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Wednesday 9 January 2013

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Qatar beat Oman

Oman’s Abdul Aziz Humaid Mubarak (top) fights for the ball with Qatar’s Khalfan Ibrahim during the Gulf Cup match in Manama yesterday. Mohammad El Sayed scored the winning goal to help Qatar keep their Gulf Cup hopes alive with a 2-1 win over Oman at the National Stadium. See also page 28

Business | 18 Sport | 27

Qatar Exchange down 0.15pc

Spain hails Messi ‘the greatest’

Qatar not ‘meddling’ in EgyptDOHA/CAIRO: Qatar yesterday rub-bished talk that it wants to dominate Egypt and said such suggestions were nothing but a joke.

The Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, H E Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem bin Jabor Al Thani, told reporters in Cairo that Qatar and Egypt enjoyed a warm and strong relationship.

“We appreciate the role of Egypt in Arab politics and regional issues. Egypt is the larg-est Arab country,” the Premier said, rejecting the talk of Doha wanting to dominate Cairo as jest.

Replying to questions at a news briefing, he said that the talk of Qatar wanting to domi-nate Egypt was for local political consumption. “It concerns Egyptians, not Qatar.”

Qatar does not interfere in any country’s internal matters. “Egyptians have elected their president and a government and we are cooperating with them. We can’t dominate Egypt,” he said.

The Premier said he heard that in the Egyptian media there was this baseless talk of Qatar buying the Suez Canal. “Well, Qatar has never been made an offer. Suez Canal is Egypt’s lifeline. Qatar is being unnecessarily dragged into all this.” He reiterated that Egypt was playing a key role in looking after and pro-tecting Arab interests and Qatar was highly appreciative of that. Asked about souring relations between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Egypt, the Premier said things would soon settle down as both the countries have strong and historical ties.

Qatar, as a matter of policy, doesn’t want differences among Arab countries, the Premier said. He was addressing the news briefing jointly with his Egyptian counterpart Dr Hisham Qandil, after meeting President Mohammed Mursi.

Qandil said Qatar and Egypt were deter-mined to further bilateral and economic ties. A delegation is due in Cairo next week, led by Qatar’s Minister of Economy and Finance, H E Yousuf Hussein Kamal, comprising experts to look for ways to bolster economic ties between the two sides. He said Sheikh Hamad bin

Jassem’s meeting with Mursi also focused on bilateral and economic relations as well as on regional issues, including those of Palestine and Syria. The issue of how to rebuild Gaza was also taken up for discussion between the two leaders, as aid flows to Gaza take place via Egypt. Meanwhile, the Premier announced to lend another $2bn to Egypt and an extra $500m outright to help it ride over a currency crisis.

“There was an initial package of $2.5bn, of which $500m was a grant and $2bn a deposit,” the Premier told reporters, referring to the aid it has provided since Egypt’s uprising two years ago. “We discussed transferring one of

the deposits into an additional grant so that the grants became $1bn and the deposits dou-bled to around $4bn,” he said of the new pack-age. The Premier said that the new grants and deposits with Egypt’s central bank had all arrived. “Some of the final details with the deposits are being worked on with the techni-cal people, but the amount is there.”

Egypt, meanwhile, said it expected an International Monetary Fund (IMF) techni-cal committee to visit Cairo in two to three weeks’ to resume talks on a crucial $4.8bn loan to plug balance of payments and budget deficits. THE PENINSULA

PM scoffs at rumours, announces $2.5bn aid for Egypt

The Prime Minister and Foreign Minister H E Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem bin Jabor Al Thani with Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi in Cairo yesterday. See also page 2

Ministry blasted over kid’s death in manhole

More central markets in the offingDOHA: The Central Market in Doha comprising livestock, fish, fruit and vegetable markets would be closed down in less than three years as authorities plan to set up new markets in the outskirts of the city.

State-owned Hassad Food is working on a plan to establish a new livestock market in Umm Al Uwaina, south of Salwa Road, and

central markets in Umm Salal, Al Wakra and Rayyan, a senior company official told a session of the Central Municipal Council (CMC) yesterday.

Nasser bin Mohammed Al Hajari, chairman of Hassad’s board of directors, told the CMC that the new markets will be ready in 28 months. The existing central market will be shuttered

once the new facilities open, he added.

The new markets to be con-structed at a cost of QR300m will have state-of-the-art slaughter houses, and facilities to sell veg-etable, fruit and fish.

The official said Hassad’s pro-posed poultry project is intended to provide the local market with an additional 15,000 tonnes of

chicken. He said the company wants to own and develop inter-national agricultural companies to promote food security.

The company has approved huge investments abroad worth more than $1bn in countries including Australia, Sudan, and Egypt. Hassad will raise its capital to $6bn if needed, said Al Hajari. THE PENINSULA

Hotline to help trace runaway workers

No labour complaint in December: Ministry

DOHA: The Ministry of Interior has launched a 24-hour hotline as part of its ongoing campaign to comb out runaway workers and those who might be staying in the country illegally. People who have information on suspect workers, including their hideouts, can call the hotline (44695222) round-the-clock and provide tip-offs in Arabic, English or Urdu-Hindi. The Ministry said it was determined to carry on with the drive until all illegal workers were caught. “Inspections will continue until the problem of illegal work-ers is eradicated,” the Ministry said in a release yesterday. The Search and Follow-Up Department (SFD) will continue raiding places where there is a possibility of illegal workers being employed or doing odd jobs.

DOHA: The Ministry of Labour has said it didn’t receive a single complaint from workers against their employers in December last year. “No worker complaint was filed with the Labour Department in the whole of December 2012,” the Ministry said on its website. Transactions with 70 companies were suspended for violating health and safety rules and 59 companies were issued warnings in this respect, according to the Ministry.

Severe weather hits Palestine, JordanJERUSALEM: Extreme weather, including torrential rains and heavy winds, killed four people in Israel and the Palestinian ter-ritories yesterday, as widespread flooding swept the Middle East.

A man was killed and two others injured after their car was swept away by heavy rain in the West Bank town of Attil.

Another three people died in the early hours of the morning after their car was blown to the side of the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem highway, and dozens were injured in weather-related accidents across Israel.

In northern Jordan, relief workers distributing aid to Syrian refugees were injured in a “stampede” in a camp where hundreds of tents have been destroyed by heavy rains.

Snowfall made roads unusable in the Syrian capital, and floods forced roads and schools to shut in Lebanon, while Egyptian authorities closed the port of Alexandria for a third straight day due to severe winds.

Israeli army helicopters rescued six Israeli Arabs from the roof of their car in Taibeh, and another 15 were evacuated in the same manner from the roof of their flooded home in Baqa Al Gharbia.

Medical officials said they were being treated for hypothermia.Jerusalem braced for possible snowfall today and tomorrow and

Israel’s met office said this winter was set to be the wettest in a decade.In Jordan, torrential rains swept through the country for a second

straight day forcing the closure of most road tunnels and gridlocking traffic. See also page 6

Mursi, Abbas and Meshaal meet todayCAIRO: Egyptian President Mohammed Mursi will meet his Palestinian counterpart, Mahmoud Abbas, and Hamas politburo chief Khaled Meshaal in Cairo today, Mursi’s office said.

Abbas and Meshaal will first “meet Egypt’s intelligence chief before holding a three-way meeting with President Mursi,” presidential spokesman Yasser Ali said.

Azzam Al Ahmad, who is in charge of reconciliation efforts between his Fatah party, of which Abbas is head, said Abbas was travelling to Egypt at Mursi’s invitation to discuss the subject.

Meshaal and aides arrived in Cairo from Doha yesterday for a visit of several days, the official MENA news agency said.

Hamas and Fatah had been at loggerheads since the Islamist movement seized control of Gaza in June 2007. AFP

DOHA: The death of a three-year-old Omani girl after fall-ing into a sewer manhole in Al Wakra recently and the Ministry of Municipality and Urban Planning’s refusal to own up moral responsibil-ity for negligence have led to angry reactions in sections of the Qatari community.

A heated debate is raging in the community over the safety of children in the country where, recent media reports suggest, some 40,000 children are injured annually due to falls, poisoning, burns, choking and being hit in driveways.

“Are our children safe?” is the question being asked by many in the community, as shown in comments posted on local social networking sites.

And the civic ministry shift-ing the blame for the manhole tragedy to a private clean-ing contractor seems to have angered people.

“We are not convinced by what the ministry has to say,” was how some commentators have reacted.

“It is the ministry which must be held responsible for the tragedy,” said some. But all of them said they were extremely saddened by the girl’s death.

The girl fell into the manhole near her home in Al Wakra some two weeks ago during a clean-up which was carried out by municipal workers at about 8pm, and they didn’t even notice that a child had fallen into it. The workers put the lid back on the manhole after the clean-up and left.

The parents of the child began looking for her all around when

she didn’t return until quite late in the night. Many neighbours joined the worried parents in the search, but in vain.

It was then that a neighbour suggested that civic workers were there and they had opened the cover of the sewer manhole for cleanup and put it back and gone and maybe she had fallen in by accident.

People then took the lid of the manhole off and discovered to their horror that the child, Arreem, was lying dead, Al Sharq reported yesterday.

It was a huge shock for the parents as they had lost their nine-year-old son in a road accident just five months ago. The boy had perished when his father’s car was hit by a care-less motorist who was talking on the mobile phone while driv-ing. The case is still on in the court.

The manhole incident was reported to Al Wakra police, which summoned the manager of the civic contracting com-pany, and arrested the worker. He was later released on a per-sonal bond.

The Ministry has shifted the blame for the incident to the company which, it said, had been awarded the cleaning contract.

“Our workers do not clean up sewer manholes. We have con-tracted the work to a private company,” the Ministry told Al Sharq.

“We are not to blame. We can catch the company only when it does not do the cleaning work properly,” the Ministry was quoted as saying by Al Sharq.

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02 HOMEWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013

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Prime Minister in Cairo talks

The Prime Minister and Foreign Minister H E Sheikh Hamad bin Jassem bin Jabor Al Thani met Egyptian Prime Minister Dr Hisham Qandil in Cairo yesterday. They reviewed bilateral relations and means of enhancing them especially in economic, trade and investment fields as well as the follow-up of the agreements signed between the two countries. They also discussed regional and international issues.

The Last Show to open Arab Theatre FestivalQatar’s efforts to promote culture and arts lauded BY RAYNALD C RIVERA

DOHA: The Qatari play The Last Show will open the fifth annual Arab Theatre Festival tomorrow at the Qatar National Theatre.

Organised by UAE-based Arab Theatre Institute, the festival is being hosted by Doha for the first time. Previous editions were held in Cairo, Beirut, Tunisia and Amman.

“There had been invitations from other Arab countries to host the fifth edition of the festival but Doha was chosen for having been a Capital of Arab Culture and having played a significant role in arts and culture,” said Abdul Sattar Naji, media head of the festival.

Speaking on the sidelines of a press conference yesterday, Naji lauded Qatar’s efforts to focus on culture and the arts as the coun-try’s economy continues to see fast development.

“The country is growing fast and culture is going in the same pace as the government focuses on building human capacity and pro-moting culture in various spheres

such as theatre and cinema seen in its hosting of the annual Doha Tribeca Film Festival and other big events,” he said.

With many people working together to build theatre culture in the country, Naji believes it is possible for Doha to be on the international map of theatre in the near future.

Nine plays from various coun-tries including Lebanon, Kuwait, Qatar, Morocco, Algeria and Tunisia, will be staged during the six-day festival to be held at Qatar National Theatre and Katara Drama Theatre. They will com-pete for the Al Qasimi Award for Best Dramatic Work 2012.

The festival will be a show-case of well-acclaimed plays and Arab theatre’s new generation of plays and playwrights. “The par-ticipating plays promote Arab culture and depict the wave of changes going on in the Arab world such as the Arab Spring,” noted Naji.

More than 250 artists from 22 Arab countries are in Doha to take part in the festival which will also honour 16 talented women

artists in theatrical art in the Arab world in addition to Qatari artist Dr Hassen Rasheed.

Four workshops on puppetry, theatrical costume and playwrit-ing will also be organised on the sidelines.

The festival also includes meet-ings of the board of trustees and the council of delegates in addi-tion to a three-day seminar. More than 70 books, studies, research and theatrical texts will be dis-played at an exhibition of the publications of the Arab Theater Institute.

The press conference at Doha Marriott yesterday was attended by Mubarak bin Nasser Al Khalifa, Secretary-General of the Ministry of Culture, Arts and Heritage and Chairman of the Higher Committee of the Arab Theatre Festival and Ismail Abdullah, Secretary-General of the Arab Theatre Institute and the Director of the festival.

The opening ceremony will be held at 7pm at the Qatar National Theatre, followed by The Last Show at 8pm.

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FROM LEFT: Mubarak bin Nasser Al Khalifa, Ismail Abdulla, and Abdul Sattar Naji at a press conference at Doha Marriott yesterday. (SHAIVAL DALAL)

Awsaj Academy awarded top CIS and MSA accreditationsDOHA: Awsaj Academy has been awarded a dual accredi-tation by two international accrediting agencies, the Council of International Schools (CIS) and the Middle States Association (MSA).

Both agencies are recognised by the Supreme Education Council (SEC).

Awsaj Academy is a member of Qatar Foundation for Education, Science and Community Development. It began the accreditation process in 2008 through CIS and conducted a full-scale self-study during the 2009-2010 academic year.

In response to a site visit by CIS in March 2011, Awsaj contin-ued working on its initial appli-cation and CIS agreed to have MSA join in awarding the final

accreditation this year. “This accreditation represents

the dedication and hard work of Awsaj teachers and staff during the past four years, involving countless hours of reviewing all aspects of the school and identify-ing areas needing improvement. We now have a solid curriculum guide in place and clear action steps to continue improving what we do for students,” said Dr Howard De Leeuw, Head of Curriculum Development and Research at Awsaj Academy.

Currently, more than 300 schools throughout the world have earned CIS accreditation, which “demonstrates that a member school has achieved high stand-ards of professional performance in international education and has a commitment to continuous

improvement,” according to CIS’ own guidelines. Meanwhile, MSA has accredited more than 3,000 institutions in 85 countries.

This dual accreditation repre-sents a significant accomplish-ment by Awsaj Academy and an acknowledgement of the success of its academic programmes. According to MSA, “the accredi-tation process validates to the public the integrity of a school’s programmes and student tran-scripts. The accreditation process assures a school community that the school’s purposes are appro-priate and being accomplished through a viable educational programme. The accreditation process justifies the faith and resources others place in the school.”

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04 HOMEWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


TAMUQ plans more graduate programmesUniversity invests $135m in researchBY ISABEL OVALLE

DOHA: Texas A & M University in Qatar (TAMUQ) hopes to expand its graduate programme in the fall this year. The univer-sity is considering three disci-plines: Electrical, mechanical and petroleum engineering.

Dr Mark Weichold, Dean of Tamuq, told The Peninsula that the university “would like to expand the graduate offer for next year. Currently we have chemical engineering and now we are looking at expanding our graduate programme into one or more disciplines.”

Texas A&M has 100 seats for new students every year. For these seats, the university receives about 500 applications. “There is a very strong interest in our pro-gramme, we don’t have a problem attracting students, but selecting them,” said the dean.

However, he added that chal-lenges in this field in Qatar are similar to those of North America and Europe and they involve “get-ting students interested in engi-neering as a career”.

About a possible expansion of the campus to admit more stu-dents, Weichold said: “We have probably grown as much as we are going to in the undergraduate pro-gramme, but we could see future expansion due to the growth of the graduate programme.”

In collaboration with the

university in Texas, the Qatar campus sends about 12 students to the US each semester, while a similar number comes to Doha from Texas.

The university invests over $135m in research activities whi ch are aligned with Qatar Vision 2030, approaching topics such as oil and gas, materials and tele-communications, among others. “The bottom line is that they are all relevant,” said the dean.

Tamuq has been offering undergraduate degrees in chem-ical, electrical, mechanical and petroleum engineering at Qatar Foundation’s Education City campus since 2003, and graduate courses in chemical engineering since fall 2011. Almost 300 engi-neers have graduated from this varsity since 2007.

Regarding employment oppor-tunities for Tamuq graduates, the dean said that “approximately two- thirds or three quarters will find a job here, while a fraction will work abroad and 10 or 15 percent won’t go into the workforce but continue their studies or dive into academics”.

“In Qatar there is a very high demand for engineers, and it’s only going to grow, among other reasons, to prepare for the World Cup. We are going to need lots of engineers. There is an incredible demand,” said the dean. Studies predict that by 2015, Qatar could need 6,000 or more engineers.

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Moroccan Minister of Education Dr Lahcen Daoudi addressing a plenary session of the World Congress on Engineering Education 2013 at the Qatar National Convention Centre, yesterday. Others from left are, Dr Khaled bin Lataief, Dean, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology; Dr Sheikha Al Misnad, President, Qatar University; Dr R Bowen Loftin, President, Texas A and M University (TAMU), US; Dr Sabah Randhawa, Provost and Executive Vice-President, Oregon State University, SA; and Dr N K Anand, Executive Associate Dean of Engineering and Associate Director, Texas A and M Engineering Experiment Station, TAMU. (SALIM MATRAMKOt)

Qatar could host WCEE for two more yearsDOHA: Qatar could host the World Congress on Engineering Education (WCEE), which is being held in Doha, at least two more years. The event is organ-ised by Texas A&M University in Qatar (TAMUQ) and spon-sored by Maersk Oil.

Dr Mark H Weichold, TAMUQ’s Dean, told The Peninsula: “We have already been in contact with other universities in the region, and it looks like we have sponsors for the next two years. It seems like it will happen regularly,” he added.

“This is no ordinary gathering

of scholars, but a vibrant and dynamic mix of professionals whose daily work influences the current and next generations of engineers,” he said at the opening session of the congress yesterday.

“The theories, research and technologies discussed today have a very real bearing on how engineering education will evolve and develop in the near future,” he added.

Lewis Affleck, Managing Director of Maersk Oil in Qatar, said: “The WCEE 2013 will help share good practices

in engineering education, and therefore, benefit educational institutions and future engineer-ing students in Qatar.”

Dr Sheikh Abdulla Ali bin Al Thani, President of Hamad bin Khalifa University and Vice-President of Education at Qatar Foundation, also spoke at the opening ceremony, say-ing: “I believe strongly in the importance of engineering to the advancement of human development.

“Our purpose is to constantly improve engineering education so that the discipline can meet the

demands being placed upon it and can consequently enhance quality of life of people the world over,” he added.

Dr Sheikha Al Misnad, President of Qatar University (QU), emphasised the value of cultural diversity in perform-ing the work of an engineer. Among other qualities useful for an engineer, she said, were creativity, problem solving skills and social responsibility. She added that in QU the number of female engineer students is over 60 percent.

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QU students get first-hand experience on mangrovesDOHA: Students of Qatar University (QU)’s College of Arts and Sciences (CAS) had a field trip to the mangrove and salt marsh ecosystems at Al Khor and Al Dhakeera. The trip was aimed at raising awareness among youngsters studying sustainable development.

It was held in conjunction with Unesco Office in Doha. Fifteen students from vari-ous CAS departments studying sustainable development led by Qatar Shell Professorial Chair for Sustainable Development at QU Prof Mohamed Ajmal Khan took part.

The visit focused on basic man-grove ecology, the importance of ecosystems in biodiversity conser-vation, re-creation, and carbon sequestration.

Before the excursion to Al Khor and Al Dhakeera, the students attended a 30-minute presentation on ‘Floating mangroves for carbon sequestration’ by Unesco Doha Office Ecological Sciences Adviser – Arab Region Dr Benno Boer.

“Our students were provided with valuable information on the significance of protecting coastal ecosystem and its impact on Qatar’s sustainable development by Dr Boer who is an expert on

this issue. During the trip, they were able to see and touch man-groves and collecting litter was a way of sending a message on the necessity of keeping our eco-system in good health,” said Prof Khan.

The students heard that man-groves play a major global role in climate change mitigation, and protection against coastal ero-sion. The human impact was also highlighted as causing loss of mangrove habitat due to coastal development projects, oil spillage, and pollution by solid waste such as plastic, aluminium, and glass.

The students carried out a

15-minute exercise, collecting dumped litter of 20 glass bottles, glass-fragments of six bottles, 53 aluminium cans, five large alumin-ium food trays, 45 plastic bottles, 30 other items such as bags and wrappers, 25kg of fish nets and nylon-ropes. Fish nets, also known as ghost nets, contribute to killing a significant number of fish, crabs, as well as marine turtles, dugongs, and dolphins.

CAS Dean Dr Eiman Mustafawi said: “This trip is an example of our continued effort towards pro-viding students in the College of Arts and Sciences with hands-on experience. For this particular

topic, it is very important for them to connect what they learn in the classroom with real-life applica-tions in their own country.”

Student Shaima Sherif said: “The trip opened my eyes to a whole new biodiversity I never knew existed. It was shocking to see such beautiful places in the middle of a desert — it is an image that I want the outside world to focus on. I was not only able to witness the hidden treasures of Qatar but also understand first-hand the importance of the Qatari mangroves in sustainable development.”

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QOC launches survey on sports exercisesDOHA: Qatar Olympic Committee, Qatar Statistics Authority and the Supreme Council of Health yesterday held a press meet on the occasion of launching a survey on sports exercise, which is being super-vised by QOC’s Planning and Development Department, and implemented through a part-nership with QSA and SCH.

Dr Al Anoud bint Mohammad Al Thani, Director of Health Promotion and Non-communicable Diseases at SCH; Nasser Saleh Al Mahdi, Director of QSA’s Censuses, Household Surveys and Statistical Methods Department; Sultan Ali Al Kuwari, Director of QSA’s Population and Social Statistics Department; Khalil Ibrahim Al Jaber, Head of Sports Affairs Department at QOC; Hassan Abdullah Al Mohammadi, Head of Media at QOC; and Ibrahim Khalil Al Jufairi, QOC representative and Acting Head of Planning and Development Department were present.

Dr Al Anoud bint Mohammad said QOC had prepared the survey in cooperation with QSA and SCH and an SCH representative had participated in the process from the beginning as a member of the technical committee, taking part in the calculation of the sample and training of volunteers. She added that an SCH team from the Health Promotion and Non-communicable Diseases Department will train the team in collecting survey data and using medical devices to measure biometrics.

The survey will help in the implementation of the national strategy for nutrition and physi-cal activity 2011-2016 and the Qatar National Development Strategy 2011–2016.

Nasser Saleh said the state’s interest in sport stems from investment in human resources, which is the main engine of the development process, pointing to the Emiri Decree to celebrate the Qatar Sports Day on the second Tuesday of February every year.

Citizens and residents can participate in the survey on QSA website www.qsa.gov.qa. Results will be announced on Sports Day, according to QSA.

QNA

Training on use of child seat beltsDOHA: The Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) has launched the first training pro-gramme in the country focusing on the use of car seat belts for children. It aims to educate the trainees on how to prevent child injuries in road accidents through the use of appropriate car seat belts and restraints.

The course is being conducted by Hamad International Training Centre (HITC) at HMC in partnership with Safekids Worldwide, as part of the Kulluna for health and safety campaign. The first session was held at HITC recently.

“HITC and the Kulluna teams are very proud to host such an important course in Qatar in partnership with Safekids Worldwide. Research tells us that the proper use of car child restraint devices significantly reduces the number and severity of child injuries in accidents,” Dr Khalid A Noor Saifeldeen, HITC Director, said.

“The first course proved to be a big success and

we intend to run the course at least twice a year to meet the expected demand particularly from car dealers and child car seat sellers. We also aim to attract regional and international par-ticipants. One of our objectives is to develop local instructors for the course. Participants who per-form well in the course will be offered instructor training,” he added. The course included a lecture by Lorrie Walker, the Training Director at the International Child Safety Association, who said there were many types of safety seats for children from newborns through 10-year-olds. However, selecting the appropriate chair for every child depends on his/her age and weight.

The training was attended by people from different organisations involved in child safety, including HMC and College of the North Atlantic – Qatar, in addition to representatives of Toyota and Babyshop.

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Trainees getting insight into the use of child car seats and belts.

Crackdown on runaway workers

The Search and Follow-Up Department at the Ministry of Interior detained 103 runaway workers involved in selling different kinds of goods on roadsides and roundabouts illegally. Pictures show runaway workers engaged in gambling and vending CDs.

Picking the daily bread

A Western Reef Heron (Egretta Gularis), also known as Wester Reef Egret, picking food on the Doha Corniche yesterday. (QASSIM RAHMATULLAH)

HOME 05WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Qatar Airways to begin daily Warsaw flightThree more services from February 1DOHA: Qatar Airways yester-day announced daily scheduled services on the Doha–Warsaw route, effective February 1.

The current four-times-a-week service is scheduled to move to a daily operation less than two months after the launch of flights to Poland’s capital city.

The frequency rise follows a pledge by Qatar Airways Chief Executive Officer Akbar Al Baker in December to introduce more flights on the Warsaw route once there was strong passenger demand.

“I have been pleasantly sur-prised how well the route has performed since adding the latest European gateway to our ever-expanding global network last month,” he said.

“When we enter new markets, we do so carefully with limited capacity and then develop routes with more capacity once we see evidence that additional flights are warranted. Today’s develop-ment is welcome news for the people of Poland with more choice of flights and a great international network to choose from, specifi-cally to Asia, Australia and the Middle East.”

Similarly, Al Baker said pas-sengers from around the world will have more connectivity into Poland each day of the week.

“Serving popular routes with multi-frequency flights is one of our key strategies. We were confi-dent that the Doha–Warsaw serv-ice would become a highly popular route, but didn’t expect this to happen so soon,” added Al Baker.

Marking Qatar Airways’ 32nd destination in Europe, the Doha–Warsaw route was launched on December 5 with a grand recep-tion at the Warsaw Frederic Chopin Airport.

Warsaw became the 12th and final new route of the year in the airline’s expanding global route map covering Europe, the Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, North America and South America.

Qatar Airways offers the fast-est connection times between Warsaw via the airline’s Doha hub to popular Asian destina-tions such as Hanoi, New Delhi, Mumbai, Goa, Male, Riyadh, Bangkok and Colombo.

All flights on the Doha–Warsaw route are operated with a mod-ern Airbus A320, featuring 144 seats in a two-class configuration of 12 in Business Class and 132 in Economy. The aircraft offers seatback TV screens providing passengers with the next gener-ation interactive onboard enter-tainment system and a choice of more than 800 audio and video on demand options, together with an SMS text messaging service from each seat.

Over the next few weeks and months, Qatar Airways will launch flights to a diverse port-folio of new routes, including Najaf, Iraq (January 23); Phnom Penh, Cambodia (February 20); Chengdu, China (March 19); Chicago, the US (April 10); and Salalah, Oman (May 22).

The Doha–Warsaw daily schedules, effective February 1: Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays QR980 departs Doha at 0920 hrs arrives in Warsaw at 1320hrs

QR981 departs Warsaw at 1535hrs to arrive in Doha at 2255hrs. Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays QR982 departs Doha at 0230hrs and arrives in Warsaw at 0630 hrs QR983 departs Warsaw at 1105 hrs to land Doha at 1825hrs.

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Hassan Al Mulla (second right) explains one of his paintings to H E Dr Mohammed bin Saleh Al Sada (right) at the opening of the exhibition yesterday at the Souq Waqif Art Centre.

Artist brings childhood memories alive on canvasBY RAYNALD C RIVERA

DOHA: Qatari artist Hassan Al Mulla yesterday unveiled more than 40 of his latest paint-ings at a 10-day exhibition at Souq Waqif Art Centre.

In his sixth solo exhibition entitled ‘Ehsas Fnan’ (Feeling of the Artist), Al Mulla reflects on his vision of various underlying themes concerning Qatar and the Arab world.

“I just paint what I feel inside …from my heart to the canvas,” he told The Peninsula.

Childhood memories, family and daily activities in Qatar are some of the themes he captured

vividly on the paintings, most of which are being shown to the public for the first time.

The paintings, created in the last two years, reveal the artist’s spontaneity and versatility using various media such as acrylic, pastel, oil and mixed media, which impressed those present at the launch, including the guest of honour Minister of Energy and Industry and Chairman & Managing Director of Qatar Petroleum H E Dr Mohammed bin Saleh Al Sada,.

“He is very spontaneous allow-ing the viewers greatest freedom of imagination and he has mas-tered this style,” said Dr Al Sada

after inaugurating the expo.The Minister lauded the artist

for continuously creating beautiful paintings despite his busy career. “Although he had been busy at certain point with administrative work because of his career, he had continuously produced excellent paintings. We are all proud of him and his works.”

He urged the artist to pass on his knowledge and expertise to the new generation of Qatari artists.

“I call upon him to again help the young artists and I’m sure he is already doing that by interact-ing with them.”

Lauding the vibrant art scene

in the country, the Minister said: “Artistic atmosphere in Doha is excellent because we do not just enjoy the paintings but also inter-act directly with artists as we are a small brotherly family in Qatar. We know each other and this is an advantage,” he said.

A graduate of the Academy of Fine Arts in Baghdad, Hassan Al Mulla has already participated in various exhibitions in the GCC and around the world and gar-nered many awards.

The expo is open to the pub-lic until January 17 from 8am to 11pm at the Souq Waqif Art Centre. The paintings are for sale.

THE PENINSULA

HMC implements 28 projects for patient care improvementDOHA: Twenty-eight projects were implemented at Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC) hospitals as part of the Clinical Care Improvement Training Programme (CCITP) that helps HMC clinicians successfully exe-cute clinical care improvement projects.

One of these projects involved increasing the early rehabilitation of patients in the Trauma Intensive Care Unit. Another involved reduc-ing turnover time in the Hamad General Hospital Operation Theatre with the aim of reducing waiting time for surgery.

About 90 clinicians from 14 departments have been trained under the programme. CCITP is

designed to give physicians hands-on experience in using the tools of quality improvement through six days of theoretical and prac-tical sessions as well as intensive small-group coaching.

Using the skills learned from the programme, each project team identified a particular challenge in patient care, and designed and exe-cuted a plan to resolve it and thus improve care. The clinicians learned skills of negotiation and communica-tion with their colleagues in order to move the projects forward.

All these projects were led by physicians with the help and sup-port of a multidisciplinary team of nurses and other staff members.

THE PENINSULA

New cleaning area planned at Central Fish MarketDOHA: The fish cleaning area in the Central Fish Market will soon be replaced by a new facil-ity that is expected to be more hygienic.

A new hall has been allocated in the market for cleaning fish, with advanced facilities, a local Arabic daily reported yester-day, quoting a letter sent by the Ministry of Municipality and Urban Planning.

The reply was in response to an earlier report carried by the daily about crowding and unhealthy conditions in the existing facility.

The new area will be man-aged by a private company that is required to offer the serv-ice at QR1 per one kilogram of fish.

The Ministry will soon issue a tender to select the company, said the daily.

New law regulating mental health facilities soonDOHA: As part of the national strategy on mental health, Qatar is working on a new law regulating the facilities and services related to psychologi-cal and psychiatric care.

The national strategy includes establishment of a ded-icated hospital and clinics for child psychiatry, separate from such facilities targeting adults, a local Arabic daily reported yesterday.

De-addiction centres to reha-bilitate addicts will also be set up as part of the national strategy, where admission and stay will be compulsory for them, added the daily.

THE PENINSULA

06 MIDDLE EASTWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


KUWAIT: Kuwait’s parlia-ment yesterday approved a royal decree amending voting rules that sparked mass protests and an opposition boycott of elec-tions last month in the US-allied Gulf Arab country, the official news agency Kuna said.

