until we see some change.”

“I feel like I’m in jail again,” he said. “I’ve done

my time for that crime.”The border force defended

conditions inside the centre, saying “the detention popula-tion has changed considerably in recent years.”

It added “a signifi cant number” of the detained popu-lation had “their visa cancelled on character grounds, based on criminal convictions and links to criminal associations such as outlaw motorcycle gangs or organised crime.”

AFPSydney

BRITAIN/IRELAND11Gulf Times


Immigration curbs after Brexit will ‘pull rug’ from the HighlandsBy Libby Brooks Guardian News and Media

The UK government’s stance on immigration “completely pulls the rug

from under the feet of businesses and communities in the High-lands”, according to the Scottish National party’s Kate Forbes, one of the area’s most prominent and vocal representatives in the Ho-lyrood parliament.

As the Scottish government warned last Thursday that pro-posals in the UK Conservative party’s recently published white paper on immigration will cut the number of workers from Europe eligible to work in Scotland by up to 85%, Forbes identifi ed a “fail-ure of imagination” from politi-

cians who spend much of their working lives in a city so densely populated that they cannot fath-om there are areas of the country where that is not the case.

Her comments come ahead of a debate on depopulation in the Scottish parliament on Wednes-day.

“You could push it further, to people who are so far removed from reality that they pooh-pooh the fact that the average wage in this country is in the lower £20,000s,” says Forbes.

One of the most controver-sial aspects of the government’s post-Brexit immigration strategy is the £30,000 salary cap, report-ed to be strongly favoured by the prime minister herself.

Forbes — considered one of the rising stars of the Scottish parlia-

ment — is MSP for the sprawling constituency of Skye, Lochaber and Badenoch, which includes some of the most rugged and beautiful swathes of the High-lands.

But the area is facing a demo-graphic timebomb, which Brexit will compound, with latest es-timates suggesting it could lose more than a quarter of its popu-lation by 2046 if current trends are left unchecked.

“For the UK government to consider limiting immigration fl ies in the face of the challenges that currently face the High-lands, and that have faced the Highlands for decades, if not centuries,” says Forbes.

“If you look at the areas where there is the greatest pressure on recruitment, particularly around

the hospitality industry, they are (earning) considerably under the £30k mark. The whole idea of a hierarchy of skills is completely contrary to what businesses tell me they are crying out for: wait-ers, chefs, labourers.”

The SNP government, in which Forbes is now a junior minister, was calling for the devolution of migration policy long before Brexit concentrated other minds on the issue.

“There are no UK-based poli-ticians who are willing to make the positive case for immigra-tion. (The SNP) have been, and nobody really cares,” she says, laughing wryly.

“While I don’t accept that Scotland is especially better and more liberal when it comes to immigration, I do think the issue

has not been weaponised to the same extent here.”

Forbes won the “one to watch” category at the Scottish politi-cian of the year awards in No-vember, her second year nomi-nated after becoming an MSP in May 2016.

She quickly came to notice as an able advocate for her con-stituents the Brain family, an Australian couple and their son who had settled in the Highlands but faced deportation following a visa dispute.

In June 2018, Forbes was ap-pointed minister for public fi -nance and digital economy in a wide-ranging cabinet reshuffl e in which Nicola Sturgeon promoted a number of fresh faces from the 2016 intake.

A fl uent Gaelic speaker, Forbes

delivered a full speech in the lan-guage during a Holyrood debate earlier this year, while MSPs lis-tened to a simultaneous transla-tion on headphones.

Forbes welcomes the recent increase in children enrolling in Gaelic-medium education, de-spite criticisms that mainly mid-dle-class parents in cities are at-tracted by the pupil-teacher ratios rather than the language itself.

But she insists that education alone is not enough to revitalise the language, currently spoken by around 1% of Scots.

“It has to be the language of people’s hearts and daily us-age in communities. We are still slightly nervous and feel slightly ashamed of using it, and it’s so quickly hijacked by politics. I feel as an SNP MSP it’s harder for me

to defend Gaelic because it’s so easily dismissed as a nationalist cause, which is ridiculous.”

Ashamed is a strong word to use, but Forbes explains it as be-ing tied to the older generation’s sense of Gaelic as “an uneducat-ed language”.

“They would, as my grand-mother did, have used it when they didn’t want their kids to understand it and they’d be ter-rifi ed of reading and writing it because they weren’t taught it. It was a language of home and not school. And in school you’d use it in the classroom but any kid that tried to speak it in the play-ground was accused of not being cool, because English was the language of TV programmes and pop songs, and that continues to this day.”

‘Yellow vest’ protesters demonstrate in LondonBy Joe Jackson, AFPLondon

Hundreds of demonstra-tors wearing yellow vests took to the streets of

London yesterday, in the largest protest yet in Britain copying the “yellow vest” protests rocking France.

Protesters opposed to the gov-ernment’s austerity programme and demanding a general elec-tion marched through the centre of the capital before rallying in Trafalgar Square.

They included two French ac-tivists involved in the demon-strations sweeping France since mid-November who were invited by the organisers of the British event.

“We are here in support,” said Erick Simon, 61, one of the duo.

“I think that the yellow vest movement in France is the same as the one that is growing in England...people are fed up with

poverty, injustice and social and fi nancial injustice.”

The French protests began in mid-November over a proposed

increase in fuel duties, and soon turned violent.

The leaderless movement ap-peared to be petering out at the end of 2018 but has since re-gained momentum, with weekly clashes seen in Paris and other French cities.

Britain has seen several small protests by Brexit supporters wearing yellow vests since No-vember, but other activists have been slow to adopt the symbolic attire and movement.

Yesteday’s event, organised by the left-wing “People’s As-sembly” group, saw main-stream opposition lawmakers join forces with several unions and other organisations focused

on causes ranging from refugees to racism.

Addressing the crowd in Tra-falgar Square, Labour’s shadow fi nance minister John McDon-nell said eight years of austerity under the ruling Conservatives was “tearing apart the very social fabric” of Britain.

“We need a general election now to bring about the fairer, more equal society we all want to live in,” he said.

Retired teacher Stephen Hamer, 59, clad in a yellow vest, said the London protest would likely have occurred without the movement in France, but it had “helped things along”.

“I think we need a change in

government very urgently,” he added.

“The UK is falling apart — nothing works anymore.”

Delia Hazrati, a health worker in her 50s who had travelled from Kent in southeast England in a yellow vest, told AFP the left in Britain needed to “reclaim” the movement there.

“It’s a movement against aus-terity laws — that’s what it’s about,” she added, noting right-wingers had been “opportunis-tic” in adopting it.

A separate demonstration by dozens of Brexit supporters wearing yellow vests also took place in central London.

At the outset, police ar-

rested one of the organisers on suspicion of a public order of-fence.

It reportedly related to a con-troversial incident outside par-liament last Monday, when a group harangued pro-EU fi gures, including chanting “Nazi” at prominent Remain supporting MP Anna Soubry during live TV interviews.

Ahead of yesterday’s protests Nick Lowles, CEO of the anti-racism group “Hope Not Hate” accused Britain’s far-right of “attempting to copy the French ‘yellow vests’ protests in order to stir up trouble and harass, threaten and attack their politi-cal opponents.”

Protesters wearing yellow vests wait to participate in an anti-Brexit demonstration march in central London yesterday.

Yellow vest protesters take part in an anti-austerity demonstration in London yesterday.

Jail terms of 6 months or less may be scrappedAFPLondon

The British government is considering scrapping jail sentences of six months or

less for most crimes in a bid to re-duce reoff ending and ease pres-sure on the system, the prisons minister said yesterday.

The move could see tens of thousands of people convicted of non-violent or non-sexual crimes, such as burglary and shoplifting, spared jail under the plan, Rory Stewart told The Daily Telegraph.

In an interview with the newspaper’s magazine, he said

that short jail terms were “long enough to damage you and not long enough to heal you.

“You bring somebody in for three or four weeks, they lose their house, their job, their fam-ily, their reputation.

“They come (into prison), they meet a lot of interesting charac-ters and then you whap them on to the streets again,” he said.

“The public are safer if we have a good community sentence...and it will relieve a lot of pressure on prisons.”

The change would mirror 2010 reforms in Scotland, where judg-es are now guided by a legal pre-sumption against custodial sen-tences of less than three months.

Re-off ending rates there have since fallen to their lowest levels for nearly two decades, and the Scottish government is consider-ing extending it to less than a year.

Peter Dawson, director of the Prison Reform Trust, told the Telegraph that government min-isters in London “should be con-gratulated for having the political courage to start the debate”.

England and Wales’s prison population has doubled since the early 1990s to now stand at more than 80,000 inmates, offi cial fi g-ures show.

Meanwhile more than half of the 86,275 off enders sentenced to im-mediate custody in 2017 were giv-en sentences of six months or less.

The country’s prisons are con-sidered in a state of crisis, with violence and drug use on the rise.

Stewart made the eye-catch-ingly bold pledge last August to resign if he was not able to reform its 10 worst jails within a year.

A Ministry of Justice spokes-man confi rmed that it was “ex-ploring potential alternatives” to prisons for some crimes.

“As we have said previously, short sentences are too often in-eff ective, provide little opportu-nity to rehabilitate off enders and lead to unacceptably high rates of reoff ending,” he said.

“But this work is ongoing and we have reached no conclusions at this time.”

People with red hair celebrate ‘Kiss a Ginger Day’ on the 10-year anniversary of yesterday’s anti-bullying day, in Dublin, Ireland.

Anti-bullying anniversary

MoD planners deployed over post-Brexit border concernsGuardian News and MediaLondon

Military planners have been deployed to the De-partment for Transport,

the Home Offi ce and the Foreign Offi ce as offi cials desperately try to avoid backlogs and chaos at the border in the event of a no-deal Brexit, the Observer can disclose.

Details released under the Freedom of Information Act re-veal that 14 military planners have been dispatched by the Ministry of Defence to key min-istries, which also include the Cabinet Offi ce, the hub of the government’s Brexit planning, in a sign of concerns inside White-hall at the prospect of Britain crashing out of the EU with no agreement in place.

In a ramping up of no-deal preparations in recent weeks, one planner is in place at Chris Grayling’s beleaguered DfT, which has already been criticised for awarding a £14mn contract to run ferries in the event of a no-deal Brexit to a company that does not have any ships.

The transport secretary has also been criticised for a live rehearsal of emergency traffi c measures that will be put in place to prevent logjams around Dover in such a scenario.

Some drivers taking part in the event described it as a waste of time, while haulage campaigners said it was “too little, too late”.

Four planners have been post-

ed in the Border Force, which is facing the challenge of keeping passengers and goods fl owing to and from Britain should no EU agreement be signed.

Three are operating in the For-eign Offi ce, while six are working from the Cabinet Offi ce.

The departments involved re-fused to comment on why they had requested a military planner, or what projects they were assisting.

A Defence ministry spokes-man said: “The MoD routinely works with other government departments on planning for a range of contingency scenarios.”

Insiders said some depart-ments had asked for assistance on no-deal planning, “recognis-ing the unique skills and opera-tional planning experience the military can off er”.

Exercise planning and overall “command and control” advice are understood to be their main duties.

Cabinet ministers were in open disagreement last week over the consequences of leaving the bloc with no deal in place, with business secretary Greg Clark saying such an outcome would be disastrous, but defence secretary Gavin Wil-liamson insisting that Britain could succeed under any Brexit scenario.

Contingency no-deal prepara-tion has been taking place under the codename Operation Yellow-hammer, with plans being drawn up on the assumption that criti-cal trade between Calais and Do-ver will face disruption.

It has been suggested that Michael Gove, the environment

secretary, was preparing to re-quest the help of a military plan-ner to help ensure food supplies were not disrupted. However, details passed to the Observer suggest he has not yet done so.

Speaking in the Commons last week, Liberal Democrat leader Vince Cable said he had been told by civil servants of contingency plans to slaughter a third of all Brit-ish sheep in the event of no deal.

World Trade Organisation tariff s would hit exports so hard that there would be too many sheep, causing domestic prices to plummet, he said.

“We have the problem that if we leave the European Union with no deal, on WTO terms, the European Union’s tariff s on dairy products, lamb and various other items, which are quite high, im-mediately kick in,” Cable said.

“The problem with that, as we discovered when we had the foot and mouth epidemic, is that if we cannot export, prices crash. The only logical response from the farm-ing industry, in order to maintain the value of the stock, is to slaughter large herds. This will happen.

Fraught no-deal planning is also taking place in the corporate world, with wildly diff erent prob-lems facing diff erent sectors.

Brexit consultants said the food and textile sectors would face the highest increase in po-tential customs duty. Several companies are said to be looking at potentially paying tens of mil-lions extra in duties and admin-istrative costs each year.

EUROPE


Protesters skirmished with police in Paris and other cities yesterday as thou-

sands turned out for new rallies against French President Em-manuel Macron, with dozens arrested as offi cials vowed a crackdown on the violence that has marred the demonstrations since November.

The “yellow vest” marches began calmly amid a heavy police deployment of some 80,000 of-fi cers nationwide, with protest-ers singing the “Marseillaise” national anthem and holding signs including “Insecurity is not a job”.

However scores of protesters later clashed with riot police af-ter arriving at the Arc de Triom-phe in Paris, prompting volleys of tear gas and water cannon as security forces prevented them from reaching the Champs-Elysees.

Nearly 60 people had been ar-rested in the capital, police said, alongside dozens more else-where including the central city of Bourges, the site of another major rally.

The interior ministry said there were 32,000 protesters na-tionwide as of 2pm (1300 GMT), including 8,000 in Paris.

That was above the 26,000 counted at the same time last week.

Many of the central districts of the capital were on lockdown for the ninth straight Saturday of protests, which have picked up steam after a holiday lull.

Dozens of banks, jewellery stores and other shops were boarded up on the Champs-

Elysees and elsewhere across the city, which have taken a heavy toll on businesses.

“We’ve come to Paris to make ourselves heard, and we want-ed to see for ourselves at least once what’s going on here,” said Patrick, 37, who told AFP he had travelled from the Savoie region.

A few hundred protesters also clashed with police in the his-toric centre of Bourges, where nearly 5,000 people gathered as organisers sought to draw more participants from areas far from Paris.

Signs reading “Macron re-sign!” and “France is angry” were held aloft, while police said

18 people had been detained.In the well-heeled racehors-

ing town of Chantilly just north of Paris, 1,000 or so protest-ers marched through the centre before descending on the hip-podrome where they delayed the start of a race, local media said.

Sporadic skirmishes were also reported in the southern town of Nimes involving some 1,000 protesters.

The demonstrations also spilt over the border into eastern Bel-gium late on Friday, where one of around 25 protesters manning a blockade died after being hit by a truck, Belgian media reported.

