May 19, 2012

SATURDAY, MAY 19, 2012

@alwatandaily

Issue No. 1439

12 PAGES

www.alwatandaily.com

150 Fils with IHT

Motions filed against Al-Shamali may be merged

Staff Writers

KUWAIT: The Majority Bloc will meet today (Saturday) at the diwaniya of MP Khaled AlTahous to discuss the interpellation intended to be filed against the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Mustafa Al-Shamali, as well as other issues. MP Mohammad Al-Kandari told Al Watan that he would propose that one of the three MPs MusallamAl-Barrak, KhaledAl-Tahous and Abdulrahman Al-Anjeri, who filed the interpellation against Al-Shamali, would step away to be replaced by Dr. Obaid Al-Wasmi, who filed another interpellation motion against the same minister in order to merge the two motions.

MP Abdulletif Al-Omairi said that the attendees will discuss the interpellation motion and laws on anti-corruption, financial disclosure, protecting the informants, and preventing conflict of interests, which were approved by the bloc and are intended to be approved by the parliament within the coming two weeks.

Al-Omairi said that the Majority Bloc does not seek to prevent any MP from filing interpellations, stressing that any decision will be made unanimously after discussions. He stressed that

the coming phase is important and that the Parliament and the government should not pay attention to rumors surrounding the Parliament, which is aiming to set achievements and enact important laws.

For his part, MP Abdulrahman Al-Anjeri asked the Board of Directors of the Public Authority for Social Securities to resign immediately and to open an investigation. He said that the State Audit Bureau (SAB) rejected investigating the investments of said authority by parliamentary committee under the pretext that it contradicts the law.

Informed sources said that the Majority Bloc meeting will discuss a number of interpellations intended to be filed. They said that the government is required to take steps to reshuffle certain posts, especially as the government expressed its willingness to cooperate with parliament on several occasion.

In a related development, MP Salem Al-Namlan said that no interpellations will be submitted without the approval of the Majority Bloc, which has the required number of votes to approve any law which is in the interest of the country.

Speaking to Al Watan, Al-Namlan said that he

Bus plunges into Vietnam river bank, kills 34

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Zuckerberg kicks off Facebook IPO

CAPITALS: Mark Zuckerberg, wearing his trademark hooded sweatshirt, remotely rang the bell to open the Nasdaq Friday, marking a historic share offering for Facebook that confirms the growing importance of the social network giant.

Amid a crowd at Facebook’s California headquarters, Zuckerberg and hundreds of employees cheered as the 28-year-old co-founder rang the bell via video for the New York-based Nasdaq.

Facebook shares were to start trading later in the day in the richest-ever initial public offering for a technology firm.

Zuckerberg wore a dark hoodie, unfazed by criticism from some on Wall Street about his casual attire. And most

of those on hand for the ceremony were wearing similar sweatshirts or T-shirts.

The company’s stock, priced at 38 US dollars per share, was to begin trading under the symbol “FB” on the Nasdaq, giving the leading website a dizzying value of $104 billion at its market debut.

The initial public offering (IPO) raised more than $16 billion, making it the richest after that of financial giant Visa in 2008, according to Renaissance Capital.

The addition of a possible stock “overallotment” could boost the total to $18.4 billion.

Facebook itself is selling 180 million shares and early investors in the company the remaining 241 million. More on 5

Police detain 400 ‘Blockupy’ activists in Frankfurt

is all for the five constituency system, and rejects the one-constituency system as well as allowing the establishment of political parties, as they will divide the society.

In another development, the Minister of Health Dr. Ali Al-Obaidi reshuffled certain posts within the ministry and had certain officials retire. The decisions will come into force as of May 25. Head of Human Resources Mezid Al-Mezid and Head of Budget and Censorship Mohammad Al-Ruwaih are to retire.

Meanwhile, Dr. Adel Al-Asfour was appointed Director of Sabah Health Zone, replacing Dr. Abdullatif Al-Sahli, who was appointed adviser for the ministry. Dr. Tariq Al-Jassar was appointed Director of Capital City Health Zone, replacing Dr. Adel Al-Khatrash who was appointed adviser for the ministry. Dr. Khaled Al-Abdulghani was appointed Director of Hawally Health Zone replacing Dr. Abdulaziz Al-Farhous who was appointed Director of Jahra Health Zone.