The emergency decree issued by Kuwait’s emir in October-a week after he dissolved parlia-ment-reduced the number of votes per citizen to one from four.

While the government said these changes bring Kuwait into line with democratic norms else-where, the opposition, which includes Islamist, liberal and leftist politicians, said their aim was to skew polls in favour of pro-government candidates.

Parliament’s decision to ratify the decree may help deflect any legal challenge to the election and lends the measure political and legal weight ahead of hearings

before Kuwait’s constitutional court in the coming months.

“The approval was expected since this parliament was elected on the back of this decree,” said Ghanim Al Najjar, professor of political science at Kuwait University. “What we really need to watch is what will happen at the constitutional court.”

The court will consider sev-eral legal complaints related to the elections, including whether there was a need for the emir to issue the decree changing the election law.

Under the former voting sys-tem, citizens could select four candidates using four votes of equal weight, which meant can-didates could call on supporters to cast their additional ballots for allies in the 50-seat legislature.

The opposition held a major-ity in the last assembly elected in February and raised pressure

on the cabinet, forcing two min-isters to quit the body, which is dominated by the Al Sabah royal family that has ruled Kuwait for 250 years. Kuwait has the most open political system among the Gulf Arab states. Parliament has legislative powers and the right to question ministers. But the emir, head of the Al Sabah fam-ily, appoints the prime minister, who chooses the cabinet.

The government says opposi-tion lawmakers have used parlia-ment to settle scores rather than pass laws to develop the economy. Opposition politicians accuse the government of mismanagement and have called for an elected cabinet.

Parliament also approved a decree issued by the emir that bans the incitement of sectarian or tribal hatred in Kuwait, impos-ing lengthy prison sentences and hefty fines. REUTERS

DUBAI: Iran’s most powerful leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned the Iranian public yes-terday against helping Tehran’s enemies by criticising the forth-coming presidential election.

Iranians go to the polls in June to elect a successor to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and Iran’s leadership is keen to avoid a repeat of the widespread protests that followed the last presidential vote in 2009.

Khamenei’s comments appear to be a response to a debate inside Iran about whether reformist candidates-those with a more moderate stance on issues such as social policy and greater politi-cal freedoms-should be allowed

to run. “Everyone, even those who make general recommenda-tions about the election through (expressing) c oncerns, should take care not to serve the purpose of the enemy,” Khamenei said in a statement published on his official website.

Analysts say reformist candi-dates may be allowed to run for election if they distance them-selves from the two 2009 presi-dential candidates, Mirhossein Mousavi and Mehdi Karoubi, who have been under house arrest for nearly two years.

The two opposition leaders alleged Ahmadinejad’s landslide reelection was rigged and they became figureheads for the “green

movement” anti-government demonstrations across Iran, the biggest opposition protests since the 1979 revolution.

The government denied vote rigging and said the protests had been stirred up by Iran’s foreign enemies as part of a plot to over-throw the Islamic Republic’s sys-tem of government.

Reformist groups are torn between participating in the election and boycotting it unless Mousavi and Karoubi are freed. Their position is expected to be debated at a meeting of reformist groups later this month.

Last month, former President Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani said that a free, transparent and

legal election could pave the way for “restoration of moderation” in the country, the Tehran Times newspaper reported.

Longstanding enmity between Iran and the West has deepened in recent years, with increas-ingly severe sanctions led by the United States and European Union, designed to halt Iran’s nuclear programme, strangling the economy.

Iran says its nuclear project has only peaceful purposes and has refused in three rounds of inter-national talks since April to scale back its uranium enrichment activity unless major economic sanctions are rescinded.

REUTERS

Turkish army kills 14 Kurdish rebels

DIYARBAKIR: The Turkish army killed 14 rebels from the rebel Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) during an opera-tion near the Iraqi border that also left one soldier dead, an official statement said yester-day. “A crowded group of ter-rorists were engaged after they were spotted preparing an attack against a border post on January 7,” the governor’s office in the southeastern city of Hakkari said in a statement.

Egypt urged to stop military trial of scribes CAIRO: Advocacy group Amnesty International has called for the release of an Egyptian journalist facing mili-tary trial under a controver-sial law that allows the army to court-martial civilians. The army arrested Mohamed Sabry, a freelance video journalist and an activist who opposed military trials, in the eastern Sinai penin-sula while he was working on a story for the Reuters news agency, Amnesty International said.

Egyptian court acquits TV presenterCAIRO: An Egyptian court yesterday acquitted a televi-sion show presenter on charges of trying to incite President Mohammed Mursi’s murder, a judicial official said. Tawfiq Okasha, who hosted a show on his Faraeen television station, was put on trial after several people complained to the court that he called on Egyptians to overthrow Mursi and kill him.

Saudi beheads Syrian for drug trafficking RIYADH: Saudi authorities yesterday beheaded a Syrian convicted of trafficking a large amount of narcotic pills, the interior ministry said, in the first execution in the kingdom this year. Mohammed Darwish was arrested “as he was traf-ficking a large amount of nar-cotic pills into the kingdom,” the ministry said in a statement carried by official news agency SPA. He was beheaded in Al Jawf province, in the kingdom’s north.

Algerian jailed for life over tourist kidnap ALGIERS: An Algerian court handed a life sentence yes-terday to Gharbia Amar, an Islamist convicted of participat-ing in the 2003 kidnapping of 15 foreign tourists, including 10 Germans, in the Sahara desert. A Malian, Youcef Ben Mohamed, was acquitted of the same charge but given a seven-year jail term for belonging to an armed group and smuggling illegal weapons, one of their lawyers said.

AGENCIES

DUBAI: An appeals court ruling con-firming prison terms for 13 protest lead-ers in Bahrain this week shows that the Gulf Arab state’s judicial system is flawed and unable to protect basic rights, interna-tional watchdog groups said.

Bahrain, a US ally against Iran and home to the US Fifth Fleet, has been in political ferment since a street revolt led by majority Shias erupted in early 2011, part of a tide of unrest against autocratic rulers across the Arab world.

On Monday, Bahrain’s highest appeals court upheld sentences ranging from five years in prison to life that were originally handed down by a military court in June 2011 to protest leaders, a ruling that could kindle further unrest.

Bahrain’s case has stirred international

criticism, with US officials calling for acquit-tals to help restore calm and stability in the island monarchy. New York-based Human Rights Watch said its own investigation showed that evidence against the convicted men was based on public statements in which they called only for reforms and on confes-sions apparently obtained through coercion.

“The mind-boggling verdicts in these cases did not mention a single recognisable crimi-nal offence, instead pointing to speeches the defendants made, meetings they attended, and their calls for peaceful street protests in February and March 2011,” said Joe Stork, HRW’s deputy Middle East director.

“Bahrain’s Cassation Court has proven its inability to protect the most basic rights guaranteed in Bahrain’s constitution and the international treaties it has signed,” he said in

a statement. The government says Bahrain’s courts are independent, though the Sunni Muslim ruling Al Khalifa family holds senior cabinet portfolios including justice and key posts in the judiciary. The Court of Cassation is headed by an Al Khalifa relative and King Hamad heads the Supreme Judicial Council.

In Geneva, UN human rights spokes-woman Cecile Pouilly said she “regrets” the convictions despite “conclusions of the Bahrain independent commission of inquiry and appeals by the international community concerning the judicial procedure and allega-tions of torture”.

“These persons are political and human rights activists and we are concerned they may have been convicted wrongly for legiti-mate activities,” Pouilly told a news briefing yesterday. REUTERS

Kuwait’s Speaker Ali Al Rashed (left) and Shia MP Adnan AbdulSamad reacting during a parliament session in Kuwait City, yesterday.

Kuwait approves decree curbing popular voteCourt to hear complaints against election

Yemen reassures southerners ahead of national dialogue SANA’A: Yemeni President Abdrabuh Mansur Hadi has ordered the formation of two panels to resolve the grievances of southerners, in a new move to get them to join a stalled national dialogue, state media said yes-terday. One commission will be tasked with resolving disputes over land that southerners claim the previous regime seized from them, the official news agency Sana said. The other will handle cases of civil servants and secu-rity officials fired from their jobs.

The panels will also investi-gate “violations” against south-erners that have occurred since the south, which broke away in 1994 causing a short civil war, was overrun by northern troops.

The president’s decision “aims at going ahead with the national dialogue and achieving national reconciliation,” the agency said.

The national dialogue was due to start in November, but has been delayed for various rea-sons, crucially that factions of the Southern Movement refused to take part. The Southern Movement, which emerged in 2007, has gradually grown more radical in its demands, which include autonomy or outright secession for the formerly inde-pendent south. Three of the movement’s four main groups have now agreed to participate in the dialogue, and efforts are on to persuade the hardline separatist faction of former vice president Ali Salem Al Baid to join. AFP

JERUSALEM: Extreme weather, including torrential rains and heavy winds, killed four people in Israel and the Palestinian territories yester-day, as widespread flooding swept the Middle East.

A man was killed and two oth-ers injured after their car was swept away by heavy rain in the West Bank town of Attil.

Another three people died in the early hours of the morning after their car was blown to the side of the Tel Aviv-Jerusalem highway, and dozens were injured in weather-related accidents across Israel.

In northern Jordan, relief workers distributing aid to Syrian refugees were injured in a “stam-pede” in a camp where hundreds of tents have been destroyed by heavy rains.

Snowfall made roads unus-able in the Syrian capital, and floods forced roads and schools to shut in Lebanon, while Egyptian authorities closed the port of Alexandria for a third straight day due to severe winds. Israeli army helicopters rescued six

Israeli Arabs from the roof of their car in Taibeh, and another 15 were evacuated in the same manner from the roof of their flooded home in Baqa Al Gharbia.

Medical officials said they were being treated for hypothermia.

Jerusalem braced for possible snowfall today and tomorrow and Israel’s met office said this win-ter was set to be the wettest in a decade. In Jordan, torrential rains swept through the country for a second straight day, forcing the closure of most road tunnels and gridlocking traffic, as flash floods overwhelmed the capital’s drain-age system.

Elsewhere, refugees at the Zaatari camp on the border with Syria “started to push each other as they ran towards aid workers. They hurled stones at each other and there was a stampede” that injured several workers, Anmar Hmud, a government spokesman, said.

“At least one of the aid workers was taken to hospital,” he added.

The incident occurred as aid workers were helping some of the 62,000 Syrians sheltering in the

camp, where two days of heavy rains have destroyed hundreds of tents.

Syria’s met office predicted abundant rainfall for the next two days, as heavy rains and wind hit several parts of the country, and a buildup of snowfall in Damascus made some roads unusable, the interior ministry said.

In neighbouring Lebanon, a day after a six-month-old baby was swept away when a flash flood hit a Bedouin encampment, storms continued across the country.

Roads in Beirut were flooded and schools were closed nation-wide yesterday and will also be today. The Damascus-Beirut road was forced to shut and rains caused widespread damage to farmland. “Lebanon hasn’t seen a storm like this in a dozen years,” said Abdel Karim Damaj, a weather expert at Beirut’s inter-national airport.

Egypt closed the port of Alexandria for a third day in a row as a precaution, as high winds battered the Mediterranean city after torrential rains caused power cuts. AFP

4 dead in Israel as severe weather sweeps region

A family walks through snow in Sawfar village in eastern Lebanon, yesterday.

Criticising election will help enemies: Khamenei

Verdict shows Bahrain courts can’t protect rights: Groups

MIDDLE EAST 07WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


BAGHDAD: Iraqi Sunni Muslim and Kurdish minis-ters boycotted a cabinet session yesterday to show support for protests that are threatening Shia Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki’s fragile cross-sectarian government.

Thousands of protesters have demonstrated and blocked a key highway in Sunni provinces for more than two weeks to challenge Maliki, a leader many Sunnis feel has marginalised their com-munity a year after the last US troops pulled out.

Protests and the conflict in nearby Syria, where mainly Sunni insurgents are fighting President Bashar Al Assad, an ally of Shia Iran, are fuelling worries that Iraq risks sliding back into the sectarian slaughter that peaked in 2006 and 2007.

Sunni-backed Iraqiya party lawmakers said their ministers stayed away from the cabinet meeting in support of the protests sparked in late December when security forces arrested body-guards of Sunni Finance Minister Rafaie Al Esawi.

“They made a decision to boy-cott the session today,” Iraqiya lawmaker Jaber Al Jaberi said. “They don’t see a response from the government to the demands of the protesters... or to accepting power-sharing.”

Alaa Talabani, a Kurdish law-maker, said party leaders had also asked Kurdish ministers to stay away. A senior government source at the meeting confirmed Sunni and Kurdish ministers had missed the Council of Ministers session. Violence and bombings

are down sharply since the height of the Opec country’s conflict, but the government, split among

Shias, minority Sunnis and eth-nic Kurds, has been deadlocked over power-sharing since it was

formed in December 2010.Complicating the crisis is

a growing dispute between

the Arab-led government in Baghdad and autonomous Kurdistan in the north, where ethnic Kurds run their own regional authority.

Tensions have worsened since Kurdistan signed oil deals with majors such as Exxon Mobil and Chevron, a move seen by Baghdad as an unconstitutional challenge for control of Iraq’s crude.

In the Sunni heartland of Anbar province, once a base for Sunni Islamist fighters and Al Qaeda insurgents battling US troops, at least 5,000 protesters have taken daily to the streets and blocked a highway leading to the Syrian border.

Sunni leaders and tribal sheikhs’ demands range from Maliki’s removal to release of detainees and the suspension of an anti-terrorism law that Sunnis believe has been abused by authorities to target their sect unfairly.

Some Sunni politicians now sense a chance in the conflict across the border in neighbour-ing Syria against Assad, an Iran ally whose minority Alawites have roots in Shia sect.

Should Assad fall, a Sunni regime may rise to power in Syria, weakening the influence of Iran in the region’s Shia-Sunni power balance and embolden Iraq’s own Sunni minority.

Lawmakers from the Sunni-backed Iraqiya block, Maliki’s State of Law Shia alliance, Kurdish parties and other Shia parties failed to agree over the weekend on talks in parliament to discuss the demands of protesters.

REUTERS

JERUSALEM: The foreign policy outlook of US President Barack Obama’s nominee for defence secretary, Chuck Hagel, is “cause for concern” for Israel, parliament speaker Reuven Rivlin said yesterday.

“This concept of ‘splendid isolation’ which Hagel espouses changes US strategy in the world and accordingly it also affects Israel,” Rivlin said in a statement. “This outlook must give Israel cause for concern but not scare it,” said Rivlin, adding it was “important that Israel know how to deal with” such a worldview. “Splendid isolation” is a foreign policy character-ised by a lack of intervention in international affairs and was first used to describe the British Empire’s stance towards con-tinental Europe at the end of the 19th century. Obama named Hagel on Monday as his choice for Pentagon chief although the appointment must be confirmed by the Senate.

The blunt-talking 66-year-old is known for his fiercely independent streak and has drawn fire for his opposition to some sanctions on Iran, which Israel and much of the West suspects is trying to develop a nuclear weapons capability.

He has also been accused of insufficient support for Israel, with his nomination draw-ing criticism from some of the Jewish state’s supporters.

“The concern is not only an Israeli concern and is not even tied to Hagel’s personal stance on Israel. The nomination of Hagel doesn’t only affect Israel but it affects the balance of glo-bal strategic forces,” Rivlin said.

“You cannot separate the security of the United States from the security and stabil-ity of the Middle East, and the threat of Iran represents a dan-ger to the United States.

“One man does not deter-mine policy and there is no danger in his nomination to the strategic ties between Israel and the United States,” he said, expressing confidence that Israel’s security establish-ment would find a way of work-ing with Hagel. With just two weeks until Israelis go to the polls for a snap general election, officials have largely kept quiet on Hagel’s nomination, which has sparked a welter of gloomy forecasts in the Israeli press.

The top-selling Yediot Aharonot said it was “the first course in the bitter meal that

O b a m a intends to feed Prime M i n i s t e r Ben j amin Netanyahu,” s u g g e s t -ing it was payback for Netanyahu’s open sup-port for O b a m a ’ s rival dur-ing the US

presidential election.“It is going to be very

unpleasant for us under Hagel,” a high-ranking Israeli official told Maariv, citing Hagel’s posi-tion on Iran and his support for negotiations with the Islamist Hamas movement. But others were more circumspect.

“There were in the past nom-inations which appeared worry-ing, but at the end of the day, the reality turned out to be totally different,” Home Front Defence Minister Avi Dichter told pub-lic radio. “Israel and America’s bond goes way, way beyond cer-tain relations between individu-als,” said Naftali Bennett, head of The Jewish Home, a national religious pro-settler party. AFP

L O N D O N/ DA M A S C U S : Britain will host an interna-tional meeting to plan for the period after Syrian President Bashar Al Assad’s “inevitable” departure, the Foreign Office said yesterday. The meeting will take place today and tomorrow, and delegates will include Syria experts, academics in post-con-flict stabilisation, representa-tives of the Syrian National Coalition (SNC) opposition group and other agencies.

The gathering highlights jit-ters over the shape of a post-Assad Syria, and experts fear regional and sectarian rivalries could extend the bloodshed and destabilise other countries in the strategically sensitive and vola-tile region. “Aim is to galvanise planning for political transition in Syria,” Foreign Secretary William Hague said on Twitter.

“Assad’s departure from power is inevitable. Vital that interna-tional community plans ahead for the day after in Syria,” he said.

Hague, along with other Western leaders, dismissed a defi-ant speech by Assad on Sunday,

which the Syrian president billed as peace plan but in which he rejected talks with his opponents. Rebels described the speech as a renewed declaration of war. While

many experts say Assad’s ousting is all but certain, there is no sign his rule will end soon. Rebels are edging closer to the centre of the capital Damascus, but Assad still has backing from powerful allies Russia, China and Iran. More than 60,000 people have died in the uprising which has developed into a civil war since it erupted in March 2011, the United Nations said last week. Foreign ministers and SNC chief Mouaz Alkhatib are not expected to attend the talks. The meeting is not open to reporters, and the conclusions are expected to be published in a clos-ing communique.

Five civilians were killed in heavy fighting around a Palestinian refugee camp in the Syrian capital yesterday as rebels withdrew from a northwestern town after a night of clashes, a watchdog said. Four of the civil-ians were killed in shelling and the fifth by a sniper as battles raged between troops and rebels near the Yarmuk refugee camp in south Damascus, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. AGENCIES

Syrian refugees in Turkish camp to vote in taste of democracy ANKARA: Thousands of Syrians living in a refugee camp in southern Turkey will hold elections this month to select camp leaders and an administra-tive council in an exercise Turkey said was aimed at introducing democracy to Syrian citizens.

Turkey, which is sheltering tens of thousands of Syrians flee-ing violence in their homeland, is an outspoken critic of Syrian President Bashar Al Assad, who is battling rebels trying to over-throw his government.

Refugees aged 18 and over at the Kilis camp housing more than 13,000 Syrians on the Turkey-Syria border will be able to vote on January 17 for leaders of dif-ferent sections of the camp and for an 18-member administrative council, the Turkish government said in a statement. The elections are aimed at “introducing Syrian citizens to democracy and aim to provide the opportunity to gain experience in this field”, it said.

A total of 42 candidates, who are required to be over the age of 30, will be able to launch elec-tion campaigns with bi-weekly speeches. They will be provided with flags, placards and technical support. Each of the six sections in the camp has to have at least one female candidate.

The election winners will help administer services relating to security, health, education and religion in coordination with the local governor’s office.

Turkey has tried to showcase the Kilis camp, where refugees live in heated and air-conditioned containers with refrigeration facilities, as opposed to tents at other camps. While Turkey has provided some of the best shelter and facilities for refugees among Syria’s neighbours, overcrowding remains a concern and sporadic unrest has erupted at camps including Kilis. Turkish security forces have on occasion used tear gas to suppress the protests.

There are now more than 150,000 Syrians living in some 15 refugee camps in Turkey, according to the country’s disaster manage-ment body (AFAD), and officials say there are tens of thousands more in towns and cities around the country. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who has likened Assad to dictators Hitler and Mussolini and accused him of creating a “terrorist state”, has called on the Syrian leader to step down. REUTERS

Iran seizes Saudi fishing vessels DUBAI: Iran’s coast guard has detained two Saudi fishing ves-sels after they entered Iranian waters, the semi-official Fars news agency reported yesterday.

Separated by about 250km of Gulf waters, Shia power Iran and Sunni Muslim-led Saudi Arabia have often had tense rela-tions. Saudi Arabia, a US ally, has accused Iran of fomenting unrest among Shias in its oil-rich Eastern Province, a charge Iran denies. Fars did not give a date or location for the incident but said it was reported by Qalandar Lashkari, the coast guard com-mander at Bushehr, which is both a province and a port town on Iran’s Gulf coast. It is also the site of the only nuclear power station in the Islamic Republic.

Fars quoted Lashkari as saying that the two dhows were tracked and confiscated after they illegally entered Iran’s territorial waters.

All their 10 crew were arrested, it said. Initial investigations showed that the vessels were from Saudi Arabia but their captains and crews were Indian nation-als, Fars said. They had crossed into Iranian waters to fish, the agency said. A week earlier, Fars said, forces of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards’ “second naval zone” seized another Saudi vessel and its four-strong crew after it illegally entered Iranian waters. The vessel was later expelled, the agency said, with-out elaborating. On January 3, Saudi Arabia detained 21 Iranian nationals who were aboard two boats near al-Harqus island 78km off the Saudi coast, the Saudi bor-der guard said. REUTERS

BAGHDAD: Thousands took to the streets in predominantly Shia southern Iraq yesterday in a show of support for the Shia premier after more than two weeks of protests in the mainly Sunni Arab north and west.

The loyalist rallies are the latest twist in a long-running standoff within Iraq’s unity government between Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki and his

mainly Sunni Arab critics who accuse him of abusing counter-terror legislation to persecute the minority community.

Pro-government demonstra-tions were held in the port city of Basra, and the southern cit-ies of Kut, Diwaniyah, Karbala and Samawa, dismissing calls for reform of anti-terror laws and condemning the alleged involve-ment of other Middle Eastern countries in the anti-government

rallies. They ranged in numbers from several hundred in Kut to thousands in Basra.

Demonstrators carried pho-tographs of relatives they said were killed in militant attacks, as well as Iraqi flags and banners painted with slogans including, “With our blood and souls, we will protect Iraq,” and “No, No for Sectarianism; Yes, Yes for National Unity”.

AFP

Five killed as fighting flares in Palestinian camp in Damascus

UK meeting plans for post-Assad Syria

Hagel stance cause for concern: Israel speaker

Iraqi Sunnis, Kurds boycott cabinet to back protests

Supporters of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki shout slogans during a demonstration in Basra, yesterday.

Iran expects US policy changes DUBAI: Iran’s foreign ministry said yesterday it hoped the appointment of Chuck Hagel as the next US defence secretary would lead to “practical changes” in Washington’s foreign policy. “We hope there will be practical changes in American foreign pol-icy and that Washington becomes respectful of the rights of nations,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast said at his weekly news confer-ence, Iran’s Irib news web-site reported.

He was answering a ques-tion about Hagel’s views on Israel and US sanctions on Iran. Israel has threat-ened military action against its arch-enemy’s nuclear sites if sanctions-backed diplomacy fails to rein in Tehran’s atomic work. Mehmanparast did not elab-orate. REUTERS

Vehicles and containers of the German Army division “Patriot” are loaded onto the ferry boat in the port of Lubeck-Travemunde in northern Germany yesterday as part of a Nato mission. Germany deploys Patriot missiles about 120km from the Syrian border to help Turkey defend its border.

Shias hold counter-demos in southern Iraq

One million Syrians in need of food aid GENEVA: About one million Syrians are going short of food, most of them in conflict zones, due to government restrictions on aid distribu-tion, the United Nations said yesterday.

The UN’s World Food Programme (WFP) is hand-ing out rations to about 1.5 million people in Syria each month, still short of the 2.5 million deemed to be in need, WFP spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said. Bread and fuel par-ticularly are in short supply. The WFP is unable to step up assistance as only a handful of aid agencies are authorised to distribute relief goods in Syria. REUTERS

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PUBLICATION

The other side

08 VIEWS WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Editorial

Charting a future

AFGHAN President Hamid Karzai is going through the most crucial phase in his presidency. By the end of 2014, he will be left to govern his country on his own and any success or failure

would eventually be the success or failure of a nation. The world is wishing earnestly that he succeed, because a failure would have dis-astrous consequences not only for Afghanistan, but the entire world.

The Nato combat mission in Afghanistan will conclude by 2014-end and Washington is thinking about how fast to withdraw its 66,000 troops or whether to keep a small residual force there. Karzai will be discussing this and other crucial security issues with US President Barack Obama at their meeting in Washington this week.

Currently, all talks about Afghanistan are centred on the US-Nato withdrawal and its impact on Afghan security. There is a visceral fear that the Taliban would take advantage of any security vacuum to stage a comeback and undo everything which the Nato-Afghan combine has achieved so far. The onus is on Karzai to equip his forces to face the post-2014 challenges and it’s not a certainty that he would be able to.

The situation on the ground is fluid and there are factors which give both hope and concern. On the positive side, there are signs of an incipient peace process between the Afghan government and the Taliban, but past experiences should make us wary of investing much

hope in it. Karzai seems confident of a smooth transition and will be under pressure to gain control. And Pakistan, which has been accused of backing insurgents, has recently signalled an apparent policy shift towards promoting its neighbour’s stability.

But the biggest concern is about the preparedness of Afghan army and police forces to challenge the Taliban and enforce peace. According to Pentagon, only one of 23 Nato-trained Afghan brigades can operate without American assistance. That assessment paints a dismal scenario of the reality on the ground. Nato and US forces are currently training Afghan forces for the post-2014 period, but the results have been woeful due to an alarming rise in insider attacks on US and Nato troops. The fear for life has crushed any appetite foreign troops might have to train their Afghan counterparts.

Karzai’s meeting with Obama is very important because it will define the future relationship between the two countries. It will be a critical encounter also because they will be required to reach an agreement on a few critical issues, like the number of US troops that will remain and the role they will play.

Obama is in a hurry to pull out his men from what has become a costly trap, and Karzai will be expected to successfully fill the vacuum which their departure creates.

Assad’s departure from power is inevitable.

Vital that international community plans ahead for

the day after in Syria.Quote ofthe day

Karzai’s meeting with Obama this week will be decisive.

Britain’s euro visionWilliam Hague

British Foreign Secretary

BY NAUREEN SHAH

ON MONDAY, President Obama nominated John Brennan — the architect

of his secretive, deadly drone programme — to head the CIA. Before he is confirmed, Brennan should publicly commit to getting the CIA out of the killing business.

With drone strikes in Pakistan accelerating since 2008, the CIA has transformed into a quasi-military force. But as a spy agency, the CIA’s instincts are to wage war the way it runs covert actions — in secret, and by its own rules. As it goes about its mission, the agency’s habit is to check the boxes, doing the mini-mum work necessary to achieve legal cover and political buy-in. The CIA selectively leaks details of its drone strikes to the press, so the public only ever learns of its successes, never its failures.

This sounds plausible and even palatable if the CIA is just a spy agency secretly running

down terrorists once in a while, as in fictional television shows like Homeland. It is untenable, though, as the model of warfare it is fast becoming. More than 300 drone strikes in Pakistan and Yemen have killed about 3,000 people, according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. If the CIA’s hunter-killer role becomes permanent, the US government will have no grounds for protest when other countries inevitably follow the CIA’s example of carry-ing out drone strike campaigns in any place, at any time, and with-out any official acknowledgement or need to publicly and legally jus-tify its actions.

Knowing the dangerous prec-edent the CIA is setting, Obama has alluded to a “due process” for death decision-making. Details are few, but we know the process does not involve the courts or the public, and vests full discretion within the executive branch. Even if it met concerns about the legal-ity of drone strikes, though, this

kind of decision-making would be wrong for the CIA, which has a history of grabbing for all the power it can get while failing to rein in abusive agents.

Though it ill fits the CIA’s targeted killing programme, the internal due process Obama described would somewhat match what military commands tradi-tionally do on the battlefield. The difference is that in democracies, the public entrusts the military to wield lethal force only because it is subject to laws and the enforcing machinery of political oversight. The military has the responsibility of earning public approval for its actions overall, or it risks losing its mandate for war. Public disapproval of the war in Iraq, and dismay at continuing involvement in Afghanistan, led to the US troop drawdowns of the last few years.

This system of public approval and disapproval for military action is imperfect and sometimes fails, but it markedly contrasts

with the oversight of the CIA’s secretive war-making.

Although the Obama adminis-tration touts the drone campaign as a success, it is officially a state secret — giving the CIA a free pass on disclosing civilian casu-alties to courts or to Congress, except in closed sessions with a few members.

In this climate, polls show the American public broadly approves of a drone campaign of which it knows alarmingly little. In American media, the slick and sanitised image of a Predator drone suspended mid-air accompanies news stories on drone strikes that report “mili-tants” killed. Precisely who these men were and how they were selected for execution are rarely mentioned.

The bodies of civilian dead are never pictured, even when these deaths are reported. Reports that drone strikes have killed more than 100 children have sullied the international reputation of the

United States, and have led to UN calls for an investigation. Within the US, however, there is little if any public interest in debating the cost of drones on civilian lives.

In Monday’s nomination announcement, Obama compli-mented Brennan on recognising the responsibility to be as “open and transparent as possible” about counterterrorism policies. Brennan himself pledged “full and open discourse” — though only with “appropriate elective repre-sentatives”. Despite these nods, it would be naive to expect the CIA, under Brennan, to engage fully with the American public about the drone programme. The CIA is too accustomed to secrecy ever to let it go.

If Brennan and Obama were serious about transparency over killing, they would extract the CIA from the drone programme altogether. America’s premier spy agency should no longer also be its chief assassin.

THE GUARDIAN

BRITAIN is in a deep thinking process on its future role in Europe. Having cut off articulately by a water channel, London has always been an extended part of the continent.

But socio-economic and political considerations had pitched it as a stakeholder and the emergence of European Union had just furthered that image.

But now Brits are getting second thoughts. They believe that it is no less than a curse to carry the additional baggage of 27 nations under the umbrella of a confederation, and it is toiling on its resources.

But there is no dearth of people who think otherwise, and cam-paign that in a globalised world, the UK would risk going alone, and it should be part of the EU by any means. The reason: it can’t afford to be separated from its closest geographic and political allies in continental Europe.

British Prime Minister David Cameron is never lost on ideas to appease his constituency when it comes to addressing the issue of Pan-Europa. In an interview he said that a vote to decide over the issue could come very soon.

The critical question his government has to address is as how to undo the disillusion of Brits with the EU, and what impact it would have on UK if it calls it a day.

The single market carries immense benefits for Britain, as EU by default remains its largest trading partner, accounting for more than 50 per cent of exports.

But the problem is that London is not happy with whatever the Union does without due consideration to the volume and potential of respective economies in the region — making it a reluctant partner in the realms of geo-economics.

Britain sooner than later has to end this dichotomy on regional affairs, and it would be better advised to opt for deeper integration with the eurozone and stop preaching from outside.

The thinking in some quarters that Britain could be well off with a special trade agreement with the European Union is misplaced. So irrational are the thoughts of bidding adieu to the club.

Cameron has a leadership task at hand, and that is to reorient Britain in the Europe’s scheme of things. The indispensability of London and Brussels by political and monetary means is in need of being reinforced.

KHALEEJ TIMES

Brennan must kill CIA’s drone assassination policy

Cartoon Arts International / The New York Times Syndicate

Brennan’s nomination is the time to restore the CIA to being a spy agency and end its role as a remote-control death squad.