Offi cials had warned of bigger

and more violent protests than last week, when demonstrators rammed a forklift truck through the main doors of a government ministry in Paris.

“Those who are calling to demonstrate tomorrow know there will be violence, and there-fore they are in part responsi-ble,” Interior Minister Christo-phe Castaner said in a Facebook interview on Friday with Brut, a digital news site favoured by many yellow vests.

But many demonstrators pointed to social media foot-age of a police offi cer repeatedly striking an unarmed man on the ground during a protest last

week in Toulon, accusing the police of excessive use of force.

The yellow vest movement, which began as protests over high fuel taxes, has snowballed into a wholesale rejection of Ma-cron and his policies, which are seen as favouring the wealthy at the expense of rural and small-town France.

Macron has called for a na-tional debate starting next week to hear voters’ grievances, hop-ing to sate demands for more of a say in national law-making and tamp down the protesters’ anger.

He has already unveiled a €10bn ($11.5bn) fi nancial relief package for low earners, and

axed the planned fuel tax hike.But the public consultations

risk being hobbled by record levels of distrust towards politi-cians and representatives of the state.

A poll by the Cevipof politi-cal sciences institute released on Friday showed 77% of respond-ents thought politicians inspired “distrust”, “disgust” or “bore-dom”.

And Macron may not have done himself any favours on Fri-day, when he told a gathering at the Elysee Palace that “too many of our citizens think they can get something without making the necessary eff ort”.

Clashes erupt as French ‘yellow vests’ stage fresh protestsAFPParis

Police spray a water cannon during an anti-government demonstration called yesterday by the ‘yellow vest’ (Gilets Jaunes) movement on the Place de l’Etoile, in Paris.

Two French fi refi ghters and a Spanish citizen were killed, and nearly 50 peo-

ple injured, in a gas explosion that gutted the ground fl oor of a building in a central Paris shop-ping district yesterday, authori-ties said.

The accident occurred with central Paris under security lock-down for a ninth consecutive Saturday of “yellow vest” pro-tests (see report below).

Large parts of the capital were blocked off by riot police, al-though the protests have reduced in scale compared with Novem-ber.

“As fi refi ghters were looking for a gas leak in the building, a

dramatic explosion took place,” Interior Minister Christophe Castaner said, adding that one of the fi refi ghters had been buried under debris for several hours.

Castaner said on his Twit-ter feed that two fi refi ghters had died and 10 people, including one other fi refi ghter, had serious in-juries.

Another 37 people had lighter injuries, he said.

Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell wrote on his Twitter feed that a Spanish woman had also died in the blast.

French authorities did not immediately confi rm the third death.

Spanish newspaper El Confi -dencial reported that the wom-an was a tourist visiting Paris with her husband, who was un-harmed.

Just hours after the blast, thousands of yellow vest protest-ers marched noisily but peaceful-ly through the Grands Boulevards shopping district of northern Paris, just a few hundred metres from the scene of the explosion.

In recent years, France has suf-fered a string of deadly militant attacks in Paris, Nice, Marseille and elsewhere but authorities quickly ruled out foul play.

“A this stage we can say it (the gas blast) is clearly an accident,” Paris prosecutor Remi Heitz told reporters.

A police source said the explo-sion tore apart a bakery on the Rue de Trevise, and witnesses said the force of the blast shat-tered nearby storefronts and rocked buildings hundreds of metres away.

Cars were overturned by the

blast and glass and rubble was strewn across large swathes of the street after the explosion gut-ted the lower part of the building.

More than 200 fi refi ghters joined the rescue operation and two helicopters landed on the nearby Place de l’Opera to evacu-ate victims.

Ambulances struggled to ac-cess the blast area because of police barriers set up to contain any violence by yellow vest pro-testers.

An eyewitness at a hotel near-by said he saw fl ames envelop the ground fl oor of the building blown out by the blast.

“There was broken glass eve-rywhere, storefronts were blown out and windows were shattered up to the third and fourth fl oors,” said 38-year-old David Bangura.

He said that as he approached

the scene, a woman was crying for help from the fi rst fl oor of a building: “Help us, help us, we have a child”.

“I was sleeping and was woken up by the blast wave,” Claire Sal-lavuard, who lives on the Rue de Trevise, told AFP. “All the win-dows in the apartment exploded, doors were blown off their hing-

es, I had to walk on the door to leave the room, all the kids were panicking, they couldn’t get out of their room.”

“Firefi ghters advised us to leave but the elevator shaft had been blown out, there was no railing, nothing, and there was too much smoke,” she said.

“We were sleeping when we

heard the noise, it sounded like an earthquake,” a teenager who lives on a nearby street told AFP.

“We came downstairs and we saw a building on fi re,” her broth-er said.

Many homes and buildings in Paris use gas for heating and cooking, though explosions due to leaks are relatively rare.

Three killed in Paris gas blastReuters/AFPParis

A woman is evacuated by firefighters after the explosion of a bakery on the corner of the streets Saint-Cecile and Rue de Trevise in central Paris.

Avalanche, storm warnings in Alps

DPAVienna

After stormy winds brought snowdrifts to parts of Austria overnight, alpine

avalanche risk monitors issued fresh warnings yesterday.

Heavy snow looks likely once again this weekend in the Alps, ending the brief respite provided by a Friday with relatively little snowfall.

As a result, snow on meadow slopes and in forests could sud-denly start to slide even below an altitude of 2,000m above sea level.

Avalanches could break loose on steep rocky terrain, the ava-lanche warning service for the state of Styria in southeast Aus-tria reported.

Across the Alps, safety agen-cies kept the avalanche threat level on high, though it was downgraded yesterday to lower levels in some spots, including in Germany’s Berchtesgaden.

In the central Austrian Ybb-stal Alps, some 20cm of new snow was expected at 1,500m in elevation, with temperatures at -5° Celsius.

The German weather service DWD also issued a warning over expected heavy snowfall.

In Upper Bavaria and Swabia, a storm warning was sent out: above 1,000m in elevation, up to 1m of fresh snow is expected be-tween the weekend and Tuesday.

In the German Alps and the Bavarian Forest region, between 20cm and 50cm of snow is antic-ipated at 600m above sea level.

In the foothills of the Alps, gusty winds of up to 70kph are expected, while in the Bavar-ian Forest speeds could reach 100kph.

Danish premier at funeral for Dane slain in MoroccoHundreds of mourners, including Danish Prime Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen, packed a church yesterday for the funeral of a hiker murdered in Morocco’s Atlas Mountains in December.Louisa Vesterager Jespersen, 24, was killed together with 28-year-old Maren Ueland from Norway, as the

two camped overnight at an isolated hiking spot south of Marrakesh while on vacation.Moroccan authorities have said they were beheaded and are calling the crime a “terrorist” act.Ueland’s funeral is to be held in Norway on January 21.

Swiss shipping line starts clean-up after container spillSwiss shipping line MSC has started cleaning up Dutch sea waters, 10 days after it lost nearly 300 containers from one of its cargo vessels in a storm.“The clean-up will likely take months”, Dutch water authorities spokesman Edwin de Feijter said yesterday. “The largest part of the debris has been

located, but there are still parts missing.”On January 2, 291 containers, some holding hazardous chemicals, fell off one of the world’s largest container ships, the MSC Zoe, in German waters near the island of Borkum during a North Sea storm.

INDIA13Gulf Times


UP equation not a setback for us: RahulIANS Dubai

Congress president Rahul Gandhi said yesterday the Samajwadi Party (SP)

and Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) leaving the Congress out of the alliance in Uttar Pradesh was not a “setback” for his party, and stressed that the poll results “would surprise people”.

“The SP and BSP have every right to have an alliance. It’s their political decision. They might have taken it after due consid-eration. I won’t call it a setback because the BJP is anyway not going to win any seats in Uttar Pradesh,” Gandhi said at a press conference here.

“The Congress party has tre-mendous amount to off er to the people of Uttar Pradesh, so we will do our best. We will fi ght with full aggression for our ide-ology. And the result will sur-prise people,” he added.

Gandhi said the results of the coming parliamentary elections

will surprise Prime Minister Narendra Modi who “will not understand what has happened”.

However, Gandhi refused to open up on possibility of a post-poll alliance with the two domi-nant parties in Uttar Pradesh.

Notably, the SP-BSP alliance will not fi eld its candidates on the Lok Sabha seats of Amethi and Rae Bareli, the constituen-cies of Rahul and Sonia Gandhi respectively.

“I have tremendous respect for Mayawati ji, Mulayam Singh ji and Akhilesh. The BSP and SP have said a few wrong things about us, but we accept it. That’s our way of doing things,” Rahul Gandhi said.

He said the Congress “might give a surprise or two to the peo-ple” about what it was capable of doing in Uttar Pradesh.

Uttar Pradesh is considered the most crucial as it has 80 in the Lok Sabha seats, the maxi-mum for any state.

Political pundits hold that the road to 7, Lok Kalyan Marg, the Prime Minister’s offi ce, goes from Uttar Pradesh.

Gandhi also emphasised that the equation in Uttar Pradesh will not aff ect alliances in others states.

“The situations are diff erent in diff erent states. In Maharash-tra, Tamil Nadu, Jharkhand, Bi-har and others states, alliances are being sealed smoothly one after another. So I don’t think it should be any problem,” he said.

Asked what will be his priori-ties if his party comes to power, Gandhi said the Congress gov-ernment would take “rational economic decisions” and would restructure the Goods and Serv-ices Tax (GST).

He accused the Modi govern-ment of vitiating the atmosphere of the country, undermining “every single constitutional in-stitution” of the country and taking rash economic decisions such as demonetisation and multi-layered GST which ward-ed off big business from India.

He said unlike Modi, he would fulfi l all his commitments made to the people and restore the credibility of institutions.

A camel performs during the first day of the Bikaner Camel Festival in Bikaner yesterday.

Aiming high

Former envoy to Doha gets new charge

Former Indian ambassador to

Qatar Sanjiv Arora has been ap-

pointed as secretary — Consular,

Passport, Visa & Overseas Indian

Aff airs, with eff ect from February 1.

He will take charge from

Dnyaneshwar Mulay, according to

a notification issued recently by

the Department of Personnel and

Training, Ministry of Personnel,

Public Grievances and Pensions,

India.

Arora, a 1984-batch off icer

of the Indian Foreign Service, is

currently India’s ambassador to

Lebanon.

The announcement on his new

role comes following approval

from the Appointments Commit-

tee of the Cabinet.

Arora served as the Indian

envoy to Qatar from August 2012

to October 2016.

His Highness the Deputy Amir,

Sheikh Abdullah bin Hamad al-

Thani, had presented Arora with

the Sash of Merit in recognition

of his role in enhancing relations

between India and Qatar.

Before that, he served as

consul-general in Houston, Texas

(US), from November 2008 to July

2012, according to information

available on the website, www.

indianbureaucracy.com.

His first posting was in Egypt

(1985-88), where he learnt Arabic,

and has since served in various

countries, including Germany, Sri

Lanka and the Czech Republic.

He was head of the United

Nations (Political division) at the

Ministry of External Aff airs from

2005 to 2008.

He was also involved in the

Indian government’s initiative that

led to the United Nations General

Assembly adopting a resolution

to observe Mahatma Gandhi’s

birthday (October 2) as the Inter-

national Day of Non-Violence.

Assam Accord Clause 6 crisis: Think logically, not emotionally, BJP urges expert panelIANS New Delhi

With at least three members named to a committee formed by the govern-

ment to implement Clause 6 of the Assam Accord refusing to serve in the face of the controversy over the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill 2016, the BJP yesterday asked them to re-consider their decision logically.

“The BJP would like to request these eminent members to recon-sider their decision not to be part of the committee logically, rather than emotionally,” Assam BJP spokes-person Rupam Goswami told IANS here.

“Clause 6 is a necessity for pro-tecting the rights of the indigenous people of Assam,” Goswami said.

Goswami stressed that while the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill is ef-fective nationally, the Assam Accord is confi ned only to Assam, which is why implementing its Clause 6 is necessary.

A day before the Joint Parlia-mentary Committee (JPC) tabled its report on the Citizenship (Amend-ment) Bill on January 7, the govern-ment announced the formation of a high-powered committee as ap-proved by the federal Cabinet for implementing Clause 6 that seeks to

protect the rights and culture of the state’s indigenous people.

Seven eminent persons from As-sam were named for the commit-tee — M P Bezbaruah (chairman) and Subhhash Das, both former IAS offi cer; The Sentinel newspa-per founder-editor Dhirendra Nath Bezboruah; two former Axom Xa-hitya Xabha presidents Nagen Saikia and Rongbong Terang; educationist Mukunda Rajbonghsi and Assam Advocate General Ramesh Borpa-trogohain.

The high-powered committee also included a joint secretary from the federal Home Ministry and a representative from the All Assam Students Union (AASU).

However, Saikia, Rajbongshi and Terang, as also the AASU represent-ative, have declined to be part of the committee in view of the Lok Sabha passing the Citizenship (Amend-ment) Bill on Tuesday.

“The Clause 6 committee is cabinet-constituted committee and not a bill. So, once the govern-ment changes at the Centre, the recommendation of the commit-tee will not mean anything. Earlier, I thought I will participate in the committee and give some recom-mendations for the protection of the indigenous people,” Saikia said last week.

“I think by keeping this commit-tee in front, the government wants the Citizenship Bill to be passed,” he said.

“When AASU, which was a signa-tory to the Assam Accord, has re-fused to be a part of the committee, there is no question that I should be a part,” said Terang.

Following this, M P Bezbaruah has written to the Home Ministry stat-ing that he does not want to chair a committee that is “defunct” follow-ing the refusal of three members to join it.

Clause 6 of the Assam Accord seeks to provide constitutional, leg-islative and administrative measures to protect, preserve and promote the cultural, social, linguistic identity and heritage of Assam’s indigenous communities.

Basically, it means reservation of electoral seats, land and political rights, rights to natural resources and protection of culture and her-

itage of the indigenous Assamese people.

However, with the Lok Sabha passing the Citizenship (Amend-ment) Bill, questions have arisen about the viability of implementing Clause 6 since this will aff ect Clause 5 of the Accord.

According to Clause 5, only those people who came to Assam till March 24, 1971, will be accepted as Indian citizens.

Clause 5 states: “Foreigners who came to Assam on or after March 25, 1971, shall continue to be detected, deleted and expelled in accordance with law. Immediate and practical steps shall be taken to expel such foreigners.”

This means all illegal migrants irrespective of religion will be de-tected, deleted from the voters list and expelled.

However, the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill seeks to make an exception to this by bringing in reli-gion to give refuge to illegal infi ltra-tors.