Al-Obaidi told Al Watan that the decisions he has made aim to replace old directors with those of a younger workforce. He added that other reshuffles will take place in central directorates and within the nursing staff.

France names first South Korean-born minister

PARIS: President Francois Hollande has named 38year-old technocrat Fleur Pellerin as France’s first South Korean-born minister, in charge of small and medium enterprises and the digital economy. Pellerin, born in Seoul and adopted by French parents at the age of six months, is a classic product of France’s elite education system as opposed to the hierarchy of Hollande’s Socialist Party.

She had a brilliant academic career, entering the International Business School in Europe aged 17, followed by the Sorbonne and the elite Ecole Nationale d’Administration (ENA) – which also educated Hollande and much of France’s political class. Pellerin, who told AFP she does not see herself as Asian, was raised in a family “with left-wing values” and only joined the Socialist Party in 2006, before becoming Hollande’s advisor on the digital economy, which she calls a “lever of growth.”

She also worked for the campaigns of the last two Socialist candidates, Lionel Jospin and Segolene Royal.

Pellerin says that she declined an offer to stand for an easy seat in next month’s parliamentary elections.

In France, ministers are not required to hold elected office.While resisting being pigeonholed as a young, nonwhite woman, Pellerin admits that “ticking all those boxes” bettered her chances of joining the new government.

Previously little known in France, Pellerin was feted by the Asian media during the grueling campaign. She told AFP that in Korea “there is a kind of collective guilt about having sent away children for adoption during the 1970s.

Now, they’re trying to renew their links and to see what these children have become.” Her passport still carries what was her first name at birth - Jong-Sook - which she for a long time thought meant “perfect woman.” -AFP

4,700 potentially dangerous asteroids lurk near Earth: NASA

Protesters march during an anti-austerity demonstration in Frankfurt May 18, 2012. The demonstration is part of a four-day-long “Blockupy” protest, due to run until Saturday, against capitalism and austerity measures implemented to tackle the euro zone crisis. (Reuters)

FRANKFURT: German police said they detained 400 anti-capitalist protesters in Frankfurt on Friday for defying a ban on demonstrations against austerity policies implemented to tackle the intensifying euro zone debt crisis.

The demonstration in the German financial capital was part of a four-daylong “Blockupy” protest, due to run until Saturday, against capitalism and swinging austerity measures.

“Hungry? Eat a banker,” read one banner protesters held up outside the Messeturm skyscraper housing Goldman Sachs’ offices. Reuters’ Frankfurt office is also in the building. Police closed several main roads in Frankfurt - including a main artery into the city that passes by the Messeturm - and flooded the centre with officers. There was no violence.

The protesters are angry at the misery they say governments are inflicting on people with their response to the crisis, which has intensified since inconclusive elections in Greece this month fueled concerns about its future in the euro zone.

“The Greek austerity measures are making Greece go kaputt even faster,” said protester Leonard Loch, 37, from Hamburg.

The European Central Bank reported no trouble on Friday and commercial banks, many of whom have made contingency plans to cope with the protests, said their operations were running smoothly.

“Our operating business is not curtailed. We were well prepared,” said a Commerzbank spokeswoman. Police sealed off Deutsche Bank’s headquarters.

Germany’s biggest bank said its business was unaffected.

The ECB is at the centre of the policy response to the crisis and has faced calls from politicians, investors and protesters to do more.

The central bank says it has already headed off a major credit crunch with unprecedented funding operations in December and February that unleashed over 1 trillion euros ($1.3 trillion) into the financial system. It is pressing governments to act. “The ECB shouldn’t give the cheap money to banks but rather to countries,” said Guenther Stamer, 62, a social worker from Kiel. -Reuters

WASHINGTON: A new NASA survey has pinned down the number of asteroids that could pose a collision threat to Earth in what scientists say is the best estimate yet of the potentially dangerous space rocks according to SPACE. The survey found there are likely 4,700 potentially hazardous asteroids, plus or minus 1,500 space rocks, that are larger than 330 feet (100 meters) wide and in orbits that occasionally bring them close enough to Earth to pose a concern, researchers said. To date, only about 30 percent of those objects have actually been found, they added. Potentially hazardous asteroids, or PHAs in NASA-speak, are space rocks in orbits that come within 5 million miles (8 million kilometers) of Earth and are large enough to cause damage on regional or global scale if they were ever to hit our planet. The new study was based on observations from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), an inMore on 9 frared space telescope.