VIEWS 09WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


BY PHIL STEWART

A decorated Vietnam veteran acutely aware of the limits of military power, Chuck Hagel is likely to favour a sizeable drawdown in Afghanistan,

more frugal spending at the Pentagon and extreme caution when contemplat-ing the use of force in places like Iran or Syria.

Obama’s decision to nominate Hagel — a Republican former senator who split with his party to oppose the Iraq war — as US defence secretary came despite a public lobbying campaign against his candidacy in recent weeks by a host of critics, some of whom seized upon past remarks to argue he is anti-Israel.

Hagel’s supporters deny that, but are bracing for a tough confirmation battle in the Senate. Obama, as he announced the nomination, called Hagel the kind of leader US forces deserve and pointed to his sacrifices in the Vietnam War, where he earned two Purple Hearts — the deco-ration for troops wounded in battle.

“Chuck knows that war is not an abstraction,” Obama said. “He under-stands that sending young Americans to fight and bleed in the dirt and mud, that’s something we only do when it’s absolutely necessary.”

Hagel, who would be the first Vietnam veteran to take the job, would succeed Defence Secretary Leon Panetta, 74, who is retiring from public life after a more

than four-decade career in government that included leading the CIA during the covert raid to kill Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in 2011.

The blunt, 66-year-old Hagel will need to take over where Panetta leaves off, orchestrating a drawdown in intended to bring the combat mission to a close by the end 2014.

The drawdown’s pace is an open ques-tion, as is the size of the residual force the US will leave behind. Obama is again showing his readiness to veto the mili-tary brass, considering a lower range of options — keeping between 3,000 and 9,000 troops in Afghanistan — than his top commander in Afghanistan proposed, one US official said.

Hagel has not yet commented on the

matter, but Obama would likely not choose a Pentagon chief who fundamen-tally disagreed with him on that or other key issues.

Hagel, who fought alongside his own brother and suffered shrapnel wounds in Vietnam and burns to his face, has made no secret of his reservations about what the military can accomplish in Afghanistan.

“We can’t impose our will. The Russians found that out in Afghanistan. We’ve been involved in two very costly wars that have taught us a lesson once again,” Hagel told PBS’s Tavis Smiley show last year.

Unsurprisingly, he also is extremely cautious about what could be done in Syria. “I don’t think America wants to

be in the lead on this,” he told Foreign Policy magazine in May.

Hagel’s first-hand experience in war may win respect inside the Pentagon. He volunteered for the Vietnam War as an infantryman. He would become be the first defence secretary who started and ended his military career with an enlisted rank, as opposed to serving as an officer — an important distinction in wartime.

The enlisted ranks are “the ones who have the least say about where, when, and why we go to war, but bear the harsh-est consequences when we do,” Matt Pottinger, a veteran of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and a former journal-ist, wrote in a piece on the The Daily Beast website applauding Hagel as a candidate to become defence chief.

Obama on Monday quoted Hagel as saying: “My frame of reference ... is geared towards the guy at the bottom who’s doing the fighting and the dying.”

Hagel’s comments on Middle East issues, including on Israel, are likely to complicate his Senate confirmation. House of Representatives Majority Leader Eric Cantor, a Virginia Republican, said he is “profoundly concerned and disap-pointed” by Hagel’s nomination.

Critics, including Abraham Foxman of the Anti-Defamation League, a group devoted to fighting anti-Semitism, have raised questions about Hagel’s past com-ments, including one during a 2006 inter-view in which he was quoted as saying: “The Jewish lobby intimidates a lot of people up here.” Hagel also has faced crit-icism for urging direct talks with Iran.

Many foreign policy heavyweights have come to Hagel’s defence, including former national security advisers Brent Scowcroft and Zbigniew Brzezinski, who served Republican and Democratic presidents, respectively, and former US ambassador to Afghanistan and Iraq Ryan Crocker. Questions remain about Hagel’s approach to the defence budget.

Panetta has said the US military would be hollowed out if $487bn in planned spending reductions over the next decade is doubled — something that would hap-pen if Obama and Congress fail to agree by the end of February on a way to avert automatic cuts due to kick in.

But Hagel said in an interview last year with the Financial Times: “I think the military needs to be pared down. I don’t think the military has really looked at themselves strategically, critically in a long, long time.”

His position in favour of deficit reduc-tion raises questions about possible cuts or schedule delays to big weapons sys-tems like Lockheed Martin Corp’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter, according to Jim McAleese, a defence consultant.

McAleese also named as being at risk of cuts or delays the army’s planned Ground Combat Vehicle, the V-22 Osprey built by Boeing Co and Bell Helicopter, a unit of Textron Inc, and the Navy’s early work on developing a new ballistic mis-sile submarine. He said final decisions would be up to Congress, where such pro-grammes enjoy strong support.

REUTERS

BY RASHMEE ROSHAN LALL

As the world has watched India’s public outrage at December’s fatal gang rape in Delhi, no coun-

try has followed the story with a greater sense of pained, if pre-sumed, understanding than its neighbour and rival Pakistan. On New Year’s Day, Pakistani civil rights organisations took to the streets of their capital Islamabad for a candlelight vigil in memory of the victim, who died of her injuries in late December. Amid calls for a law against domestic violence in Pakistan, Rehana Hashmi, president of Sisters Trust Pakistan, an NGO, declared that there can be no borders when it comes to showing solidarity for women’s rights.

Many Indians would agree, though they might quibble over Pakistanis’ claim that the Delhi gang rape reveals a shameful misogyny that mirrors their own. Within days of an op-ed in one of Pakistan’s major newspapers, The News, arguing that India and Pakistan share a rape culture that supports and enables offenders, the Indian web portal Rediff ran a story by an Islamabad journal-ist who described the far greater horrors of being a woman in Pakistan, and estimated that 70 to 90 percent of women have suf-fered domestic violence.

In a blog post for the German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, Ayesha Hasan, a freelance jour-nalist from an orthodox Pashtun district in Pakistan wrote: “If one rape case could lead to such reac-tions in India, protesters should have spent the entire 2012 on the streets of Pakistan. Every year some 2,900 women are raped in Pakistan, almost eight a day.”

The introspective tone con-tinued in a New Year’s Eve story in the Express Tribune, a lib-eral paper launched in 2010 in concert with the International Herald Tribune, Pakistan’s first with an international affiliation. With the headline “Pakistan’s shame: Rape cases in 2012,” the paper used the Indian incident

as a peg to recap the violence wrought on women in Pakistan: “The plight of women who have faced rape and sexual assault in Pakistan has been largely confined to formulaic articles in the press, slow-moving cases in the courts, frequent dropped charges due to bribes, and threats of further vio-lence and family pressure on the victim to avoid further ‘shame.’”

A blog post in the Express Tribune lamented the entrenched orthodoxies of Pakistan, where strict Sharia laws that often resulted in rape victims incar-cerated for adultery were in force until 2006, and 15-year-old Malala Yousafzai was shot in October 2012 for campaigning for girls’ education.

“While there is talk of some change taking place in India in response to this abhorrent inci-dent,” the post’s author wrote, “the same cannot be said for Pakistan where women are bur-ied alive and senators stand in the galleys of parliament and say that it is our custom and no one has the right to dispute it”.

But another strand of Pakistani opinion refused to credit India with its develop-ment, focusing instead on the risqué nature of Bollywood films and urban Indians’ conspicuous Westernisation.

In an article for the Frontier Post, an English-language newspa-per in northwest Pakistan, head-lined “No Justice For a Woman in India,” columnist Afshain Afzal described the gang rape as “a rou-tine affair” for India, where work-ing women “especially internees at hospitals are quite frequently sexually abused and those who refuse to cooperate are tortured or their lives made miserable. This is, but, the true face of India”.

He suggested “there is a need for Indian young girls and women to observe dress code according to their eastern tradition and culture?.

Meanwhile, sections of the Pakistani web community derided India’s “pretensions” to laws, rights and equality. In response to an op-ed in a Pakistani paper by an Indian writer arguing for

a change of mindset rather than castration for rapists, a reader raged: “Indians pretend to have laws, rights and equality. They are high on philosophy and morality. But in practice they are a klepto society.”

There was an echo of this in nearby Afghanistan, even though it remains deeply absorbed by its own problems, including the high incidence of rape among female police officers in Kabul.

Tolo, the country’s leading tele-vision channel, provided constant coverage of the events in Delhi, prompting a mixed response from Afghans. According to an Afghan media observer, opinion was divided on whether anti-rape protests were worth duplicating in Afghanistan, where half of its women prisoners are in jail for “zina” or moral crimes such as rape and adultery.

He said that some Afghans on television and radio shows felt that Indians’ anger exposed the flaws in “a big democracy, where we thought the women were well respected. But we were wrong. Women rights are violated there

too and they don’t have much freedom”.

In the subcontinent’s treacher-ous politics, the carping reflects the contradictions between India’s visible failures and its image as the South Asia’s most developed country. That’s too bad, says Syed Irfan Ashraf, who writes for Dawn, Pakistan’s oldest newspa-per. “Pakistan and the subconti-nent suffer by not having a strong example to point to in the neigh-bourhood,” he told Foreign Policy.

But the dominant sentiment in the subcontinent is clearly schadenfreude, reflected in an article by filmmaker Hira Nabi in the Friday Times, which describes itself as a liberal newspaper.

Comparing gender equity on both sides of the border, she wrote that Indian women’s apparent freedoms were “illusory” even though those in Delhi are more “brazen” than in Lahore, “wear-ing most whatever they pleased, owning the streets as they walked, hailing rickshaws, taking the Metro, crossing streets, shopping in bazaars, talking back.”

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Hagel likely to favour sizeable Afghan drawdown

Pakistan raps India for mistreating women

BY PETER WILBY

Is our long love affair with education coming to an end? In a post-Christmas announcement that went

largely unreported, Matthew Hancock, the Skills Minister, said non-graduates will be able to qualify, through apprentice-ships, as lawyers, accountants, and chartered engineers. It marks a rare reversal of a century-old trend: For longer and longer peri-ods of full-time education to be required from anyone aspiring to a professional career. It has been called “the diploma disease” or “the qualification spiral”.

We take it as axiomatic that the longer you stay in school and university, the better you’ll do in life. Sixty years ago you could still enter most professional jobs — in law, management, finance, the civil service, engineering, survey-ing, nursing, midwifery, and so on — with the equivalent of five GCSEs at grade A to C, some-times less. Since then, employers and professional bodies have, by stages, raised the requirements: to one A-level, then two A-levels, then a degree. Now postgraduate study is needed before a young person starts work.

Education is regarded as an unmitigated good, of benefit to society, the economy and the individual. More means better, we think. In many respects, that is true: if we are a more tolerant, more inclusive society than we were 50 years ago, that is largely because most of us are better edu-cated. But we should look more closely at how the demand for ever higher pre-career qualifi-cations has affected professional and managerial competence, the educational experience and, above all, social mobility.

Take, first the demand for higher general qualifications: the batch of GCSEs and A-levels or a degree without which most employers won’t look at a job application. These credentials

carry little or no information about knowledge and skills that may be of relevance to a particu-lar career.

They are sifting devices, allow-ing employers to exclude those they perceive as unintelligent or lazy. They create, in students, an instrumental attitude to educa-tion. Subjects are studied and examinations taken, not because of enthusiasm for history, chem-istry or German literature, but because they are required if the student is to progress.

As more employers and profes-sions aspired to “graduate entry” status, universities developed degree courses — in business, accountancy, sports management, nursing, journalism, for instance — that purport to cover knowl-edge and skills directly relevant to careers. They allow students to lop a year or two off the period of full-time education before they actually start earning.

But if such courses are to escape the “Mickey Mouse” category, they must maximise academic content and margin-alise mundane practical skills. A “vocational” course’s academic acceptability is in inverse pro-portion to the extent to which it teaches anything necessary for doing a job. The most quoted example is nursing, the short-comings of which are highlighted in a report on patient deaths at the Mid-Staffordshire hospital trust. As Ilora Findlay, professor of palliative medicine at Cardiff University, put it, “A nurse can graduate without being able to apply the scientific basis of ill-ness to real patients or respect-ing the importance of hands-on care”. Textbooks take priority over bedpans.

We have reached a situation where, for many, full-time edu-cation does not end and work begin until their mid-20s. We then accept people as competent doctors, accountants, engineers, and so on, for the next 40 years.

THE GUARDIAN

UK’s diploma disease beginning to unravel

US troops arrive at the site of a suicide attack in Spin Boldak district of Kandahar province in southern Afghanistan. Two Taliban suicide bombers targeted a community meeting in a government compound, killing five people and wounding 15, officials said.

Indian students shout slogans as they burn an effigy of spiritual guru Asharam during a protest in New Delhi, yesterday. Asharam sparked a backlash after saying the Delhi student could have averted the murderous gang rape by begging for mercy from her attackers.

Chuck Hagel was a Republican

US senator with independent

streak. He may be wary about using

force in Iran or Syria.

10 INTERNATIONALWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Congo rebels declare truce before talksKAMPALA: Congolese rebels declared a unilateral ceasefire yesterday ahead of a second round of peace talks with the government, boosting hopes for a negotiated end to their nine-month-old revolt.

The announcement marked a relaxation of the M23 rebels’ demand last week that the Democratic Republic of Congo government also agree to a truce before troubled negotiations resume.

“We’ve been for peace ... Today we’re declaring that we’re in a ceasefire,” Francois Rucogoza, the rebels’ executive secretary told journalists in the Ugandan capi-tal Kampala, speaking in French through a translator.

“Even if the government refuses to sign a ceasefire agreement we’ll continue with the negotiations,” he added.

Foreign powers fear the conflict could trigger another regional war in a borderlands zone that has suffered nearly two decades of turmoil. Successive cross-border conflicts have killed and uprooted millions in the Congo basin since the colonial era, driven by political and ethnic divisions and competi-tion for vast mineral resources.

The Congolese government said it did not have much confidence in the rebel ceasefire.

“We don’t think we can see this

as a concession from people who don’t tend to do what they say. We’ll wait and see ... We want to know why (they’ve made this announcement),” government spokesman Lambert Mende said.

The rebels suggested the United Nations should send an envoy to help them agree on a final truce with the government.

“We want Kinshasa to sign a ceasefire with us and if a UN spe-cial envoy can help achieve that, we think that that’s good,” M23 spokesman Bertrand Bisimwa told the journalists in Kampala.

The M23 insurgents agreed to pull out of Democratic Republic of Congo’s eastern city of Goma last month under regional pres-sure — but a first round of nego-tiations that followed fell apart amid threats and accusations.

UN experts have accused neigh-bouring Uganda and Rwanda of supporting the rebel campaign, a charge both countries deny.

M23, named after a 2009 peace deal for eastern Congo, at first said it had taken up arms because the Kinshasa government failed to honour its side of the bargain, under which rebel fighters were integrated into the army.

It later broadened its goals to include the “liberation” of all of Congo and the removal of President Joseph Kabila.

REUTERS

Government doesn’t trust ceasefire

Vice-President of the delegation of M23 rebels, Roger Lumbala (left), speaks next to the President of the delegation of M23 rebels, Francois Rucogoza, at a press briefing in Uganda’s capital Kampala, yesterday.

Wild fires rage in Australia

A firefighter is silhouetted against flames leaping from a property near the town of Wandandian in New South Wales, Australia, yesterday. There are huge wild fires raging in the southeast of the country.

Actor slinks out of France to attend Strauss-Kahn film shootPARIS: Gerard Depardieu(pictured) spurned a Paris drink driving court appearance yesterday and instead went to Montenegro to prepare a film in which the larger-than-life French star will play Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

The no-show means the hulk-ing actor, embroiled in a bitter tax row that saw him take Russian nationality and angrily vow to quit France, will now be tried by a criminal court and could get up to two years in jail.

The Cyrano de Bergerac, Green Card and Asterix & Obelix star, who has already pleaded guilty to driving his scooter while intoxi-cated, could not attend court because he was in Montenegro, his lawyer Eric de Caumont told reporters.

The 64-year-old was in the Balkan nation to meet produc-ers of the film in which he will play the disgraced ex-IMF boss Strauss-Kahn. A police official there said that rumours he was seeking Montenegran citizen-ship were false. Depardieu has

said he wants the role because he did not like Strauss-Kahn, who was tipped to be the next French president until a sordid US sex scandal ended his career, because he was “like all French people, a little arrogant”.

The actor, whose highly-pub-licised flight into tax exile has embarrassed President Francois Hollande, was arrested in Paris in November after falling off a scooter he was riding while three times over the legal alcohol limit.

If he had turned up yesterday in court he would have escaped with a small fine and penalty

points on his licence. Now the rotund actor, whose many previ-ous exploits include urinating in a bottle on a plane, faces criminal proceedings.

Depardieu hit the headlines in December when he bought a house just over the border in Belgium after accusing the French Socialist government of punishing “success, creativity and talent” with allegedly exces-sive taxes. That prompted Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault to brand his move as “shabby and unpatriotic” — which in turn prompted the actor to threaten to give up his French citizenship.

The saga became ever more farcical when Russian President Vladimir Putin, eyeing a poten-tial propaganda coup, offered the star of dozens of films Russian nationality.

Depardieu leapt at the chance, travelling last weekend to get his new passport and for some hugs and a meal with the Russian strongman in his sumptuous dacha in the Black Sea resort of Sochi. AFP

Reporter’s life sentence is cut to three years in BurundiGITEGA, BURUNDI: A court in Burundi reduced a life sen-tence handed last year to a reporter accused of complicity in a 2011 gun attack after find-ing him guilty of a less serious offence, an appeal judge said yesterday.

Deadly clashes last year between security forces and former militia fighters rocked the landlocked central African country, which had enjoyed rela-tive peace since rebels laid down arms and joined the government in 2009 after two decades of civil war.

Journalists have been targetted in a wave of detentions. Human Rights Watch said last year the government was trying to restrict efforts by independent media and civil society to denounce violence blamed on the state.

Hassan Ruvakuki, a reporter for Radio France Internationale (RFI) and a Burundi independ-ent radio station, was arrested in November 2011, accused of involvement in the attack by militants on the eastern town of Cankuzo that was launched from neighbouring Tanzania.

The prosecution had said Ruvakuki was complicit in the attack because he had travelled to Tanzania earlier that month and interviewed the rebel group’s proclaimed leader. He was con-victed by a court of first instance in June last year.

“The court redefines the charges against Ruvakuki and says he is guilty of participation in an association formed for the pur-pose of attacking people and prop-erty,” said the head of the appeal court in the central province of Gitega, Fulgence Ruberintwari.

“Consequently, the court sen-tences him to three years in prison,” he told a crowd that included journalists and mem-bers of the public who had come to hear the verdict.

Alexandre Niyungeko, chair-man of the Burundi journalists’ union, said he was shocked by the new verdict. One of Ruvakuki’s lawyers said he would appeal to the Supreme Court.

“I am not happy with the judgement even if the penalty was reduced,” said the lawyer, Fabien Segatwa. “It is an unjust conviction.”

Critics accuse President Pierre Nkurunziza’s ruling party of monopolising power, appoint-ing only members of one ethnic community, the Hutu, into posi-tions of power and repressing the opposition, which boycotted elec-tions in 2010. The appeal court reduced the prison terms of 13 other defendants accused of being rebel fighters, who were convicted in the same case. REUTERS

On German visit, Samaras says Greece striving to reformBERLIN: Greece is making enormous efforts to get its econ-omy back on track despite the pain this involves for its citi-zens, its prime minister Antonis Samaras said yesterday on a visit to Germany, chief cham-pion of austerity in Europe.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has praised the reform drive of Samaras’ coali-tion government, said the whole European Union faces hard work in the coming months to reach

agreement on closer economic ties aimed at ending the debt crisis.

“I would like at the outset to make clear that our country is making enormous efforts, accom-panied by great sacrifices, to get things back on the right path,” Samaras told reporters before his talks with Merkel.

“We are trying to win back credibility, among the peoples of Europe and among the finan-cial markets,” he said, adding that Greece had adopted a raft

of measures to achieve this goal and to get liquidity flowing to businesses again.

“This and investments are the two big elements which are nec-essary for our country, a country that is indeed suffering a great deal, above all from the scourge of unemployment, especially among young people.”

Greece, which has received tens of billions of euros in emergency loans from its euro zone part-ners since mid-2010 to stave off

bankruptcy, is expected to see its economy shrink for the sixth con-secutive year in 2013.

But the Samaras government has won praise, including from Merkel who visited Athens last autumn, for implementing tough austerity measures that Germany and other euro zone countries have demanded in return for their continued financial support.

Reflecting Greece’s improved standing in the euro zone, Samaras held talks in Bavaria

last month with leaders of the Christian Social Union, Merkel’s conservative coalition part-ner that has been very critical in the past of Athens’ failure to meet tough fiscal targets under its international bailout programme.

Greek business and household bank deposits rose for a third con-secutive month in November due to receding fears that Greece may quit the euro zone.

REUTERS

Ethiopian court rejects appeal of journalist jailed on terror chargesADDIS ABABA: An Ethiopian court has rejected an appeal by journalist Reeyot Alemu, who is in jail on terror-related offences, her lawyer said yesterday.

Reeyot was sentenced to 14 years in prison last January after an Ethiopian court found her and four others — including other journalists and an opposition member — guilty of “participating in a terrorist organisation” and “planning a terrorist act.”

“We appealed to the Ethiopian court and the judge refused to

accept our appeal,” Reeyot’s law-yer Molla Zegeye said. In August, a higher court reduced her sen-tence to five years and Molla had asked the appeals court to reject the sentence altogether.

“I am very much disappointed,” Molla said, adding the judges did not accept his argument that the court had no legal grounds to con-vict his client.

Reeyot was a journalist for the now-defunct independent news-paper Fiteh, which means “justice” in Ethiopia’s Amharic language.

Rights groups have criticised Ethiopia’s anti-terrorism legisla-tion for being vaguely worded and used to stifle peaceful dissent.

Since it was introduced in 2009, every suspect charged under the law has been found guilty.

However, the Ethiopian govern-ment has in the past pardoned people convicted under the anti-terrorism law. Last September, two Swedish journalists jailed on terror-related offences were released after serving 13 months of their 11-year sentence. AFP

Epiphany cake

French President Francois Hollande cuts a giant traditional Epiphany cake (galette des rois) next to the president of French bakeries National Confederation, Jean-Pierre Crouzet, yesterday at the Elysee Presidential Palace in Paris.

Top cop in London court

Detective Chief Inspector April Casburn arrives at Southwark Crown Court in London yesterday. She is accused of passing information to the now-defunct tabloid News of the World.

INTERNATIONAL 11WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


WASHINGTON: Former US congresswoman and gun violence survivor Gabrielle Giffords put the National Rifle Association squarely in her sights yesterday as she unveiled a major initiative for tougher gun laws.

Giffords, shot in the head in January 2011 while meeting con-stituents in her native Arizona, announced she was forming her own lobby group after a visit to Newtown, Connecticut where 20 children died in a December 14 mass shooting.

“We can’t just hope that the last shooting tragedy will pre-vent the next,” Giffords said, in an op-ed article in the USA Today newspaper co-signed by her astronaut husband Mark Kelly.

“Achieving reforms to reduce gun violence and prevent mass shootings will mean match-ing gun lobbyists in their reach and resources,” she said, refer-ring specifically to the influential NRA.

Her group, Americans for Responsible Solutions, will “raise the funds necessary to balance the influence of the gun lobby” and support political leaders who support tougher limits on the pri-vate ownership of guns.

President Barack Obama

has promised new measures to address gun violence in the US in the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in which six school staff members also died.

The gunman, Adam Lanza, 20, also killed his mother, owner of the Bushmaster military-style assault rifle he used to cut down the six- and seven-year-olds before taking his own life in one of the worst mass shootings in US history.

The NRA, with a highly moti-vated membership and legendary lobbying clout on Capitol Hill, is proposing to post armed guards in American schools as a means to deter future shootings.

US Senator Dianne Feinstein has meanwhile pledged to reintroduce a national ban on military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition clips that expired in 2004.

Guns are involved in more than 30,000 deaths in the US, the majority of them suicides, and handguns — rather than rifles or shotguns — figure in most homicides.

Giffords, who resigned from Congress a year ago to focus on her rehabilitation, said she upholds the Second Amendment of the US Constitution that sets

out the rights of Americans “to keep and bear arms.” “We don’t want to take away your guns any more than we want to give up the two guns we have locked in a safe at home,” wrote Giffords two years to the day after she was gravely shot — and six oth-ers killed, including a nine-year-old girl — in the parking lot of a Tucson, Arizona shopping mall.

“What we do want is what the majority of NRA members and other Americans want: responsi-ble changes in our laws to require responsible gun ownership and reduce gun violence.”

Elaborating on her campaign, Giffords told ABC World News anchor Diana Sawyer that she was stirred into action by the Newtown tragedy, seen by some as a potential “tipping point” towards greater gun control.

“I’m hopeful that this time is different, and I think it is,” she said. “Twenty first-graders being murdered in their class-rooms is a very personal thing for everybody.”

Giffords and Kelly said the first change they hope to see is the introduction of comprehen-sive background checks for the private sale of firearms within the United States.

“I bought a gun at Walmart

recently and I went through a background check. It’s not a dif-ficult thing to do,” Kelly said.

“Why can’t we just do that and make it more difficult for

criminals and the mentally ill to get guns?”

He also disputed the need for civilians to own high-capacity ammunition clips, noting how

the “clearly mentally ill” man who shot Giffords, Jared Lee Loughner, had used a 33-round clip in a Glock semi-automatic handgun. AFP

Shot US ex-congresswoman takes on gun lobby Obama promises new measures to curtail gun violence

Former US Representative Gabrielle Giffords and her husband, former astronaut Mark Kelly, leave the Newtown Municipal Building in Newtown, Connecticut.

OTTAWA: Aboriginal tribes liv-ing near Canada’s oil sands sued the government yesterday to try to quash a bill they say jeopardises their hunting and fishing rights.

The omnibus budget bill passed by parliament last month could have a “dangerous impact on the Canadian environment,” George Stanley of the Frog Lake First Nation told a press conference in Ottawa.

Natives essentially argue that the bill waters down environmental pro-tection for waterways and land.

Stanley said the government must honour its treaties with native tribes, some of them inked centuries ago, and “keep our lands and water safe... for hunting and fishing for future generations.”

The lawsuit comes amid grow-ing native unrest and days before a

scheduled meeting on Friday between Prime Minister Stephen Harper and several chiefs to try to diffuse the protests.

Harper agreed to the talks with aboriginal leaders after a hunger strike by Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence, who is demanding improve-ments to squalid living conditions on reserves, entered its fourth week.

Spence stopped eating on December 11. Since then, her hun-ger strike has become the focal point for ‘Idle No More’, an aboriginal rights movement strung together in November by four native women who met online.

The campaign over the past month has exploded into dozens of pro-tests and highway blockades across Canada, and has inspired thousands to demand their treaty rights. AFP

Canadian natives sue govt over fishing, hunting rights

CARACAS: Venezuela’s top opposition leader yesterday urged the Supreme Court to rule on whether cancer-stricken President Hugo Chavez’s re-inauguration can be postponed, as his govern-ment argues.

“I do not know what the judges of the Supreme Court are waiting for. Right now in Venezuela, without any doubt whatsoever, a constitutional conflict has arisen,” Henrique Capriles said.

Chavez is scheduled to take the oath of office tomorrow fol-lowing his October re-election win. But he is recovering from cancer surgery in Cuba, his fourth operation in 18 months, and it not clear he will make it to the ceremony in Caracas.

The government says the swearing is a mere formality that can be delayed, but the opposition says the constitution must be respected.

The charter says new elec-tions must be held within 30 days if the president-elect dies or is permanently incapacitated either before he takes office or in the first four years of his six-year term.

“There must be a response from our institutions in the face of this conflict,” said Capriles,

who lost to Chavez in the October vote but gave him a run for his money. Capriles also urged Latin American leaders to stay away from a pro-Chavez rally convened by the govern-ment for tomorrow in place of the inauguration.

So far Uruguay’s President Jose Mugica, Bolivia’s President Evo Morales and Foreign Minister Ricardo Patino of Ecuador are the only ones to confirm their attendance.

Capriles urged regional lead-ers not to succumb to “a game

by a political party” — allud-ing to Venezuela’s ruling party. He mentioned by name the presidents of Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Bolivia and Ecuador.

Earlier, the country’s main opposition coalition turned to international organisa-tions for support. It warned the Organisation of American States of an “alteration of the constitutional order” if Chavez is unable to take the oath of office as scheduled but his government remains in charge anyway. AFP

NEW YORK: A smoky fire broke out aboard an empty Japan Airlines 787 Dreamliner in Boston on Monday, officials said, in the latest trouble to hit the fuel-efficient Boeing passenger aircraft.

The plane was being readied at a gate for a noon departure after arriving at Logan Airport in Boston, Massachusetts from Tokyo at 10am (1500 GMT), when smoke was found in the aft cabin.

Japan Airlines said no pas-sengers or crew members were injured in the incident.

“The fire department was called and the fire was extin-guished,” a JAL statement said.

“The smoke was traced to a fire from the battery used for the auxiliary power unit (APU) which was situated in an elec-trical room at the aft section of the aircraft.”

It said 172 passengers, includ-ing one infant, had been aboard the plane, along with three cockpit crew and eight cabin crew. They had all disembarked before the fire was detected.

“We’re aware of the situation

and we’re working with the air-line to understand more about it right now,” Boeing spokesman Doug Alder said.

The National Transportation Safety Board said on Twitter that it has launched an investi-gation into the incident.

The Dreamliner was touted as the great new hope for US manufacturer Boeing, which says its next-generation com-posite fibre body reduces weight and boosts fuel efficiency.

But the incident at Logan Airport was only the latest in a series of glitches for the aircraft, including test engine trouble in July that was the sub-ject of a probe by the National Transportation Safety Board.

On July 23, Japan’s All Nippon Airways said it was ground-ing five 787 Dreamliner jets for repairs because of a defect on the Rolls-Royce engine. In February, Boeing said around 55 Dreamliners were at risk of developing a fuselage problem.

ANA, the first company to take delivery of a Dreamliner, began offering flights on the jet in October. AFP

Boeing Dreamliner catches fire in Boston

Court must rule on Chavez crisis: Opposition

The governor of the Venezuelan state of Miranda, Henrique Capriles, speaks during a press conference in Caracas yesterday.

WASHINGTON: A Chinese man pleaded guilty in a US federal court yesterday to pirating software that inves-tigators said was worth more than $100m.

The US Immigration and Customs Enforcement said that it had broken up an operation run by Xiang Li, 36, of Chengdu in Sichuan, China, that the bureau called “one of the most significant cases of copyright infringement ever uncovered — and dismantled.”

Li had distributed via his website Crack99.com high-cost programmes for defense, engi-neering of things like computer chips and aerospace materials, telecommunications, aerospace simulation, and computer-aided manufacturing which he had “cracked,” or broken access codes to allow anyone to use them, the ICE said in a state-ment. Between 2008 and 2011 he sold software by some 200 dif-ferent manufacturers to at least 325 buyers, ICE said, with more than one-third of the buyers in the United States, including a NASA engineer and a defence contractor. AFP

Chinese man guilty of $100m software piracy

12 ASIA / PHILIPPINESWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


TOKYO: Japan will raise mili-tary spending this year for the first time in over a decade under a ruling party plan, an official said yesterday, as Tokyo summoned Beijing’s envoy in a territorial row.

The national defence task force of the newly-elected Liberal Democratic Party will increase the defence budget request by more than ¥100bn ($1.15bn) in response to an emboldened China, a party official said.