According to the Bill, people be-longing to six minority communities — Hindus, Sikhs, Jains, Buddhists, Parsis and Christians — from Af-ghanistan, Bangladesh and Paki-stan, facing religious persecution, will be given citizenship in India.

Muslim refugees are not covered by the Bill.

Clause 6 seeks to provide constitutional, legislative and administrative measures to protect, preserve and promote the cultural, social, linguistic identity and heritage of Assam’s indigenous communities. It means reservation, political rights, rights to natural resources and protection of culture and heritage of the indigenous Assamese people

No corruption, major terror attack under Modi-rule: SitharamanIANS New Delhi

Rallying BJP workers ahead of the up-coming Lok Sabha polls, Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman yester-

day asked them to create awareness about the government’s achievements, especially that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has pro-vided “corruption-free” fi ve years and that no major terror attack has taken place dur-ing this period.

Speaking on the party’s political resolu-tion on the last day of the two-day Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) National Convention here, she also accused the Congress of seek-ing help from Pakistan to remove Modi as the prime minister and said it was possible only under Modi’s leadership that the coun-try could foresee a bright future.

“BJP workers should highlight two things. First, that there has been no major terror-ist attack after 2014. All attempts to wreak havoc in the country have been eliminated at the border itself and this government has ensured that there are no opportunities for terrorists to disturb peace.

“And second, that we have had corrup-tion-free fi ve years. There has not been even

a whisper of corruption in this government,” Sitharaman said.

She said that from small to large reforms, Prime Minister Modi had paid attention to good governance.

“If we have to continue on the road of ‘sabka saath, sabka vikaas’ (development for all), we can’t aff ord to lose momentum. It’s only under Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership that the country can foresee a bright future,” she said.

The defence minister said the country presented a very sorry picture in 2014 before this government came to power.

“India lived in hopelessness as the gov-ernment was not responsive, it did not know what the poor needed, there was complete policy paralysis, corruption was rampant and terrorists used to play havoc in the country,” she said.

She said the fi rst thing that Modi said af-ter taking charge was that his government would be committed to the welfare of the poor.

“If one counts the number of pro-poor de-cisions Prime Minister Modi has taken, they would fi nd that there has been on an average one decision every day over the last almost fi ve years. This has led to the transformative change that India is witnessing today.”

She said the government was able to im-plement various social welfare schemes be-cause it was able to maintain peace, which was its top priority.

“Pakistan is today isolated in the world arena due to prime minister’s diplomacy and his ability to maintain relations with all countries. He has built relations with the leaders of the world. Pakistan is feeling the heat today and unoffi cial (terror) groups supported by Pakistan wreaking havoc in the country are being stopped right at the border,” she said.

Sitharaman added that under Modi’s leadership, “the defence forces conducted surgical strikes across the border and in-stead of commending them, the opposition wanted proof”.

“We showed them the proof. And it was the same opposition — some leaders of the Congress — who went to Pakistan seeking help to remove Prime Minister Narendra Modi. This is the kind of dirty politics that the Congress plays.”

She said India was at a “historically im-portant juncture” and the BJP workers should create awareness about reforms be-ing undertaken by the government and work in that direction till Lok Sabha election re-sults are declared.

Reinstate Verma as CBI chief: Cong

The Congress yesterday demanded reinstatement of CBI chief Alok Verma,

terming his ouster from the in-vestigating agency by the prime minister-led selection commit-tee, a negation of “natural jus-tice” and a decision taken to de-rail the Rafale probe.

Congress leader Abhishek Manu

Singhvi referred to the statement given to a newspaper by retired Supreme Court Justice A K Pat-naik, who supervised the selection committee meetings, to accuse the ruling party of removing Verma from the CBI post in “haste and anxiety” and with a view to “hide matters of public interest”.

“This is very serious, it is ur-

gent, it is very important be-cause ultimately the issues are the same, the issues have not changed. This government is running scared...I think, it is very clear...that there is much to hide, it is not a cupboard full of skel-etons, it is only skeletons, there is no cupboard,” Singhvi said in a press conference.

INDIA


President Ram Nath Kovind yesterday approved a constitutional amendment that provides 10% reservation to economically weaker general category people in education and government jobs. The Constitution (One Hundred and Third Amendment) Act, 2019 amends Articles 15 and 16 of the Constitution to provide quota to general category people with a family income of up to Rs800,000 per anum. “Nothing in this Article shall prevent the State from making any provision for the reservation of appointments or posts in favour of any economically weaker sections of citizens other than the classes mentioned in clause (4),” the Amendment of Article 16 read.

Two elephants died yesterday from electrocution after coming in contact with a high-voltage cable in West Bengal’s West Midnapore district. The local administration alleged that non-rectification of sagging lines over a vast field in West Midnapore district’s Gurguripal area caused the tragedy. “The bodies of two full-seized elephants were found lying in the paddy field at Nepura village under Gurguripal police station area today morning. It seems they died from electrocution,” Rabindranath Saha, Divisional Forest Off icer said. “Some of the high-voltage cables are sagging dangerously low in the area,” he said.

Booking.com, one of the world’s leading digital travel platforms, yesterday revealed that Kerala topped the list with five out of 10 most welcoming tourist destinations in India. According to its 2018 Guest Review Awards survey data, the five destinations were Varkala, Kochi, Thekkady, Alleppey and Munnar. For the seventh annual edition of the awards, a total of 6,125 accommodation providers from India were recognised. “No matter the type, size or location of the property, what we see from our customers is that they value human connection when they travel,” said Ritu Mehrotra, country manager India, Sri Lanka and Maldives at Booking.com.

A 12-hour shutdown, called by six tribal parties in the tribal areas of Tripura to protest police firing earlier this week injuring six youths agitating against the Citizenship (Amendment) Bill, crippled life yesterday, police said. “Except two minor incidents, the shutdown was peaceful in the entire TTAADC (Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council) areas. Bandh supporters attacked a passenger vehicle and a two-wheeler at Bishramganj areas in western Tripura,” Police said. Most of government and semi-government as well as private off ices, educational institutions, shops and business establishments were closed due to the strike, the police said.

Women clad in traditional Punjabi dress perform a ‘giddha’ folk dance during celebrations on the eve of the Lohri festival at Shahzada Nand College in Amritsar yesterday.

10% upper caste quota bill gets president’s nod

2 elephants die after being electrocuted in Bengal

Kerala is top tourist destination in India

Shutdown cripples life in Tripura tribal areas

CHARTER CHANGE TRAGEDYNUMBER CRUNCH POLITICS SEASONAL CHEER

CEC pushes training for offi cials handling EVMs and VVPATsIANS New Delhi

Ahead of the Lok Sabha polls, Chief Elec-tion Commissioner Sunil Arora has di-rected the chief electoral offi cers of all the

states and Union Territories to ensure proper training of the polling staff who are going to handle EVMs and VVPAT machines.

Arora directed the chief electoral offi ces (CEO) to do “meticulous assessment” of all the resources required for the conduct of elec-tions, including the electronic voting machines (EVMs) and voter verifi able paper audit trail (VVPAT) machines. He asked the offi cials to ensure adherence to the deadlines specifi ed for completion of the machines’ fi rst level checking.

The CEC’s directions came during a two-day conference of the CEOs that concluded here yesterday. The directive came in the background of a large number of EVMs and VVPAT machines malfunctioning during the Lok Sabha and as-sembly by-polls in May last year.

The EC had to constitute a committee to look into the reason for malfunctioning of an unu-sually high number of machines during the by-

polls, which pointed out mishandling of the ma-chines as one of the primary reasons.

Addressing the CEOs, Arora emphasised the fact that the electoral roll that is currently under the process of revision and fi nalisation will be used in the coming elections. Hence, care must be taken to ensure the purity of the roll.

He said every eff ort must be made to register all voters well in time. He directed all the state CEOs to put in place support systems for the election helpline 1950 as early as possible.

Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa said that the entire election machinery must now be geared up in order to deliver a fl awless election.

He said that in order to accomplish this, a de-tailed planning process and a leadership role has to be assumed by the CEO at the state level and the District Election Offi cers at the district level.

He also emphasised upon co-ordination with bordering states as well as with other agencies in order to give more teeth to the expenditure moni-toring mechanisms operational in the states.

The focus of the conference was on the in-tegrity of the electoral roll, meticulous planning for elections, EVM and VVPAT assessment and training and extensive voter outreach, said an EC offi cial.

NRI tycoon gifts half his group’s shares to staffBy Ashraf Padanna Thiruvananthapuram

Aries group head Sohan Roy, whom

the Forbes Middle East had last

year listed among the 100 top

Indian business owners in the Mid-

dle East, will share 50% of his stake

with his employees.

He announced the unique busi-

ness model in a press release here

yesterday, making the company as

a society with employee participa-

tion.

He hopes the initiative to make

the employees of his multinational

conglomerate more “responsible,

committed, valued and many

more.”

“The common factor which paves

the way to the success of every or-

ganisation is engaged and focused

on employees,” the release said.

“While strategies are key to suc-

cess, a real win for any organisation

lies in the execution of the strategy

such that the revenue goals are

achieved. And this is met by the

employees.”

The group operates 48 com-

panies in Qatar, Oman, Kuwait,

the UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia,

Azerbaijan, China, India, Singapore,

Malaysia, US, UK, Russia and Italy.

“This gives a feeling of owner-

ship to them. People tend to re-

member such gratitude for a very

long time,” it quotes Roy, a marine

engineer, as saying.

The group has also initiated a

Parent Pension scheme for em-

ployees and pension to retirees,

considering the entire company as

a family.

Parents get a lifelong pension

for their eff orts to mould their

child as a professional to serve the

company.

“It has become a model manage-

ment principle with better hu-

manitarian values. Aries is perhaps

the only company in the world to

initiate such a pioneering concept,”

he said.

Few of his initiatives include

relief work in the flood-aff ected

remote areas in Chennai and Nepal

rescue operations, production of

world’s first charity movies Aicka-

rakkonathe Bhishaguaranmaar and

Jalam. Roy ... innovating business model

BSP-SP alliance for LS polls snubs Congress, targets BJPIANS Lucknow

Arch-rivals for over 25 years, the Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) and Samajwadi Party SP yesterday an-

nounced that they will contest the com-ing Lok Sabha polls together in Uttar Pradesh, sharing 38 seats each of the 80 in the state, while leaving Rae Bareli and Amethi for Congress, which has been kept out of the alliance.

“The Bahujan Samaj Party and Sa-majwadi Party will each contest 38 seats while two seats have been left for one or two parties. We have also decided to leave Amethi and Rae Bareli seats for Congress though we do not have alliance with it,” Mayawati said at a joint conference here with SP chief Akhilesh Yadav.

Answering questions, Mayawati called the alliance a “permanent phenomenon” that would not only sound the “end of the dictatorial, arrogant and anti-people the BJP” but one that would last beyond the 2019 general election and also go in the 2022 state Assembly polls.

The two parties will keep their personal diff erences aside to end “the monstrous rule” of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), she said.

Akhilesh Yadav hinted at supporting Mayawati as a prime ministerial candi-date.

“Uttar Pradesh has produced numer-ous prime ministers in the past. You know whom I will support. I will be happy if another prime minister comes from the state.”

Mayawati described the alliance also as a “new political revolution” taken in na-tional interest to stop the BJP from com-ing to power again.

The four-time Uttar Pradesh chief minister started her address by saying that what she was about to say and an-nounce would give anxious and sleep-less moments to the “guru-chela” duo of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and BJP national president Amit Shah.

She also said that the BJP was rattled at the fact that the two regional parties had buried a long-standing animosity and that it was letting loose government agencies to thwart the alliance.

“But here we are formally coming to-gether, to ensure that at all costs, the BJP is not allowed to return to power but also to give relief to the teeming millions who were suff ering at the hands of the faulty and anti-people policies of the BJP government at the Centre and in many states”, the Dalit leader announced.

Making it clear that the deep diff erenc-es and simmering hostility between the BSP-SP were “now things of the past”, Mayawati also said that in “larger public interest she had even decided to overlook the infamous June 1995 murderous attack on her by SP workers”.

Listing a host of problems like demon-

etisation, rolling out of the GST, agrarian distress, marginalisation of the poor, Dal-its, downtrodden and farmers, Mayawati said that the alliance was set to knock out the BJP as they successfully did in the 1993 state Assembly polls when the late Kanshiram and Mulayam Singh Yadav came together to form the government.

She went on to bracket the BJP and the Congress on the same page, saying their “ideology and the working style” was similar.

The BSP supremo also alleged that while the people did not profi t in govern-ments of both the Congress and BJP, even defence scams took place under their watch.

“If Bofors was responsible for the ouster of the Congress government at the centre in the 90’s, the BJP will go down soon due to the Rafale jet fi ghter scam” she said.

Explaining the reason for keeping the Congress out of the alliance, Mayawati said it was because of past experiences and electoral history showed that while the vote of the BSP and SP shifted to the Congress in toto, it did never happen vice versa.

“Both the BSP (1997) and SP (2017) tied up with the Congress, but the results

were not in our favour because of this very reason.”

The coming together of the two parties, which were swept away by the Modi wave in the 2014 Lok Sabha and the subsequent Assembly polls in 2017, has been viewed by analysts as a possible game changer.

In the 2014 Lok Sabha polls, the BJP won 71 seats on its own while its ally Apna Dal picked up two.

The BSP drew nil, while the SP won fi ve and Congress two — all family pocket-boroughs.

Mayawati said the seat-sharing be-tween two parties was decided at a meet-ing in Delhi on January 4 and the distribu-tion of seats has also been broadly worked out. It will be made public through a press release.

She said Amethi, which is represented by Congress President Rahul Gandhi and Rae Barelli, represented by UPA chairper-son Sonia Gandhi, have been left for Con-gress as they do not want BJP to “compli-cate” matters.

Mayawati said ever since reports of the tie up between the two parties had appeared, the BJP got “scared” and con-spired to weaken the alliance as part of its strategy.

It was “misusing” state machinery and

targeting Akhilesh Yadav, whose name cropped up in the media in the alleged mining scam.

“The BJP should know that after this the alliance has got further strength-ened,” she said and appealed to people not to waste their votes on outfi ts like Shivpal Yadav, Akhilesh Yadav’s estranged uncle, on whom “the BJP is spending money like water”.

She suggested that as part of this strat-egy, parties may be fl oated to attract Muslim votes.

Akhilesh Yadav said that he decided to have an alliance with the BSP ever since the BJP leaders “drunk with power” abused her.

In future, any insult to Mayawati will be his personal insult, he said appeal-ing to SP workers to work in the spirit of brotherhood with BSP cadre.

The Dalit leader also compared the current situation in the country to that in 1977 and said while the Congress had imposed the Emergency then, now it is a state of “undeclared emergency”.

Mayawati however parried questions on whether she would contest the Lok Sabha polls or not.