Regime forces fire on massive Syria protests

Syrian anti-government demonstrators shout slogans during a protest in Atareb in the northwestern province of Idlib on May 18, 2012. (AFP)

DAMASCUS: Regime forces fired on protesters who took to the streets of Aleppo on Friday, wounding several people at the biggest rally seen in Syria’s second city since a revolt erupted last year, a watchdog said. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said demonstrators also suffered gunshot wounds in Douma, a key protest hub near Damascus, but did not provide any casualty figures. “Thousands of people demonstrated in various districts (of Aleppo) despite the repression,” said Rami Abdel Rahman of the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. “These are the most important events in Aleppo since the beginning of the revolt,” he told AFP in Beirut.

The government said its forces foiled a suicide bomb attack in Aleppo last Friday, a day after twin bombings in Damascus killed 55 people and wounded nearly 400. It has repeatedly blamed such attacks on “terrorists”.

UN chief Ban Ki-moon said on Thursday he believes Al-Qaeda committed the Damascus attack. “Very alarmingly and surprisingly, a few days ago, there was a huge serious massive terrorist attack. I believe that there must be Al-Qaeda behind it. This has created again very serious problems,” Ban said. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, as well as the United States and Russia, has already pointed to an Al-Qaeda presence in the country since the revolt against his regime began. The Observatory said at least seven died in violence across the country on Friday, including two children and a woman killed by regime forces.

Besides Aleppo, protests demanding the ouster of Al-Assad also took place in Damascus, the eastern city of Deir El-Zor, northeastern Hasaka, Homs in central Syria, and northwestern Idlib, said the Britain-based Observatory. See also 2

Students defiant as Quebec unveils law to quell strikes

MONTREAL: Angry Quebec student leaders on Friday vowed to fight a tough new law being proposed to quell 14 weeks of strikes and sometimes violent mass protests against tuition hikes in the Canadian province.

The Quebec government, seeking to end demonstrations it says could harm the economy, wants to make anyone organizing a protest of more than 10 people give the police eight hours’ advance notice.

The new law, unveiled on Thursday night, would also ban demonstrations in the immediate vicinity of universities and colleges and impose large fines on those who disobey.

The students, who pay some of the lowest tuition fees in North America, say the price hikes would leave them facing thousands of dollars in debt.

“When laws become unjust sometimes you have to disobey them and we are thinking seriously about this possibility,” Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, head of the

militant CLASSE student group, told a news conference held jointly with major trade union leaders in Quebec City. Asked whether he would be prepared to go to prison, he replied: “We’ll see.”

Leo Bureau-Blouin, head of the more moderate Quebec College Student Federation, said the law would be appealed and called on the public for support.

About 155,000 students - more than a third of Quebec college and university students - are striking against plans to increase annual tuition fees by 1,625 Canadian dollars (1,595 US dollars) over the course of five years, a 75 percent hike.

The proposed law would ban protests either on, or within 50 meters (yards), of the grounds of a university or college.

Individuals breaking the law could be fined up to C$35,000 while student associations face penalties of up to C$125,000. -Reuters

UN talks take first steps on 2015 climate deal

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Demonstration in Tehran over Bahrain-Saudi union

TEHRAN: Thousands of people demonstrated in Tehran on Friday to protest a proposed union of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, in the first step toward closer links among six Arab monarchies across the Gulf.

The authorities had urged citizens to protest what was called an “American plan to annex Bahrain to Saudi Arabia and express their anger against the lackey regimes of Al-Khalifa and Al-Saud,” the dynasties ruling the two countries.

Media reports said demonstrators in the capital, many brandishing the Bahraini flag, shouted “death” to America, Israel, the “traitors” Al-Saud and AlKhalifa. Official media also reported protests in other cities.