The relatively small amount — just over two percent of the total military budget — is largely sym-bolic, but reflects anxiety at what Japan sees as an increasingly hos-tile region in which China appears happy to throw its weight about.

“We have decided that the additional budget will be used for research into a new radar system as well as fuel and other main-tenance costs for early-warning aircraft,” the official said on con-dition of anonymity.

The news came as the for-eign ministry called in China’s ambassador to protest at the latest dispatch of official vessels into waters around the Tokyo-controlled Senkaku islands, which Beijing claims as the Diaoyus.

The summons was the first under nationalistic Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, and is in line with the tough stance he pushed on China on the campaign trail in December.

Beijing, however, rebuffed the move. Hong Lei, spokesman for China’s foreign ministry, told reporters in Beijing patrols were “normal” because the islands are Chinese territory.

Nerves in Tokyo have also been rattled by an unpredictable North Korea. It sent a rocket over Japan’s southern islands last

month in what it insisted was a satellite launch. Tokyo and its allies said the launch was a covert ballistic missile test.

The military is bound by the country’s US-imposed pacifist constitution, which restricts its ability to project power or to wage aggressive war. However, commentators say it is a modern, well-funded and well-equipped force.

In the run-up to last month’s election, the LDP pledged to expand the number of personnel in the Self-Defence Forces and boost their equipment and spend-ing power.

The proposed increase in fund-ing comes after declines over 10 consecutive years as Tokyo grap-pled with its huge public debt.

The initial defence budget for fiscal 2012, which ends in March, stood at 4.65 trillion yen. This compares with a budget for fis-cal 2002 that peaked at 4.94 trillion yen. Defence Minister Itsunori Onodera has said Abe’s government will review Japan’s long-term basic defence pro-gramme, adopted in 2010 under the Democratic Party of Japan which was routed at the polls.

The current programme includes plans to trim troop num-bers by around 1,000.

Kazuhiko Togo, director at the Institute for World Affairs of Kyoto Sangyo University, said the planned rise in defence spend-ing was a direct result of China’s more hostile attitude, specifically over the disputed islands.

“China has publicly said it would seize the islands by force if necessary and acted as such. To avoid a possible armed clash, Japan has no choice but to possess deterrence by boosting its defence budget,” he said. AFP

Japan to spend more on military amid China row Territorial dispute heightens

Philippine navy personnel with the unmanned US drone recovered by fishermen.

MANILA: The US confirmed yesterday that it owned a drone found in Philippine waters, but said the craft only drifted into Filipino territory after crashing at sea four months ago.

The “unarmed target drone” was deployed from the guided missile destroyer USS Chafee in war games off the coast of Guam in September last year, the US embassy in Manila said in a statement.

“It appears the ocean currents brought the drone to where it washed ashore last week off Masbate island,” it said.

Fishermen found the drone drifting just off the coast of the island in central Philippines, about 2,500km from Guam, at the weekend.

President Benigno Aquino had previously said US drones are

allowed to conduct reconnais-sance missions in the Philippines as part of efforts to contain a range of security threats.

The Philippine military has said drones are used during annual joint military exercises with the US in its waters, while some 600 US forces have been in the southern Philippines since 2002 to help train local troops to deal with Islamic militants.

Nevertheless the discovery of the drone stirred controversy in the Philippines, prompting local authorities to insist the machine was not being used for spying or to fire weapons at targets.

“It is not a spy plane. It is unarmed. It is used by the US Navy in its training,” Philippine military spokesman Colonel Arnulfo Burgos said.

The Philippine department of

foreign affairs released a similar statement, although qualifying it by emphasising its comments were based on assurances from the US government.

“At this point, we have been assured by the US Embassy that the reported aerial vehicle is by design and purpose solely used for target practice and not armed or used for surveillance,” the state-ment said.

Renato Reyes, secretary-general of leftist political group New Patriotic Alliance, alleged the drone was proof the United States — a former colonial ruler of the Philippines — was violating Filipino sovereignty.

“No sovereign nation would allow a foreign power unham-pered use of domestic airspace,” Reyes said in a statement.

AFP

US claims ownership of drone found in Philippine waters

Manila to adjust electricity prices this monthMANILA: Electricity rates in areas serviced by the Manila Electric Co (Meralco) are expected to go up this month due to price adjust-ments in the wholesale elec-tricity spot market (WESM).

Last month’s load-weighted average price rose by P0.64 per kilowatt-hour (kwh) from November. WESM is a mar-ket for trading of electricity as commodity.

An industry source said supply constraints last month pushed prices up even as power consumption remained stable from November to December.

The Ilijan and Sta Rita natu-ral gas plants in Batangas went on scheduled power outage last month as part of preventive maintenance.

In addition, the Masinloc coal-fired power plant in Zambales also went on power outage during the period, adding to the tight supply situation.

China train derails in test run, one dead BEIJING: A subway train derailed yesterday in a test run on a new line in south-western China, killing one driver and injuring another, state media reported.

The first carriage of the train ran off the tracks in the city of Kunming in Yunnan province at 9:09am (0109 GMT), the China News Service said. There were no passengers on board.

One driver was struck by falling heating equipment in the driver’s cabin and died, while another was slightly injured and taken to hospital, the report said, citing the sub-way’s operator, state-owned Kunming Rail Transit Co.

The city government was investigating the cause of the accident, it added.

Chinese authorities have long been accused of compro-mising safety in their rush to develop the country’s vast transport network.

Seoul to expand nuclear energy SEOUL: South Korea has no option but to expand its nuclear power plant pro-gramme despite growing pub-lic concern over safety in the wake of Japan’s Fukushima disaster in 2011 and a series of scares that closed two reactors last year.

The proportion of South Koreans who considered nuclear power safe fell to 34.8 percent in a survey conducted in November and published on Tuesday, down from 40 percent in April 2011 and 71 percent in January 2010, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy said.

The ministry has been sharply criticised for its role as regulator and operator of the country’s nuclear power plants, and one of its subsidiaries was accused of suppressing nega-tive public opinion after the Fukushima disaster by not publishing polls.

AGENCIES

BRIEFLY

MANILA: President Benigno Aquino may be the most pow-erful man in the country but he still has to submit to the Commission on Elections when it comes to guns during the election period.

Elections Chairman Sixto Brillantes yesterday said the president will not be automati-cally exempted from the gun ban, which will takes effect on Sunday, the start of the 120-day election period.

“I think no, (he is not exempted). We’re giving exemp-tion more to the security rather than the person himself, which means if you are a Senate presi-dent, it is not the Senate presi-dent who will be given exemption but the security,” he said in an interview.

Brillantes said even members of the Presidential Security Group (PSG) are not automati-cally exempted from the gun ban.

“PSG personnel will have to apply individually and then we will approve their applications,” he said.

According to Elections Commissioner Rene Sarmiento, the President’s participation in target shooting will have to be put on hold while the gun ban is in effect.

Aquino has admitted going on target shooting during weekends as part of his recreation.

“No one is above the law. Shoot fest is not tolerated when a gun ban is in effect. It is not stated in the Comelec resolution but the wisdom and morality of the reso-lution dictates that,” Sarmiento added.

He said gun ban exemp-tions should be filed with the Comelec’s gun ban committee headed by Commissioner Elias Yusoph.

THE PHILIPPINE STAR

Aquino not exempt from poll gun ban

GUANGZHOU, China: Protesters rallied yesterday for a second day to call for press freedom in China, as social media users and celebri-ties backed a campaign which poses a test for the nation’s new leaders.

Scores of people, some carrying mourning flowers, gathered out-side the Guangzhou offices of the Southern Weekly, a popular liberal paper which had an article urg-ing greater protection of rights censored.

“The government is using the media for their purposes,” said a 24-year-old man surnamed Leung. “If we don’t step out now to support this newspaper and call for greater freedom, our soci-ety will have less and less space for freedom.”

Some demonstrators wore masks depicting British revo-lutionary figure Guy Fawkes, adopted as an anarchist sym-bol internationally after being popularised in the film “V for Vendetta” — which was recently broadcast on state television.

Police stood by, allowing the rally to proceed. As it dispersed for the day a lone woman demon-strator stood outside the building, holding a white rose and raising one hand, making a victory sign with her fingers.

Some protesters traded insults with around a dozen rivals who showed support for the authori-ties. A few held up portraits of Mao Zedong, the founding father of communist China.

Protests about explicitly politi-cal issues such as rights are very rare in China. The dispute comes after the ruling party’s new lead-ership headed by Xi Jinping took over in November, raising expec-tations of a more open style of governance.

The second day of demonstra-tions came after bloggers and

celebrities — some with millions of followers — voiced support online for freedom of the press.

Yao Chen, an actress who has 32 million followers, posted the paper’s logo on China’s Twitter-like Weibo service and quoted Russian dissident Alexandr Solzhenitsyn: “One word of truth shall outweigh the whole world”.

Fellow actor Chen Kun, who has 27 million followers, replied: “I am not that deep, and don’t play with words, I support the friends at Southern Weekly”.

Media outlets are subject to

directives from official propa-ganda departments, which often suppress news seen as negative by the communist authorities.

The row erupted after censors blocked Southern Weekly’s New Year message calling for the reali-sation of a “dream of constitution-alism in China”. They replaced it with an article in praise of the Communist Party, according to journalists.

In an open letter, journalists blamed provincial propaganda official Tuo Zhen and called for his resignation. AFP

China press freedom campaign swells with new rally

A newspaper vendor attends to a customer on a street in Shanghai, yesterday.

KATHMANDU: A court in Nepal has jailed members of a mob who burned alive a 40-year-old woman after accusing her of casting black magic spells in a remote southern village, an offi-cial said yesterday.

Mother-of-two Dhengani Devi Mahato died when she was severely beaten, doused in kerosene and set alight in February last year after the vil-lage shaman (traditional spiritual healer) accused her of practising

witchcraft. “Eight men including a shaman have been convicted of murder. The district court has sentenced each of them for 20 years,” Din Bandhu Baral, an officer at Chitwan district court said. “I think this will serve as an apt precedent at a time when pro-tests are being organised across the country demanding stern action against the perpetrators of violence against women.”

Baghauda village, inhabited by ethnic Tharus and other

indigenous tribespeople, is a 90-minute drive from the near-est town of Bharatpur.

Hundreds of lower-caste women suffer abuse at the hands of “witch hunters” every year in Nepal, where superstition and caste-based discrimination remain rife and where most communities still operate on strict patriarchal lines.

Human rights campaigners say the perpetrators of such crimes are rarely brought to justice.

AFP

Nepal jails mob for burning ‘witch’ alive DHAKA: Flights at Bangladesh’s main interna-tional airport ground to a halt yesterday after staff at the state-owned carrier Biman went on strike over a pay dispute.

Thousands of passengers were stuck at the Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport in the capi-tal Dhaka as hundreds of Biman officials stopped ground handling operations.

Biman’s main union called the

strike to demand a hike in wages, improved benefits and for hun-dreds of temporary workers to be made full-time.

“After they enforced the strike, no flight could take off from the airport,” said Nazmul Anam, a director of the country’s civil avia-tion authority. Anam said three international flights did manage to land in the early morning but passengers were still stuck in the airport as they could not retrieve their luggage. AFP

Strike halts flights at Dhaka airport

ISLAMABAD: US President Barack Obama and Afghan President Hamid Karzai will discuss matters of war, includ-ing future US troop levels and Afghanistan’s army, when they meet on Friday, but matters of peace may be the most delicate item on their long agenda.

After nearly 10 months in limbo, tentative reconciliation efforts involving Taliban insur-gents, the Karzai government and other major Afghan factions have shown new signs of life, res-urrecting tantalising hopes for a negotiated end to decades of war.

Pakistan, which US and Afghan officials have long accused of back-ing the insurgents and meddling in Afghanistan, has recently sig-nalled an apparent policy shift toward promoting its neighbour’s stability as most US combat troops prepare to depart, top Pakistani and Afghan officials said.

In another potentially signifi-cant development, Taliban rep-resentatives met outside Paris last month with members of the Afghan High Peace Council — although not directly with mem-bers of the Karzai government, which they have long shunned.

US officials, speaking on condi-tion of anonymity, said the devel-opments are promising — but that major challenges remain to opening negotiations, let alone reaching an agreement on the war-ravaged country’s political future.

Hopes for Afghan peace talks have been raised before, only to

be dashed. Last March, the Taliban sus-

pended months of quiet discus-sions with Washington aimed at getting the insurgents and the Karzai government to the peace table.

Obama is expected to press the Afghan president to bless the for-mal opening of a Taliban political office in Qatar as a way to jump-start inter-Afghan talks.

Karzai has been lukewarm to the idea, apparently fearing his government would be sidelined in any negotiations.

A TURNING POINT

Karzai’s meeting with Obama, at the end of a three-day visit to Washington, is shaping up to be one of the most critical encoun-ters between the two leaders, as the White House weighs how rap-idly to remove most of the roughly 66,000 US troops in Afghanistan

and how large a residual force to leave after 2014.

Obama, about to begin his sec-ond term in office, appears deter-mined to wrap up US military engagement in Afghanistan.

Other issues on the agenda have plenty of potential for caus-ing friction: the future size and focus of the Afghan military; a festering dispute over control of the country’s largest detention centre; and the future of inter-national aid after 2014.

Karzai’s trip “is one of the most important ones because the dis-cussions we are going to have with our counterparts will define the relations between (the) US and Afghanistan,” Afghan Foreign Minister Zalmay Rassoul told the lower house of parliament this month.

No final announcement on post-2014 US troop levels is expected during Karzai’s visit,

and the issue is further compli-cated by Washington’s insistence on legal immunity for American troops that remain.

General John Allen, the top US and Nato commander in Afghanistan, recommended keep-ing between roughly 6,000 and 15,000 US troops in Afghanistan after 2014.

But the White House is con-sidering possibly leaving as few as 3,000 troops.

A US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the White House had asked for options to be developed for keep-ing between 3,000 and 9,000 troops in the country.

Last year, the Obama admin-istration hoped to kick-start peace talks with a deal that would have seen Washington transfer five Taliban prisoners from Guantanamo Bay prison. In return, the Taliban would renounce international ter-rorism and state a willingness to enter talks with Karzai’s representatives.

That deal never came off, and the question now is whether it, or an alternative peace process, can get under way as the US military presence rapidly winds down.

Looking at developments in the last few months, “you could see that there are things happening,” said one US official, who was not authorised to speak for the record.

At the end of 2012, Pakistan released four Afghan Taliban prisoners who were close to the movement’s reclusive leader,

Mullah Mohammed Omar. It appeared to be a step

toward meeting Afghanistan’s long-standing insistence that Islamabad free those who could help promote reconciliation. A senior Afghan official welcomed the release.

A member of Pakistan’s parlia-ment closely involved in Afghan policy-making said there are signs of a shift in the thinking of Pakistan’s powerful military. Some in the military, which has long regarded Afghanistan as a battleground in its exis-tential conflict with rival India, are now saying that the graver threat comes from Pakistan’s own militants.

“Yes, there is scepticism. The hawks are there. But the fact is that previously there were abso-lutely no voices in the army with this kind of positive thinking,” the parliamentarian said.

“Pakistan has also realised that there won’t be a complete withdrawal of the US from Afghanistan,” the lawmaker said.

“The security establishment realises it has to compromise somewhere. Hence the Taliban releases. ... Hence the statements from even the most sceptical Afghan officials that there is a change in Pakistani thinking.”

Ghairat Baheer, who repre-sented the Hezb-e-Islami faction at last month’s peace talks in the Paris suburb of Chantilly, rejected a continued US military presence in Afghanistan.

But he praised the Pakistan

prisoner release as a sign of its good intentions.

WAITING FOR THE TALIBAN

After more than a year of frus-tration, Obama administration officials are skeptical about luring the Taliban to peace talks, citing what appears to be a deep fissure within the movement between moderates who favour entering the political process and hardlin-ers committed to ousting both Nato troops and Karzai.

The Taliban’s lead negotiator, Tayeb Agha, whom the Obama administration regards as a reli-able interlocutor, offered to resign last month in apparent frustra-tion, the Daily Beast website reported.

Taliban envoys have yet to meet officially with Karzai’s government, and the insurgents demand a rewriting of the Afghan constitution.

“I don’t think anyone knows where (reconciliation) stands. And I mean that because there are a lot of reconciliation talks and a lot of games that are being played in a lot of places,” said Fred Kagan, a military analyst at the conservative American Enterprise Institute.

“The likelihood of getting an acceptable deal that actually secures our interests is vanish-ingly small,” he said. “But the probability that you could get the deal and have it implemented in time to make this drawdown timeline make sense is nonsense.”

REUTERS

DERA ISMAIL KHAN: A US drone strike killed eight people in northwestern Pakistan yesterday, intelligence sources said, the lat-est in a series of drone attacks that come as a retired US general warns their overuse may threaten American foreign policy goals.

A foreign tactical trainer for Al Qaeda was reportedly among those killed in the latest strike, although reports differed on his nationality.

Some intelligence officials said he was from Somalia but others said he was from the UAE.

Three others were also injured in the attack on Haiderkhel vil-lage, about 30km east of the provincial capital of Miranshah in North Waziristan, a region along the Afghan border that is a key stronghold of the Taliban.

Al Qaeda’s top strategist Abu Yahya Al Libi was killed nearby in a drone attack last year.

On Monday, retired US General Stanley McChrystal said that drones had helped US troops but were hated around the world and that their overuse could jeopardize American security.

Opinion in Pakistan is divided over drone strikes. Many criticise them as an infringement of the country’s sovereignty and because they have killed civilians.

Others say the strikes reach militants who are terrorising the local population in areas the Pakistani army cannot go.

There has been an increase in drone strikes in recent weeks.Last week Mullah Nazir, a strong supporter of attacks on US troops

in Afghanistan, was killed in a drone strike along with his deputy and top commanders. On Sunday a drone strike killed between 10 and 12 militants, local residents said.

REUTERS

Anti-polio drive to begin next weekPESHAWAR: A three-day anti-polio campaign will begin in Pakistan’s troubled tribal regions bordering Afghanistan from Monday in five agencies of the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (Fata). However, it will not be carried out in North and South Waziristan.

An official said yesterday that 20,000 teams have been consti-tuted to administer vaccination to over 0.7 million children. He added that around 0.2m children will not be immunised in North and South Waziristan agencies due to the ban imposed on vaccination teams by the Taliban.

Twenty polio cases were reported in Fata last year, while Taliban leaders Gul Bahadur and late Mullah Nazir banned polio teams in their agencies in June last year. Health workers have repeatedly come under attack in various parts of Pakistan for tak-ing part in the vaccination drives.

INTERNEWS

Obama-Karzai meet shows flickers of lifeThe three-day visit to Washington is shaping up to be one of the most critical encounters between the leaders

Drone strike kills eight in key Taliban stronghold

People shout slogans during a protest against the US drone attack in North Waziristran, in Multan, Pakistan, yesterday.

KABUL: A member of the Afghan army shot dead a British soldier, officials said yesterday, in the latest “insider attack” to undermine the US-led mission training Afghans to take over from Nato troops next year.

The attack came as fears are growing in Afghanistan that tur-moil could erupt after foreign troops depart.

The British member of an engineering regiment was killed when the Afghan opened fire on Monday at a base in the Nahr-e Saraj district of Helmand prov-ince in the insurgency-ridden south.

Nato soldiers are fighting alongside Afghan colleagues to thwart Taliban militants.

But more than 60 foreign soldiers were killed in 2012 in “insider attacks” that have bred mistrust and threatened to derail the training process.

Afghan soldiers and police are taking on responsibility for thwarting the militants from 100,000 Nato troops who will leave by the end of next year — more than a decade after a

US-led invasion brought down the Taliban regime.

“The British soldier was killed when a suspected Afghan soldier opened fire first at Afghan troops and then at British soldiers,” said Major Martyn Crighton, a spokesman for the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

“In the subsequent engage-ment, the attacker was killed by British troops.”

Taliban spokesman Yousuf Ahmadi claimed in an email to AFP that the attack was carried out by a militant infiltrator, and that eight British and two Afghan soldiers had been killed.

The group often exaggerate death tolls and ISAF officials say that most “insider attacks” stem from personal grudges and cul-tural misunderstandings rather than Taliban plots.

A Helmand police official said three Nato soldiers were also wounded, but ISAF declined to confirm the figure.

The number of US troops who could remain in Afghanistan after Nato combat forces withdraw will

be a key topic of the meeting.Latest reports citing the US

Defence Department suggest between 3,000 and 9,000 troops would remain to focus on prevent-ing Al Qaeda, which was sheltered by the 1996-2001 Taliban regime, from regaining a foothold in Afghanistan.

General John Allen, com-mander of US and Nato forces in Afghanistan, had earlier suggested leaving 6,000 to 20,000 US troops, US media reports have said.

The number of foreign soldiers battling the Taliban-led insur-gency has already fallen to 100,000 from about 150,000.

Of those, 66,000 are US troops, down from a maximum of about 100,000.

Last month, in the first insider attack by a woman, a female police officer killed a US adviser in Kabul’s police headquarters.

The threat has become so seri-ous that foreign soldiers working with Afghan forces are regu-larly watched over by so-called “guardian angel” troops to provide protection.

AFP

Commission seeks record sum for general electionsISLAMABAD: The Election Commission of Pakistan (ECP) has written to the Ministry of Finance for a sum of Rs5.9bn for the conduct of the general elections.

If approved, the amount will make the poll most expensive to have been conducted in the country’s 65 year history and four times as expensive as those in 2008.

However, there has been no indication in this connection from the ministry so far as to when these funds will be made available for the purpose, in one go or in chunks, official sources said here yesterday.

Sources said that not only the Minister for Information and Broadcasting, Qamar Zaman Kaira, and the Minister for Religious Affairs, Khurshid Shah, but also Prime Minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf had assured the ECP of meeting all of its require-ments for smooth and orderly elections for the country in a transparent way.

The estimated amount for the elections is over 100 percent more than spent on 2008 general elec-tions, which was around Rs1.45bn.

INTERNEWS

British soldier shot deadin Afghan ‘insider attack’

Joy ride

A Pakistani passenger stands on top of a mini bus during a cold and foggy morning in Islamabad, yesterday. Foggy weather in Punjab and other parts of the country has badly affected flight and rail schedules.

US President Barack Obama Afghan President Hamid Karzai

13PAKISTAN / AFGHANISTAN WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


14 INDIAWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


BRIEFLY

Khurshid heads to Paris, nuclear deal on agenda

NEW DELHI: India and France will seek to step their civil nuclear cooperation and intensify economic ties when External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid goes on a two-day visit to Paris start-ing tomorrow. Announcing the visit, Syed Akbaruddin, the spokesperson of the external affairs ministry, said Khurshid will hold talks with his French counterpart Laurent Fabius.

Khurshid will also call on French President Francois Hollande.

This will be the first visit by Khurshid to Paris since he assumed charge as the foreign minister. During the talks, India and France are expected to discuss a clus-ter of issues, including civil nuclear cooperation, trade and investment, defence cooperation and the global financial crisis.

Trade and investment between India and France are steadily surging. Bilateral trade is estimated to be $8.9bn. More than 800 French compa-nies have their representative office in India. Over 100 Indian companies have established their presence in France. India is the 13th largest investor in France.

MIM leader Akbar Owaisi arrestedHYDERABAD: Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen (MIM) leader Akbaruddin Owaisi was arrested yesterday in a case booked against him for delivering alleged hate speeches.

After undergoing medical tests through the day at gov-ernment-run Gandhi Hospital, the legislator was arrested by police. The medical tests showed that he is fit to face the questioning.

Police said Akbar Owaisi is being shifted to Nirmal town in Adilabad district, about 200 km from here, for questioning.

Smriti sues Nirupam for defamationNEW DELHI: TV actress-turned-politician Smriti Irani yesterday filed a defa-mation here against Congress MP Sanjay Nirupam for using “indecent language” against her during a televi-sion debate.

While discussing the Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh assem-bly elections, Nirupam mocked at the Bharatiya Janata Party MP as a former dancer who had entered politics only some years ago.

Himachal Pradesh legislator surrenders CHANDIGARH: A court in Panchkula town in Haryana sent a newly elected Congress legislator of Himachal Pradesh, whose name figured in a murder case, to six days police remand after he sur-rendered earlier yesterday.

Ram Kumar Chaudhary, who was wanted by the Haryana Police for the murder of a 24-year-old woman Jyoti along with three others, was absconding for the past few days.

Police had tried to arrest him by raiding various places in Himachal but he evaded arrest. Police on Monday announced a reward of `200,000 to anyone giving information about his whereabouts. Chaudhary was supposed to take oath as a legis-lator in the Himachal assembly in Dharamsala yesterday but he appeared in the Panchkula court and surrendered.

AGENCIES

Warming up

People warm themselves by a fire at a vegetable wholesale market on a cold winter morning in Chandigarh. Temperatures in Chandigarh have dipped to 1.5 degrees Celsius, according to meteorological department. The current cold weather in northern India has killed more than 100 homeless people, an aid group said.

Two soldiers killed in border clashNEW DELHI: Pakistani troops yesterday killed two Indian soldiers near the tense disputed border in Kashmir, military sources said, two days after Islamabad said one of its soldiers was killed there.

“Pakistani troops had intruded into Indian territory before the clash began. An Indian ground patrol “saw something suspicious and then there was a firefight”, Army spokesman Rajesh Kalia said.

“We lost two soldiers and one of them has been badly mutilated,” he added, declining to give more details.

Yesterday’s deaths occurred in southern Kashmir’s Mendhar sector, 173km west by road from Jammu, the commander said.

Poonch Deputy Commissioner A K Sahu said the Pakistanis killed two Indian soldiers and wounded a third. “They slit the throats of two soldiers.”

Sources said that the Pakistani troops took away the weap-ons of the dead Indian soldiers: Sudhakar Singh and Hemraj of 13 Rajputana Rifles.

The Pakistanis reached the post since it was located close to the fence near the LoC, which divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan.

The Indian Army has erected a three-tier fence in its territory running along the LOC. The fence is about 500 metres to two kilo-metres inside Indian territory and seeks to prevent Pakistani intru-sion. But the Pakistanis sneaked in using the fog in the forested area as a cover, an army spokes-man said.

“The (Indian) patrol spotted them and engaged the intruders” for about half hour after which the Pakistani troops retreated,

he said. The official termed the intrusion and killings as “yet another grave provocation by the Pakistan Army”.

He said the latest attack was being taken up “sternly through official channels”.

The report of the Pakistani attack - which has the potential to derail India-Pakistan rela-tions - came soon after India told Pakistan “to ensure that the sanctity of LoC is upheld at all times”.

Also yesterday, Pakistani army chief General Ashfaq Parvez Kayani visited Sialkot and asked the army to remain “fully prepared to respond to the full spectrum of threats, direct or

indirect, overt or covert”.He said Pakistan was putting in

place a new concept of war fight-ing “evolved and validated in the Azm-e-Nau (New Resolve) series of war games and exercises”, the Associated Press of Pakistan reported.

The Indian external affairs ministry denied that Indian troops crossed the LoC in Rampur sector or violated the ceasefire in force since 2003 in the area as claimed by Islamabad. “India is committed to the sanctity of LoC,” he said, calling it the most important part of the India-Pakistan confidence-building measures.

“We call upon the Pakistan authorities to ensure that the

sanctity of the LoC is upheld at all times and to ensure that such incidents of unprovoked firing do not recur.” The spokesman was referring to an earlier incident which Pakistan says involved fir-ing by Indian troops that left one of their soldiers dead.

India says that the director generals of military operation of both countries were in touch over the earlier firing. New Delhi says it were the Pakistani who trig-gered the earlier gun battle.

Their “unprovoked firing on Indian troops” damaged the roof of a house in Churunda village. “Indian troops undertook control-led retaliation in response.”

In Islamabad, a Pakistan

military spokesman denied what he called an “Indian allegation of unprovoked firing”. He declined to elaborate.

The allegation follows another disputed incident on Sunday, when Pakistan said Indian army troops attacked their base and killed a soldier. India said they had not launched an attack and that Pakistani troops bombarded their positions for more than five hours.

On Sunday, Pakistan said Indian troops crossed the de facto border in Kashmir known as the Line of Control and stormed a military post. It said one Pakistani soldier was killed and another injured.

It lodged a formal protest with India on Monday over what it called an unprovoked attack.

India denied crossing the line, saying it had retaliated with small arms fire after Pakistani mortars hit a village home.

A foreign ministry spokesman said Indian troops had under-taken “controlled retaliation” on Sunday after “unprovoked firing” which damaged a civilian home.

A ceasefire has been in place along the Line of Control since 2003 but it is periodically violated by both sides.

Relations between the nuclear-armed rivals have been slowly improving over the last few years following a rupture in their dialogue after the 2008 attacks on Mumbai, which was blamed by India on Pakistan-based militants.

The latest deaths could under-mine recent efforts to build trust, such as opening up trade and offering more lenient visa regimes which have been a feature of recent talks between senior political leaders from both sides.

AGENCIES

MANCHESTER/ BANGA-LORE: The father of an Indian student who went missing in the English city of Manchester a week ago yesterday urged wit-nesses to come forward after he travelled to Britain to help police.

Souvik Pal, an 18-year-old stud-ying at Manchester Metropolitan University in northwest England, has been missing since celebrating New Year’s Eve with friends at a nightclub in the city.

His father Santanu, who flew to Manchester from Bangalore to help detectives with the search, said he was proud of his son and would not leave Britain until he was found.

“I would like to directly appeal to anyone who has any clues that can help the police search for Souvik, to call the police,” he told journalists at police headquarters in Manchester.

“This has been a very diffi-cult time for our family back in India, including Souvik’s younger brother, who views him as a role model.” Police divers have searched Manchester’s canals for

the student, who was last seen at the Warehouse Project club to the west of the city centre at around 11pm on December 31.

Police described him as 1.70 metres (5 feet 7 inches) tall, of slim build and Asian appearance and with a scar on the right side of his forehead.

He speaks English with an Indian accent and was last seen wearing a pale denim shirt, grey trousers and navy blue leather boots.

AFP

KOCHI: Minister for Overseas Indian Affairs Vayalar Ravi made it clear yes-terday that the government was willing to go to any extent to help Indians to return from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) under the amnesty offer of the UAE government.

“We do not want any Indian to suffer because they don’t have money to pay for their fare. We will make all arrange-ments for them,” Ravi told reporters at the 11th Pravasi Bharatiya Divas being held here. “We will use the India Community Welfare Fund for the repa-triation of Indians,” said Ravi.

Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said they are baffled by the poor response ever since the amnesty offer started on December 4.

“So far just 300 Keralites have regis-tered for it. We will find out why there has been such a poor response,” said

Chandy. According to reports from the UAE, 800 Indian’s have registered for the amnesty, which ends on February 3. “We want to ensure that our people can continue to work legally in the UAE. But as a government we will be able to do little in that respect because the laws of that country have to be respected,” said Chandy.

State Minister for Diaspora K C Joseph said that the state government will lend a helping hand to those who return.“We can link up with com-mercial banks in the state to provide soft loans to the returnees to help them start a business,” said Joseph. The Kerala government had earlier announced that they would set apart `2.5m to meet repatriation expenses of Keralites who wish to return. The last time the UAE offered an amnesty was in 2007 and 40,000 Indians made use of

it and returned. Another 37,000 used the offer to legalise their stay in the UAE by paying reduced penalties.

Earlier, Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh praised the southern state of Kerala on the occasion of the Pravasi Bharatiya Divas. In his address, Dr Singh said: “Kerala is blessed by the generosity of nature, the hospital-ity of its people and the richness of its culture. This gives it a well-deserved right to claim that Kerala is ‘God’s own country’.”