“In due time, you will be informed of this also,” she said smiling.

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav and Bahujan Samaj Party leader Mayawati address a press conference in Lucknow yesterday.

Modi insists choice is between majboot and majboor sarkarIANS New Delhi

Pitching himself as the sole leader against a motley group of individuals on the

rival side, Prime Minister Naren-dra Modi yesterday dismissed the opposition grand alliance as a “failed experiment” and said that parties are coming together to defeat “one man” to form a majboor” (helpless) government while the country wants a maj-boot (strong) government.

He also launched a scathing attack on the Congress saying it had pushed the country into darkness, bled banks and had created road blocks to an early judicial solution to the Ayodhya dispute.

In his valedictory remarks winding up the two-day BJP Na-tional Convention at the Ram-lila Maidan here, he set the tone for the BJP’s bid to come back to power again, stating that his government’s track record was “spotless”, it worked with hon-esty for all sections, ended de-spondency, raised people’s con-fi dence, accelerated the pace of development and enhanced In-dia’s stature.

Speaking on the legislation giving 10% cent reservation for the economically weaker sec-tions among the general cat-egory, he said this was not only reservations but will give a new dimension to the youth of the country.

Accusing rivals of spreading rumours and hatching conspira-cies that the new quota will be at the cost of the existing reserva-tions for SC-STs and OBCs, he said “we have to foil their de-signs”.

Cautioning party workers against any complacency, he said the election will be won on the BJP’s tried and tested method of “mera booth, sabse majboot” and not by his speeches alone.

The convention adopted a political resolution, which de-scribed the mahagathbandhan as a “comical alliance” and said the choice before the people was be-tween “stability and instability, between an honest and coura-geous leader and a leaderless op-portunistic alliance — a majboot government and a majboor gov-ernment.”

Modi came down heavily on the opposition parties, saying they were aligning for their “self interest” while the BJP-led NDA government was fi ghting for the nation’s interest.

“These days a campaign has been going on to promote ma-hagathbandhan which is a failed experiment of Indian political history. The parties, which were born protesting against the Con-gress, its working culture and its corrupt practices, are now unit-ing,” Modi said in a direct attack on most of the regional parties which are forging a grand alli-ance with the Congress.

He told over 12,000 delegates including from top brass to dis-trict-level offi ce bearers that these political parties were sur-rendering to the Congress at a time when the grand old party was at its “lowest ebb” and its leaders were out on bail in cor-ruption cases.

“These parties (the regional parties), which had emerged as options against the Congress, have betrayed the people’s man-date and trust,” he said.

Modi said that when such al-liances take shape, the govern-ments in those states work under political compulsions and cited the examples of the recent devel-opments in Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

“The chief minister of Kar-nataka (H D Kumaraswamy) is saying that he was working like a clerk and not as a chief min-ister. In Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh, the governments are being threatened (by allies) to take back cases or face the con-sequences,” he said calling these incidents as “trailers” of the grand alliance.

Modi said that politics is done on the basis of ideologies and alliances are made on visions but for the fi rst time it is happening “when all are uniting against one man”.

Modi said that 10 years of the UPA government were lost in scams and allegations of corrup-tion.

“Last four years have taught us that nothing is impossible. We have made it possible. When we took over, we inherited a weak foundation. Today our founda-tion is getting stronger. Imagine what will happen if we get an-other fi ve-year term,” he said.

BJP president Amit Shah, who spoke before Modi, said the 2019 battle was very crucial for the party and if it wins “it will be in power for a long time from pan-chayats to parliament.”

He also accepted the chal-lenge of a grand alliance in Uttar Pradesh and other states.

“Parties can come together for power and self-interest. The workers of the BJP under Modiji are prepared for the fi ght.”

LATIN AMERICA 15


Assembly calls for protest to oust MaduroVenezuela’s sidelined

opposition-controlled legislature is calling for a

mass protest against President Nicolas Maduro in a bid to oust the socialist leader in favour of “a transitional government.”

Maduro, 56, was sworn in for a second term on Thursday, hav-ing won a controversial election in May that was boycotted by the opposition and branded a fraud by the United States, Eu-ropean Union and Organisation of American States.

The president of the Na-tional Assembly, Juan Guaido, said on Friday that the consti-tution gives the legislature the right to assume transitional power after declaring Maduro a “usurper,” but said it would need military backing and for people to take to the streets to demand change.

“Is it enough to lean on the constitution in a dictatorship? No. It needs to be the people, the military and the interna-tional community that lead us to take over,” said the 35 year-old Guaido, speaking to a crowd of around 1,000 opposition sup-porters in Caracas.

In response, Prisons Minister Iris Varela threatened Guaido on Twitter, saying she had a cell

ready for him - as Maduro dis-missed the opposition as “little boys.”

“I hope you quickly name your cabinet to know who is going to accompany you,” Varela said.

But Guaido’s announcement was welcomed outside of Ven-ezuela.

US National Security Adviser John Bolton said the admin-istration of President Donald Trump “resolutely supports the Venezuelan National Assem-bly, the only legitimate branch of government duly elected by the Venezuelan people,” and especially supports “the coura-geous decision” by Guaido to “declare that Maduro does not legitimately hold the country’s presidency.”

In Washington, OAS Sec-retary-General Luis Almagro recognised Guaido as head of state, as the person at the top of Venezuela’s only legitimate governing body.

“We welcome the assumption of @jguaido as interim President of Venezuela,” Almagro tweeted.

Brazil’s far-right government welcomed Guaido’s readiness to “constitutionally assume the Venezuelan presidency.”

Guaido called for a mass pro-test on January 23 - the day in 1958 on which the military dictatorship of Marcos Perez Jimenez fell.

The National Assembly has

dismissed Maduro’s election as illegitimate, but the body has been sidelined by the president’s power grab.

Having lost control of the legislature in 2016, Maduro last year created a rival Constituent Assembly fi lled with loyalists.

And all decisions taken by the National Assembly are consid-ered null and void by Venezue-la’s Supreme Court, the pro-government Supreme Justice Tribunal.

Maduro’s swearing in cer-emony was even held at the Su-preme Justice Tribunal.

The hand-picked successor to late strongman Hugo Chavez also has the backing of the mili-tary high command, which reit-erated its “loyalty” to the presi-dent on both Wednesday and Thursday.

But as part of his call for the military to sever ties with Ma-duro, Guaido announced that the legislature would pass an amnesty law for military mem-bers imprisoned on conspiracy charges.

Mass protests demanding Maduro’s exit also erupted in 2014 and 2017, leaving around 200 dead and hundreds arrested.

Maduro is widely blamed for the country’s economic crisis, with basic food and medicine scarce and hyperinfl ation esti-mated to reach 10mn percent in 2019, according to the IMF.

AFPCaracas

Juan Guaido, president of the Venezuelan National Assembly and lawmaker of the opposition party Popular Will (Voluntad Popular), speaks during a gathering in Caracas yesterday.

Venezuela claims win in diplomatic dispute

Venezuela’s government claimed victory yesterday in a diplomatic quarrel

with Latin American countries over a border dispute with Guy-ana, while ignoring an avalanche of criticism over President Nico-las Maduro’s second term in offi ce.

Maduro had warned mem-bers of the so-called Lima Group of “diplomatic meas-ures” after they said on Janu-ary 4 that they would not recognise his second term

because Venezuela’s 2018 election was not free or fair.The statement, signed by na-

tions including Brazil, Argentina and Colombia, also expressed concern that Venezuela had vio-lated Guyana’s sovereignty by stopping a ship doing off shore oil exploration on behalf of Exxon Mobil Corp.

Foreign Minister Jorge Arreaza said at a news conference yes-terday that 10 of the 12 govern-ments that signed the statement had since clarifi ed their position on the Guyana dispute.

“We believe that regional di-plomacy has convinced these

countries” to reconsider the border issue, Arreaza said. “Di-plomacy has ensured the rule of law.”

He said he hoped that the oth-er two countries - Paraguay and Canada - would follow the ex-ample of the bloc’s other mem-bers. Paraguay cut diplomatic ties with Venezuela on Thursday.

Arreaza did not address the Group’s broader point about the legitimacy of Maduro, who was sworn in on Thursday, except to denounce the bloc’s Jan 4 state-ment as “vulgar” interference in Venezuelan internal aff airs.

The Opec nation’s 2018 vote

was widely boycotted by the opposition and condemned as rigged by governments around the world. Maduro insists it was fair and that opposition leaders did not take part because they knew they would lose.

Congress has been stripped of powers by the Supreme Court and a pro-Maduro legis-lature known as the Constitu-ent Assembly, and the impact of Guaido’s remarks was not immediately clear. Brazil’s gov-ernment said yesterday that it recognised the opposition lawmaker as the legitimate president of Venezuela.

ReutersCaracas

Rallies across Colombia demand resignation of attorney general

Colombians yesterday staged protest rallies around the country, de-

manding the resignation of At-torney General Nestor Humber-to Martinez.

Martinez has been accused of not investigating graft cases he was aware of.

He formerly worked as a legal adviser for one of the Colom-bian partners of the Brazilian construction company Odebre-cht which is widely implicated in a far-reaching corruption scandal.

Demonstrators marched to prosecutors’ offi ces in Bogota,

Cali, Barranquilla, Bucaramanga and other cities, broadcaster Caracol reported.

“The behaviour of prosecu-tor Martinez is destroying trust in state institutions,” said Pedro Pablo Salaz, one of the organis-ers of a demonstration in Tunja in the north.

Odebrecht is under inves-tigation by the attorney gen-eral’s offi ce for allegedly of-fering bribes in exchange for contracts, as the company has admitted to doing across Latin America.

Suspicions of a cover-up mounted after two key witnesses in the case died in suspicious circumstances.

Three former Odebrecht ex-ecutives on Friday addressed

a Colombian judge via video conference from Brazil, apolo-gising for corruption cases un-der investigation, according to Caracol and other media.

The apology was one of the conditions on which prosecutors had agreed not to sue them.

Demonstrators said they wanted Martinez to follow the example of Peru’s attor-ney general Pedro Chavarry, who stepped down earlier this month amid allegations that he tried to prevent an investiga-tion into links between Odebre-cht and some of the country’s politicians.

The Brazilian giant has admit-ted to paying bribes worth nearly $800mn in 12 countries, 10 of them in Latin America.

DPABogota

Demonstrators demand the resignation of Colombian Attorney General Nestor Humberto Martinez in Medellin, Colombia, yesterday.

Recession and austerity measures hamper re-election bid of Macri

Following a painful 2018 that left Argentina in re-cession and forced into

unpopular austerity measures, President Mauricio Macri faces an uphill battle in his bid for re-election in October.

But while the statistics from his “annus horribilis” make grim reading - infl ation initially cal-culated at 10% fi nished the year at 48% while an economy ex-pected to grow by 3.5% shrunk by 2.7%, according to the World Bank - if he manages to stabilize the economy, he has a chance.

Macri has a lot of ground to make up: his approval rating crashed from 66% in October 2017 to just 35% last month, according to a poll by the San Andres University.

A lot of people will need con-vincing that he could bring sta-bility, and even prosperity, if af-forded a second term in offi ce.

“I think Argentines will choose the most extensive path: the one of eff orts, truth, the long term, joint construction. We’re

tackling the enormous task of turning the corner on 70 years of taking shortcuts,” wrote Macri in a New Year’s message.

His aim is to slow down infl a-tion to arrive at October’s elec-tions with a brighter outlook.

But “Macri needs to improve a lot of things and sort out many things,” said Pablo Knopoff , di-rector at Isonomia consultancy.

Something that might work in his favour is a divided Per-onist opposition, which covers the entire left-to-right spec-trum, making it diffi cult to unite behind a single candidate.

Its most popular politician is the centre-left former presi-dent Cristina Kirchner, but she’s facing several court cases over corruption.

Nine months out from the election, there is no dominant front-runner and opinion polls suggest that whoever wins will have to form alliances with po-litical opponents to prop up their government.

A poll published by Opinaia last week gave Macri 27% of voter intentions compared to Kirchner’s 26 and 11 for her fel-low Peronist Sergio Massa.

It’s “a fi ght between minori-ties. The biggest group is the undecided,” said sociologist Ricardo Rouvier.

“Whoever wins will have a minority and will have to negoti-ate with some other force.”

There is still time for another option to gain momentum before August’s primaries.

“Cristina Kirchner will be an important defi ning factor,” says Knopoff , who believes her standing would benefi t Macri.

Rouvier believes Kirchner could top the fi rst round of vot-ing ahead of Macri, but her re-jection rating is so high that she would struggle to claim victory in the subsequent second round run-off .

Rouvier says that Macri and his Cambiemos (“Let’s Change”) alliance “don’t have anything to off er in economic and social terms so they will run on other issues: security and the fi ght against corruption.”

That will strike at Kirchner’s solar plexus as the 65-year-old leader from 2007-15 is the sub-ject of seven judicial investi-gations - six of which are for corruption.

Macri, though, has been be-set by circumstances out of his control.

An unusually tough drought last year severely hit Argentina’s main export: grain. And invest-ment in bonds suff ered from two dramatic currency drops that saw the peso lose more than half of its value against the dollar.

Macri’s solution was to se-cure a $56bn loan from the In-ternational Monetary Fund, an organisation widely hated by Argentines, who have since been subjected to austerity measures demanded by the global fi nanc-ing institution in order to secure those funds.

But while the exchange rate has stabilised, Argentina, and indeed Macri, isn’t out of the woods yet, because “in an elec-tion year, there is usually a dol-larisation of assets,” said Loren-zo Sigaut, from consultants Ecolatina.

“There’s huge uncertainty surrounding the exchange mar-ket,” he said, adding that Argen-tines view the dollar “as a safety net,” which was exactly the at-titude that provoked the peso’s 2018 problems.

Another currency fall would dump Argentina “into a criti-cal situation, because you can’t go back to the IMF” begging for more money.

With consumption and pub-lic investment expected to drop, “stagnation is the best case sce-nario for this year,” said Sigaut.

And that spells trouble for Macri’s re-election hopes.

AFPBuenos Aires

Argentine President Mauricio Macri

17 die in fire at Ecuador drug rehab clinicAt least 17 people died and 12 others were injured in a fire on Friday at a drug rehabilitation clinic in Guayaquil, Ecuador’s largest city, authorities said.The fire started when patients set mattresses ablaze to try to escape from the clinic, which lacked the necessary permits, according to Tania Varela, the chief of police in the poor area of the city where the incident took place.Such makeshift treatment centres are common in the Andean country.“We regret the loss of 17 human lives in this tragedy, and we reject the negligence of the owners,” the Guayaquil fire department said in a statement.Police are seeking the arrest of the owners and operators of the clinic. (Reuters)

Ecuador dismissesAssange’s embassy condition claims

Ecuador has denied media reports that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange

had been made to sleep on the fl oor and denied heating at the country’s London embassy.