The planned union between Bahrain and Saudi Arabia has triggered a war of words between Shiite-dominated Iran and the Sunni rulers of Shiite-majority Bahrain.

This weeks Tehran Friday prayer leader Ayatollah Kazem Sedighi said the “US-Zionist plot” to create a union between will fail.

“Recently ... (Riyadh and Manama) came up with this plot to annex Bahrain to Saudi Arabia ... They call it a union but they want Bahrain to lose its identity instead of giving in to its people’s demands,” the cleric said on state radio.

“This is US-Zionist conspiracy and they should know that the Muslim people of the world and the Iranians will not tolerate this plot ... Saudi Arabia did not prevail by its military presence there, and will gain nothing in this plot except See also 2 disgrace,” he added.

Fans wear wigs with colors as they wait for the cast of the movie before the screening of “Madagascar 3 Europe’s Most Wanted” presented out of competition at the 65th Cannes film festival on May 18, 2012 in Cannes. (AFP)

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ALWATAN DAILY

world

SaturDAY, MAY 19, 2012

Al-Qaeda chief urges Baghdad market Saudis to topple ruling family bombs kill at least four BAGHDAD: Three roadside bombs ripped through a Baghdad marketplace on Friday, killing at least four people and injuring at least 30 more near one of the capital’s main Shiite neighborhoods, police and hospital sources said.

The almost simultaneous blasts in Ma’amil, near the Sadr City district in eastern Baghdad, occurred in the early morning when there were few people attending the outdoor market that sells birds, witnesses said.

“The three bombs exploded almost at the same time. After I heard one of the explosions, I found myself in hospital with shrapnel in my hands, legs and head,” said Ahmed Kareem, at Sadr City General Hospital.

Violence has eased in Iraq since the height of the war in 2006 to 2007 when tens of thousands were killed as Sunnis and Shiites fought one another. But Sunni Islamists tied to Al-Qaeda remain a potent force, and often hit security forces and Shi’ite targets to try to stir sectarian tensions. -Reuters

Al-Qaeda’s second-in-command Ayman Al-Zuwahiri.

(Reuters)

DUBAI: Al-Qaeda chief Ayman Al-Zawahri on Thursday urged Saudis to rise up against the kingdom’s ruling Al-Saud family, suggesting they draw inspiration from uprisings that have deposed leaders across the Middle East and Africa in the past year and a half.

Speaking in a video clip that was posted on an Islamist website, Zawahri, who took over the leadership of Al-Qaeda after Osama bin Laden was killed in Pakistan just over a year ago, said: “Muslim brothers in the land of the holy mosques, a year has passed since the uprising of the Arab people against their rulers...my dear brothers why do you still accept to be ruled by the Al Saud family. They are one of the worst corrupt governments who steal your money,” he said.

“Why don’t you rise up (against the Al Sauds) as

you are the companions of the Prophet,” he added.

Saudi Arabia has been spared the mass protests that have forced four Arab heads of state out of office, partly thanks to a big public spending package announced by the world’s largest oil exporter early last year.

But the kingdom’s Eastern Province has seen sporadic demonstrations since March last year, and in November four people were killed, according to the Interior Ministry and activists.

Protesters’ demands have so far focused on political reform in the mainly Sunni kingdom, with calls to improve life for the country’s Shiite minority and to release political prisoners.

Security forces have arrested and released around 500 people over the protests, and are currently holding 80 people, according to activists. -Reuters

A soldier inspects a damaged vehicle at the site of a bomb attack in Sadr city in north-eastern Baghdad. (Reuters)

Iran summons Bahrain envoy over union row

UN chief blames Al-Qaeda for Damascus blasts Syrians revolt Islamist slogans under criticism

UNITED NATIONS: Ban Ki-moon, the UN secretary-general, has said that he believes Al-Qaeda was responsible for last week’s bombings in Damascus, the Syrian capital, that left more than 50 people dead.

“A few days ago there was a huge, serious, massive terrorist attack. I believe that there must be Al-Qaeda behind it. This has created again very serious problems,” Ban said on Thursday.