The shores of Kerala have been part of the global currents of commerce, cul-ture and religion since ancient times. This state was one of the first to come into contact with Judaism, Christianity and Islam. It had a strong tradition of maritime trade, extending from the Gulf and Europe in the West to China in the East, he said.. AGENCIES

One dead soldier badly mutilated by Pakistan army, says official spokesman

Border Security Force (BSF) soldiers stand guard along a fence near the India-Pakistan Chachwal border outpost, some 65km north from Jammu.

Father’s appeal for student missing in UK

We’ll help Indians in UAE: Minister Wikipedia’s ‘Goan war’ unmasked as hoax MUMBAI: It went undetected for five years on Wikipedia, but now a seemingly meticulous entry about a 17th century conflict between colonial Portugal and Maratha empire has been outed as a hoax. “The Bicholim Conflict” of 1640-41, described in detail in the online piece assessed as a “good article”, has been unearthed not as an episode of Goan history, but a tale by a mischievous user.

Added to the site in July 2007, the entry was only uncovered as a lie by another eagle-eyed user in December. “After careful consideration and some research, I have come to the conclusion that this article is a hoax - a clever and elaborate hoax,” wrote user “ShelfSkewed”, who found the sources cited also did not exist. The fantasy conflict has been added to Wikipedia’s list of hoaxes that have dogged the site since it was founded in 2001, such as non-exist-ent Indonesian island Bunaka and Gaius Flavius Antoninus, supposed assassin of Julius Caesar. AFP

Santanu Pal speaking in Manchester, yesterday.

15INDIA WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Gandhi’s memorabilia

Anti-corruption activist Anna Hazare (right) and retired Army General V K Singh hold some of the personal memorabilia of Mahatma Gandhi in Mumbai, yesterday. They were auctioned in London on April 17, 2012 and purchased by Indian industrialist Kamal Morarka who handed them over to Hazare and his team.

Guru blames Delhi rape victim, sparks outrage NEW DELHI: A popular Indian spir-itual guru sparked a backlash yester-day after saying a 23-year-old student could have averted a murderous gang-rape by begging for mercy from her attackers.

Self-styled godman Asharam (pic-tured), known to his followers as “Bapu” or father, told his devotees that blame for the assault on a moving bus in New Delhi on December 16 should not just rest with her attackers.“This tragedy would not have happened if she had chanted God’s name and fallen at the feet of the attackers. The error was not committed by just one side,” he said in video footage which has been widely circulated on the Internet.

The 71-year-old’s remarks-the lat-est in a series of gaffes by public figures blaming women for the country’s rape epidemic-drew a chorus of condemna-tion. Ravi Shankar Prasad, spokesman for the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), said the statement was “deeply disturbing and painful”. “For him to make the statement in relation to a crime which has shocked the conscience of the country is not only unfortunate but deeply regrettable,” he told reporters.

The Hindu newspaper said it was “a disgrace when a man of religion stoops so low”. “Asharam deserves to be condemned in the strongest words,” the daily added in an editorial.

The editorial also criticised politicians from the ruling Congress party as well as the BJP for their sexist commentary on the Delhi rape and the need for Indian women to stay home and make tra-ditional choices. “Their notions of... an ideal society appear rooted in the very prejudices that have engendered a culture of violence against women, the Delhi incident being its most recent and horrific manifestation,” the newspaper said.

Abhijit Mukherjee, the son of India’s president who is a Congress lawmaker, landed himself in hot water last month after comparing women who took part in protests over the gang-rape to patched up second-hand cars. AFP

Two to plead not guilty in gang rape: Lawyer NEW DELHI: Two of the five men accused of gang-raping and murdering a 23-year-old woman in a moving bus in New Delhi last month will plead not guilty to all charges, a lawyer said yesterday.

“They will plead not guilty to all charges,” M L Sharma, who says he represents Mukesh Singh and Akshay Thakur, said. “Nothing has been proven yet.”

Mukesh Singh, who is the brother of the alleged bus driver Ram Singh, and labourer Thakur are two of the five charged with rape and murder over the December 16 attack on the young student, which has fuelled protest

demonstrations across the coun-try. A sixth accused, who is 17, is to be tried in a separate court for juveniles.

Officials at Tihar jail, the maxi-mum security prison where the accused are held, confirmed that Sharma had met the two defend-ants yesterday.

Prosecutors have said they have evidence of bloodstains linking the men to the attack. But the advocate said he would challenge the police over their handling of evidence, while refusing to give details.

The next hearing, to be held behind closed doors, has been scheduled for tomorrow when a

magistrate is expected to transfer the case for trial in a special fast-track court. It is not yet clear who will represent the three other defendants, all residents of New Delhi slums aged from 19 to 35.

A legal officer working at Delhi’s Juvenile Justice Board, who declined to give his name, said that the case of the sixth sus-pect would be heard on Tuesday, when his age would be clarified. “The age of the accused is not in proper order so the court asked the principal of (the) teenage accused’s school to come along with age-related documents of the minor,” he said.

The brutal attack on a medical

Another Delhi molestation; three arrested

NEW DELHI: Three men have been arrested for alleg-edly kidnapping, drugging and raping a woman here last week, police said yes-terday. Two more accused were still on the run.

“The incident occurred Jan 2 afternoon in Alipur area of north Delhi,” said a senior police officer.

Police said, the five men, all aged between 20 and 30, overpowered the 20-year-old victim, dragged her into their car, and took her to a house in Tikri Khurd area, where they drugged her and raped her in turns. They dumped her in a deserted area afterwards.

“Yogendra, Sunil Kumar and Rahul were arrested from Bakhtwarpur area on Monday after the woman lodged a complaint with the police,” said the police officer.

Two more accused- Jitender and Manoj-are on run, said the officer.

The woman told police that she knew Jitender, who lives near her house, for the past few months, and he had threatened her of dire con-sequences if she went to the police.

Western culture to blame for rapes: SP leader

MUMBAI: Samajwadi Party leader Abu Asim Azmi said yesterday that Western culture had ruined Indian culture and led to increasing atrocities on women including rapes.

“Young girls and women must not roam around with any men except their parents, brothers or husband,” Azmi said here. “Having boyfriends and girlfriends has become a fashion in cities. This is why incidence of rapes is higher in urban areas compared to rural parts of the country,” he added. Azmi endorsed RSS leader Mohan Bhagwat, who last week expressed similar sentiments.

Asked if he supported the RSS chief ’s views, Azmi said: “When he is saying is something right. I cannot say he is wrong. “If he calls the sun the sun or the moon the moon, I cannot say he is wrong just because of our political differences.”

Saying that “we are all proud of our Indian culture and values”, Azmi added that women in Rajasthan were always veiled. But when young women go out skimpily dressed, they attract atten-tion and face risks.

“Such nudity must be banned. The censor board must not clear movies having explicit scenes which embar-rass families watching them together.

“Women from rural India with knowledge of Indian cul-ture must be inducted into the censor board,” Azmi said.

IANS

AGARTALA: Denial of bail, lowering the juvenile age to 15 from 18 and imprisonment till death are among the key pro-posals made by the Left Front government in Tripura to curb crimes against women, a top official said here yesterday.

“The state cabinet headed by Chief Minister Manik Sarkar finalised proposals to be sent to the Justice Verma Commission. Denial of bail, lowering the juve-nile age to 15 from the existing 18, and imprisonment of the convict till death are among the major suggestions decided by the council of ministry,” Tripura Chief Secretary S K Panda told reporters.

Panda said the Tripura govern-ment has proposed tough laws and setting up of fast-track courts to deal with crimes against women.

“The probe relating to crimes against women has to be com-pleted within three months. During this period the accused

should not be given bail,” Panda said. The state government has also suggested banning adver-tisements that harm the image of women, introduce moral edu-cation in schools and colleges and massive awareness campaigns about safety, security and respect to women.

The central government has recently constituted a three-member committee of jurists -headed by former chief justice of India J S Verma-to give rec-ommendations on amending laws to provide speedier justice and enhanced punishment in sexual assault cases against women.

The Justice Verma Commission has sought suggestions from the state governments, the public in general, eminent jurists, legal professionals, NGOs and women’s groups on reviewing the existing laws to provide quicker justice and stringent punishment in cases of sexual assault.

IANS

Hearing to be held tomorrow behind closed doors

student and her boyfriend has stirred nationwide anger in India, with politicians and the victim’s family calling for the death pen-alty for the culprits.

The gang are accused of repeat-edly raping and violating the woman with an iron bar, causing horrific internal injuries.

Although gang rapes are com-monplace in India, the case has touched a nerve, leading to three

weeks of sweeping introspec-tion on the country’s attitudes to women, its often insensitive police force and dysfunctional justice system.

In a series of protests across cities, demonstrators condemned the recent surge in violence against women and the apparent lack of political will to address the country’s growing rape crisis.

AFP

Students shout slogans against spiritual guru Asharam during a protest in New Delhi, yesterday.

Tripura suggests stricter laws for crimes against women

MORNING BREAK16WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


SEOUL: South Korean pop icon Rain has been confined to barracks for a week, the defence ministry said yesterday, after his dating put him on the wrong side of the country’s strict mili-tary service rules.

“Under a decision by the dis-ciplinary commission of his unit, Rain will be confined to his bar-racks to spend seven days of repentance,” a defence ministry spokesman said.

The 30-year-old singer is a little over halfway through the two-year military service that is mandatory for all able-bodied South Korean men.

The country’s well-oiled celeb-rity gossip machine went into overdrive last week when it was confirmed that Rain had begun dating Kim Tae-Hee, 32, a TV drama star with a massive fol-lowing in Japan.

But fan excitement was tem-pered by questions over how the couple had managed numerous reported dates. During their mili-tary service men are given little free time, even for family visits.

“He breached regulations against having private meetings while on official duty,” the minis-try spokesman said.

The punishment was one of the lightest options open to the disci-plinary committee.

Rain, whose real name is Jung Ji-hoon, is one of the biggest names in the world of K-pop, which commands a huge follow-ing in South Korea, across much of Asia and beyond.

After tabloid pictures of his dates with Kim emerged, the defence ministry’s website was bombarded with messages calling for him to be disciplined.

Some suggested he be forced to repeat his military service like the Gangnam Style star Psy, who was made to serve twice after it emerged he had furthered his showbiz interests during his first stint. AFP

Korean pop icon made to ‘repent’ in barracks

JOHANNESBURG: David R Ellis, the child actor and former stuntman who went on to direct gory films, including Snakes on a Plane, has been found dead in a Johannesburg hotel.

Ellis, 60, was last seen alive in a restaurant on Saturday. His body was discovered in a bathroom by a hotel manager at the weekend. There was no indication of foul play or robbery, police said in a statement yesterday.

“It is unknown what was the cause of death,” South African police said.

Ellis was in South Africa shoot-ing a movie.

His 2006 film Snakes on a Plane about reptiles slithering through a jet inflicting gruesome deaths on passengers spawned numer-ous parodies, massive Internet hoopla and was one of the most heavily hyped films of the North American summer season.

The film’s star, Samuel L Jackson, threatened to quit when the studio considered changing the title, saying he had taken the job based on the name.

“So talented, so kind, such a Good Friend. He’ll be missed. Gone too soon!” Jackson tweeted yesterday.

Ellis also directed other B-list thrillers, including Shark Night and Cellular. REUTERS

Snakes on a Plane director dies in South Africa

David R Ellis

TEXAS: A dog found shot in the head and face with a pel-let gun, stuffed in a garbage bag and left to die is recovering from his injuries at an animal clinic in Texas. And it’s thanks, in part, to a Facebook cam-paign launched to help pay for his veterinary bills.

The bag containing the three-year-old male mixed breed was discovered tied to a fence in Conroe, Texas, earlier this month. When local residents opened the bag, the dog emerged, took a few steps and collapsed, according to the Montgomery County Police Reporter. The dog was covered in blood, said neighbour Tami Augustyn, leading her to believe he was a “bait dog”— or a dog used by fight dogs for practice.

Augustyn rushed the dog to an emergency animal clinic, where he was treated for multi-ple bird-shot pellets to the face, eyes, mouth, neck and shoulders, and hypothermia from being left outside overnight.

The pooch was stabilised, but according to Dr Ron Hendrick, a vet at the Animal Emergency Clinic of Conroe, pellets remain in both eyes and it’s unclear whether the dog — nicknamed Buck — was left permanently blind.

A Facebook page, Buck Needs Bucks for his Buckshot Injuries, launched last week by Augustyn

to help pay for the dog’s esti-mated $5,000 in medical bills, has attracted nearly 7,000 “likes” and, according to its creator, already more than enough donations to pay for his treatment.

“The last 24 hours has been overwhelming for me,” Augustyn wrote on the page.

“I have gone from not knowing if I would have enough money to pay for Buck’s emergency bill to having an unbelievable amount of money to provide THE BEST care possible for Buck’s recovery. I have thought long and hard about this today and how I should handle this. The conclusion is that I will be opening a separate bank account for Buck and all donations will channel thru that account and be used for Buck’s recovery and necessities.”

With the help of Facebook, Buck’s story quickly sparked international interest. (“The dog who wouldn’t die,” the UK’s Daily Mail proclaimed.)

Buck is now walking, Augustyn says, and an appointment with an ophthalmologist scheduled for today will determine what can be done about his vision.

Police in Montgomery County say they are investigating the incident, and Augustyn says she has been in contact with law enforcement officials about donating a reward for informa-tion leading to the arrest of the

person responsible. Sadly, cases like Buck’s are not uncommon, particularly in Texas.

In July, a small dog was discov-ered tortured in what the Dallas Morning News described as “one of the worst cases of animal cru-elty ever reported in the county.”

The pug mix — nicknamed Hope by her rescuers — was found near Weatherford, Texas, dehydrated, with her mouth sealed shut with electrical tape, tongue protruding and five large cuts that took more than 100 stitches to close. Hope was

later adopted by the family on whose ranch she was first spotted wandering.

And Hendrick told the paper he sees animals “wounded as badly as Buck about once a month.”

AGENCIES

‘Dog who wouldn’t die’ recovering after FB campaign

Buck with Tami Augustyn.

LONDON: British actress Kate Winslet’s husband won a court battle yesterday stopping The Sun newspaper from print-ing photographs of him “semi-naked” at a private fancy dress party several years ago.

Lawyers for Ned RocknRoll, 34, who married the Titanic star last month, argued that there was no public interest in the Sun publish-ing the pictures, that it would be a breach of his privacy and it could lead to Winslet’s children being bullied.

According to the Press

Association, the judge at London’s High Court ruled in favour of RocknRoll and ordered The Sun not to publish the pictures pend-ing any trial, adding that he would give the reasons for his decision at a later date.

“We have stopped The Sun from publishing semi-naked photos of Ned taken by a friend at a pri-vate 21st birthday party a few years ago,” the couple said in a statement.

“The photos are innocent but embarrassing and there is no reason to splash them across

a newspaper,” they added. “We recognise that in the Internet age privacy is harder and harder to maintain. But we will continue to do what we can, particularly to protect Kate’s children from the results of media intrusion.

“We refuse to accept that her career means our family can’t live a relatively normal life.”

Winslet, nominated for six Academy Awards, including the best actress honour she won for The Reader, has a son and a daughter and has been married twice before. REUTERS

Kate Winslet’s hubby wins UK photo court battle

Ned RocknRoll and Kate Winslet with children Mia and Joe.

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News in Numbers

GDP by Economic Activity Financial Services Indirectly Measured ( FISIM )

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Current Prices Y-O-Y Change Real Growth Rate

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WINDOW ON ECONOMIC ACTIVITY GDP- 12

Source : http://www.qsa.gov.qa/

FISIM at Current Prices (QRm)

FISIM at Constant 2004 Prices(QRm)

Current Prices Y-O-Y Change

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Wednesday 9 January 201327 Safar 1434

Volume 17Number 5574

Price: QR2

[email protected] | [email protected] Editorial: 44557741 | Advertising: 44557837 / 44557780www.thepeninsulaqatar.com

Business | 18

BY SATISH KANADY

DOHA: The Arab region must seriously re-look into its exist-ing system of offering subsidies to the utilities, leaders of the region’s two leading entities said yesterday.

Subsidies to the utilities are really weighing down on the economy of many Arab coun-tries. The subsidy to electricity alone is accounted for at least 50 percent of the total budget deficit of these countries, Fahad Hamad Al Mohannadi, General Manager of Qatar Electricity and Water Company (QEWC), said while addressing a session at the General Conference of Arab Union of Electricity and Exhibition here yesterday.

Given the proposed develop-ment plans lined up by some of the emerging Arab nations, the demand for electricity is expected to double for the next ten years, meaning the budget deficits of these countries are set to increase by 6 to 8 percent.

“The very low tariff rate being enjoyed by people living in huge villas will definitely have a major impact on the sustainability of the electricity sector in the long run. We need to encounter this. This conference must come out with a concrete proposal to scrap the existing subsidy system in the region in a phased manner, if not in a one strike”, he said.

“Subsidy to utilities is an evil. It’s equal to wasting precious resources,” Dr Hisham Khatib, Vice Chairman at the World

Arab region must rethink utilities subsidy: ExpertsDemand for electricity set to double in 10 years

Energy Council of Jordan and the Global Energy award laure-ate, told The Peninsula. Subsidies

to water and electricity are bringing in huge financial com-mitments to the governments. It is high time we to do away with this system.

“There is no two opinions on giving concessions to low income citizens. But it should be done in a way that the respective coun-tries make sure they are meeting at least the production cost.”

According to Dr Hisham, the estimated amount the region incurred due to the electricity subsidy in 2011 was almost dou-ble to the total investment in the electricity sector. He said the region allocated nearly $55bn to the subsidies in the electricity.

“The future of Arab’s electric-ity sector is based on the subsidy system. The region’s electricity sector needs holistic reforms. Some countries are giving 100 percent subsidies to the utilities. We need to have a rethink on it,” Dr Hisham said.

Dr Hisham who said that the world would continue to depend largely on fossil fuel for the next 50 years shared his concern whether the region was going a little bit hasty in developing the alternative energy sources.

He said the economic return on investments in the traditional fuels is too low compared to the returns on the investments in the alternative energy. The high level of humidity, incessant sand storms and ‘above 50 degree Celsius’ weather patterns are not ideal for massive investments in the solar energy, he said.

THE PENINSULA

Eng Fahad Hamad Al Mohannadi, General Manager, QEWC, during a session at the 4th General Conference of Arab Union of Electricity and Exhibition yesterday. BELOW: Dr Hisham Khatib. ABDUL BASIT

DOHA: The power trading from the GCC integrated grid has not picked up as expected, a top official said here yesterday.

Addressing a session at the ongoing Arab Union of Electricity Conference here yesterday, Ahmed Ali Al Ebraham, COO of GCC Interaction Authority (GCCIA), said the power trading between the member countries were taking place only on some emergency basis. The ‘unsched-uled exchanges’ of power is yet to pick up, he said.

There is still poor concept of trading of electricity between the member countries. We need to change this thinking and have to make power trading as part of daily market philosophy. High level of subsidies is another issue that is hitting the development of electricity market.

Currently, there exists a differ-ent type of regulatory frameworks in the region which typically does not address cross-border trade. There needs to be some kind of harmonization in the regulatory system. “We need to develop a uniform regulatory framework while maintaining the sovereignty of the member countries in terms of cross-border power trade from the grid”, he added.

Ahmed Ali said the member-countries need to develop a bet-ter transparency in the pricing too. As of now, the cross-border trade price is being fixed after negotiations. There need to be a floor price. Ideally, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia will each be able to export or import up to 1, 200MW electricity from the grid. Bahrain, Qatar and UAE will be able to trade 600MW, 750MW

and 900MW, respectively. Meanwhile, the Executive

Bureau of the Council of Arab Ministers of Electricity, which met here yesterday, discussed several issues pertaining to the region’s electricity sector, including the proposed Arab electricity grid. The Executive Bureau took a number of key decisions on the Arab grid and the process of implementation, QNA quoted H E Dr Mohammed bin Saleh Al Sada, Minister of Energy and Industry, as saying.

On the grid interconnection, the meeting reviewed details of the project and appointed legal consultant to develop the legal reference for the project. The meeting also called for a greater cooperation among the Arab states for accelerating its renew-able energy sector production.

THE PENINSULA

Power trade yet to pick up from GCC grid, says official

Prof Dr Abdelmajid Mahjoub, Director General of the Arab Atomic Energy Agency (AAEA)-Tunisia, speaking on the second day of 4th General Conference of Arab Union of Electricity and Exhibition yesterday. ABDUL BASIT

BY MOHAMMAD SHOEB

DOHA: Battling severe eco-nomic hardships, Egypt’s Islamist government wants local private players to play a major role in narrowing down the yawning gap between energy supplies and demand, says a vis-iting official from a key Egypt-based investment company.

Taking advantage of the gov-ernment’s encouragement of the private sector, Egypt’s Citadel Capital has in fact formed a joint venture with Qatar’s QInvest that would soon bid for contracts to import liquefied natural gas (LNG) into Egypt.

And, the joint venture, which is

yet to be named, is to begin bid-ding as soon as the coming Sunday (January 13) to bring additional gas on the Egyptian market, especially, for the industries, said Mohamed Shoeib (pictured), Managing Director of Energy Division at Citadel Capital. Shoeib is here to attend the ongoing 4th General Conference of Arab Union of Electricity and Exhibition.

Egypt’s energy portfolio is dif-ferent from Europe and other countries. Over 90 percent of its electricity is generated in thermal power plants which are mainly fed on gas and fuel oil.

According to Shoeib, the country witnesses a high level of demand and supply deficit during summer

season. Aiming to overcome the demand and supply gap of energy, the post-Mubarak government is encouraging and inviting private companies in a big way to play a significant role for the regasifica-tion of the domestic industry.

The leading private equity firm Citadel Capital (49 percent) formed a joint venture with QInvest (51 percent) as well as other Qatari investors to import liquefied natural gas (LNG) into Egypt from mid-2013.

Citadel Capital is a leading investment company in Africa and the Middle East with about $9.5bn in investments. The firm participated in the conference to discuss investment opportunities

in the regional energy sector. It will construct and own the facilities required to position a floating LNG storage and regasification unit to deliver natural gas to high-volume end-users in the local market.

Asked to comment about the estimated investment cost of the joint venture, Shoeib declined to give further details about the project. Keeping in mind the depleting nature of fossil fuel energy, he highlighted the need for an integrated approach to the region’s energy problems. He also discussed the ‘triple combo’ fundraising strategy targeting Development Finance Institutions, Sovereign Wealth Funds and Export Credit Agencies.

Shoeib was here to moderate a panel on the role and benefits of private capital in the power and alternative energy sectors in the region, with some of the top-ics discussed including the gen-eral financing requirements for such projects and the institutions involved in financing them.

“Despite the GCC account-ing for around 54 percent of the world’s conventional oil reserves and around 40 percent of global natural gas reserves, the inevi-tability of our one day reaching a ‘peak oil’ stage is undeniable, making the search for renewable and alternative energy solutions a particularly pressing issue for our generation as we seek an optimal

DOHA: Enterprise Qatar (EQ), the state’s entrepreneurial support body, yesterday announced the first Government Procure-ment and Contracting Programme (GPCP). The ground-breaking initiative is expected to trans-form the fortunes of Qatari small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) by drastically improv-ing their ability to win business through tenders.

The GPCP has been designed specifically to fit the needs of the Qatari SME and entrepreneurial ecosystem, making use of find-ings from EQ’s SME Think-Tank

Seminar, which was held for the first time on May 17, 2012. At the seminar, EQ invited clients and partners to discuss the challenges facing SMEs in Qatar when access-ing government tenders, and iden-tified potential solutions that can be delivered by EQ in cooperation with its strategic partners.

Noora Al Mannai, CEO of Enterprise Qatar, added that difficulties in competing in the tendering process are one of the biggest challenges facing SMEs in Qatar today. “Having surveyed the needs and challenges of over 200 SMEs in Qatar, we can say

with great certainty that com-peting for tenders represents one of the biggest barriers to growth,” she said.

“At EQ our mission is to sup-port entrepreneurs and SMEs turn their ambitions into reality, by opti-mising their performance and min-imising the risks where possible. We have designed the Government Procurement and Contracting Program meticulously to ensure that SMEs come away with a firm understanding of best practice in the area of procurement, enhanced knowledge of the requirements of major buyers in the market, and

develop new contacts with buy-ers. Armed with these contacts and knowledge, we expect SMEs to win more business and be more competitive,” she added.

The GPCP was developed follow-ing a number of meetings with gov-ernmental and semi-governmental entities and large private sector corporations. GPCP comprised of 11 projects that are classified into four main areas: Enabling SMEs Business Environment; Business Linkage Facilitation; Business Development Services; and facili-tate Access to Finance.

THE PENINSULA

Enterprise Qatar announces GPCP initiative

Qatar-Egypt venture to bid for LNG import contracts

balance between conventional and renewable sources of energy,” added Shoeib.

According to him, an inte-grated approach from a multi-plicity of sources along the value chain — upstream, midstream and downstream — stretching from petroleum to electricity to renewables is required in order to come up with a solution that truly tackles the energy problems that the region faces today.

THE PENINSULA

DOHA: The regulator of the Qatari bourse has slapped deter-ring fines on three listed entities, including the popular con-sumer cooperative chain Al Meera.

A press statement issued by the Qatar Financial Market Authority (QFMA) which regulates Qatar Exchange (QE) said yesterday that Al Meera has been fined QR200,000, while Qatar Securities Company, QR300,000.

The third listed company that has been penalised is Dlala Holding. It has been fined QR100,000, Al Sharq reported yes-terday but said the QFMA statement did not give any reasons for slapping the fines.

The decision to penalise the companies was taken by the Accounting Committee at the QFMA. The companies have been notified and asked to submit grievances, if any. THE PENINSULA

Qatar bourse regulator slaps fine on three firms

18 BUSINESSWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


IMPORTANT NOTE: Published by HSBC Bank Middle East Limited, P O Box 57, Doha, Qatar which is licensed and regulated by Qatar Central Bank and Jersey Financial Services Commission. Information quoted is from publicly available sources or proprietary data and subject to change. HSBC accepts no liability for any loss or damage arising out of the use of all or part of this material. This information is general and does not take into account individual circumstances, objectives or needs. The price of bonds can and does fluctuate. The secondary market for bonds may not provide significant liquidity or may trade based on prevailing market conditions. Past performance is not a reliable indicator of future performance. You should consider these matters and consult your financial advisor prior to making any investment decisions.

*Periodic Distribution Amount

QATARI MARKETBond Coupon Maturity Currency Mid-Price Yield Moody’s S&P

Qatar Govt 5.15% 4/9/2014 USD 105.38 0.80 % Aa2 AA








Qatari Diar 3.5% 7/21/2015 USD 105.25 1.39 % Aa2 AA

Qatari Diar 5% 7/21/2020 USD 117.00 2.51 % Aa2 AA

Comqat 5% 11/18/2014 USD 106.00 1.71 % A1 A-

Comqat 3.375% 4/11/2017 USD 104.31 2.31 % A1 A-

QIB 3.856% 10/7/2015 USD 104.63 2.11 % NR NR

QNB 3.125% 11/16/2015 USD 103.50 1.86 % Aa3 A+

QNB 3.375% 2/22/2017 USD 104.81 2.15 % Aa3 A+

Doha Bank 3.5% 3/14/2017 USD 104.19 2.44 % A2 A-

Qtel 3.375% 10/14/2016 USD 105.38 1.89 % A2 A

Qtel 7.875% 6/10/2019 USD 130.69 2.65 % A2 A

Qtel 4.75% 2/16/2021 USD 112.88 2.95 % A2 A

Qtel 5% 10/19/2025 USD 113.25 3.69 % A2 A

Rasgas 5.5% 9/30/2014 USD 107.50 1.08 % Aa3 A

Rasgas 5.832% 9/30/2016 USD 109.50 3.11 % Aa3 A

Rasgas 5.298% 9/30/2020 USD 112.50 3.44 % Aa3 A

SOVEREIGNSBond PDA* Maturity Currency Mid-Price Yield Moody’s S&P

Abu Dhabi Govt 5.5% 4/8/2014 USD 106.00 0.64 % Aa2 AA

Abu Dhabi Govt 6.75% 4/8/2019 USD 129.25 1.78 % Aa2 AA

Dubai Govt 6.7% 10/5/2015 USD 111.13 2.47 % NR NR




Qatar Govt 4% 1/20/2015 USD 105.50 1.25 % Aa2 AA

Bahrain Govt 6.273% 11/22/2018 USD 115.13 3.41 % NR BBB

Bahrain Govt 5.5% 3/31/2020 USD 108.38 4.15 % NR BBB

Egypt Govt 5.75% 4/29/2020 USD 100.50 5.66 % B2 B-

Morocco Govt 4.5% 10/5/2020 EUR 104.63 3.80 % NR BBB-

DOHA: Audi Qatar, represented by Q-Auto, announced an ambi-tious development plan for the brand with the four rings in Qatar. New 20-work bay service facilities that are fully compliant with global Audi standards will be opened this year. A state-of-the-art Audi showroom will also be opened within a year.

“Our focus is on after sales service. The new Audi service facilities will be equipped with the latest technologies and manned by Audi trained technicians in order to provide our customers with a true Audi experience. Further details will be announced at the Qatar Motor Show.”

Q-Auto also announced a New Year promotion on all 2013 Audi models. The offer gives buyers up to 12 months deferred first pay-ment, five years warranty, main-tenance, service and consumables exchange as well as round-the-clock roadside assistance.

The promotion began on January 6 and runs until Jaunary 31. Q-Auto’s General Sales and Marketing Manager Mohamed El Talkhawi said: “Owning an Audi

Q-Auto unveils Audi promotion, development plans

has never been easier. Our aim is to demonstrate our commitment to providing Audi’s fans in Qatar with

an unrivalled experience from the minute they decide to buy an Audi.”

Q-Auto was chosen as the

official dealer for Audi in Qatar following a tender by Audi Volkswagen Middle East FZE.

DOHA: Qatar Exchange was down 12.91 points or 0.15 percent to 8,656.11 points yesterday from the previous closing of 8,669.02. Among the top losers were Industries Qatar whose share dropped 1.20 percent to QR164, Barwa Real Estate lost 0.89 per-cent to QR27.90, Doha Insurance fell 0.90 percent to Q27.50 and Gulf International was down 1.10 percent to QR31.45.

The banking and financial sector dropped 0.04 points, the insurance sector was down 0.14 points, the industrial sector lost 0.60 points and the services sector added 0.07 points.

Meanwhile, an initial merger agreement between Abu Dhabi’s top two developers yesterday added fuel to a rally on UAE bourses driven by bets of strong fourth-quarter earnings, while other regional markets also rose.

Shares in Aldar Properties and Sorouh Real Estate jumped 6.4 and 7.2 percent respectively after sources familiar with the

matter told Reuters that the pair had reached an initial agreement to create a combined entity with assets worth more than $15bn. The number of shares changing hands in Abu Dhabi surged to 195 million, the highest daily volume since March 2012.

Abu Dhabi’s index climbed 0.6 percent to its highest finish since July 2011. “The merger report boosted the retail investor sen-timent to be more aggressive in other stocks as well,” Marwan Shurrab, vice-president and chief trader at Gulfmena Investments, said. “People are positioning themselves in anticipation of growth in 2013, as well as strong Q4 results and dividends.”