In a statement, the presi-dency’s communication sec-retary dismissed the claims as “TOTALLY FALSE,” and said the embassy’s heating system “is working normally.”

“No furniture has been re-moved from his room, which is accessed by an electronic key for his exclusive use,” the statement added.

Assange, 47, has been living in the embassy since seeking refuge there in 2012 to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he faced sexual assault charges that have since expired.

But he still refuses to leave the embassy to avoid extradi-tion to the United States to face charges over his website publishing huge caches of hacked State Department and Pentagon fi les in 2010.

US prosecutors in Novem-

ber inadvertently revealed the existence of a sealed indict-ment against Assange, ac-cording to WikiLeaks, but it was not known what the ac-tual charges were. The pos-sible indictment suggested that Washington will seek As-sange’s extradition if he leaves the embassy.

Last month, Ecuador said conditions had been met for the embassy’s increasingly unwelcome guest to leave, as Britain had guaranteed it wouldn’t extradite him to any country where his life would be in danger.

That could be an issue in the case of the United States be-cause it has the death penalty.

Meanwhile in Britain, he also faces prosecution for fail-ing to meet his bail conditions after fl eeing to the embassy.

In October, Assange sued Ecuador for violating his “fundamental rights” by lim-iting his access to the outside world after blocking his inter-net and mobile phone access back in March.

But the Australian’s case was thrown out by an Ecuadoran court.

AFPQuito

PAKISTAN


The Supreme Court of Pa-kistan has ordered mineral water companies to pay

partially towards the building of dams in the country.

The apex court has imposed a levy on companies selling miner-al water and beverages at a rate of Rs1 for every litre of surface water extracted by them.

The revenue so collected will go to the funds for Diamer-Bha-sha Dam and Mohmand Dams.

Authored by Chief Justice of Pakistan Saqib Nisar, the judg-

ment issued this week also re-quires the provincial govern-ments and the Islamabad Capital Territory administration to set up separate and distinct accounts to receive the amounts collected under the water charges.

The amounts will then be de-posited in the court-created dams fund.

The judgment was issued on a suo motu case pertaining to selling by the companies of wa-ter extracted from underground sources without any charge as well as the quality and fi tness of the same for human consump-tion.

The apex court made it clear

that the funds so collected would not be diverted in any circum-stances to any other purpose other than the construction of dams and water-related activi-ties.

However, once the dams are constructed, the provincial gov-ernments, subject to the order of the apex court, will be at a liberty to utilise the funds collected in the accounts, the judgment said.

The apex court also constitut-ed a special committee, headed by Professor Dr Ahsan Siddiqui and comprising representatives of the provincial chief secretar-ies, director generals of the fed-eral and provincial environmen-

tal protection agencies (EPAs) and others, to devise a mecha-nism for calculation, collection and monitoring of the recovery of water charges from all major industries consuming surface or groundwater.

The industries include the en-ergy sector, pulp and paper, ce-ment, sugar, ethanol refi neries, textiles, garments, tanneries, pe-troleum refi neries, petrochemi-cal industries and fertilisers.

A similar levy has already been imposed on the cement industry.

The committee after consulta-tions will suggest imposing wa-ter tariff on these industries, the court order said.

The apex court directed the federal and provincial govern-ments to ensure installation of foolproof metering mechanism at every extraction unit within a period of 30 days.

Close-circuit cameras will also be installed at the respec-tive premises of the companies involved in the extraction of groundwater or utilisation of surface water for their business.

Extraction will be monitored closely by the respective EPA on a daily basis, the verdict said.

In order to counter environ-mental impact, the Supreme Court ordered the mineral water and beverage companies to start

tree plantation programmes to fulfi l their corporate social re-sponsibility.

“We expect each company to plant/arrange the plantation of 10,000 trees per annum,” the court said, adding that a compre-hensive programme would also be put in place to gradually phase out plastic bottles.

In the meantime, it said, it would be ensured that the plastic used for making bottles is certi-fi ed by competent laboratories as being fi t for human consump-tion.

The bottled water companies are also required to provide a chart highlighting milestones for

meeting all the objectives spelt out in the order and will furnish monthly compliance/progress reports with the implementation bench being constituted under the judgment for its perusal and appropriate orders.

“The respective food authori-ties and the special committee also enjoy the authority to con-duct surprise inspections at any time of the factory premises and water bottling/beverage facili-ties to ensure strict and faithful compliance of this order,” the Supreme Court said.

The implementation bench will take up the matter on Janu-ary 31.

Mineral water fi rms to pay towards building of damsInternewsIslamabad

President Dr Arif Alvi has reconstituted the 9th Na-tional Finance Commis-

sion (NFC) to work out a new resource distribution formula between the federal and provin-cial governments amid Prime Minister Imran Khan’s desire to slash provincial shares without amending the Constitution.

The fi nance ministry has is-sued an offi cial notifi cation of the new 10-member commission.

Finance Minister Asad Umar will chair the NFC, which will comprise the four provincial fi nance ministers and their re-spective technical members, ac-cording to the notifi cation.

The Centre has included the federal fi nance secretary as the

10th member as the offi cial ex-pert.

The 9th NFC had been consti-tuted in April 2015 to fi nalise the 8th NFC Award.

The 9th Commission was fi rst reconstituted in February 2016 when Punjab changed its techni-cal member.

It is the second reconstitu-tion in the last four years, as all the four provincial governments have decided to change their non-statutory members.

Punjab has replaced Naveed Ahsan with Dr Salman Shah, who previously served as adviser to the prime minister on fi nance during the General Pervez Mush-arraf regime.

Sindh has nominated Asad Sayed in place of Senator Saleem Mandviwala, who is now deputy chairman of the Senate.

Khyber Pakhtunkhwa has

brought in Musharraf Rasool Cyan in place of Professor Ibra-him Khan.

Baluchistan has replaced Dr Qaisar Bengali with Mehfooz Ali.

The NFC is required to be set up at intervals not exceeding fi ve years as required under Clause (1) of Article 160 of the Constitu-tion.

The fi nance minister and pro-vincial fi nance ministers are statutory members of the NFC.

Each provincial government also has the right to include one non-statutory member.

The 9th NFC has held few meetings during the last tenure before they reached a deadlock over the Centre’s demand to set aside 6% of the federal divisible pool for incurring expenditures on security and federally admin-istered regions.

Currently, the Centre gets

42.5% of the divisible pool, while the provinces receive the rest.

Under the 7th NFC award, an-nounced in 2010, the provincial share had been raised to 57.5% of the total divisible pool.

Former fi nance minister Ishaq Dar and former caretaker fi nance minister Dr Shamshad Akhtar had proposed cutting the prov-inces’ share in the range of 6% to 8.2% to meet extraordinary se-curity expenditure and fulfi l the requirements of the Azad Jammu and Kashmir, Gilgit-Baltistan and the former Federally Admin-istrated Tribal Areas (Fata).

During staff -level talks, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had also pressed Pakistan to cut provincial share under the NFC.

The offi cials said the provinces have taken a unanimous position that they would not support any

change in the NFC formula.However, during an interac-

tion with the IMF in November last year, the provincial fi nance ministers urged the IMF to ask Islamabad improve the perform-ance of the Federal Board of Rev-enue (FBR) instead of blaming the federating units.

Some economists are of the view that the federal government can still redefi ne the size of the federal divisible pool by adding or deleting any tax in the pool.

“At any time before an Order under Clause (4) is made, the President may, by Order, make such amendments or modifi ca-tions in the law relating to the distribution of revenues between the federal government and the provincial governments as he may deem necessary or expedi-ent,” says Article 160 (6) of the Constitution.

Provinces brace for cut in revenue shareInternewsIslamabad

Testing time

Pakistani and foreign religious students take part yesterday in their second term exam at an Islamic Jamia Binoria seminary in Karachi. More than 5,000 students took their examinations at the seminary.

The US has ultimately seen that its demand for Pa-kistan to “do more” was

unsuccessful, says former envoy to Washington Ali Jehangir Sid-diqui.

Siddiqui, who served in Wash-ington from May to Dec 2018 – a period when Pak-US ties went from cold to frigid – was speak-ing in an interview with Dawn newspaper about the complexi-ties in relations between the two countries, the challenges he faced as an envoy, and whether Pakistan can contribute to nor-mality in Afghanistan.

“I cannot say whether they recognise that it was an un-fair demand – that Pakistan had done a lot at a great cost to herself. But it is clear that the US South Asia strategy was not successful,” said Siddiqui, when asked how did America’s de-mand for Pakistan to “do more” aff ect bilateral ties.

“I think that Pakistan has gained from standing its ground. Of course, in the interim there was a lot of pressure on the re-lationship but we sustained it,” he added.

Asked if Pakistan can help create a semblance of normality in Afghanistan as the Americans demand, Siddiqui said: “There is a lot of focus on Pakistan here,

but we have already done every-thing we can.

“We used every ounce of se-curity and diplomatic goodwill we had to get all parties on the table.”

Referring to Pakistan’s eff orts to persuade the Taliban to hold direct talks with the Americans, he said the outcome of these talks would be determined by the Americans and the Afghan people, not Pakistan.

“The Americans understand that, and we are facilitating the process as best we can, because not only is peace in Afghanistan a noble goal, but Pakistan has been the second worst suff erer in this confl ict … and we want a peaceful Afghanistan,” he said.

Asked what he believes is pre-venting US-Pakistan relations from taking off , Siddiqui said it is the lack of “clarity on both sides”.

He noted that Pakistan had not had broad-based strategic dialogue with the US for a long time, and that held things back.

“But when we did have the strategic dialogue in the Obama years, that was precisely when the relationship was worsening rapidly. So, the problem is deep-er than a structured engage-ment,” he said.

“There is mistrust on both sides that needs to be unwound, and that will take an eff ort where the leadership on both sides need to be engaged by the re-

spective diplomats and histori-cal issues are discussed and we clear and put the last 20 years of history behind us.”

He disagreed with the com-mon perception that the US and Pakistan sides fail to understand each other and instead of talking to each other, they talk across each other.

“I don’t think this perception is correct. The bureaucracies on both sides are sophisticated. But the US political system has much more infl uence in its bu-reaucracy compared to ours,” he said.

Siddiqui noted that many US bureaucrats at the assistant secretary and higher levels were political appointees, providing

a strong political dimension in their system, which ensured that the direction that the US presi-dent wanted was where the sys-tem went.

“So, both sides have an un-derstanding of each other and of their own historical positions.

“It is true that both sides don’t spend enough time un-derstanding where the other is coming from, and frequently miss the considerations and pressures the other side has to manage,” he said.

Siddiqui said that since Pa-kistan was often busy dealing with short-term issues and cri-ses, there was limited long-term policy planning at least vis-a-vis the US.

US demands on Pakistan proved unsuccessful: ex-envoyInternewsWashington

On his promise to depo-liticise civil bureauc-racy and the police,

which has been the top slogan of his Pakistan Tehreek-e-In-saf (PTI) party for years, Prime Minister Imran Khan has not found the required support from his cabinet ministers and party leaders.

Quoting offi cial sources in the ruling PTI government’s civil service, The News daily disclosed that the setback is despite Khan being willing to surrender his own discretion-ary authority in the appoint-ment of federal secretaries.

However, many of his min-isters want to keep their role in the appointment and removal of federal secretaries.

The sources admit that without any political interfer-ence, merit-based institution-alised appointments and secu-rity of tenure for bureaucrats are key conditions for the de-politicisation of civil bureauc-racy, for which Imran Khan is ready but his ministers are not.

It is said that the prime min-ister accepted the proposal when he was told that his dis-cretionary power to appoint or remove any offi cer as secretary in any ministry or division will be done away with.

The premier was told that in order to appoint the right person for the right job and to check the arbitrary use of the prime minister’s discretionary power, a three-member com-mittee of senior bureaucrats will be constituted to suggest a panel of three offi cers for each post of the secretary.

In the proposed scheme, Khan was told that the premier would have the authority to appoint any offi cer as secretary from the suggested panel, but he could not appoint or remove any offi cer arbitrarily as is is the practice now.

The source said that the pre-mier was also supportive of the security of tenure of federal

secretaries and that a secretary could only be prematurely re-moved for some sound reasons to be recorded in the fi le.

The source lamented that despite Prime Minister Khan’s readiness to surrender his own authority for the sake of depoliticisation of the civil bureaucracy, his ministers op-posed the move and wanted their hold in their secretaries.

The ministers’ argument, it is explained, was primarily based on two points.

First, how the ministers could be held accountable for their performance when they would not have the secretary and the team of their own choice.

Second, the bureaucracy which is already not in the control of political govern-ment would become totally out of control if given security of tenure.

According to a bureaucrat source, in the PTI’s election manifesto, Khan had commit-ted that his government’s min-isters would be the “agents of change”, but now they are ap-pearing as “agents of the status quo” and “promoters of bad governance”.

Those who in the govern-ment understand the reasons for politicisation of bureauc-racy, argue that if the typi-cal mindset of “controlling the bureaucrats” and “having choice offi cers” prevails, there is no hope for improvement in the bureaucracy, even during Imran Khan’s government.

PM’s bureaucratic reform bid blocked by his own ministersInternewsIslamabad

Imran Khan: was prepared to cut his own powers to eff ect change.

High Court to take up Sharif’s appealThe Islamabad High Court (IHC) will take up former prime minister Nawaz Sharif’s appeal against his conviction, as well as a petition seeking the suspension of his sentence in the Al-Azizia/Hill Metal Establishment reference, on January 21.A division bench comprising Justice Aamer Farooq and Justice Mohsin Akhtar Kayani will hear the appeal and the petition.Sharif was convicted by an accountability court on December 24.He was sentenced to seven years in prison and fined Rs1.5bn and $25mn.

Mobile phone calls set to become more expensiveWith possibility of seeking assistance from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) to overhaul Pakistan’s dilapidated taxation system, taxes on mobile phone calls are set to go up.The Federal Board of Revenue (FBR) is contemplating various options for slapping rates of 5% to 10% Federal Excise Duty (FED) on usage of cellular phone through upcoming mini-budget to increase tax collection.An IMF team visited the FBR headquarters last week and continued lengthy deliberations.The sources said that diff erent tax proposals for upcoming mini budget was also discussed.One top off icial said that the government is considering diff erent proposals to increase dwindling tax revenues, as the FBR is facing massive shortfall of over Rs160bn in first six months of the current fiscal year.Without additional measures, the FBR cannot achieve the tax target of Rs4.39tn.Now the government is planning to increase the tax target to Rs4.45tn for end June 2019.The Supreme Court of Pakistan had suspended collection of withholding tax from mobile subscribers, causing huge losses to both the FBR at federal level and provincial revenue collection authorities at provincial levels.