At least 55 people were killed and 372 others were wounded in blasts in Damascus on May 10, in the deadliest attacks in the Syrian capital since an uprising against President Bashar Al-Assad began early last year.

Ban also noted that there have been two attacks against unarmed UN monitors trying to reduce the violence in the country.

There are 257 unarmed UN monitors in Syria to observe an unraveling five-week-old truce negotiated

by UN-Arab League peace envoy Kofi Annan.

“The deployment of monitors has some dampening effect, the number of violence has reduced but not enough, not all the violence have stopped,” Ban said while addressing youth group at UN headquarters in New York.

“We are trying out best efforts to protect the civilian population.”

The UN chief said at least 10,000 people had been killed in the conflict.

Damascus says that it is facing a “terrorist” conspiracy funded and directed from abroad.

Earlier this month, Syria sent the UN the names of 26 foreign nationals it said had been apprehended after coming to fight in the country. It described 20 of those as members of Al-Qaeda who had entered the country from Turkey.

Meanwhile, the use of Islamist slogans by protesters during weekly Friday demonstrations against Assad’s regime has triggered criticism among an alreadyfractured opposition.

Activists have been organizing online polls on “The Syrian Revolution 2011” Facebook page since the be-

Syrians gather around Arabic writing made from fire which reads, “we will continue,” during a demonstration in Zabadani neighborhood, Damascus, Syria. (AP)

ginning of the uprisings in March last year to pick slogans for demonstrations that usually take place after Friday prayers.

But slogans like “victory from God,” “God’s Victory is near” and “armies of Islam, set us free,” have provoked criticism from many in the fragmented opposition, which includes the Muslim Brotherhood, nationalists, liberals and independents.

Syrian activist and journalist Kinan Ali said the use of religious slogans “shows that the opposition is bankrupt of political ideas.”

Abdul Karim Karman, a Hama-based activist, agreed.

“I am a committed Muslim but Islamist slogans do not benefit (the revolt) and do not represent everyone,” Abdul Karim Karman, a Hama-based activist, told AFP though Skype.

“We need slogans that have political content for the Syrian public and for the international community.”

Activist Yusef Al-Shami, from Syria’s Druze city of Sweida, complained of the negative impact of these slogans on demonstrations.

“They have weakened the protests in some areas of Syria,” he said.

“The largest demonstrations took place when the focus was the slogan ‘revolt for all Syrians.” The activists have also questioned the authenticity of the polls on Facebook, saying they are not scientific.

Under pressure, Syria’s main opposition alliance, the Syrian National Council (SNC), has decided to create a new application on Facebook, ensuring “transparent” voting, by imposing new rules such as banning Internet users from voting more than once.

SNC chief Burhan Ghalioun announced on Thursday that he is resigning.

His announcement came shortly after the Local Coordination Committees, a network of activists on the ground in Syria, threatened to pull out of the SNC over its “monopolization” of power.

The SNC, which was founded in October 2011, was particularly criticized for not sufficiently coordinating with activists inside the country, and for the strong influence wielded by representatives of Syria’s Muslim Brotherhood. More than 12,000 people, the majority of them civilians, have died since the Syrian uprising began, according to monitors. -AFP

Iranian demonstrators hold up portraits of the Islamic republic’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and wave Bahraini flags during a protest after the Friday noon prayer in Tehran on May 18, held in response to a government call to protest a plan to unite Bahrain with Saudi Arabia that Tehran has said is a US plot. (AFP)

Iranians rally to denounce Bahrain-Saudi ties and vice-versa TEHRAN: Iran summoned Bahrain’s ambassador in Tehran after his foreign minister told the Islamic republic to stop interfering in his nation’s internal affairs, state media reported on Friday. Foreign Minister Sheikh Khaled bin Ahmad AlKhalifa on Thursday warned Iran to stop meddling over a proposal for Bahrain to form a union with Saudi Arabia.

Tehran “rejects comments made by the Bahrain foreign minister and hopes that the Bahraini government finds a suitable solution towards the developments there,” the reports quoted a foreign ministry official as saying.

“The only way out of the existing problems is respond to the legitimate demands of the Bahraini people,” the official added.