Dubai’s measure hit a 10-month high, rising 2.1 percent. Volumes also surged to 346 million, the most shares traded in one ses-sion since April last year. Builder Arabtec jumped 5.3 percent after winning a $653m contract to con-struct the Abu Dhabi branch of France’s Louvre museum, while

Emaar Properties climbed 3 per-cent. Small-caps dominated trade though, with Gulf Navigation and Deyaar Development advancing 4.2 and 4.3 percent respectively.

In Cairo, the bourse extended gains to touch a 10-week high as investors bet on an improv-ing economy. A senior IMF offi-cial met Egypt’s government on Monday to discuss a vital $4.8bn loan as the Islamist-led state bat-tles to contain a currency crisis set off by political turmoil that is depleting its foreign reserves.

IMF said it is committed to supporting Egypt and the country expects a visit from an IMF technical committee in two-three weeks, a presidential spokesperson said. “The senti-ment is quite positive - the IMF news is a catalyst and a new con-stitution is in place so the politi-cal scene is more stable than last year,” said Mohamed Radwan, director of international sales at Pharos Securities. “Some are betting it can again give a

positive performance.”The benchmark index rose

1.2 percent in its sixth straight gain. It advanced a whopping 50.8 percent in 2012, the best per-forming market among regional peers. Commercial International Bank and Orascom Construction Industries gained 3 and 1.5 per-cent respectively. Palm Hills Development rose 4.3 percent and Egyptian Resorts jumped 7.2 percent.

Elsewhere, Saudi Arabia’s index gained 0.6 percent to a near 16-week high. Banks lent sup-port after Banque Saudi Fransi (BSF) beat local analysts’ esti-mates with a 22.2 percent jump in fourth-quarter net profit. “The +39 percent year-on-year growth in non-lending income was a key driver of the earnings beat,” Riyad Capital said in a note, add-ing benign non-performing loans, rising asset yields and further loan growth would help BSF’s performance in 2013. The bank’s shares gained 3.7 percent, while

the wider banking index advanced 1.9 percent.

Shares in developer Dar Al Arkan dropped 6.1 percent after the company said its fourth-quar-ter net profit halved year-on-year as finance costs rose and property sales generated lower margins. Net profit for the final three months of 2012 was SR144m ($38.4m).

HIGHLIGHTSABU DHABI: The index climbed

0.6 percent to 2,723 points.DUBAI: The index rose 2.1 per-

cent to 1,728 points.EGYPT: The index rose 1.2 per-

cent to 5,804 points.SAUDI ARABIA: The index

gained 0.6 percent to 7,053 points.QATAR: The index slipped 0.2

percent to 8,656 points.KUWAIT: The index gained 0.4

percent to 6,043 points.OMAN: The index advanced

0.2 percent to 5,779 points.BAHRAIN: The index climbed

1 percent to 1,066 points.REUTERS

Qatar Exchange down 0.15pc; most Gulf markets rise

BRUSSELS: European unem-ployment has hit an unaccept-able high, as one national leader put it yesterday, with dire figures in Spain highlighting a growing north-south divide that experts warn will only get worse.

The unemployment rate across the troubled 17-nation eurozone hit 11.8 percent in November, up from 11.7 percent in October, with the number of people out of work in the single currency area now nudging 19 million.

The 19th rise in a row for the eurozone, home to some 330 million people, represented an increase of more than two mil-lion on the dole compared with a year ago, according to data pub-lished by the EU statistics service Eurostat.

London-based IHS Global Insight analyst Howard Archer calculated the cumulative increase since April 2011 as 3.278m after another 113,000 people lost their jobs.

“The only crumb of comfort was that this was the smallest rise since August, although it did follow a particularly sharp rise of 220,000 in October,” Archer noted, before adding that he expected the jobless rate to “move clearly above 12 percent during 2013.”

The jobless numbers exceeded 26m for the first time across the full 27-member European Union, which includes Britain and Poland, but the EU as a whole posted an unchanged unemploy-ment rate of 10.7 percent.

Such levels are “completely unacceptable,” said Irish Prime Minister Enda Kenny, who cur-rently holds the EU’s rotating pres-idency, during a visit to Germany.

Eurostat figures showed that more jobs were lost over the past year in the eurozone, at 2.015m, than in the 27-member EU, where the number was slightly lower at 2.012m.

Hit by a property market bust and riddled with bad debt in its banks, Spain recorded the high-est unemployment rate of all European countries — at 26.6 percent, worse even than bailed-out Greece. Among under-25s, both those countries reported unemployment rates that hovered around 57 percent.

AFP

LONDON: European stock markets closed mixed but mostly lower yesterday as inves-tors digested company news and were cautious ahead of US alu-minium giant Alcoa kicking off the quarterly earnings season.

London’s FTSE 100 index of leading companies slid 0.18 percent to 6,053.63 points and Frankfurt’s DAX 30 dropped 0.48 percent to 7,695.83 points, while in Paris the CAC 40 edged up 0.03 percent to 3,705.88 points.

The European single cur-rency fell to $1.3074, compared with $1.3115 late in New York on Monday. And on the London Bullion Market, gold prices firmed to $1,656 per ounce, from $1,645.25.

“There is an element of cau-tion in the markets ... with Alcoa to kick of the reporting season tonight,” said analyst Craig Erlam at trading group Alcoa. With the US fiscal crisis out of the way until talks next month on raising the country’s borrowing limit and cutting spending, eyes are now on the upcoming earnings season.

European indicators gave little sense of direction. The unemploy-ment rate in the eurozone hit a record 11.8 percent in November, as expected, but eurozone and EU retail sales edged up in November and economic confidence improved in December. Trader Alex Young at CMC Markets UK said “it seems that sitting on ones hands for now is the preferred option until companies start to give a clearer idea of what their forward guidance is likely to be...”

In London, global miner Anglo American named AngloGold Ashanti boss Mark Cutifani as its new chief executive to succeed Cynthia Carroll with effect from April. Australian Cutifani, 54, has been chief executive officer of South Africa-based gold producer AngloGold Ashanti since 2007, during which time he has led a major restructuring of the busi-ness. Anglo’s share price surged 1.4 percent to 2,028 pence.

Air France-KLM airline reported that firm business in Europe and Asia had enabled it

to increase passenger traffic by 2.1 percent last year but also revealed that freight traffic fell by 6.3 per-cent. In response, Air France-KLM shares fell by 2.2 percent to 7.76 euros in Paris trade.

US stocks moved lower with the Dow Jones Industrial Average down 0.53 percent to 13,313.66 points in midday trading. The broad-based S&P 500 fell 0.52 percent to 1,454.34, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.55 percent to 3,081.62 points.

Asian equity markets retreated, following overnight losses in New York, as dealers took profits from recent advances. Tokyo was also weighed by a rise in the yen, which has suffered heavy selling in recent weeks, while the South Korean bourse slipped on disap-pointment over the latest earn-ings guidance from Samsung Electronics. Hong Kong stocks lost 0.94 percent, Seoul was 0.66 percent lower, Shanghai fell 0.41 percent, Sydney dipped 0.57 per-cent and Tokyo slid 0.86 percent.

AFP

European indices mixedEuro falls to $1.3074; gold prices firm up

LONDON: Egypt’s currency crisis has intensified its oil supply troubles, as the weaker pound makes it more difficult for cash-strapped Cairo to buy vital crude for its refineries.

State-owned Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation (EGPC) has only purchased 3 million barrels of crude oil for the first quarter of this year, half of what it was seeking in a tender, trad-ers said. That tender was already considered insufficient to supply Egypt’s refineries, even at reduced

running rates. EGPC officials could not be reached for com-ment. Egypt subsidises fuel costs heavily, spending around a fifth of its GDP on making fuel more affordable to the population.

EGPC has been trying to miti-gate the cost of subsidies by buy-ing more refined oil products instead of expensive crude oil feedstock, but is hard pressed to meet its needs. Egypt has not bought any crude for January and on top of this, its December deliveries will arrive late.

J P Morgan sold 2 million barrels to EGPC via its fourth quarter tender but the company has yet to complete the delivery, the trader said. The B Elephant tanker has been waiting to dis-charge in the Red Sea since December 24, as seen on Reuters AIS Live ship tracking, after load-ing crude in Oman. “J P Morgan’s vessel has been waiting for more than two weeks,” one seller said. “No letter of credit.”

Egypt already pays hefty pre-miums for its fuel deliveries to

cover sellers’ rising costs for dealing with it. Currency deval-uation is amplifying the situa-tion as it makes buying crude oil priced in dollars even more expensive.

The Egyptian pound has lost more than a tenth of its value, since the 2011 revolution and 4.6 percent of its value since end December alone. Demand for refined oil products such as petrol and diesel is rising due to popula-tion growth.

REUTERS

Egypt struggles to buy oil as currency crisis deepens

Nearly 19 millionwithout jobs in the eurozone

Investors talk under a display board showing Spanish IBEX 35 index average at Madrid’s Stock Market in Madrid yesterday.

Boat show

A heavy-load transporter transports the British yacht Princess 98’ MY in Duesseldorf, Germany. It is the largest yacht to be exhibited at a boat show which starts on January 19 and ends on January 27.

19BUSINESS WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


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LONDON: Kurdistan has begun to export crude oil directly to world markets through Turkey, posing the biggest challenge yet to Baghdad’s claim to full control over Iraqi oil.

The export of crude, in addition to small volumes of niche conden-sate, demonstrates the autono-mous region’s growing frustration with Baghdad as it moves towards ever greater economic independ-ence, industry sources said.

Iraqi officials in Baghdad said the trade of Kurdish oil, which they view as illegal, would make it more difficult to reach a deal on pay-ments to oil companies operating in the northern region, which the central government has delayed.

The volume of Kurdish oil involved is small, but industry sources said the direct export is highly symbolic as the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG)

seeks more financial autonomy.The first crude has been deliv-

ered by truck to the Turkish port of Mersin on the Mediterranean. “The KRG gave us permission to start crude exports from the Taq Taq oilfield,” Genel Energy President Mehmet Sepil said.

But Baghdad insists that it has the sole right to export. “If the Kurdistan Regional Government insists on moving in the wrong direction, even by bartering crude without legal approval, this will worsen the situation and make it more difficult to reach an agree-ment,” a senior Iraqi oil official said.

Oil is at the heart of a deep-ening rift between Baghdad and Kurdistan that threatens to undermine the country’s uneasy federal union just a year after the last American troops left.

The KRG halted exports through the Baghdad-controlled

Iraq-Turkey pipeline last month due to the renewed payment dis-pute. And a KRG source said the crude trade through Turkey was likely to keep going.

“Crude is a new component in the KRG’s ongoing barter deal with Turkey, and it’s likely to continue because Baghdad is not paying as agreed, nor is it supplying the KRG with suffi-cient refined products,” the KRG source said.

“So the trade is part of our 17 percent entitlement to refined products, and the contractors will be able to earn their share as well, according to their contracts.” An agreement with Baghdad enti-tles Kurdistan to 17 percent of oil products refined in Iraq, the KRG source said.

Oil shipments from Kurdistan are unlikely to resume through the federal pipeline system, with

Kurdish and Iraqi Arab officials increasingly at odds over oil pol-icy and autonomy, officials and sources said.

Kurdish and Iraqi officials said negotiations to resolve the dispute are at a stalemate. “No date has been set for a meeting between Kurdish regional officials and Iraqi oil officials to discuss pay-ments and export issues. I think the current political crisis is preventing a date being set for a meeting,” an Iraqi oil official said.

The KRG began exporting its own very light oil, or condensate, independently to world markets in October by truck to a Turkish port, where it was sold via an intermediary.

A fresh cargo of condensate is also ready to sell through an imminent tender, a shipping source said. Industry sources reckon around 15,000 barrels per

day (b/d) of condensate from the Khor Mor gas field are reaching the Toros terminal in Turkey. Just added crude oil exports from Taq Taq, for now, are also small. In exchange, Turkey is sending back refined products to the Kurdish region, which is short of fuel.

Over the past year-and-a-half, Kurdistan has upset Baghdad by signing deals with oil majors such as ExxonMobil and Chevron, pro-viding lucrative production-shar-ing contracts and better operating conditions than in Iraq’s south.

The KRG says its right to grant contracts to foreign oil firms is enshrined in the Iraqi constitu-tion, drawn up following the 2003 invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein. But payments to foreign operators in Kurdistan are caught up in the long-running spat over land and petroleum rights.

Baghdad said last month it

would not pay oil firms operating in Kurdistan because the region had failed to export the volume of crude it pledged under a deal struck in September.

That agreement stipulated that Kurdistan would pump crude through the Baghdad-controlled Iraq-Turkey pipeline in return for payment. An export target of 200,000 b/d was set for the last two months of 2012, and Kurdish authorities pledged to raise exports to 250,000 b/d in 2013.

But exports of Kurdish oil have been halted since around mid-December, after nearing the 200,000 target early in the month. Baghdad transferred an initial sum of 650bn Iraqi dinars ($560m) to the KRG. But a second payment is still pend-ing for the foreign companies in Kurdistan.

REUTERS

Kurdistan starts independent crude oil exportsFirst supply from Taq Taq oilfield reaches Turkish port; Baghdad says ‘illegal’ trade will complicate payment efforts

DUBAI: Airlines in Iran have seven days to repay more than $200m in debts they owe to the oil ministry for fuel or face being grounded, a senior official was quoted as saying yesterday.

Several airlines have amassed large debts due to the pressure of successive fuel price increases and the loss of access to govern-ment-subsidised foreign cur-rency exchange rates which has resulted in a sharp rise in spare parts costs.

The demand for payment comes amid continued economic pres-sure from sanctions over Iran’s disputed nuclear programme which have more than halved its revenue from crude oil sales.

“Based on meetings with offi-cials from the Civil Aviation Organisation, it was agreed that all airline companies have seven days to clear their debts to the National Oil Refining and Distribution com-pany,” Mehr news agency reported deputy oil minister Alireza Zeighami as saying.

He admonished airline com-panies for not taking the oppor-tunity to address the issue in recent meetings with state offi-cials. The total amount of pay-ments outstanding amounted to more than $200m, two-thirds of which was owed by domestic carriers, he added.

Zeighami did not say which companies were in debt but Iranian media have reported that they include Mahan, Aseman and Zagros airlines. The cost of fuel domestically has risen seven-fold since mid-2011 after the govern-ment launched a programme to withdraw generous subsidies.

In September 2012 the gov-ernment withdrew the airlines’ access to a preferential rate for foreign currency as part of a drive to reduce state spending.

As a result, airlines have been forced to raise ticket prices. In November last year national car-rier Iran Air nearly doubled prices to international destinations after facing soaring costs due to the slump in the value of the rial.

Finding spare parts continues to be a challenge for carriers, which are prevented by sanctions from making purchases directly from manufacturers Boeing and Airbus. REUTERS

ISTANBUL: Banks are contin-uing to exchange gold in Turkey, despite US pressure over the country’s booming gold-for-gas trade with Tehran, which helps Iran cope with sanctions, bank-ers said yesterday.

Gold exports from Turkey to Iran jumped to $6.5bn in the first 11 months of 2012 from just $54m for all of 2011, as the United States tightened sanctions over Iran’s disputed nuclear programme.

Turkey is Iran’s biggest natu-ral gas customer, but Western sanctions prevent it from paying Tehran in dollars or euros. Iran is instead paid in Turkish lira — of limited value on international markets but ideal for buying gold in Turkey.

While the shipments are not in breach of existing Western sanc-tions, they have helped Tehran to manage its finances despite being largely frozen out of the global banking system.

The US State Department said

in December that US diplomats were in talks with Ankara over the flow of gold to Iran after the US Senate approved expanded sanctions on global trade with Iran’s energy and shipping sec-tors in November that would also restrict trade in precious metals.

One senior US official said at the time that the new sanctions, which have yet to take effect, would end “Turkey’s game of gold for natural gas”.

“We continue our business as usual,” a senior foreign banker said of his bank’s gold trad-ing activities in Turkey. “We’re always careful in transactions if we have doubts about the source of the money or the identity of the customer; however, we have not faced any extra ban with regard to gold transactions,” he said.

Washington believes gold sales to Iran have provided a financial lifeline to a government under the choke of sanctions. Turkish Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan

said last week that the gold sales to Tehran would continue, saying the trade was carried out entirely by the private sector rather than between states and was not sub-ject to sanctions.

Couriers carrying millions of dollars worth of gold bullion in their luggage have been flying from Istanbul to Dubai, where the gold is shipped to Iran, industry sources said. Turkish bankers said the trade with Iran was not being handled through them and that it was business as usual for their gold trading desks.

Interbank gold trading is not particularly common among Turkish banks, though lenders usually swap dollars for gold as the central bank allows them to keep a portion of their forex reserve requirements in gold.

Turkey buys more than 90 percent of Tehran’s gas exports — about 10bn cubic metres a year — under a 25-year supply deal.

REUTERS

LONDON: Fragile economies and extreme weather have combined to crank up the glo-bal risk dial in the past year, creating an increasingly dangerous mix, according to the World Economic Forum.

Despite Europe’s avoidance of a euro break-up in 2012 and the United States stepping back from its fiscal cliff, business leaders and academics fear politicians are failing to address fundamental problems.

That is the conclusion of the group’s Global Risks 2013 report, which surveyed more than 1,000 experts and industry bosses and found they were slightly more pessimistic about the outlook for the decade ahead than a year ago.

“It reflects a loss of confidence in leadership from governments,” said Lee Howell, the WEF managing director responsible for the report.

Severe wealth gaps and unsustainable gov-ernment finances were seen as the biggest economic threats facing the world, as they were last January. The 80-page analysis of 50 risks for the next 10 years comes ahead of the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) annual meeting in the Swiss ski resort of Davos from January 23 to 27, where the rich and powerful will ponder the planet’s future.

Bringing together business leaders, politi-cians and central bankers, Davos has come to symbolise the modern globalised world dominated by successful multinational cor-porations. Chief executives arriving on their private jets may still ooze confidence but “Davos man” — and most delegates are male — has plenty to worry about these days. “Most of the risks have gone in the wrong direction

in the past year,” Howell said yesterday.On the economic front, eurozone instability

will continue to shape global prospects in the coming years and the “associated risk of sys-temic financial failure, although limited, can-not be completely discarded,” the report said.

Concerns about rising greenhouse gas emissions have grown notably in the past 12 months. The issue is ranked as the third big-gest worry overall, while failure to adapt to climate change is viewed as the biggest single environmental hazard.

This year’s Davos meeting takes as its theme “resilient dynamism”, in recognition of the need for governments and businesses to develop strategies to ensure critical systems continue to function in the face of such threats.

REUTERS

DUBAI: Abu Dhabi’s two big-gest real estate developers have reached an initial agreement to merge via a share swap, with a final deal expected to be signed in the coming weeks, sources familiar with the matter said.

Aldar Properties and Sorouh Real Estate have a combined market capitalisation of about Dh10bn ($2.7bn), which would make the proposed merger one of the biggest conducted by listed firms in the Middle East.

The merger would create a state-backed company with com-bined assets worth nearly $15bn, and could help to repair Abu Dhabi’s weak real estate market by ensuring better coordination of new property developments.

With the support of the Abu Dhabi government, which owns a major stake in Aldar, manage-ments of the two companies have held discussions for nearly a year on asset valuations, financial terms and the new management structure, the sources said.

SHARE SWAPThe merger will be based on a

share swap and will not involve a cash payment, two sources said. The terms of the share swap could not be confirmed. Aldar and Sorouh declined to comment.

“The deal had the blessing of the state from the beginning but it was always a matter of getting an agreement on the valuation,” said a senior banking source.

“A lot of permutations and combinations were put forward and there was involvement from the highest authorities when it looked like things were getting out of hand.”

Shares in both companies rose sharply in response to news of the initial merger agreement, although it is not clear whether the deal will be beneficial to investors in both; that will depend on the ratio of the share swap. Aldar shares jumped 10.7 percent and Sorouh surged 13.7 percent.

Mergers among companies in the Gulf are not common as shareholders, who are often powerful local families, tend to demand high valuations and are reluctant to cede control.

A planned merger between Dubai’s largest developer, Emaar Properties, and the property unit of conglomerate Dubai Holding at the peak of the emirate’s real estate crisis in 2009 was ulti-mately called off.

Abu Dhabi’s intention to merge Aldar and Sorouh was first announced last March, as the emirate conducted a review of its economy in the wake of the global financial crisis.

PROTERTY PRICES FALLReal estate prices in the emir-

ate have tumbled over 50 percent in the last few years following the 2008 global financial cri-sis and because of oversupply of new properties. This has forced some firms to cancel projects and restructure their debts.

Aldar — the larger company, which built the Yas Marina Formula One Circuit, home to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix — said in November that it had written down Dh737m of assets, mainly related to hotels.

It has received $10bn in res-cue funds from the Abu Dhabi government, equivalent to the amount which Abu Dhabi lent Dubai to rescue it from a debt crisis in 2009. In return, land on Al Raha beach, the Ferrari World Theme Park, and other key assets, were sold by Aldar to the government.

Smaller Sorouh, which has assets of Dh14.1bn, has fared slightly better.

The companies established a steering committee for the merger, comprising banks, advi-sors and managements of both companies, in March last year.

Goldman Sachs and National Bank of Abu Dhabi advised the committee. Credit Suisse is advising Aldar while Morgan Stanley is working with Sorouh. Ernst & Young provided accounting advice to the steer-ing committee while property consultants Jones Lang LaSalle helped with valuations.

A new management structure has been agreed upon with some senior executives and other offi-cials expected to be laid off, one source said.

REUTERS

Aldar, Sorouh reachinitial merger deal

Iran tells airlines to pay debts or face grounding

Banks continue Turkey gold trade despite Iran connection

Income disparity, govt debts top WEF risk list

20 BUSINESS VIEWSWEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Doom scenario far-fetched but eurozone gloom to deepenBY ALAN WHEATLEY

IT WOULD be fair to say that US hedge-fund man-ager Kyle Bass does not expect the explosion in glo-bal debt in recent years to

turn out well.“This ends through war,” Bass,

the founder of Hayman Capital Management in Dallas, said. “I don’t know who’s going to fight who, but I’m fairly certain that in the next few years you will see wars erupt, and not just small ones,” he told a recent conference.

But while many investors have, like Bass, bet heavily on chaotic sovereign default in countries such as Greece, three years of dogged diplomacy in Europe have so far wrong-footed the doom-sayers.

And while some popular pro-tests have erupted into violence, notably in Greece, the mystery for many analysts is why Europeans have not fought harder against escalating job losses, social spending cuts and tax rises. Unemployment in Greece and Spain has reached 25 percent.

Bass bases his apocalyptic view

on his calculation that credit mar-ket debt has reached 340 percent of global output, saying the world has never lived in peacetime with such a burden.

He says some societies will not withstand the social strain when trillions of dollars of debt have to be restructured, inflicting hefty losses on millions of investors.

War in the eurozone — which Bass does not expect to survive in its present form, if at all — looks far-fetched, to put it mildly.

Europe’s political elite demon-strated in 2012 its determination to preserve the euro. Prophecies that doom has merely been delayed could well prove yet again to be wide of the mark.

But it is reasonable to ask how much those caught in the cross-fire between creditors and debtors will stand for as the euro’s battle for survival drags on.

Take Portugal, now into the third year of recession, where the president has asked the Constitutional Court to rule on the legality of unprecedented tax increases.

Adelino Maltez, a political scientist at Lisbon Technical

University, said Portugal “got drunk on Europe” during the boom years. “Now for the first time we have the feeling that we have nowhere to go,” he said. “For 2013 the Portuguese lack a sense of mission. There is a recognition of collective powerlessness.”

In other words, with scant prospect of a swift return to growth, the risk in 2013 is less outright conflagration in the sin-gle-currency area than a fraying of social and political ties and an insidious erosion of hope.

GREECE & SPAINJean-Dominique Giuliani,

who heads the Robert Schuman Foundation, a pro-European think tank in Paris, says dif-ficult reforms must continue because the crisis shows no sign of going away.

“Changes will now be con-stant and will demand a great deal of populations, overturn societies, surprise political leaders and unsettle experts,” he said in a commentary on his group’s web site.

Charles Robertson, chief econ-omist at Renaissance Capital in

London, is among those wonder-ing how much more voters are prepared to sacrifice. He expects Greece to quit the euro this year and says Spain might follow by the end of 2014.

Spain has already endured one year of unemployment above 25 percent but will probably have to manage three more in order to meet the financial targets set by its international creditors.

“No economy (as far as we are aware) has ever sustained this unemployment rate and main-tained a peg to a fixed exchange rate,” Robertson said in a report.

Most damaging of all, he said, was the absence of hope: “For households, wages are still likely to fall to boost competitiveness. Households are deleveraging and defaulting, not borrowing more to fuel consumption.”

A vibrant black market and a still-generous welfare state mean unemployment is prob-ably sustainable at higher levels, and for longer, than ever before, Robertson acknowledged.

Still, by 2014, Spanish voters will have had time to conclude that the reforms introduced by

Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, whom they elected in 2011, have failed to deliver prosper-ity. “People may then take to the streets and demand change,” Robertson argued.

SLOWLY CORRODINGEven though the consensus has

swung towards the euro staying intact, many economists fret about the broader ramifications of protracted austerity.

A possible explanation sug-gested by Deutsche Bank for Europe’s relative social peace to date is that the burden of adjust-ment has fallen disproportion-ately on young people.

In Spain, for example, the employment rate for the under-25s tumbled from 39.1 percent in mid-2007 to 18.3 percent in mid-2012, a fall of 20.8 percent-age points.

For the 35-49 age group, with a higher level of protection against layoffs, the drop over the same period was 8.9 percentage points.

This mix of “youth sacrifice” and relative economic security for the bulk of the population might be why street protests have failed

— except in Greece — to translate into a big shift in votes for radical parties, according to Gilles Moec, a Deutsche economist.

But the potential economic cost is huge. With fewer young-sters working, Italy and Spain have suffered a loss in produc-tivity of about 2 percent, bod-ing ill for future growth, Moec estimated.

The textbook answer is to push policies that end the divide between hard-to-fire ‘insiders’ and typically young ‘outsiders’ on precarious short-term contracts.

The risk, however, is that these and other structural reforms become discredited because voters associate them with declining liv-ing standards and rising inequal-ity, according to Simon Tilford, chief economist at the Centre for European Reform, a London think tank.

“The consequences are likely to be far-reaching. Not only will governments struggle to push through the needed reforms, but there is a risk of a broader back-lash against the market economy and the European Union,” he said.

REUTERS

BY WILLIAM PESEK

TARO Aso, 72, sure is a busy man. While most Japanese of his vintage are happily ensconced in retirement, Aso has three new jobs: deputy prime minister, finance min-ister and minister for financial services. This trifecta of

responsibilities means Aso has been deputised to end deflation and weaken the yen once and for all. As he endeavours to do what no one has done before, Aso also will conduct an experiment of great interest to policy makers and investors: Testing whether credit ratings matter.

Aso clearly has the complete trust of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, who was elected last month. What Abe and Aso share is a love of the idea of Japanese primacy in Asia and the kind of Keynesianism on steroids that left the country with the biggest ratio of debt-to-gross-domestic-product of any developed nation. What they don’t talk about much is how their plans to reopen the money spigot may run afoul of Moody’s Investors Service, Standard & Poor’s (S&P) and Fitch Ratings.

The Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) ruled Japan for a half-century before losing power in 2009. To show how much it changed after three years in the minority, Abe assembled a “crisis break-through Cabinet” to end Japan’s malaise. Yet the LDP is better at devising reformist mantras than implementing them. Did any of its earlier stimulus packages make Japan more competitive, cre-ate the next Apple, stop China’s economy from becoming bigger or keep South Korea from turning into Asia’s innovation leader?

Now Abe and Aso say the people should trust the new-and- improved LDP. They insist their two-point plan to create an aggressive inflation target and to demand that the central bank buy unlimited blocks of government bonds is a magic formula for renewed prosperity. The motivation is clear enough. Japan has been trying to ward off deflation for a decade-and-a-half. Why not just throw all the money Japan can find at the problem, what economists call the “nuclear option”? Wouldn’t the end justify the desperate means? Perhaps, but there’s a party to this enterprise that officials in Tokyo aren’t considering: The arbiters of percep-tions that affect Japan’s fiscal health.

There’s a school of thought that the odd sovereign downgrade doesn’t matter. Just ask Timothy Geithner, the Treasury Secretary on whose watch the United States lost its AAA rating. All S&P did was unleash a bull market in US debt. Investors can’t get enough of the stuff, driving yields to historic lows and shaming S&P’s number crunchers. It’s an open question whether a post-downgrade Japan would maintain its sub-1 percent bond yields and add to the raters’ humiliation. In 2002, Japan practically declared war on credit- rating companies for downgrading it below Botswana. Its investigation of their evaluation methods made global headlines.

Japan’s debt market is hardly conventional; more than 90 per-cent of it is held domestically, so ratings don’t matter that much. Yet Japan doesn’t print the reserve currency, as the United States does. Nor are its demographics as virtuous as America’s. Japan is the fastest-aging and least-fertile member of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Abe and Aso are about to test the tolerance for downgrades. Credit analysts won’t sit by as they push Japan’s debt-to-GDP ratio toward 250 percent and beyond when Greece, at 171 percent, is below invest-ment grade. They also won’t like the absence of new thinking com-ing from the LDP. A fresh explosion of stimulus measures must be accompanied by strategies to increase their potency.

Strong accountability is needed to avoid the white-elephant public-works projects of the past. If there is a new burst of infrastructure spending, it should be concentrated in the earthquake-devastated Tohoku region. Also, make it unattractive, via new taxes, for banks to hoard government bonds. Give them incentives to lend, thereby promoting monetary policy’s multiplier effect. Otherwise, Japan will just throw away another trillion dollars, or more.

Aso is a former prime minister and LDP stalwart, and nothing he has said or done suggests he’s approaching his new job with a fresh lens or toolkit. The same goes for Abe. Abe is no more vision-ary in foreign policy. An unreflective nationalist, he has wasted no time irking Japan’s neighbours. He wants to rewrite Japan’s pacifist postwar constitution to confront an ascendant China, to which S&P assigns the same AA- rating it does to Japan. Abe is sure to heighten tensions over a group of disputed islands Tokyo calls Senkaku and Beijing calls Diaoyu. What’s the point of driving down the yen if two of your biggest customers boycott your goods?

The challenge is for a party known more for cronyism and gridlock than enlightened policies to reinvent a system it created. Relying on stimulus alone will hurt Japan’s creditworthiness given the context of its fiscal morass. If Abe is hopping mad now that China has surpassed Japan, imagine how angry he will be when China’s credit rating is significantly higher than Japan’s.

WP-BLOOMBERG

Do credit ratings matter? Japan will soon find out

Egypt’s currency crisis hinges on household dollarsBY SUJATA RAO

THE key to preventing a messy devaluation of Egypt’s pound may lie with the country’s households, whose dollar hold-ings are being eyed by foreign investors as a critical gauge of

trust in the authorities.Countless emerging market crises have

shown over the decades that it is not the withdrawal of foreign investors from a market but the flight of local households and businesses from a currency that is instrumental in its collapse. Egypt, despite months of upheaval, is not there yet.

But investors are watching closely for evidence of a significant rise in ordinary Egyptians’ dollar holdings. Households’ dollarisation ratio — broadly, the level of foreign currency holdings as a proportion of money supply — was 15.5 percent at the end of October 2012, according to Bank of America-Merrill Lynch estimates, based on central bank data.

That will undoubtedly have gone up in recent weeks as panicky Egyptians have rushed out to buy dollars in the face of ris-ing political turmoil and as the central bank has allowed the currency to fall — by 0.5 percent a day for the past week.