China to establish cybersecurity research centreWith the world moving towards advanced “cyber-weaponry” in a world of fifth generation warfare, Pakistani and Chinese universities have joined hands to set up a modern cybersecurity research centre (CSRC).In the partnership between the National University of Sciences and Technology (NUST) and the Beihang University (BUAA) of China, one of China’s top 15 universities, the cyber-security centre will be set up at the NUST School of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (SEECS).To formalise the partnership, the dean of the BUAA School of Cyber Science and Technology, Professor Liu Jian-wei, visited the NUST this week.

PHILIPPINES17Gulf Times


Troops thwart bomb attempt in KudaratBy Roy NarraManila Times

A terrorist attack in urban centres in Sultan Kudarat was foiled by security

forces after they seized impro-vised bombs and triggering de-vices in Paglat, Maguindanao, yesterday morning.

Members of the Philippine Army and the Philippine Na-tional Police seized four impro-vised bombs and three pistols in the village of Damakling around 5am.

The counter-terrorist op-eration was conducted after the state forces learned of the pres-ence of bombs in the village, ac-cording to Lt Col Harold Cabu-noc, the commanding offi cer of the 33rd Infantry (Makabayan) Battalion.

Cabunoc said they have been monitoring terrorist bomb-ers, identifi ed as Ustadsz Yasser Saligan and his cohort, Sheik Makakena alias Abu Jihan, who was also spotted in the area.

“Our informant showed us the pictures of terrorist bomb-ers Ustadz Yasser Saligan and his cohort, Sheik Makakena aka Abu Jihan as they detonated a bomb to test (if it was lethal). We had

been tracking the suspects since November 2018,” he added.

The 33rd Infantry Battalion, 4th Special Action Battalion, Criminal Investigation and De-tection Group-Autonomous Re-gion in Muslim Mindanao and Maguindanao Provincial Police Offi ce swooped down on the ter-rorists’ lair in Damakling around 3 am.

They arrested fi ve people but Saligan and Makakena escaped by jumping into the murky wa-ters of Liguasan Marsh upon sensing the presence of the se-curity forces.

Authorities handed over the fi ve unidentifi ed suspects to vil-lage offi cials.

Two weeks ago, Cotabato City was shaken by a bomb attack on New Year’s Eve that led to the death of two people.

One of the alleged suspects, Salipudin Lauban Pasandalan, is in the custody of Police Regional Offi ce-12 after he surrendered on January 6.

His cohort, identifi ed as Alias Saed Nur Kasim, is at large.

Meanwhile, two members of the Maute Group under Abu Dar surrendered to government troops in Pagayawan, Lanao del Sur on Friday.

The two gave themselves up to

the 55th Infantry Battalion (IB).Lt Col Ian Ignes, 55th IB com-

mander, said the duo got tired of running and evading govern-ment troops.

The two also surrendered a KG9 sub-machine gun and one caliber .45 pistol.

Maj Gen Roseller Murillo, 1st IB and Joint Task Force Zampe-lan (Zamboanga Peninsula and Lanao Provinces) commander, commended the eff orts of gov-ernment troops that led to Abu Dar’s people surrendering to them.

“Our campaign against ter-rorists will be continuous in or-der to attain a just and lasting peace in our area of operation,” he said.

Col. Romeo Brawner, 103rd IB commander, vowed to continue combat operations against the remaining forces of the Maute group.

“Our combat operation will be relentless and continuous so as not to hamper the recovery, re-construction, and rehabilitation of Marawi,” he said.

Abu Dar, who is also known as Owayda Benito Marohomb-sar, emerged as the leader of the Maute after Omar Maute was killed by government troops during the Marawi siege.

Security alert as poll fever heats up across nationBy Roy NarraManila Times

The Philippine National Police (PNP) has set up checkpoints in strategic

locations across the country to prevent poll-related violence, as the election period kicks off today.

PNP chief Oscar Albayalde instructed police regional di-rectors to start checkpoint op-erations in cities and munici-palities to intercept guns and explosives and go after armed groups that may sow violence that could aff ect the credibil-ity of the midterm elections in May.

The Commission on Elec-tions (Comelec) had declared that the election period would start on January 13 and end on June 12.

The PNP had listed 18 cities in Ilocos Region and the Au-tonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao, particularly Basi-lan and Lanao area, as election hotspots.

It also proposed that Cota-bato City and Daraga in Albay should be placed under the control of the Comelec in light of the bombing and the assas-sination of AKO Bicol repre-sentative Rodel Batocabe, re-spectively.

Beginning today, the carry-ing of fi rearms is prohibited, according to the Comelec.

Also prohibited during the 150-day election period is the transfer or detail of offi cers and employees in the civil service including public school teach-ers; organisation and main-tenance of reaction forces, strike forces or similar forces; and suspension of any elective provincial, city, municipal or Barangay offi cers.

“The start of the election period is also the offi cial start of election fever,” Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said in a news briefi ng on Friday.

Pursuant to Comelec Reso-lution 10446, qualifi ed persons and entities may seek exemp-tion to the gun ban and other prohibited acts by applying for the appropriate Certifi cate of Authority (CA) at the Comelec.

“No person shall bear, carry or transport fi rearms or deadly weapons outside his residence or place of business, and in all public places, including any building, street, park, and in private vehicles or public con-veyances, even if he is licensed or authorised to possess or car-ry the same, unless authorised by the Commission,” Jimenez said.

Also prohibited are the em-ployment, availment or engage-

ment of the services of secu-rity personnel or body guards, “whether or not such security personnel or bodyguards are regular members or offi cers of the Philippine National Police, the Armed Forces of the Philip-pines, other law enforcement agency of the government or from a private security service provider, unless authorised by the Commission.”

The transport and delivery of fi rearms and/or its parts, am-munition and explosives is also not allowed.

Up for grabs in the May 2019 elections are 12 positions for senators, 60 party-list seats at the House of Representatives, 243 district congressmen, 81 governors, 81 vice governors , 780 members of the Sanggu-nian Panlalawigan, 1,634 city/municipal mayors, 1,634 city/municipal vice mayors,13, 544 members of city/municipal council and a governor and a vice governor for the Autono-mous Region in Muslim Mind-anao (ARMM) and 24 ARMM assemblymen.

The campaign period for candidates for senator and party-list is from February 12 to May 11. Campaigning is pro-hibited on March 28, 2019 (Holy Thursday) and March 29, 2019 (Good Friday).

The campaign period for

candidates for members of the House of Representatives and regional, provincial, city and municipal offi cials will be from March 30 to May 11.

The substitution of an offi cial candidate of a political party or coalition who died or was disqualifi ed can be done until midday of election day or May 13, provided that the substitute candidate and the substituted candidate have the same sur-name.

The Metropolitan Manila De-velopment Authority (MMDA) warned motorists to prepare for traffi c gridlocks at the Ellipti-cal Road in Quezon City today because of the Unity Walk for a fair 2019 elections to be held by various groups.

MMDA General Manager Jose Arturo Garcia Jr yesterday said portions of the Elliptical Road would be temporarily closed as 5,000 participants were ex-pected to join the walk.

The agency said members of religious groups and several civic organisations would start assembling at the Quezon City Hall compound at 4am. At 7am, they would march to the Que-zon Memorial Circle. “Let’s avoid passing (by the Ellipti-cal Road) because the Quezon City government and police estimate that at least 5,000 will take part,” he told reporters.

A policeman stops a bike rider at a checkpoint in Taguig City, Metro Manila.

A woman begs as her children play at an overpass in Cubao, Quezon City.

Self-rated poverty declinesBy Catherine S ValenteManila Times

The number of Filipino families who rated them-selves “mahirap” or poor

fell in the last quarter of 2018, according to the latest survey of the Social Weather Stations (SWS).

The poll, conducted from De-cember 16 to 19, showed

50% of 1,440 adults respond-ents, or an estimated 11.6mn families, rating themselves poor.

This is two points below last quarter’s 52%, ending the

10-point rise throughout the year.

“The proportion of self-rat-ed poor families was at 42% in March 2018. It rose by six points to 48% in June, and by four

points to 52% in September. It subsided by two points to 50% in December,” the polling fi rm said.

“Nevertheless, the resulting average self-rated poverty rate of 48% for 2018 is two points above the average 46% in 2017, and four points above record-low average of 44% in 2016. This is the second consecutive increase in the annual self-rated poverty rate since 2016,” it added.

The SWS attributed the de-crease in self-rated poverty na-tionwide to a sharp 16-point de-cline in Mindanao

(49%) and a six-point de-crease in the Visayas (61%).

Self-rated poverty, however, increased by four points both in Balance Luzon (51%) and Metro Manila (30%).

Meanwhile, the number of families who consider them-

selves “food-poor” also fell to 34% (7.9mn families) from 36% in September.

It decreased by eight points in Mindanao (38%) and fi ve points in Visayas (44%), while it went up by one point in Metro Manila (22%) and remained unchanged in Balance Luzon (31%).

According to the SWS, self-rated food poverty measures the proportion of respondents rating the food their family eats as poor.

Of the 50% self-rated poor families, 37% said they were “always poor,” while the re-maining 13% slipped into pov-erty. Of the other half of the respondents who did not con-sider themselves poor, 27% said they had never experi-enced poverty.

The remaining 15% said they

pulled themselves out of pov-erty. The SWS said the median self-rated poverty threshold — the monthly budget that a poor household needs for home ex-penses in order not to consider itself poor in general — was P10,000.

The median self-rated pov-erty gap — the amount poor families lack in monthly home expenses relative to their stated threshold — was unchanged at P5,000, or half of the self-rated poverty threshold, it added.

The fourth quarter poll, conducted using face-to-face interviews of 1,440 adults (18 years old and above) nation-wide, had sampling error mar-gins of + or - 2.6% for national percentages, and + or – 5% each for Balance Luzon, Metro Manila, Visayas and Mindanao.

Weather forecasters look for signs of El Nino dry spellBy Francis Earl CuetoManila Times

State weather forecasters continue to monitor variables, including the occurrence of a dry spell, before they declare the onset of the El

Nino phenomenon that may aff ect majority of Lu-zon and the Visayas.

The El Nino phenomenon, which usually ac-counts for hotter days, is a climate pattern that describes the unusual warming of surface waters in the eastern tropical Pacifi c Ocean.

In an interview over ABS-CBN’s morning show Umagang Kay Ganda, weather forecaster Raymong Ordinario said the Philippine Atmospheric, Geo-physical and Astronomical Services Administra-tion (Pagasa) was looking at the various conditions that might be set before the phenomenon could be declared. “We are monitoring it. It should meet all

conditions before we can declare the El Nino,” Or-dinario said.Pagasa’s climate outlook earlier stated that there was a probable occurrence of the El Nino phenomenon during the fi rst quarter of 2019, stat-ing that it might aff ect 47 provinces.

Ordinario said there would fi rst be a drought that would persist for three consecutive months, where the rainfall was way below normal rainfall (60% re-duction from average) or fi ve consecutive months of below normal rainfall condition (21% to 60% reduc-tion from average). According to Pagasa, a “dry spell” is defi ned as three consecutive months of below nor-mal rainfall (21% to 60% reduction from average) or two months of consecutive way below normal rainfall (more than 60% reduction from average).

State weather forecasters said the majority of the villages in the town of M’lang in North Cotabato province were experiencing the mild eff ect of drought as severe temperatures since mid-December had dried up their irrigation canals.

A farmer walks on a dry rice field in Baliaug, Bulacan.

New eased adoption measures plannedBy Javier J IsmaelManila Times

As the country celebrates Adoption Conscious-ness Week in February,

President Rodrigo Duterte is expected to sign into law a har-monised version of Senate Bill (SB) 2081 and House Bill (HB) 5675 or the “Simulated Birth Rectifi cation Act of 2018,” a measure which would do away with lengthy court proceedings in the adoption of “unwanted” children.

The Senate and the House of Representatives have ratifi ed the measure, and hopefully it

would be signed into law by the president in time for the week-long adoption consciousness celebration from February 10 to 18.

Records from the Depart-ment of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) showed that about 6,500 children have been declared available for adoption.

Almost 4,000 of them are under the care of government and non-government residen-tial care facilities.

The House of Representa-tives has been tasked to en-rol the harmonised version of SB 2081 and HB 5675 before it could be transmitted to Mala-

canang for the President’s sig-nature.

Under the measure, prospec-tive parents need not undergo the lengthy judicial process in the adoption of a child that usually takes more than six months to complete.

The proposal also “grants amnesty and allow the recti-fi cation of the simulated birth of a child where simulation was made for the best interest of the child, and that such child has been consistently considered and treated by the person.”

“Birth simulation” refers to the tampering of the civil reg-istry to make it appear in the record of birth that a child was

born to a person who is not the child’s biological mother.

Republic Act 8552, also known as the Domestic Adop-tion Act, “penalises any person who shall cause the fi ctitious registration of the birth of a child under the name (s) of a person(s) who is not his/her biological parent (s).”

This provision makes the adoption process “tedious and excessively costly for ordinary Filipinos,” Senator Grace Poe, principal author of the bill, said.

“This leaves a lot of adoptees under assumed fi liation and unduly deprived of the benefi ts of legitimacy and succession,” Poe added.


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CHAIRMANAbdullah bin Khalifa al-Attiyah

EDITOR-IN-CHIEFFaisal Abdulhameed al-Mudahka

Deputy Managing EditorK T Chacko

Will government shutdown derailUS-China talks?

The United States and China have agreed to go ahead with a further set of trade negotiations at the end of January, although there are fears the talks could be delayed because of the ongoing shutdown of the US government.

The proposed talks in Washington, DC, if materialise, may see more senior offi cials from both sides participating, according to market analysts.

It remains to be seen whether the partial shutdown of the US government over funding for President Donald Trump’s proposed wall on the southern US border would derail the talks.

The president has insisted on more than $5bn in funding for his long-promised wall at the US-Mexico border.

The ongoing partial government shutdown entered its 22nd day yesterday, breaking the record to become the longest government shutdown in US history.

An estimated 800,000 federal workers have been aff ected by the lapse in funding -- either by having to work without pay while it lasts or by being furloughed.

If the government shutdown continues any longer, it will constitute the longest-ever lapse in federal funding, taking the nation — and the stock market — into uncharted territory.

The world’s two biggest economies are separately struggling to come in for unparalleled, simultaneous soft landings, an eff ort complicated by the trade war they’re waging at the same time, Bloomberg said in a dispatch.

It is hard enough for the US or China to pull fi scal and monetary levers to manage a step-down in growth alone.