The planned union between Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, the first part of a broader union of the Gulf’s six Arab monarchies, has triggered a war of words between Shiite-dominated Iran and the Sunni rulers of Shiite-majority Bahrain.

The summoning of Bahrain’s envoy to Tehran came ahead of Iranian government-organized protests on Friday against what it has called “the American plan to annex Bahrain to Saudi Arabia.”

On Thursday, Sheikh Khaled said the union is a “demand by the people” of the Gulf Cooperation Council, while adding that Bahrain “rejects Iranian interference in the affairs of the kingdom.”

The minister said that “every once in a while, we hear Iranian claims that Bahrain is the 14th governorate” of the Islamic republic and that Bahrainis want to “return to the motherland.”

Saudi Arabia had also previously told Iran to keep out of its relations with Bahrain, where dozens of people, mostly Shiites, have been killed in violence since February 2011.

And Iran hit back on Thursday, with foreign ministry spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast saying “the proposed union or

annexation of Bahrain to Saudi Arabia” would lead to the “disappearance” of the Gulf archipelago.

Tensions have escalated between Iran and its Gulf Arab neighbors since a Saudi-led Gulf force rolled into Bahrain in March 2011 to boost the kingdom’s security forces which then crushed a monthold Shiite-led uprising against the regime.

Iran has repeatedly voiced support for the protests in Bahrain and strongly condemned the deployment of Saudi-led forces.

Meanwhile, Iranians rallied Friday to denounce efforts by Bahrain’s Sunni rulers to forge closer ties with Saudi Arabia, a pact the Shiite powerhouse Iran claims would go against the will of the tiny island nation’s majority Shiites.

Iran’s anger is directed at archrival Saudi Arabia, which has been acting as a protector of Bahrain’s ruling Sunni dynasty. It was set off by efforts earlier this week by Gulf Arab states to outline closer political and security ties among their nations.

Though a decision on a Gulf Arab pact was postponed at a meeting in Riyadh on Monday, the gathering itself upset Tehran, which summoned Bahrain’s top diplomat in the country late Thursday to relay its concerns, the official IRNA news agency reported.

Bahrain has been rocked by an uprising in which the Shiite-led opposition seeks to overturn the wide-ranging powers of the ruling Sunni dynasty. At least 50 people have died in the unrest since February 2011.

Bahrain’s rulers and their patron Saudi Arabia accuse Iran of encouraging the protests, claims that Tehran has denied.

Iran and Bahrain have occasionally summoned each other’s envoys since the beginning of Bahrain’s unrest.

Last year, Saudi forces led 1,500 Gulf troops into Bahrain to help prop up the Sunni dynasty against the uprising, now in its 15th month. The result has been a virtual melding of the two countries on the ground - with the Saudi and Bahraini flags often displayed in unison at the airport and some security checkpoints.

Opposition groups in Bahrain, how-

ever, have strongly denounced the calls for tighter bonds with Saudi Arabia and possibly other Gulf states.

Friday’s government-backed march followed midday prayers in Tehran, led by cleric Kazem Sedighi who said a SaudiBahraini pact would be an “ominous conspiracy” aimed at the “annexation” of Bahrain by Saudi Arabia.

“Bahrain and regional nations, as well as the Muslim world and the Iranian nation will never accept the conspiracy,” Sedighi said.

State television said similar rallies took place in other cities and towns in Iran, with thousands participating.

In Manama, thousands of Shiites took to the streets on Friday to demonstrate against a proposal to unite the Sunni-ruled kingdom with neighboring Saudi Arabia, also a Sunni monarchy, witnesses said.

“No to union. Bahrain is not for sale,” protesters chanted as they marched along a main road linking a number of Shiite villages around the capital.

Others shouted “the country is not up for auction,” as the crowds responded to a call by the predominantly Shiite opposition to march under the slogan “ready to sacrifice (ourselves) for Bahrain.”

Shiite spiritual figure Ayatollah Issa Qassem, speaking at a mosque in Duraz, west of Manama, demanded that any proposed union of the two countries be submitted to a referendum.

The principal opposition group, AlWefaq, has made the same demand.

The people have the “right to oppose or approve this union,” Qassem said.