In Luxor, for example, a town that makes its living from the tourists who visit its Pharaonic temples, some taxi drivers have started asking for payment in euros or dollars. But the household dollarisation ratio is still likely to be well below the 41 percent ratio among companies, or the 33 percent house-hold dollarisation levels seen back in 2004.

“Increased household dollarisation and a run on the currency, that’s the big risk,” says Jean Michel Saliba, BofA-Merrill Middle

East economist, who estimates households account for more than 70 percent of depos-its in the banking system.

In contrast, foreigners hold a mere 3-4 percent of the local bond market, according to other estimates from Barclays. “If the (dollarisation) ratio goes back to the 2004 peak that would create additional demand for $15bn and will wipe out the central bank’s reserves,” Saliba says.

TRIGGER What could precipitate such a move?

The central bank’s decision to allow some weakening in the pound after spending two years and $20bn propping it up, has broadly been welcomed by economists and equity investors who say Egyptian exports need to become more competitive.

But this is a tightrope from which it is easy to fall. Moved from a peg to a managed float in 2003, the pound has traded between 5.5-6 per dollar since then and citizens have enjoyed some reassurance from the central bank’s sturdy defence of the exchange rate during the 2011-2012 turmoil. But Egypt’s hard currency reserves are at $15bn or below the three-month import cover deemed the minimum safe level, and that as forced it to embark on dollar auctions allowing the pound to sink to a series of record lows.

Around a third of the pound’s depre-ciation since early-2011 has come in the past week and that may well have spooked households who hold over 600bn pounds ($93.05bn) in local currency bank savings.

“I felt (devaluation) was coming. So for hedging purposes I changed half my savings into dollars just a couple of days before the pound slump,” said one Egyptian. “I don’t trust the current regime ... and see no opportunity for growth on the short term

... no hope,” he said. “I think that the pound slump is not going to stop.”

The risk is that other locals feel the same, viewing authorities’ tacit acceptance of a weaker currency as a sign that they are no longer able to stabilise the situation, a story that has played out time and again in emerging markets, from Russia to Indonesia.

“It’s not a question now of how much (the central bank has) in reserves ... their top priority is to prevent people from exchang-ing their pound savings into dollars,” says Bartosz Pawlowski, a strategist at BNP Paribas in London “That’s something no central bank in the world can survive.”

Most analysts expect the pound to fall at least to 7 per dollar while currency forwards are pricing it at 7.75 per dollar in six months, a drop of 16 percent from current levels.

There are signs the currency would have fallen more already but for the shortage of dollar liquidity. Banks have slapped lim-its on deposit withdrawals and transaction fees on dollar purchases. Travellers can now carry a maximum $6,000 each while leaving the country. “There is significant amount of financial repression that will artificially put on hold dollarisation,” said Alia Al Moubayed, senior Barclays economist for the Middle East and North Africa.

Analysts agree that what stands in the way of massive household flight from the pound is the prospect of external aid, par-ticularly from the International Monetary Fund which has sent an official to discuss the disbursement of a $4.8bn loan. The problem is that the more fiscal reforms are delayed, the greater any currency adjust-ment will have to be. Second, many worry that Egypt’s leaders, fearing further pro-tests, will delay the austerity measures the IMF has set as loan conditions. REUTERS

Cartoon Arts International / The New York Times Syndicate

BRENT

$ 111.82

DUBAI

$ 109.20

QATAR EXCHANGE | DAILY TRADING REPORT | 08-01-2013

INTERNATIONAL MARKETS A List of Shares from the worldCOMPANY CLOSE NET VOLUME NAME CHG TRADED

COMPANY CLOSE NET VOLUME NAME CHG TRADED





A C C-A/D 1415.05 -3.35 17148

Aarti Drugs-T/D 225.7 4.7 1704

Aban Offs-B/D 398.85 1.9 89297

Ador Welding-B/D 145.8 0.35 6287

Aegis Logis-B/D 190.7 1.95 27024

Ahmed.Forg-B/D 142.55 -5.05 25762

Alembic-B/D 17.55 -0.5 21665

Alok Indus-B/D 12.14 -0.06 1926903

Andhra Paper-B/D 287.45 1 6683

Apollo Tyre-A/D 89.35 1.1 231657

Asahi I Glass-/D 52.45 0.1 9496

Ashok Leyland-/D 26.7 0.1 298309

Bajaj Hold-A/D 1015.9 -9.25 5329

Ballarpur In-B/D 23.3 -0.2 119803

Banaras Bead-T/D 45.25 1.35 6196

Bata India-A/D 884.45 4.45 22160

Bayer Crop-A/D 1240.1 -18.1 1226

Beml Ltd-B/D 284.45 -0.4 20546

Bh Electronic-/D 1320.65 14.2 1970

Bharat Bijle-B/D 577.2 -9.95 1309

Bhartiya Int-T/D 174.5 1.4 11575

Bhel-A/D 243.55 3.4 363822

Bom.Burmah-B/D 123.4 -1.35 22491

Bombay Dyeing-/D 135.4 0.1 139712

Cable Corp.-B/D 23.3 0.35 3326

Canfin Homes-T/D 178.4 -1.65 11522

Caprihans-B/D 51.3 -0.05 1482

Castrol Ind-A/D 311.35 -1.05 25456

Century Enka-B/D 134.55 -0.8 5636

Century Text-A/D 442.95 1.4 80004

Chambal Fert-B/D 70.45 -0.8 131485

Chola Invest-B/D 277.7 -7.9 9281

Chowgule St-B/D 19 0.1 3461

Cimmco-B/D 46.5 1.85 2052

Cipla-A/D 428.85 5.55 673267

City Union Bk-/D 58.95 -0.45 67994

Cmc Ltd-B/D 1279.85 33.8 45900

Colgate-A/D 1544.65 7.55 20464

Container Cor-/D 962.4 1.9 1362

Dai-Bichi Kar-/D 44.25 -0.4 3651

Dcm Financia-B/D 1.7 0.05 3500

Dhampur Sugar-/D 52.95 -0.05 27852

Dr. Reddy-A/D 1907.7 20.95 67816

E I H-B/D 72.15 -0.55 34997

E.I.D Parry-B/D 204.55 -0.25 11652

Electrosteel-B/D 27.55 0.5 389197

Emco-B/D 31.5 -0.8 43269

Escorts Fin-B/D 4.63 -0.02 2909

Escorts-B/D 74.85 -0.65 213454

Essar Oil-A/D 72.35 -0.8 535283

Eveready Indu-/D 24.05 -0.35 312253

F D C-B/D 95.25 0.2 135840

Federal Bank-A/D 520.6 -1.7 24412

Ferro Alloys-B/D 6.99 0 44693

Finolex-B/D 61.9 -0.25 33861

Gail-A/D 364.45 -2.45 129229

Gammon India-B/D 41.9 -0.45 42085

Gangotri Tex-B/D 3.6 -0.01 41046

Garden P -B/D 62.45 0.25 4785

Goodricke-B/D 158.45 -0.3 7662

Goodyear I -B/D 341 -2.6 2461

Hcl Infosys-B/D 39.95 0.4 305336

Him.Fut.Comm-B/D 10.48 -0.2 358795

Himat Seide-B/D 40.5 -0.5 52256

Hind Motors-B/D 12.64 0.63 3145822

Hind Org Chem-/D 19.65 -0.25 15022

Hind Unilever-/D 525.15 -0.35 80713

Hind.Petrol-A/D 322.85 -6.1 138586

Hindalco-A/D 133.05 -1.3 483555

Hous Dev Fin-A/D 839.65 16.05 97059

I F C I-A/D 39.15 0.2 8258210

Idbi-A/D 116.2 -0.05 233151

Ifb Ind.Ltd.-B/D 106.4 -1.15 8854

India Cement-B/D 91.9 1.8 160313

India Glycol-B/D 171.6 -0.55 8583

Indian Hotel-A/D 66.8 -0.7 156836

Indo-Tcount-T/D 14.77 0.7 6076

Indusind-A/D 434.8 3 66994

J.B.Chemical-B/D 91.4 -1.5 33833

Jagatjit Ind-B/D 68.8 -1.2 2050

Jagson Phar-B/D 14.59 0.6 52869

Jbf Indu-B/D 127.1 -0.25 53956

Jct Elect P -B/D 0.65 0.04 143734

Jct Ltd-B/D 1.52 0.01 43544

Jenson&Nich.-B/D 4.03 -0.05 41176

Jik Indust-B/D 2.29 0.1 79053

Jktyre&Ind-B/D 125.6 -0.1 30861

Jmc Projects-B/D 118.8 -3.3 26093

Kajaria Cer-B/D 234.45 4.2 3260

Kalpat Power-B/D 99.1 -0.9 57583

Kalyani Stel-B/D 62.3 0.55 223270

Kanoria Chem-B/D 39.5 0.5 67989

Kg Denim-T/D 14.66 0 9917

Kilburnengg-B/D 19.95 -0.25 4924

Kin.Motor-B/D 12 -0.13 60486

Klg Systel-T/D 19.45 0 4187

Kopran-B/D 21.35 -0.35 30358

Lakshmi Mach-B/D 2280.15 18.15 2889

Lloyd Metal-B/D 17.5 0.5 2500

Lloyd Steel-B/D 13.98 -0.08 176513

Lloydsfin.-B/D 1.27 0.11 88648

Lok.Hous&Con-B/D 23.95 1.1 175533

Lupin-A/D 597.6 -1.65 45876

Lyka Labs-B/D 12.25 0.3 28487

Maha Scooter-B/D 522.65 -1.65 30434

Mangalam Cem-B/D 180.8 0.6 14288

Maral Overs-B/D 15.69 1.28 16710

Mastek-B/D 146.5 7.6 67747

Max India L-A/D 253.6 2.9 28986

Mrpl-A/D 66.85 -2.05 122771

Nagreeka Ex-B/D 18.3 0.8 1965

Nagreeka Ex-B/D 18.3 0.8 1965

Nahar Spg.-B/D 79.2 5.1 52169

Nath Seeds-B/D 6.8 -0.33 3736

Nation Alum -A/D 50.4 0.3 57390

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LONDON

EXCHANGE RATE

GOLD & SILVERWORLD STOCK INDICES

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Buying Selling

QE Market Summary Comparison Today Previous day

08-01-2013 07-01-2013

Index 8,656.11 8,669.02

Change 12.91 32.58

% 0.15 0.38

YTD% 3.56 3.71

Volume 2,604,304 4,063,614

Value (QAR) 135,258,853.08 213,347,452.24

Trades 2,416 3,117

Up 12 | Down 19 | Unchanged 08

INDEX Day’s Close Pt Chg % Chg Year High Year Low

21MARKET WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


GOLDQR194.2774

SILVERQR 3.5667

US$ ..........................QR 3.6305 QR 3.6500

UK ...........................QR 5.8235 QR 5.9050

Euro .........................QR 4.7494 QR 4.8154

CA$ ..........................QR 3.6639 QR 3.7353

Swiss Fr ..................QR 3.9271 QR 3.9835

Yen ..........................QR 0.0413 QR 0.0421

Aus$ ........................QR 3.7905 QR 3.8658

Ind Re ......................QR 0.0656 QR 0.0669

Pak Re .....................QR 0.0370 QR 0.0378

Peso ........................QR 0.0884 QR 0.0903

SL Re .......................QR 0.0283 QR 0.0289

Taka .........................QR 0.0450 QR 0.0462

Nep Re ....................QR 0.0410 QR 0.0418

SA Rand ..................QR 0.4207 QR 0.4291

All Ordinaries 4712.316 -25.749 -0.54 4770.2 4664.6

Cac 40 Index/D 3721.44 16.8 0.45 3733.93 3692.9

Dj Indu Average 13384.29 -50.92 -0.38 13661.87 12035.09

Egypt Cma Gn Idx 1026.29 32.57 3.28 999.95 312.38

Hang Seng Inde/D 23111.19 -218.56 -0.94 23402.45 22860.25

Iseq Overall/D 3515.84 15.89 0.45 3510.46 3396.67

Karachi 100 In/D 16645.76 143.11 0.87 16935.52 16379.47

Nikkei 225 Index 10508.06 -90.95 -0.86 10743.69 10589.7

S&P 500 Index/D 1461.89 -4.58 -0.31 1474.51 1266.74

Straits Times/D 3205.52 -12.74 -0.4 3237.78 3186.28

Straits Times/D 2989.31 24.69 0.83 3035.78 2657.77

QE Indices SummaryQE Index 8,656.11 0.15

QE Al Rayan Islamic Index 2,554.74 0.36

QE Total Return Index 11,714.85 0.15

QE All Share Index 2,081.3 0.19

QE All Share Banks & Financial Services

2,019.24 0.04

QE All Share Industrials 2,732.14 0.60

QE All Share Transportation 1,371.73 0.26

QE All Share Real Estate 1,621.05 0.80

QE All Share Insurance 1,975.21 0.14

QE All Share Telecoms 1,105.16 0.91

QE All Share Consumer Goods & Services

4,812.59 0.07

SPORT24 WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Boozer dazzles as Bulls rout struggling CavaliersChicago Bulls claim top spot in Eastern Conference’s Central division

Carlos Boozer (5) of the Chicago Bulls goes

up for a shot past Jon

Leuer (30) of the Cleveland Cavaliers on his way to a game-high 24 points at the United Center in Chicago, Illinois,

yesterday. The Bulls

defeated the Cavaliers 118-92.

CHICAGO: Carlos Boozer and the Chicago Bulls recovered from a slow start to pummel the struggling Cleveland Cavaliers 118-92 yesterday and take over top spot in the Eastern Conference’s Central division.

In-form forward Boozer scored a game-high 24 points along with 11 rebounds, while Luol Deng added 19 points as the Bulls recorded their third straight win, and their 11th in a row over the Cavaliers.

Chicago, who upset NBA cham-pions Miami 96-89 on Friday, shrugged off a disappointing first quarter to improve their overall record to 19-13 and dislodge the Indiana Pacers (20-14) from top spot in the Central standings.

“I’m just playing off my team-mates,” Boozer told reporters after recording his fifth consecu-tive double-double.

“Games like this are fun because everybody played so great. We like moments like this,” he added.

“We wish all the games could be like this. We’re trying to step it up a little bit and get some more wins. We had a tough last couple

NBA ResultsWashington 101 Oklahoma City 99

Boston 102 NY Knicks 96

Chicago 118 Cleveland 92

New Orleans 95 San Antonio 88

Utah 100 Dallas 94

Memphis 113 Sacramento 81

Portland 125 Orlando 119

of weeks of 2012,” he pointed out after the match,

Guard Dion Waiters, off the bench, led the way with 18 points for the Cavaliers, who slipped to 8-28 following their eighth defeat in their last 11 games.

“That’s a good team,” Cavaliers coach Byron Scott said, after yes-terday’s match.

“They’ve just got our number. In the second half, they just turned it up. Their intensity level went way up, and we just couldn’t match it.”

Cleveland, without center Anderson Varejao for the 10th straight game due to a bruised right knee, raced into an early 7-0 lead as their opponents surpris-ingly struggled to find the hoop

and, with forward CJ Miles pour-ing in two three-pointers, they ended the first quarter 30-22 up.

But the Bulls gradually clawed their way back, taking the lead for the first time at 33-32 on a Marco Belinelli three-pointer before going into halftime 53-50 ahead.

With Boozer, Deng and center Joakim Noah all sizzling on offense in the third quarter, Chicago stretched their lead to 88-72 and stayed in control throughout the final period.

Noah finished with 11 points and 11 rebounds, while Taj Gibson chipped in with 18 and seven boards off the bench.

“They’re in rhythm now,” Chicago coach Tom Thibodeau said of his team’s 10-of-14 display in three-point shooting. “That’s the biggest thing.

“It’s off ball movement, hitting the paint, coming out, (making) the extra pass. They’re rhythm threes. Our percentage has slowly been creeping up,” he said after the match. The Bulls outshot the Cavaliers by 54 percent to 42 from the field and out-rebounded them 47-31. REUTERS

Al Wakra edge Al Ahli 72-69; Al Rayyan winBY DANOTZI SANTOS

DOHA: Al Wakra needed five more minutes and two cru-cial steals in the homestretch of the extra period to subdue a fighting Al Ahli 72-69 in the Qatar Basketball League held at the Al Gharafa Indoor Arena, yesterday.

Al Ahli surged ahead in the early quarter as Samer Mohammed and Mohammed Bekaled pushed their team in command at 21-16 after 10 min-utes of play.

Ayeni Olatukombo and Temi Soyebo sparked a 10-4 run to place Al Wakra ahead for the first time at 26-25 with 2:30 remaining in the second period.

However, Al Ahli regained consciousness and fought back to wrest the lead back 30-29 at halftime.

The two squads battled it out after the mid-game ceasefire but coach Ihab Galal’s charges burned rubber unleashing an 8-0 run to barge their way up from a 36-37 deficit and hold on to the driv-er’s seat 49-42, at the end of the

third period. The intense Beka anchored an 11-3 onslaught early in the final canto to give Al Ahli a taste of the lead, 53-52, with 4:50 to go.

Soyebo fed Nasser Al Gidea for a slam in the ensuing play and fired a trey later to hand Wakrah a 57-53 lead.

At 59-all, Soyebothen split his charities to give Al Wakra the lead at 60-59 but Hasheem Zaidan pushed Al Ahli ahead at 62-60 with 30 seconds remaining in the game.

Ayeni was fouled on the next play and canned both tries from the charity lane to even the score at 62-all, sending the game into over-time.

Meanwhile, Al Rayyan forti-fied their defence of the Qatar Basketball League title with an 83-61 demolition of Al Shamal earlier in the first game.

Al Rayyan led throughout the match, at 24-13 in the first period, 56-26 at half-time and estab-lished their biggest advantage of 42 points at 74-32 in the third quarter to break the backs of Al Shamal. THE PENINSULA

Bayern Munich thrash FC Schalke 5-0 in friendly

FC Schalke’s Chinedu Obasi (right) and Teemu Pukki (second left) vie for the ball with Bayern Munich’s Franck Ribery during a friendly match at Jassim Bin Hamad Stadium in Doha, yesterday. Bayern Munich, registered a comprehensive 5-0 victory over FC Schalke. The match ended the week-long training camp of Bundesliga table-toppers in Qatar. Thomas Müller and Mario Mandzukic scored two goals apiece. Mario Gomez accounted for one goal. FC Schalke will play their first Bundesliga match on January 18, with Bayern Munich playing a day later. Both clubs have reached the last-16 stage of the UEFA Champions League where FC Schalke will face Galatasaray and last season’s runners-up Bayern Munich will face Arsenal.

David deserves shot at Olympic squash medal, says Pendleton LONDON: Double Olympic gold medallist Victoria Pendleton has thrown her support behind squash’s bid for Olympic inclu-sion and thinks seven-times world champion Nicol David should have the chance to win Malaysia’s first gold at the 2020 Games.

One sport will be added to the programme for the 2020 Games with squash up against karate, the Chinese martial art of wushu, baseball/softball, roller sports, wakeboarding and climbing.

The International Olympic Committee (IOC) will make its decision on a host for the 2020 Games, as well as which sport to add, at its session in Argentina in September.

Pendleton watched the World Series Squash Finals at The Queen’s Club in London.

“Squash is a very physically demanding sport and it’s also very spectator-friendly,” Pendleton, who won track cycling gold med-als in Beijing and London, was quoted as saying in a World Squash Federation news release.

“The nature of the game means that it works really well - it’s fast and exciting - and it has all the qualities required to make it a great Olympic sport.

“I don’t know why it isn’t in already.”

Malaysian David beat England’s Laura Massaro to retain her title at the weekend, while Egyptian Amr Shabana took the men’s title with a win over Englishman Nick Matthew.

Pendleton hailed David’s con-sistency and showed the world number one the keirin gold and sprint silver medals she won in London.

“You so deserve to have one of these,” she told the Malaysian.

Rower Greg Searle, who won gold in the coxed pairs at the 1992 Barcelona Games and bronze medals in Atlanta and London, said one of the positives about squash was the game’s global reach.

“I think it’s really interesting that you can have a sport like squash which is so universal.” said Searle. REUTERS

KHL set to lose NHL stars after lockout deal MOSCOW: Some of the play-ers, who played for Kontinental Hockey League (KHL) clubs during the lockout in the National Hockey League (NHL) are currently on their way back to North America after it was announced the NHL and play-ers reached a tentative deal yesterday.

The official site of the KHL reigning champions Dynamo Moscow announced their trio of NHL forwards: Russian Alexander Ovechkin and Swede Nicklas Backstrom both from Washington Capitals and Finnish star Leo Komarov from Toronto Maple Leafs have already left the club.

Meanwhile, last season’s NHL MVP Yevgeny Malkin, who is playing for his native club Magnitogorsk in the KHL, dis-missed rumours he has already bought a ticket to the United States, where he plays with the Pittsburgh Pengiuns saying he was set to wait for an official announcement of the lockout’s end.

“Some journalists wrote that I’ve already bought a ticket for today’s plane to the USA,” he said. “But I’m still in Magnitogorsk and I’m gonna wait for the official announcement of the date of the new NHL season.”

The New Jeresey Devis left winger Ilya Kovalchuk, St Louis Blues right winger Vladimir Tarasenko and Columbus Blue Jackets ‘keeper Sergei Bobrovsky, who played for the KHL club Saint Petersburg, have also decided to stay in Russia until the official end of the lockout.

“Together with my agent we decided to wait for further devel-opments of the situation before taking any decisions,” Bobrovsky, who is expected to play for Saint Petersburg in Kazan yesterday, was quoted as saying by daily Soviet Sport.

“But it’s absolutely clear that we all will go to the United States in the near future.”

Earlier yesterday the NHL commissioner Gary Bettman had pinpointed January 19 as the start date to save a shortened season.

REUTERS

NFL: Redskins coach slammed for playing injured GriffinWASHINGTON: Washington Redskins coach Mike Shanahan came under fire yesterday for leaving an ailing Robert Griffin III in Sunday’s play-off loss to Seattle but rejected any notion that he risked the rookie quar-terback’s health.

Griffin only left Sunday’s 24-14 loss to the Seahawks when he injured himself while trying to grab a bad shotgun snap in the fourth quarter, but critics are sug-gesting the face of the Redskins should have been taken out of the game earlier.

“Robert is our franchise quar-terback. I am not going to take a chance on his career to win a game,” Shanahan told reporters at a news conference yesterday.

“But I also know that when you have got the belief in the guy and you feel that he can play at a cer-tain level and the doctor is telling you that he is OK to go in - then you have got to do what you think is right.

“If I didn’t think he was right then he wouldn’t have been in, its just that simple,” added Shanahan, who said he spoke to team doctors on the sidelines on four occasions during the game.”

Meanwhile, Griffin III, will have more tests on his injured right knee, the NFL team said, yesterday.

Shanahan said doctors need to distinguish between old an new problems, since Griffin had prior ligament injuries in the knee.

The sensational young star hurt the knee in a regular-season game against Baltimore, although he returned to that contest briefly before sitting out the following week. AGENCIES

Al Rayyan’s Asi Al Khalidi (in white) tries to get past Al Shamal’s Hassam Ismail during their Qatar Basketball League match at Al Gharafa Stadium, yesterday. RIGHT: Al Ahli’s Hashem Zaydan Abshar (14) attempts to score a basket during his side’s match against Al Wakra.

25SPORT WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


European Tour agrees to Saturday finish in Qatar

Rose, Dufner and Olazabal to play at top Doha eventQatar Masters to take place from January 23 to 26

FROM LEFT: Chris Myers, Tournament Manager, Commercial Bank Qatar Masters, Fahad Nasser Al Naimi, General Secretary, Qatar Golf Association (QGA), Hassan Al Nuaimi, President, QCA, Andrew Stevens, Group Chief Executive Officer, Commercial Bank, Abdulla Al Raisi, Deputy Chief Executive Officer, Commercial Bank, and Mohammed Faisal Al Naimi, Executive Director of QGA pose for a picture along with the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters 2013 trophy at Doha Golf Club (DGC) yesterday. PICTURES BY: KAMMUTTY VP

DOHA: Justin Rose of England and American Jason Dufner will be among the highest-ranked players to confirm their partici-pation in the $2.5m Commercial Bank Qatar Masters, it was announced yesterday.

The European Tour event will take place from January 23 to 26 at the Doha Golf Club.

José Maria Olazabal, a 23-time European Tour winner, will also compete in Qatar, where the Spanish legend is assured of a special reception after captain-ing Rose and his European team-mates to a spectacular comeback victory in the Ryder Cup last September.

Rose, who will join Ryder Cup colleagues Sergio Garcia, Martin Kaymer and defending champion Paul Lawrie in Doha, impressed on his last visit to the Middle East in November when a closing course record 62 secured a runner-up fin-ish behind world number one Rory McIlroy at the DP World Tour Championship, Dubai.

The 32-year-old Englishman, also second to McIlroy in the 2012 Race to Dubai, is hoping to go one better in Qatar following a stunning season that included his first WGC title, a starring role in the Ryder Cup, his best finish in a Major and a career-high world ranking of four.

“I finished the year playing really well and I want to build on that in the Middle East. I’ll be looking to win early in the season and to win the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters would be a brilliant start and set me up well in the lead-up to the Masters,” said Rose, who last competed in Doha in 2009.

“My game’s in a good place right now and I’m playing well on all types of golf courses. I really enjoy playing desert courses like Doha Golf Club as it requires lots of imagination and shot making ability, which suits me. I believe I can win as I’ve been performing consistently for a while now.”

“The European Tour has such a big reach globally so the reception I’ve received throughout Europe, Asia, Australia and Africa, where I’ve played since The Ryder Cup, has been amazing,” Rose said.

“I’m really looking forward to meeting the fans in Doha as I’ve no doubt they’ll provide a fantas-tic atmosphere,” he added.

Dufner, 35, is looking forward to facing Rose as he competes in Doha for the first time.

“It’s great that Justin’s play-ing in Doha. I’ve played practice rounds and competitive rounds with him. He’s a very skilled golfer and has come into his own with some big wins. Qatar has one big tournament a year so it’ll be good to have as many good players as possible.” said Dufner, who won twice on last year’s US PGA Tour and finished fourth on the money list with almost $4.9m.

An experienced traveller, Dufner finished runner-up in The European Tour’s Perth Invitational in Australia in October before competing in Malaysia and China, and is now keen to make his first visit to Qatar.

“I’m looking forward to Qatar, which looks like a good event when I’ve seen it on TV. I’ve spo-ken to some US Tour players and they say the Middle East tour-naments are some of the better events of the year. It should be fun,” said Dufner, whose pre-shot waggle and swing have drawn comparisons to the legendary Ben

Hogan. Olazabal will be another crowd favourite in Doha after masterminding Europe’s Ryder Cup win, a crowning glory on a storied career that includes two Masters Tournament titles (1994, 1999) among a total of 23 European Tour wins, putting him eighth on the all-time list.

The 46-year-old Spaniard, who played in seven Ryder Cups, has not won a Tour event since 2005 but was tied in 12th posi-tion when he competed in Doha last year.

Hassan Al Nuaimi, President of the Qatar Golf Association, believes the addition of Rose, Dufner and Olazabal to the field for the 16th Commercial Bank Qatar Masters will ensure a spectacular event for golf fans in Doha.

“Justin Rose and Jason Dufner are two of the world’s lead-ing golfers, as shown by their high ranking, and both will be among the favourites to win the 16th Commercial Bank Qatar Masters,” Al Nuaimi said.

“José Maria Olazabal is a golfing great and one of The European Tour’s most successful players. He showed his inspirational charac-ter as captain of Team Europe at the Ryder Cup in September, so he is assured of an especially warm reception at Doha Golf Club,” he added in a statement.

Andrew Stevens, Group Chief Executive Officer of Commercial Bank of Qatar, said this year’s tournament would have a strong Ryder Cup theme in honour of one of the most memorable sport-ing competitions of recent years.

“We already have five players from The 2012 Ryder Cup compet-ing in this year’s Commercialbank Qatar Masters, as well as the victorious captain, Jose Maria Olazabal, which will make this a special event,” Stevens said.

“We are delighted to confirm the presence of so many lead-ing players from Europe and the US, and will be announcing more world-famous players in the coming days,” he added in a state-ment. THE PENINSULA

QMDI signs an agreement with Commercial Bank Qatar Masters

DOHA: This year’s Commercial Bank Qatar Masters is sched-uled for a Saturday finish for the first time in the 15-year history of the $2.5m tournament and Tournament Manager Chris Myers is hoping the change will become permanent.

The European Tour has agreed to change the day of the final day’s play for this year, but could revert back to a Sunday finish if television audience num-bers are low.

Speaking at a press confer-ence at Doha Golf Club (DGC), yesterday, Myers said the tour-nament organisers had been thinking of hosting the final day on Saturday for a long time.

“This has been something that has been discussed by ourselves, the tournament organisers. Not just this year but the last two or three years,” Myers said.

All the earlier editions of the tournament began on a Thursday and finished on a Sunday.

“Obviously the weekends here in the Middle East run through on Friday and Saturday and it’s become apparent for the last few years that finishing on a Sunday limits the number of people, cer-tainly in the morning to watch the final day’s action,” he added.

“Although people do rush from work to try and get for the final holes on the Sunday afternoon,” he pointed out.

Myers, who is also the General Manager of DGC, said the tour-nament organisers approached the European Tour of their intentions of changing the final day to Saturday and is confi-dent the change can benefit both parties.

“We approached the European Tour and suggested we try to

have a Saturday finish, just to see how it fits with the issue of spectators coming through the gates,” he said.

“Of course their concerns were to do with the television coverage back in Europe and in fact around the world, anywhere where they have Saturday and Sunday weekends,” he added.

“We agreed with them that we would try it for this year and see how it fits with the televi-sion viewing worldwide and see how it affects us here with the number of spectators coming through the gates at the week-end. Most importantly, we think it will work for us and hope it doesn’t have much impact on tel-evision audiences worldwide,” he emphasised.

This year’s Qatar Masters competition will feature top-ranked players such as Justin Rose, Jason Dufner and Jose Maria Olazabal, as well as cur-rent champion Paul Lawrie in the tournament which will take place from January 23 to 26.

Meanwhile, the DGC have made a few minor changes to the DGC’s challenging all-grass course.

“We have decided to widen the bunker at the last hole and the length of the grass will be longer than last year,” said Myers

The course designed by Peter Harradine, one of the world’s leading golf course architects, measures 7,374 yards from the tournament tees.

The golf ’s elite will need to use every ounce of their talent while navigating the 18 holes on the course which is famed for its tantalizing combination of beauty and complexity.

THE PENINSULA

Hamad bin Khalifa Al Naser (second left), Chairman and CEO of Qatar MICE Development Institute (QMDI) shakes hand with Andrew Stevens, Group Chief Executive Officer, Commercial Bank (right) after the signing ceremony at Doha Golf Club (DGC) yesterday. Hassan Al Nuaimi, President, Qatar Golf Association (left) is also seen.

DOHA: Qatar MICE (Meetings, Incentive, Conference and Exhibition) Development Institute (QMDI) has signed a strategic partnership of three years with the Commercial Bank Qatar Masters.

The partnership will see both organisations leverage their asso-ciation and expertise to raise the level of this prestigious tourna-ment, staged in Qatar.

The three way partnership between the Qatar Olympic Committee, the Qatar Golf Association and Commercial Bank has resulted in the tourna-ment making giant strides from its humble beginnings in 1998.

QMDI, a member of Qatar Foundation, is Qatar’s premier events management company managing some of the coun-try’s biggest conferences and exhibitions.

Its partnership with one of Qatar’s prestigious sporting events will see the tournament leveraging the vast resources, experience and expertise that QMDI possess to help create a seamless logistics process for this internationally acclaimed tournament.