A misstep would also turn what’s supposed to be a controlled touchdown of their economies into something much worse – a worldwide recession. While most economists say that’s unlikely, they acknowledge that it can’t be ruled out, especially if the temporary trade truce between the two countries breaks down

or if equities keep sliding.Despite a recent stock market rally that has seen the

Dow Jones Industrial Average rally back toward 24,000, economists are warning that the partial government shutdown and other factors have put the United States economy at its greatest risk of plunging into a recession in more than half a decade.

According to a new survey conducted by Bloomberg, economic analysts believe there is a median 25% chance that the US will enter a recession within the next 12 months, ending an era of economic growth that began in 2009 and is just months away from becoming the longest on record.

Indeed, both the ongoing US-China trade war and the partial government shutdown have already shaken the markets to various degrees, and while both could be resolved within the near future, their impacts could linger for far longer, even in a best-case scenario.

Both countries have been hurt by the trade war, with the US stock market dropping in the fourth quarter and China publishing data that suggests its economic growth has begun to slow down.

The Trump administration, for its part, has alleged that China’s weakening economy proves the US is winning the trade war.

However, in an increasingly globalised economy, a weaker China will make itself known on the balance sheets of US companies.

The ongoing partial government shutdown is the longest in US history

Dark clouds over thewhite cliff s of DoverBy Silvia KusidloDover

As parliament in London remains deeply divided on the nature of the Brexit deal, ominous clouds are gathering

over the southern port of Dover.Around 10,000 trucks could be stuck

in tailbacks on the roads leading to the famous white cliff s, forced to wait for hours on sections of motorway set aside for the purpose.

Air quality will decline as a result of the transport chaos, government offi ces will be forced to close with staff unable to get to work, and rubbish could pile up in the streets as refuse trucks become stuck in the traffi c.

Children may be unable to get to school, and fresh goods will spoil during transport in the lengthening truck convoys.

These gloomy predictions are not from a disaster movie, but from a study commissioned by Kent County Council.

They could become reality should Britain crash out of the European Union without a deal on March 29.

This scenario is becoming increasingly likely in the face of the deadlocked situation in parliament, where debate on Brexit has resumed after the Christmas and New Year holidays.

A vote on the highly contested deal that Prime Minister Theresa May has hammered out with Brussels has been set down for Tuesday.

The English Channel, no more than 40km wide at this point, forms the most important link between Britain and the European mainland with its Dover-Calais ferries and the Channel Tunnel, particularly for goods that need rapid delivery to their destination.

In the event of a “no deal,” customs checks would have to be imposed from one day to the next, and the entire region would turn into a huge bottleneck, remaining jammed for up to six months, according to the predictions.

Dover residents are in a state of frustration at the lack of information. “We simply don’t know how things will go on,” a worker in the local tourism offi ce says. “The politicians tell us nothing,” she adds.

While the manager of a chemist’s has few concerns on stocking her range, she is worried about her brother.

“He’s an electrician, and he doesn’t know how his business will be able to continue after Brexit,” she says. “If uncertainty leads to people ceasing to build houses, he won’t have work any more.”

The British government authorities are scarcely ready for the looming chaos in Dover, Eric Schweitzer, the head of the German Chambers of Industry and Commerce (DIHK), has warned. “Just-in-time production and supply chains are at risk,” Schweitzer says.

In 2017, the ferries carried more than 2.6mn trucks across the Channel, packed with car parts, medicines and other goods.

In Folkestone, some 10km to the west of Dover, trains enter the Channel Tunnel, also known as the Eurotunnel, carrying trucks laden with containers under the sea fl oor to France.

Perishable goods could deteriorate if time-consuming checks are imposed with their resultant queues.

Warehouses are already bursting at the seams in Britain in anticipation.

“The amount of storage space needed is simply not there,” says Ulrich Hoppe, head of the German-British Chambers of Industry and Commerce (IHK), in London. “This is an issue particularly with fresh goods, such as food,” Hoppe says.

Around 90% of the medical supplies that are imported into Britain arrive via Dover.

Health Minister Matt Hancock has called on pharmaceutical companies and the National Health Service (NHS) to have six weeks’ worth of supplies in stock.

There are plans to bring emergency supplies in by air.

Last month, Hancock told the BBC that the British government had become the world’s largest buyer of fridges to store the medications.

Roads blocked for months will aff ect many areas.

Routes to school and hospital will have to be secured, as will transporting the dead to morgues.

In an attempt to alleviate the road traffi c situation, as many administrative workers as possible are to be encouraged to work from home for three to six months.

The Road Haulage Association (RHA) said plans for a no-deal Brexit were “dire” and that it would take eight hours to clear an average truck carrying food from Calais to Dover.

London estimates that only 12 to 25% of current capacity could be carried between the two ports in the event of Britain crashing out of the EU without a deal, with trucks stuck in tailbacks stretching for 50km.

Kent County Council’s Paul Carter has urged the national government to provide more information on how they intend to work with the council in the future.

But confi dence in the government has been repeatedly shaken.

Former Brexit minister Dominic Raab admitted to the BBC in November that he “hadn’t quite understood” the significance of the Dover-Calais crossing for the country’s goods trade.

He resigned a week later.Government plans to alleviate the

bottlenecks with additional ferry services in the event of a no-deal also came in for scorn after the BBC uncovered the fact that one of the contracts had gone to a shipping company that had not yet started operating.

Transport Minister Chris Grayling defended the contract with the “company with no ships” worth the equivalent of some 17.5mn dollars as promoting a start-up, saying he would “make no apologies for supporting a new British business.” - DPA

Lorries near Dover taking part in the Department for Transport trial. A live rehearsal of an emergency traff ic system was conducted recently to prevent congestion in Dover in the event of a no-deal Brexit. PICTURE: Sean Smith/Guardian

COMMENT

Gulf Times Sunday, January 13, 2019 19

Fully fi lling the Global Fund

High-fi bre diets help prevent cancers, heart disease

By Jeffrey D Sachs, Guido Schmidt-Traub, and Vanessa Fajans-TurnerNew York

The single most important public health measure of 2019 is the replenishment of the Global Fund to Fight

Aids, Tuberculosis, and Malaria. These three diseases, which currently kill around 2.5mn people per year, could be fully contained by 2030, with deaths reduced to nearly zero.

The Global Fund is the primary instrument for success, and it needs to raise $10bn per year to accomplish its mission.

The Global Fund, established in 2001 by Kofi Annan, has been credited with saving 27mn lives and controlling the three epidemics to the point that they can realistically be ended by 2030.

Although none of the three diseases can be completely eradicated by then, almost all deaths and new infections can be stopped, because diagnostics, prevention, and treatment have improved markedly and become far less costly over the past 25 years.

In the case of Aids, treatment of the HIV virus not only keeps infected individuals healthy, but also reduces the virus load so much that they are unlikely to infect others. In this sense, “treatment is prevention”: treating a sufficiently high proportion of HIV-positive individuals will largely end the transmission of the virus.

Similarly, advances in diagnostics (a simple pin-prick blood test), prevention (long-lasting insecticide-treated bed nets, among other tools), and treatment (low-cost artemisinin-based combination drugs) make it possible to eliminate almost all malaria deaths (which are already down by roughly 60%

from their peak in the early 2000s). The recent uptick in infections and deaths is a worrying sign that the world is again underinvesting in the fight.

For TB, the challenge continues to be early diagnosis and effective treatment, with special attention to multidrug-resistant TB. The TB mortality rate has declined by around 42% since 2000. With sufficient coverage of effective monitoring and treatment, the remaining deaths could be largely ended as well.

The relatively low costs and enormous benefits of these interventions mean that high-income and upper-middle-income countries should prioritize their health programs and national budgets accordingly. Shockingly, in the United States, only around half of HIV-positive individuals are receiving treatment, owing to the federal government’s neglect.

For low-income and many lower-middle-income developing countries, however, national budgets are not sufficient. Recent calculations by the International Monetary Fund show that these countries lack the means to ensure universal health coverage and other basic services called for by the Sustainable Development Goals.

This was one of two reasons for creating the Global Fund in the first place: to bolster poorer countries’ ability to control the epidemics. The other reason was to bring top global science and rigorous management to bear on the three epidemics. Thanks to its unique business model, the Global Fund does both: it generates and disseminates the knowledge needed to fight the three diseases, and it rigorously monitors the implementation of the projects that it funds.

The Global Fund got off to a great start in the early 2000s, with strong bipartisan support in the US and

similar cross-party support in other countries. President George W Bush was the Global Fund’s strongest backer among world leaders, and Bill Gates was its leading philanthropist. But the Global Fund budget levelled off following the 2008 financial crisis, and a gap opened between

what is needed and what is funded.That gap needs to be closed in

October 2019, when the Global Fund is to be replenished for the years 2020-22 at a conference in Lyon hosted by the French government. In the previous replenishment round, the Global Fund identified a total

three-year financing need of around $98bn, of which all but around $30bn could be met by domestic budgets and other sources. Yet, instead of filling the $30bn gap (roughly $10bn per year), the donors gave the Global Fund just $13bn. The lack of adequate funding meant that all three diseases

continued to kill and to spread unnecessarily.

This time, the entire shortfall must be covered. The Global Fund will soon issue its own assessment of fi nancing needs, but the numbers are unlikely to change much: around $30bn over three years, or $10bn per year.

This is a remarkably small price to pay to save millions of lives. Consider what $10bn per year really means. For the 1.2bn people in the high-income countries, it means $8 per person per year. For the Pentagon, it means roughly five days of spending. And for the world’s 2,208 billionaires, it means just 0.1% of their combined net worth (some $9.1tn).

Here, then, is a basic proposal: The Global Fund should pledge its eff orts to raise $30bn for the next three years. Half of the $30bn could come from donor governments. The US should continue its tradition of bipartisan support. China, a past Global Fund benefi ciary, should now become a donor. The other half of the funding should come from the world’s richest people, whose wealth has soared in recent years. Gates has set the standard, and, under the Giving Pledge that he and Warren Buff ett have launched, hundreds of the super-rich could easily pledge $5bn per year for the period 2020-2022.

In a world divided by conflict and greed, the Global Fund’s fight against the three epidemic diseases is a matter of enlightened self-interest. It is also a reminder of how much humanity can accomplish when we cooperate to save lives. – Project Syndicate

Jeffrey Sachs is Director of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN). Guido Schmidt-Traub is Executive Director of the SDSN. Vanessa Fajans-Turner is Director of SDG Costing and Financing for SDSN.

Live issues

QNALondon

A large, new analysis helps confi rm that eating lots of grains, vegetables and fruit lowers your risk of dying

early from cancer or heart disease.When compared with those who

consume very little fi bre, people at the high end of the fi bre-eating spectrum saw their risk for dying from heart disease, stroke, type 2 diabetes and/or

colon cancer plummet by 16 to 24%, investigators reported.

The team also concluded that more is defi nitely more: For every additional 8 grams of dietary fi bre a person consumes, the risk for each of those illnesses was found to fall by another 5 to 27%.

“The health benefi ts of fi bre are supported by over 100 years of research into its chemistry, physical properties, physiology and eff ects on metabolism,” said study author Andrew Reynolds, a postdoctoral research fellow at the University of

Otago in New Zealand.“What really surprised us was the

range of conditions that higher intakes of dietary fi bre seemed to improve,” Reynolds added. “Heart disease, type 2 diabetes and colon cancers are some of the most detrimental diseases of our time.”

The conclusions follow a deep-dive into the results of 185 observational studies conducted over the last four decades, alongside the fi ndings of another 58 clinical trials involving more than 4,600 participants.

Reynolds and his colleagues

reported their work, which was commissioned by the World Health Organisation (WHO), published in online edition of The Lancet.

The research team noted that worldwide most people eat less than 20 grams of fi bre each day, a fi gure that dips to just 15 grams per day among Americans.

For examples of foods: 1 slice of whole wheat bread has 2 grams of fi bre; 1 cup of boiled broccoli has 5 grams; 1 medium orange has 3 grams, and 1 cup of cooked black beans has 15 grams.

The Global Fund to fight Aids, Tuberculosis, and Malaria needs to raise $10bn per year to accomplish its mission.

Dear Sir,

Geoffrey Douglas Langlands, who died in Lahore after a brief illness aged 101 earlier this month, was popularly known to Pakistanis as the “Major”.

The “Major”, realising the enormous difficulties a newly born state would face, opted to join Pakistan Army after the partition of the sub-continent in 1947.

He developed love and affection for Pakistan on the day of its inception.

When he was about to leave for a lavish lifestyle and comforts of England after completing his contract he was requested to stay as an educator in Pakistan by none other than General Ayub Khan.

He accepted the offer and was appointed Algebra teacher in the Aitchison College Lahore.

He then devoted his 25 years to the ‘Eton of Pakistan’ teaching mathematics to upper class young Pakistanis and rose to become the college’s dean.

He taught English and mathematics for more than six decades in Pakistan, and lived long enough to see one of his students, Imran Khan, become the prime minister.

Geoffrey Douglas Langlands lost both his parents at a very early age – father to the worldwide flu epidemic when Geoffrey was just one-year-old and mother to cancer when he was only 13.

After completing A Level education at the age of 18, he started his teaching career and taught

science and mathematics to second grade students in Croydon, England.

When World War II began in 1939, after hearing the call of his prime minister Churchill he volunteered and joined the British Army as an enlisted soldier.

In the military service he found himself on a teaching job, but his devotion and strong desire to fight for his country made him a commando in 1942.

In 1944 he was sent to British India where he was promoted to second lieutenant.

His passion to educate Pakistanis never stopped and in 1979, on the invitation of the chief minister of the Northwest Frontier Province (now Khyber Pakhtunkhwa) Langlands gave up his comfortable job in Lahore

and took over as principal of Cadet College Razmak in North Waziristan and served until September 1989.

During this period he was kidnapped by tribesmen and was kept hostage for six days.

Revealing this incident Langlands described the kidnappers as polite, decent and respectful to him when they found out that he was 71 and a principal.

One of his former students, speaking of his kidnapping said: “Langlands used to tell us how he walked faster than the kidnappers up the mountainous area. They were not able to catch up, this is how energetic and full of life he was.”

The kidnappers even requested for photographs with him before releasing him honourably.

In late 1989, Langlands took charge of a small private school in Chitral that was first of its kind in that area.

In recognition of his devotion and enthusiasm for education, the school

was renamed Langlands School and College.

The school grew steadily under his guidance and leadership.

The strength of students increased from 80 to 800, about one third of which consisted of girls.

Students remember him as a cheerful friend, a passionate story teller and a great humanitarian.

For his selfl ess commitment, love and meritorious services to education Major Geoff rey Douglas Langlands was awarded the Sitara-i-lmtiaz, HiIilal-i-Imtiaz, Order of St Michael and St George, Order of British Empire, OBE by the Queen of England.

Generations of Pakistanis owe their education to the “Major.”

He was a staunch believer in what William Shedd had said, “A ship is safe in harbour, but that’s not what ships are built for”.

M Khalid KamalV- 20, Pink Villas, St-220, Ain KhalidDoha

Letters

Please send us your letters

By e-mail [email protected] 44350474Or Post Letters to the EditorGulf TimesP O Box 2888Doha, Qatar

All letters, which are subject to editing, should have the name of the writer, address and phone number. The writer’s name and address may be withheld by request.

Fondly remembering the ‘Major’

Geoff rey Douglas Langlands

WARNING

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WEATHERInshore : Moderate temperature

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Alfardan Premier Motors Co, the offi cial retailer of Jaguar Land Rover in

Qatar, has shown its support and keenness to contribute and participate in all national events, especially Qatar’s third shopping festival — Shop Qatar.

As the offi cial automotive partner, Alfardan Premier Mo-tors provided a fl eet of Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles to bring a sense of luxury and el-egance to the Design District Week held from January 5 until yesterday.

It provided “an atmosphere of stylishness to the experience of guests attending the event — from artists, designers and fashion celebrities who have come specially to participate in the shopping festival from all over the world”, the company said in a statement.

“Alfardan Premier Motors strongly believes in the impor-tant role played by Qatar’s Na-tional Tourism Council to pro-mote the local tourism sector,” the statement noted.

The Design District Week, which took place at Doha Ex-hibition and Convention Cen-

tre, is part of Shop Qatar that continues until January 20 and seeks to shed light on Qatari and international brands spe-cialising in this fi eld, in addi-tion to fashion shows, related workshops, makeup art training sessions and design art panel discussions.

Samer Bou Dargham, general manager of Alfardan Premier Motors, said: “We are delight-ed to be a part of Qatar’s third shopping festival, Shop Qatar,

which has been highly recog-nised for its wide variety of experiences. As the offi cial au-tomotive partner for the event, we have provided a fl eet of Jag-uar and Land Rover vehicles to add the touch of luxury and elegance while chauff euring the artists and fashion celebrities attending the Design District Week.

“The name of Alfardan Pre-mier Motors has been closely associated with various ma-

jor events and happenings in the country, which confi rms our commitment to be a key partner in all major activities taking place in Qatar. Our par-ticipation comes in line with our keenness to enhance co-operation between the public and private sectors, which is refl ected in the participation in such events aimed to providing a pioneering tourism experi-ence that suits all members of the society.”

QATAR


‘A Focus on Italian Heritage’ photo exhibition at Katara

The Italian embassy in Doha and Ka-tara – the Cultural Village Founda-tion have announced the inaugu-

ration of a photo exhibition, ‘A Focus on Italian Heritage’, on January 15, 6.30pm at Building 19, Gallery 1.

The exhibition, curated by Italian con-temporary art gallery Spazio Nuovo – Roma, will run until January 30.

Italian ambassador Pasquale Salzano said: “We are very proud to open the Italian embassy’s cultural programme in 2019 with this very special exhibition, a unique collection of 16 art pictures, cre-ated and made by a group of three artists, Riccardo Ajossa (Italy), Camilla Borghese (Italy) and Olivier Roller (France), using photography to reinterpret the immense Italian artistic heritage.”

Every art piece is a visual and emotion-al journey through the renowned Italian heritage of classical architecture, paint-ing, and sculpture, which have made over the centuries and still make Italy a great source of inspiration and beauty highly-admired around the world.

The three artists share the same bound of devotion to the photographic medium and to the sublime Greco-Roman art as a subject of personal interest.

However, what visually links their compositions is their aptness at high-lighting and unveiling certain key ele-ments of specifi c masterpieces of the ancient times, so as to reveal an intrinsic meaning that would have otherwise elud-ed comprehension at a fi rst glance.

Their common sense of composition, better known in the world of photography as “focus”, refl ects the intrinsic abilities to simultaneously archive and innovate.

“The artists’ approach embodies the great contribution of contemporary pho-tography to ‘cultural diplomacy’ – it cer-tainly captures moments but also helps defi ning the past, building the present, and shaping our vision for the future. Photography is a powerful tool to share cultural heritage as well as stimulate peo-ple’s feelings and ideas.

“In this regard, Italy and Qatar has the same vision. Both our countries are com-mitted to preserve, promote, and make their respective cultural heritage as much accessible as possible to encourage the inclusive development and dialogue be-tween communities and generations, as it is also highlighted in the Qatar National Vision 2030,” Salzano said.

What distinguishes the works of Roll-er, Borghese and Ajossa, are their artistic subjects, respectively sculpture, archi-tecture, and painting.

Roller investigates the anatomic de-tails of Classical Roman statues to reveal the most intimate and human aspects of power, while Borghese concentrates on the wondrous perspective and the divine proportions of the monumental architec-

ture of ancient Rome, and Ajossa re-ex-amines fragments of Italian Renaissance paintings, mirroring them in the soft un-dulations of the sea to amplify and high-light their chromatic allure.

Central to the three artists’ work is the mythic world — seemingly fl eeting — of ages long gone such as the ancient Greek and Roman periods, which so deeply marked and continue to mark Western civilisation.

The “enlargement” technique adopted by these artists is doubly revealing.

On the one hand, visitors are invited to observe the ability that marked the pro-duction of a world apparently primitive at fi rst sight, but very complex in its devel-opments.

On the other hand, they become aware of how much the Western civilisation owes its way of life, identity and progress to its predecessors.

“I am particularly proud that the in-creasing people-to-people contacts achieved through art and the more intense cultural exchanges have largely contrib-uted to strengthen the bonds of friendship between Italy and Qatar. The exhibition falls within this broader context of fruit-ful co-operation and dialogue where I believe our ambitions, expectations, and ideas can have no boundaries. I hope that all our friends here in Doha will enjoy the exhibition and I wish to all the visitors an engaging journey through our unique and beloved Italian heritage,” Salzano said.

Riccardo Ajossa, from Antonello da Messina I (Reflections Series) 2018.

Lucius Verus by Olivier Roller.

Qatar Museums announces ‘Year of Culture’ photography competition

After offi cially announcing India as its 2019 Year of Culture partner country,

Qatar Museums (QM) has offi cial-ly launched the fi rst initiative of what is set to be a year fi lled with cultural and artistic exchange.

The competition, titled ‘Crick-et Contemporary Photography’, invites Qatar-based photogra-phers to submit photographs and videos about cricket for a chance to a prize from Qatar Museums.

Said to have originated in 16th century southeast England, cricket went on to become one of the most popular sport in India.

Photographs and videos sub-mitted for review may depict any location in Qatar where the com-munity plays cricket, including professional or friendly matches that portray themes such as competition, sportsmanship, passion, loss, and triumph.

Commenting on the competi-tion launch, Fuad al-Mudahka, acting director of 3-2-1 Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum, said: “Photography has always

been an integral part of the Year of Culture program. Every year we look to photographers to use their imagery to introduce audi-ences to the cultural elements of both Qatar and partner coun-tries, thus fostering mutual ap-preciation and understanding between our people.

“Cricket has long been a sport that ignites passion among its en-thusiasts and we look forward how participants can bring that to life.”

Under the leadership of HE Sheikha Al Mayassa bint Ha-mad bin Khalifa al-Thani, QM spearheads the Years of Culture initiative — an annual series of bilateral, cultural exchange pro-grammes with a partner country.

It is designed to deepen un-derstanding between nations and their people through mutual exchanges of arts, culture and heritage.

The deadline for submissions is March 31. More information about requirements in available online at https://form.jotform.me/83150400514442.

‘Cricket photography’ by Abdelhamid Serghini.

Shop Qatar announces winners of third raffl eThe third of Shop Qatar’s

four raffl e draws was held at Mall of Qatar on Thurs-

day and nine winners walked away with two Jaguar cars and QR200,000 in cash prizes.

At the time of the raffl e draw, there was also a ‘Wheel of For-tune’ where 15 shoppers won prizes courtesy of the mall’s shops.

The fi ve winners of the QR10,000 cash prizes in the third week’s raffl e draw are Cas-tillo (148038), Yusuf (010851), Mohamed Ibrahim (142684), Ni-yaz (144157) and Milvin De Arce (132183).

The winner of QR50,000 is Gabriel (145880), while the big-gest cash prize of QR100,000 went to Ziad Ali (125086).

Two shoppers — Asif Aslam (214772) and Rasy (148214) — get to update their ride this year with brand-new Jaguar E-Pace and Jaguar XJ, respectively.

Stuart Elder, Mall of Qatar’s CEO, said: “As proud supporters of Qatar National Tourism Coun-cil (QNTC)’s Shop Qatar festival, Mall of Qatar is thrilled to host the third raffl e draw on our iconic Ooredoo Oasis stage. The cash and car prizes are a great way to support our retailers and a fan-tastic incentive to encourage our customers to shop more in order to increase their chances in the prize draw.”

Visitors and residents still have a chance to win in the fourth and fi nal draw by shopping or din-ing at any of the festival’s 13 mall

partners or at The Pearl-Qatar.For every QR200 spent at

any of the participating retail-ers or restaurants, shoppers can enter the fi nal raffl e draw with three cars — the Jaguar E-Pace, Range Rover Evoque 2019 and Land Rover Discovery Sport 2019 — along with seven cash prizes ranging from QR10,000 to QR100,000 to be won at the end of the festival on January 20.

The next and fi nal Shop Qa-tar Raffl e Draw will be held at 7.30pm on January 20 at the Doha Festival City mall.

One can enter the raffl e draws

in four easy steps: keep the re-ceipts after shopping at stores in the participating malls; go to the Shop Qatar info kiosk in the mall and show the receipts; for every QR200 spent, receive one vouch-er; and drop the voucher(s) in the Shop Qatar raffl e box.

In addition to the shopping experiences, Bollywood mu-sic buff s can listen to the most sought-after music sensation, Arijit Singh, perform his superhit songs live on January 18 at Lusail Sports Arena. Gates will open at 5pm and the concert will end at 11pm.

With more than 200 songs in just fi ve years, including hits like Tum hi ho from Aashiqui 2 and Channa Meriya from Ae Dil Hay Mushkil, Arijit Singh has enjoyed an immense fan following thanks to his soulful voice and talent.

Tickets range from QR100 to QR2,500 with VIP Box packages of QR10,000 (eight seats) and QR12,000 (11 seats), and are on sale at https://www.wanasatime.com/night-life/ArjitSingh2019.

There is also great news for American pop/rock music fans, as not one but two international sensations — Bazzi and Boyce

Avenue — will be performing live in Doha during the Shop Qatar festival on Thursday, January 17, from 7pm – 11pm.

Nominated for MTV Video Music Awards’ Best New Art-ist, Bazzi is one of 2018’s break-out stars with hit singles such as Beautiful and Mine.

Boyce Avenue’s familiar acoustic sound has gained them over 4bn views on YouTube and more than 12mn subscribers.

Tickets are available on Qtick-ets at QR275 (General) and QR550 (Premium) — https://www.q-tickets.com/Events/EventsDe-

tails/6723/stage-2551-presents-bazzi-and-boyce-avenue.

Yesterday marked the end of eight days of fashion-forward activities at the Shop Qatar De-sign District, the fi rst of its kind in the festival.

It featured 17 fashion shows from globally renowned and lo-cally acclaimed designers, 11 masterclasses and workshops by famous beauty experts and eight interactive sessions at the Fash-ion Speakers Corner organised by Fashion Trust Arabia.

Fashion enthusiasts shopped at 85 popup shops showcasing

international and local designers, beauty products and services and other custom-made and person-alised products.

In addition, the visitors en-joyed daily live entertainment and a variety of food stalls and cafes inside the district and in the outdoor entertainment area.

To fi nd out more, one can download the Shop Qatar mo-bile app from both the Android and iOS app stores or visit www.shopqatar.qa and follow the ded-icated Shop Qatar social media accounts on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.

The third raff le draw being conducted on Thursday. The ‘Wheel of Fortune’.

Alfardan Premier Motors ‘adds fl avours of elegance and luxury’ to Design District Week

Eleven Sports urges Serie A to cancel Jeddah match

Eleven Sports Network, a licensee of Serie A in a number of territories and

a major investor in Italian foot-ball has sent out a letter to Serie A Chief Executive Offi cer de-manding that the Italian Super Cup game between Juventus and AC Milan not be held in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.

This follows beIN Media Group’s letter to Serie A urging them to change the venue of next week’s Italian Super Cup Final match as Saudi Arabia has been actively supporting a plague of piracy against world sport.

While Serie A have recently said that the match in Jeddah will promote ‘Made in Italy’ and its values, the match in fact serves merely as a promotion of ‘Stolen by Saudi Arabia’ and the endorsement of a fl agrant daily breach of international norms and the rule of law, an analyst said.

In the letter addressed to Se-rie A Chief Executive Offi cer Marco Brunelli, Eleven Sports Network said: “We have become aware, with deep concern, of

the reported plans to stage the Juventus v AC Milan Italian Su-per Cup match in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on 16th January 2019. As you are aware Eleven Sports is a licensee of Serie A in a number of territories and a major investor in Italian football. The decision to stage such a signifi cant match in Saudi Arabia has considerable implications for Eleven Sports and for the longer term value of Italian football rights.

“As has been widely report-ed, the pirate service ‘beoutQ’ operates its streaming services out of Saudi Arabia, in the full knowledge of the Saudi Ara-bian authorities. This service is available throughout the Middle East region and is now increas-ingly available throughout Af-rica and even within Europe and the USA, where Eleven Sports operates a number of its own, legitimate services. beoutQ transmits Serie A content, along with numerous other premium sports rights such as La Liga, UEFA, Ligue 1, Bundesliga to name but a few, and many of these rights are licensed by

Eleven Sports. Such activity causes irreparable harm to Elev-en Sports, as well as to other le-gitimate broadcasters around the world such as the beIN Me-dia Group, who are each faced with unauthorised, and illegal competition to their rights.

“The staging of this match in Saudi Arabia serves only to reward a country that has done nothing to combat the contin-ued presence and operation of the beoutQ service from within its borders. The message this sends to the authorities in Saudi Arabia, to the pirate services operating from the territory and to all those legitimate broad-casters dealing with this daily assault on their rights, is that Serie A is unconcerned by such activity and even seems happy to reward it. This decision will drastically damage the ongoing eff orts of the entire sports in-dustry to combat and end this hugely disruptive, illegal and damaging piracy. We strongly urge you to reconsider the deci-sion to stage this match in Saudi Arabia.”

Alfardan Premier Motors provided a fleet of Jaguar and Land Rover vehicles.

Qatari-US talks to tackle Gulf crisis, bolster relations

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Transcript of Qatari-US talks to tackle Gulf crisis, bolster relations