With sport being one of the key pillars in Qatar’s National 2030 Vision, the tournament and QMDI will seek to adopt

the highest possible standards and signal to the world, that glo-bal events are not only hosted in Qatar, but well supported by local global brands such as QMDI and staged to the highest possible standards with the help of local expertise.

QMDl’s Chairman Hamad Bin Khalifa Al Naser was ecstatic with the partnership.

“This is an exciting time for QMDI. Our expertise in manag-ing Qatar’s biggest MICE indus-try events is second to none and a partnership with one of the

most prestigious sporting events in Qatar is the next step in our evolution. The Commercial Bank Qatar Masters ranks amongst the best in world and it is our ambition to partner with the best, raise our profile through sport and contribute towards the growth of the tournament,” he added in a statement.

“Our expertise and the tour-nament’s mercurial growth will realise a mutually beneficial part-nership for both,” he pointed out.

Andrew Stevens, Group CEO of Commercial Bank said: “With

QMDl’s complete package solu-tion for ticketing, accommodation and other facilities, the tourna-ment can now reach out to a wider audience locally, regionally and globally and attract a wider spectator audience.”

He added: “We have already started leveraging QMDl’s tick-eting resource vendors such as Virgin Ticketing and look forward to working together and raising Qatar’s profile on the world’s sporting stage. These are excit-ing times for both of us.”

THE PENINSULA

Johnson leads by three at Kapalua MAUI, Hawaii: The 2013 US PGA Tour season finally got going yesterday, with Dustin Johnson (pictured) opening up a three-shot lead as 30 golfers played the first two rounds of the Tournament of Champions.

High winds prevented any rounds from being completed from Friday through Sunday on the par-73 Plantation Course at Kapalua.

The tournament, reduced to 54 holes, is now slated to end today.

Johnson emerged from yester-day’s marathon on 11-under par 135 after posting rounds of 69 and 66.

“I wasn’t tired at all,” Johnson said of the day’s double duty. “We had not played any golf, so I was ready to go, first round of the year, play 36 holes. This course is a tough walk and it’s really windy out there, but I’m in pretty good shape. I can han-dle it.”

He ended the day on a high note, with an eagle on the par-five 18th in the second round. That went with six birdies and one bogey in his seven-under effort.

“I hit a good drive,” Johnson said of the 18th. “I just hit it a little too far right, but it actually had a pretty good angle.”

He said he thought his six-iron approach would be a bit short but it ended up “just perfect” and rolled close to the hole to leave him a putt for eagle.

Defending champion Steve Stricker carded a 71 and 67 for sole possession of second place on eight-under 138.

Stricker found the long day heavy going thanks to an appar-ent back problem that causes shooting pains down one of his legs.

“Nobody knows if it’s a mus-cle with pressure on the sciatic nerve or if there’s a problem with a disc,” said Stricker, who said his back did not hurt but the ail-ment does not allow him to hit full strength.

“I’m just trying to keep it in front of me and play the smart

shots,” added Stricker, who admitted he was not sure when the day began if he would be able to finish 36 holes.

“Fortunately it didn’t get any worse and that was the best part -- it just stayed the same all day,” said Stricker, who expected to tee it up in a bid to retain his title.

“I’ll get some rest tonight and hopefully I’ll feel a little bit better tomorrow (today).

Masters champion Bubba Watson was a further shot back on 139 after a 70 and 69.

Keegan Bradley and Brandt Snedeker were tied for fourth on

six-under 140.Johnson, who

will be gunning for his seventh US PGA Tour title today, has a bit of history on his side. He won the last two US PGA Tour events played over just 54 holes.

Johnson denied he knew a secret to winning a three-round tour-nament, saying he “just happened to win those two events”.

“You know, I’ve still got 18 more holes of golf. It wouldn’t matter if it was 72 holes or 54. Tomorrow (today) is still the last round and there’s 18 holes to play, so got to get the job done.” AFP

Kapalua ScoresSecond-round scores yesterday in the weather-delayed US PGA Tour Tournament of Champions (USA unless noted, 1st and 2nd rounds both played yesterday, par-73):

135 Dustin Johnson 69-66

138 Steve Stricker 71-67

139 Bubba Watson 70-69

140 Keegan Bradley 71-69, Brandt Snedeker 70-70

141 Tommy Gainey 72-69

142 Carl Pettersson (SWE) 70-72, Nick Watney 69-73

143 Scott Piercy 72-71

144 Webb Simpson 72-72, Rickie Fowler 70-74, John Huh 73-71, Johnson Wagner 72-72

145 Matt Kuchar 74-71, Ian Poulter (ENG) 71-74, Mark Wilson 69-76, J.J. Henry 71-74

SPORT26WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Nasser wins fourth stage of the Dakar Rally as Sainz falls awayQatari ace closes gap on overall leader in Peru; Peterhansel leads by 5min 16sec AREQUIPA, Peru: Qatari ace Nasser Al Attiyah won his second successive stage in this year’s Dakar Rally as he tri-umphed in the fourth stage to give himself a great chance of adding to his triumph in the 2011 edition.

The 42-year-old driver - who made it four stage wins from four for his Red Bull Buggy team - closed the gap on the overall leader, France’s Mini-driving 10-time champion Stephane Peterhansel.

Guerlain Chicherit took second

in the stage, 36sec behind, while Peterhansel, 47, who has won the race six times on a motorbike and four times in the car discipline, came in over a minute behind the Qatari and saw his lead clipped to 5min 16sec.

However, it was not all good news for the Red Bull team as the 2010 winner Carlos Sainz dropped out of contention with a second successive poor day, the winner of the first two stages suffering more problems with his car.

The Spaniard is now over three hours off the pace while another of the contenders American Robby Gordon, who was disqualified last year for his car not conforming to race regulations, also fell out of contention.

He attempted an ambitious manoeuvre and ended up with his car on its roof, losing more than two hours in the process.

Al Attiyah, though, was all smiles when he emerged from his car.

“In the dunes at the start, it was very difficult to open the way, but in the end we are here without any problem at all and a good time as well so we are happy,” said Al-Attiyah, who last year showed his all round sporting skills by winning Olympic bronze in the shooting competition.

“Of course, we know that tomorrow (Tuesday) the terrain is going to be less easy for the buggies and we will probably lose

a bit of time, but since it should be better for us in Chile, I’m not worried, especially since we are out in front and not far behind Peterhansel.”

The motorbike section saw a change of hands in terms of the overall lead as Frenchman Olivier Pain took over from compatriot and four-time winner Cyril Despres.

The stage honours went to Spanish rider Joan Barreda Bort on a Husqvarna, who recorded his second stage win of this year’s race in beating Pain by 8min

23sec while another Frenchman David Casteu was third. Pain leads Casteu in the overall stand-ings by 2min 24sec with defending champion Despres, dropping to third 3min 09sec adrift.

Pain, whose best finish in six previous editions has been two ninth places including last year, was not getting ahead of himself with regard to winning the race outright.

“I don’t want to get overexcited about my place in the overall, the rally’s still long and my objective is to finish in the Top 10 every

day, and I hope to continue doing this well until the end,” said the 31-year-old.

On Monday, Al Attiyah won the Dakar Rally third stage to make it three stages from three for his Red Bull Buggy team.

The 42-year-old driver - who won the race in 2011 - moved to second in the overall standings some six-and-a-half minutes behind France’s Mini-driving 10-time champion Stephane Peterhansel.

“The sand was very soft today and I decided not to go flat out

because the car’s very new and we still don’t know how far it can go. No problems so far,” said Al-Attiyah, who won Olympic bronze last year in the shooting competition.

Peterhansel - who had started the day in the overall lead only for Al-Attiyah’s team-mate and 2010 champion Carlos Sainz to be reinstated over a technical fault the previous day - finished third in the stage while American veteran Robby Gordon was second.

AFP

Qatar’s Nasser Al Attiyah competes during Stage 4 of

the Dakar Rally 2013 yesterday. The rally takes place in Peru, Argentina and Chile

and will end on January 20.

Dakar Rally ResultsNAZCA, Peru: Dakar Rally results after fourth stage (717km/288km timed):

Auto Stage

1. Nasser Al-Attiyah (QAT/Buggy) 3hr 28min 46sec, 2. Guerlain Chicherit (FRA/Smg) at 36sec, 3. Stephane Peterhansel (FRA/Mini) 1min 17sec, 4. Giniel De Villiers (RSA/Toyota) 4:17, 5. Nani Roma (ESP/Mini) 7:27, 6. Leonid Novitskiy (RUS/Mini) 13:55, 7. Nunzio Coffaro (VEN/Toyota) 20:45, 8. Ronan Chabot (FRA/Smg) 21:07, 9. Pascal Thomasse (FRA/Buggy Md Rallye) 24:37, 10. Carlos Sousa (POR/Great Wall) 26:09

Overall

1. Stephane Peterhansel (FRA/Mini) 9hr 04min 29sec, 2. Nasser Al-Attiyah (QAT/Buggy) at 5min 16sec, 3. Giniel De Villiers (RSA/Toyota) 33:22, 4. Leonid Novitskiy (RUS/Mini) 33:48, 5. Nani Roma (ESP/Mini) 39:06, 6. Guerlain Chicherit (FRA/Smg) 42:32, 7. Ronan Chabot (FRA/Smg) 59:30, 8. Bernard Errandonea (AND/Smg) 1hr 04:54, 9. Boris Gadasin (RUS/G-Force Proto) 1hr 22:07, 10. Pascal Thomasse (FRA/Buggy Md Rallye) 1hr 23:56.

Bubka hints at ties between Qatar and Ukraine in sportsBY ARMSTRONG VAS

DOHA: Former Olympic gold medalist turned sports admin-istrator Sergey Bubka yester-day hinted at a possible tie-up between Qatar and Ukraine in the field of Olympic sports.

The champion pole vaulter, who was on whirlwind visit to Qatar, said talks between Ukraine Olympic Committee and Qatar Olympic Committee (QOC) have been going on.

“There is a strong possibility of Qatar and Ukraine signing a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) in the near future,” dis-closed Bubka, who heads the Ukraine Olympic Committee for the last seven years.

“On Monday we signed a MoU with Oman, today (Tuesday) I was with Sheikh Saoud bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, Secretary General of Qatar Olympic Committee and we had discussions. We are keen to strengthen our cooperation, we are planning to sign a MoU talks between Ukraine Olympic Committee and Qatar Olympic Committee (QOC),” said Bubka, who was inducted into the International Association of Athletics Federation Hall of Fame last year.

Bubka who holds the current outdoor world record of 6.14 metres, which he set on July 31, 1994 in Sestriere, Italy, said the areas of cooperation will range from sending athletes from Ukraine to train in the state-of-the-art sports Aspire Academy, coaches’ education and several other fields.

Bubka, who is also a parlia-mentarian, heaped praises on the Aspire Academy which he toured yesterday as part of his visit to Qatar.

“The facilities here (Aspire Academy) are very impressive. The facilities are excellent; we should work closely to develop sports and the Olympic move-ment together. It is a good model which the Aspire Academy is

following combining sports and education. Without education you are nowhere. After fin-ishing your sports career you need to fall back on education,” added the Ukrainian, who won six consecutive IAAF World Championships, Olympics gold and broke the world record for men’s pole vaulting 35 times.

Bubka said he was visiting his friends from the region and Qatar was the third country on his jet leg having earlier visited UAE and Oman.

“I was in Dubai to attend the annual Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum Creative Sports Award ceremony,” said Bubka.

Having earned fame during his prime days, Bubka is now focuss-ing on spreading the Olympic movement and also promoting the healthy values through sports. In fact, it was for these efforts, the Ukraine Olympic Committee was honoured in Dubai.

“I am honoured to receive this prestigious award for ‘Team Achievement on Values’ on behalf of my NOC and I am even more glad to have visited Oman to further boost the strength on these lines,” said the legendary athlete.

Bubka said he enjoyed the role of an administrator.

“It is beautiful to be one of the administrators. I am lucky to be one. I am very pleased to be in sports administration. It was always a dream for me to get involved in sports administration after my sports career got over. It is different, but I enjoy it.”

He advocated the need for more athletes to get involved in the administration of the game.

“There are a lot of advan-tages in having top athletes in administration; they understand the needs of sports people. Top sports persons can give a lot to give back to the administration

and work with the athletes,” added Bubka.

Questioned as to who will be the next Bubka, he said: “We have a good school in Ukraine for sposrts and we had some success. We search for talents but they (athletes) can achieve depends on them.

“We need modern facilities, in Ukraine as some of the facilities have become old with time and we have to change the system of coaching and get the younger generation involved in the move-ment,” he added.

Bubka also holds the cur-rent indoor world record of 6.15 metres, set on February 21, 1993.

The closest threat to his indoor record has come from Australian Steven Hooker at 6.06m. The closest active threat to his outdoor record has come from American record-holder Brad Walker at 6.04m

THE PENINSULA.

An athlete in action during

Sergey Bubka’s visit to the Aspire

Academy in Doha yesterday.

BOTTOM: Bubka, signs a visitors

book before touring the

Aspire Academy yesterday. Pictures by:

SHAIVAL DALAL

Bubka and Dahlan Al Hamad, President of Qatar Association of Athletics Federation share a word during Bubka’s tour of the Aspire Academy yesterday.

27SPORT WEDNESDAY 9 JANUARY 2013


Monfils advances to second round

Hungary and Bulgaria hit by FIFA sanctions over racism

Spain hails Messi ‘the greatest’ Scottish leagues agree to restructuring plan

ZURICH: Bulgaria and Hungary will each play their next World Cup qualifying matches on March 22 behind closed doors after racist inci-dents, among other infractions, marred previous encounters, FIFA said yesterday.

World football’s governing body said that during the Hungary-Israel game in August, “a group of supporters had chanted anti-Semitic chants, and dis-played other offensive symbols”, which the Hungarian federation acknowledged and regretted.

“After taking into account the full circumstances of the case, and in particular due to the gravity of the incidents,” FIFA’s disciplinary committee ruled that Hungary’s match against Romania on March 22 would now “be played without spectators”.

The committee also decided to impose a fine of 40,000 Swiss francs (33,000 euros) on the Hungarian federation.

Bulgaria’s March 22 qualifier against Malta will also be behind closed doors after Denmark’s Patrick Mtiliga was subjected to racist abuse by a group of Bulgarian fans in a match between the two countries in October.

AFP

MADRID: Spain bathed in glory yesterday after Barcelona star Lionel Messi (pictured) won the Ballon d’Or for best footballer of the year for a record fourth time, cementing his claim to be one of the great-est players of all time.

Spain coach Vicente del Bosque also snatched top honours, in rec-ognition of their Euro 2012 tri-umph, which followed its 2010 World Cup win and Euro 2008 crown, to top a virtual clean sweep for Spanish and La Liga players at the prestigious awards.

But it was the smiling 25-year-old Argentine international who stole the show, with pictures of him picking up the FIFA prize in Zurich dressed in an eye brow-raising black and white-spotted suit and bow tie, splashed across front pages.

“Spain!!!” headlined Madrid-based Marca, Spain’s biggest-sell-ing sports daily and a favourite of Real Madrid fans.

“Unique, unmatchable Messi,” the paper said after the striker scored a stunning 91 goals in 2012 in all competitions, smashing the 40-year-old record of German legend Gerd Mueller of 85.

“Leo Messi was crowned yes-terday as the best player in his-tory,” Marca said. “No-one until now had won four Ballons d’Or in a row. Leo has done it, and consecutively.”

Rival sports daily AS, too, lav-ished praise on Messi.

“Since we have known him, every year he plays better, every year he scores more goals,” said the paper’s columnist Alfredo Relano.

“I have never seen a player with such power. He lacks aesthetic but he has plenty of everything else,” he said, predicting even more Ballons d’Or to come.

“Golden Messi,” headlined the Barcelona-based Mundo Deportivo, adding: “Leo Messi is the greatest. Huge. Unique.”

On his return to Barcelona air-port, Messi told reporters that he had forgotten many people in his speech but had wanted to men-tion Barca coach Tito Vilanova, who is being treated for a cancer

of the salivary gland, and defender Eric Abidal.

The French defender is train-ing with the squad again after a liver transplant.

“When things calmed down I remembered Tito and Abidal and everyone, obviously,” Messi said, apologising for his omission.

Messi was one of three play-ers in the Spanish league on the shortlist for the world’s best foot-baller award. The two others were his Barca team-mate Andres Iniesta and rival striker Cristiano Ronaldo of Real Madrid.

In addition, all of the top six names in the final ranking that Messi topped were from La Liga teams.

In the FIFPro selection for the best 11-man line-up, meanwhile, six were Spaniards and all but two were from the Spanish league.

That selection included Ronaldo and three other Real players -- Iker Casillas, Sergio Ramos and Xabi Alonso -- plus Iniesta, Messi and two other Barcelona players, Gerard Pique and Xavi Hernandez.

Barcelona president Sandro Rosell said he was “very proud of our players and to be with Barcelona”, the club said on its Twitter feed.

The president of the Spanish Royal Football Federation, Angel Villar, said Del Bosque’s award was “a new prize for Spanish foot-ball that is going through some marvellous years”. AFP

LONDON: The format of Scottish football could be set for an overhaul after both the country’s league bodies agreed in principle to a three-divi-sion restructuring proposal yesterday.

The decision was reached in a meeting of the Scottish Premier League (SPL), the Scottish Football League (SFL) and the Scottish Football Association (SFA), but Scottish clubs are yet to vote on the plans.

As part of the proposals, the SPL and SFL will merge, while the league system will be reor-ganised into three divisions, with 12 teams in the top two tiers and 18 in the third division.

“We have had a very productive meeting of the Scottish FA’s pro-fessional game board, at which we had board representatives from around a third of the 42 senior clubs in Scotland,” said SFA chief executive Stewart Regan.

“I’m delighted to say that we have agreed a set of principles to restructure Scottish football.

“That will include a sin-gle league body, subject to club consultation.”

Regan added: “The next stage is to take a worked-up plan to clubs and we hope to do that by the end of January.” Regan, who was joined at the meeting by SPL chief executive Neil Doncaster and SFL

counterpart David Longmuir, revealed that under the proposals, the top two divisions would split into three groups of eight after 22 matches.

“Ultimately it will be the clubs that decide but we have seen today a willingness to make change happen and a recognition that Scottish football is crying out for a new dawn and we have now got agreement to take to clubs for a single league body,” Regan said.

“That is a huge step for the game in Scotland and it shouldn’t be underestimated.”

Meanwhile, Chelsea captain John Terry is making progress in his bid for a return to first-team action and could feature in this weekend’s Premier League match against Stoke, manager Rafael Benitez said yesterday.

The 32-year-old former England centre-back has been out of action for the European champions since a 1-1 draw with Liverpool on November 11 following a collision with Luis Suarez.

Initial indications were Terry would be out for three weeks but he is still to play first-team foot-ball nearly two months on.

Terry is due to face Chelsea’s west London rivals Fulham as an over-age player when the clubs Under-21 teams meet tomorrow. AGENCIES

Australian qualifier Jones stuns MelzerAUCKLAND: Mercurial Frenchman Gael Monfils bat-tled into the second round of the Heineken Open in Auckland yesterday, displaying flashes of brilliance as he came from behind to keep his injury come-back on track.

The former world number seven beat German Benjamin Becker 6-7 (2/7), 6-3, 6-4 in the New Zealand tournament, a warm-up for this month’s Australian Open Grand Slam later this month.

Monfils’ serve proved a potent weapon in an error-strewn match, as he blasted down 19 aces, com-pared to just five from Becker, whose challenge faded after he won a first set tie-breaker.

Elsewhere, Australian quali-fier Greg Jones made a mockery of his 373 world ranking, notched his first win in five ATP matches to dispose of Austrian sixth seed Jurgen Melzer in straight sets.

Jones downed world number 29 Melzer 7-6 (9/7), 6-2, caus-ing the Austrian to throw his

racquet to the court in frustra-tion as the Australian saved triple break point in the fifth game of the first set.

“It’s a pretty good feeling,” the 23-year-old Sydneysider said. “I trained really hard during the off-season.

“Physically, I’m just feeling much better on the court,” he added, revealing he had eased back on his favourite meal of burgers and chips.

In other first round matches, Colombian Santiago Giraldo thrashed Go Soeda of Japan 6-1, 6-0, Slovak Lukas Lacko downed Italy’s Paolo Lorenzi 6-3, 6-3 and Holland’s Igor Sijsling ground out a 3-6, 6-3, 7-5 win over compatriot Robin Haase.

Canadian Jesse Levine made short work of New Zealand wild card Daniel King-Turner, stroll-ing to a 6-2, 6-2 win, while Lu Yen-Hsun of Taiwan beat France’s Benoit Paire 6-3, 2-6, 6-2.

Defending champion and top seed David Ferrer of Spain will play for the first time on Wednesday after receiving a bye into the second round, along with Philipp Kohlschreiber and Tommy Haas, seeded two and three respectively, and American fourth seed Sam Querrey.

AFP

Former world No.1 and holder of 30 Grand Slam title Serena Williams on stage to promote a Nike Training Club Workout, in the lead-up to the Australian Open tennis tournament, in Melbourne, yesterday.

Radwanska makes it six straight wins in Sydney International SYDNEY: Poland’s Agnieszka R a d w a n s k a ( p i c t u r e d ) stretched her winning streak to six matches with a straight sets victory over Japanese veteran Kimiko Date-Krumm in brutal heat at the Sydney International yesterday.

As temperatures soared above 41 degrees Celsius (106 Fahrenheit), the tournament top seed overcame an early break before wearing down 42-year-old Date-Krumm, winning 6-4, 6-3 in 70 minutes.

Radwanska, 23, went into the Sydney event immediately off the back of a win in Auckland with-out dropping a set, and is in great form heading into next week’s Australian Open in Melbourne.

“So far I feel fine. I don’t have any problems and it’s (the) begin-ning of the year,” said Radwanska, who next plays Italian Roberta Vinci.

“It’s not like in the end of the year that we play so many tourna-ments, so many matches and we

can think sometimes it’s too much and it’s better not to play everything before the Grand Slam.

“But so far I’m feeling good. I think it’s still good prepa-ration for Australian Open.”

Radwanska played in her first Grand Slam final last year at Wimbledon where she lost to Serena Williams in three sets. At one stage last year she reached world number two before slipping to her current four.

German second seed Angelique Kerber overcame Kazakh quali-fier Galina Voskoboeva 6-2, 7-5 and said playing in the heat was going to help her in Melbourne next week.

“I think it’s a good prepara-tion for Melbourne. Melbourne’s weather can be the same,” Kerber said.

“So to have matches in this heat and also to just prepare before Melbourne.”

Former world number one Caroline Wozniacki went down in a titanic duel with former French and US Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova 7-6 (7/4), 1-6, 6-2.

China’s fourth seed Li Na, who won in Sydney two years ago, breezed past Japanese

qualifier Ayumi Morita, 6-1, 6-0, while Italian third seed Sara Errani downed Russian Maria Kirilenko, 6-1, 6-1.

Chinese Zheng Jie bowed out to American qualifier Madison Keys 6-0, 6-4, while Serbia’s former world number one Jelena Jankovic went out to Vinci in three sets.

In the men’s event, Bernard Tomic won the all-Australian night match with the coun-try’s number one ranked player

Marinko Matosevic, 6-3, 6-4.Tomic continued his impres-

sive unbeaten start to the south-ern summer season, including the prized scalp of world number one Novak Djokovic at last week’s Hopman Cup mixed teams event in Perth.

Spaniard Feliciano Lopez recov-ered from losing the opening set tiebreaker to knock out French seventh seed Jeremy Chardy, 6-7 (2/7), 7-5, 6-3, while Australian wild card John Millman sur-prised Spaniard Tommy Robredo 6-3, 6-4.Czech sixth seed Radek Stepanek accounted for Spanish qualifier Guillermo Garcia-Lopez in straight sets and Finland’s defending champion Jarkko Nieminen eased past German qualifier Bjorn Phau for the loss of one game.

Italy’s Fabio Fognini eliminated Grigor Dimitrov in straight sets, with the Bulgarian coming off los-ing to Andy Murray in last week-end’s Brisbane International final.

AGENCIES

Sydney ATP/WTA International

Results from the Sydney ATP/WTA International tennis tour-nament yesterday:

Women

Second Round: Agnieszka Radwanska (POL x1) bt Kimiko Date-Krumm (JPN) 6-4, 6-3; Sara Errani (ITA x3) bt Maria Kirilenko (RUS) 6-1, 6-1; Li Na (CHN x4) bt Ayumi Morita (JPN) 6-1, 6-0; Angelique Kerber (GER x2) bt Galina Voskoboeva (KAZ) 6-2, 7-5; Dominika Cibulkova (SVK) bt Ekaterina Makarova (RUS) 7-6 (7/3), 1-6, 7-6 (7/1); Roberta Vinci (ITA) bt Jelena Jankovic (SRB) 3-6, 6-4, 7-6 (7/4); Madison Keys (USA) bt Zheng Jie (CHN) 6-0, 6-4.

Men

First Round: Radek Stepanek (CZE x6) bt Guillermo Garcia-Lopez (ESP) 6-2, 6-3; Feliciano Lopez (ESP) bt Jeremy Chardy (FRA x7) 6-7 (2/7), 7-5, 6-3; Jarkko Nieminen (FIN) bt Bjorn Phau (GER) 6-0, 6-1; John Millman (AUS) bt Tommy Robredo (ESP) 6-3, 6-4; Fabio Fognini (ITA) bt Grigor Dimitrov (BUL) 6-3, 6-1; Kevin Anderson (RSA) bt Aljaz Bedene (SLO) 6-3, 3-6, 6-3; Bernard Tomic (AUS) bt Marinko Matosevic (AUS) 6-3, 6-4; Ryan Harrison (USA) bt Roberto Bautista Agut (ESP) 2-1 retired.

Hobart WTA International

Results from the Hobart WTA International tennis tournament yesterday (x denotes seeding):

First Round: Mona Barthel (GER x9) bt Ashleigh Barty (AUS) 2-6, 6-0, 6-1 (played late Monday); Bojana Jovanovski (SRB) bt Maria-Teresa Torro-Flor (ESP) 6-0, 7-6 (9/7); Klara Zakopalova (CZE x3) bt Timea Babos (HUN) 6-4, 6-3.

Second Round: Lauren Davis (USA) bt Sorana Cirstea (ROM x2) 6-1, 6-3; Elena Vesnina (RUS) bt Yaroslava Shvedova (KAZ x4) 4-6, 6-2, 6-1; Mona Barthel (GER x9) bt Chanelle Scheepers (RSA) 7-6 (7/3), 7-5; Sloane Stephens (USA x8) bt Simona Halep (ROM) 6-4, 6-0.

Auckland Open Results

Results from the Auckland Open Men’s Singles Round 1 matches yesterday

Lu Yen-Hsun (Taiwan) bt Benoit Paire (France) 6-3 2-6, 6-2; Gael Monfils (France) bt Benjamin Becker (Germany) 6-7(2), 6-3, 6-4; Jesse Levine (Canada) bt Daniel King-Turner (New Zealand) 6-2, 6-2; Alejandro Falla (Colombia) bt Grega Zemlja (Slovenia) 6-4, 3-1 (Zemlja retired); Greg Jones (Australia) bt 6-Jurgen Melzer (Austria) 7-6(7) 6-2

Igor Sijsling (Netherlands) bt Robin Haase (Netherlands) 3-6, 6-3, 7-5; Lukas Lacko (Slovakia) bt Paolo Lorenzi (Italy) 6-3, 6-3; Santiago Giraldo (Colombia) bt Go Soeda (Japan) 6-1, 6-0.

Victoria Azarenka from Belarus, smiles as she practises at Melbourne Park in Melbourne, Australia, yesterday. Some play-ers have arrived in Melbourne for the Australian Open Tennis Tournament, the first Grand Slam of the year, which commences on January 14.

Svetlana Kuznetsova of Russia reacts following her three set win over Caroline Wozniacki of Denmark at the Sydney International, yesterday.

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Qatar keep Gulf Cup hopes alivePaulo Autuori’s side beats Oman 2-1 with late winner; UAE reach semi-finalsMANAMA: Mohammad Al Sayed scored the winning goal to help Qatar keep their Gulf Cup hopes alive with a 2-1 win over Oman at the National Stadium, yesterday.

After Ibrahim Khalfan gave Qatar the lead in the 55th minute, Hussain Ali Al Hadhir levelled the score twelve minutes later courtesy of a penalty.

As both teams pressed for the winner, Al Sayed scored the decisive goal with three minutes remaining.

In the other Group A match that was played yesterday, Mahjed Hassan scored the late winner to help UAE book their spot in the semi-finals after beating the hosts Bahrain 2-1.

Abdulwahab Al Malood can-celled out Ali Mabkhout’s early strike but Hassan scored with five minutes remaining for UAE’s sec-ond straight win.

Yesterday’s results means that Qatar, coached by Paulo Autuori, are in second place with three points with Bahrain in third spot with one point. Qatar will face

Bahrain in a crucial match on Friday.

Meanwhile, Oman, who are bottom of Group A, will have to beat UAE and hope other results go their way.

Qatar, who lost their opening match against UAE were put under pressure from the first whistle as Oman dominated the early parts of the game.

Autuori’s side survived a scare in the opening minutes of the match when Fouzi Basheer forced a save from Qatar goalkeeper Qasem Abdulhamad.

The Qatari goalkeeper was called into action again in the 13th minute, when Eid Al Farsi saw his effort tipped over the crossbar by Abdulhamad.

His effort was watched by Oman coach, Paul Le Guen, who showed his disappointment fol-lowing Burhan’s tremendous save.

The Qatari defenders had to be on top of their game as Oman continued to create chances in the first half.

In the 39th minute, striker Abdul Aziz Al Muqbali wasted

an opportu-nity when he could not con-nect properly after being put through by his t e a m - m a t e Basheer.

Autuori would have been pleased at half-time with the score at 0-0 after Oman dom-

inated the first half.Oman who started the second-

half brightly, saw themselves 1-0 behind in the 55th minute.

Oman defender Mohammad Al Maslami fouled Khalfan, in the penalty box.

Khalfan, scored his second goal of the tournament when he con-verted his penalty.

Qatar’s goal rallied Oman in the second half. After a goal was

ruled off-side, Le Guen’s team were level twelve minutes later.

After Wumaar Darwish was adjudged to have been fouled by Marcone Amaral, Hussain Ali Al Hadhir scored the penalty to can-cel out Ibrahim’s goal.

With both teams needing a win to boost their hopes of advanc-ing to the semi-finals, Al Sayed scored the goal, which proved to be the winner with three minutes left. The striker lost his marker to tap-in a cross, that thrilled the Qatar team on sidelines.

In the match between Bahrain and UAE, Mabkhout scored in the sixth minute to silence the home fans in the stadium.

The hosts, created many chances but had to wait until the 75th minute for the equaliser.

Al Malood saw his effort sneak through the legs of Bahrain goal-keeper Ali Kashief.

Kashief made a fine double save when he denied Ismail Matar and Mabkhout, but could not keep out Hassan’s effort when he smashed the ball into the roof of the net.

THE PENINSULA

Gulf Cup Results and Fixtures

Yesterday’s Results

Oman 1 Qatar 2

Bahrain 1 UAE 2

Today’s Fixtures

Iraq vs Kuwait, 4:15pm

Yemen vs Saudi Arabia, 7:15pm

Qatar players celebrate their second goal against Oman during their Gulf Cup match at Isa Sports City in Isa Town, Bahrain, yesterday.

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