“Why prevent the people from expressing their fear, their opposition and their opposition and their legitimate peaceful resistance to a project that is being forced on them?” he asked.

The six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council, a grouping of the Sunni Arab monarchies in the Gulf, have been discussing a Saudi proposal that would lead toward some form of closer political union.

The first step in this process would be the union of Bahrain, which has a Shiite majority, with Saudi Arabia. -AFP

ALWATAN DAILY

WORLD

saturdAY, MAY 19, 2012

Bus plunges into Vietnam river bank, kills 34 HANOI: A crowded bus plunged into a river bank in central Vietnam, killing 34 people and injuring 21 others in one of the country’s deadliest road accidents.

Local official Tran Bao Que says the bus smashed through the rails of a bridge late Thursday night and plunged into the bank of the Serepok River about 18 meters (60 feet) below. The bus was traveling on a regular 350-kilometer (217-mile) route from the central highland province of Dak Lak to the southern commercial hub of Ho Chi Minh City.

Y Bliu Arul, deputy director of the General Hospital in Dak Lak, says the bus’s two drivers were among the 32 people who died at the scene. Two others died at the hospital. Of the 21 injured, 16 were in serious condition.

Que said it took rescuers four hours to pull the bodies from the bus, part of which was submerged in the river.

“When the accident happened, everyone in the bus was sleeping,” online newspaper Dan Tri quoted survivor Nguyen Van Khanh as saying. “I vaguely heard a noise like a gun fire and then people were screaming when the bus was overturned. ... I managed to escape through a window which was smashed opened by others.”

Authorities are investigating the cause of the accident. Road accidents kill more than 11,000 people each year in Vietnam. -AP

NEWS IN BRIEF Two NATO troops killed in Afghan attack KABUL: Two NATO soldiers were killed and six others wounded in a rocket attack on their base in Afghanistan’s eastern province of Kunar Friday, an Afghan official with NATO forces said. “Two ISAF soldiers were killed and six others injured in a Taliban rocket attack on an ISAF base in Nari ditrict today,” a local spokesman for NATO’s International Security Assistance Force said. Two other local officials confirmed the account, while the ISAF press office in Kabul said that “two service members died following an insurgent attack in eastern Afghanistan”. They are due to pull out of the country in 2014, and details of the process will be hammered out at a NATO summit in Chicago starting on Sunday. -AFP

Thai court disqualifies ‘Red Shirt’ lawmaker

Rescuers search for victims inside a bus that crashed in Vietnam’s central highland province of Daklak May 18. (Reuters)

China jails smuggling king Lai ‘for life’ Obama, Hollande meet for first BEIJING: A Chinese court on Friday handed a life sentence to Lai Changxing, the head of a vast smuggling operation who spent 12 years on the run in Canada before being deported last year, state media said. Lai was found guilty of smuggling luxury cars and cigarettes worth billions of dollars and of bribing officials, in a case that brought down senior military and police figures and tested relations between China and Canada.

The 53-year-old received the sentence at a court in southeast China’s Xiamen, the city from which he directed his sprawling criminal empire before fleeing the country, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

The sentence was the maximum available to the Xiamen Intermediate People’s Court after China, in order to secure Lai’s extradition, issued an unusual promise to the Canadian government not to execute him. At least 14 death sentences were meted out to less important figures in the case when trials were held over a decade ago, bringing down national-level military and police officials and a swarm of local functionaries. Lai was sentenced to life in jail for smuggling, in addition to losing all his personal assets, according to Xinhua.

The court separately sentenced him to 15 years in jail for bribery, the agency said, giving no further details.

Lai’s organization smuggled luxury cars, cigarettes and other products worth a total of 27.4 billion yuan, evading 14 billion yuan in taxes, Xinhua said, quoting the verdict. This was made possible by paying bribes in cash or in kind worth 39.1 million yuan to 64 different officials, according to the verdict.

“The sums involved are unusually large, and the details are extraordinarily

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serious, meriting the double sentence,” the court was quoted as saying by Xinhua. Xinhua did not indicate whether Lai appealed the sentence. The Xiamen court declined to comment when contacted by AFP. The case, one of the largest graft scandals in communist China’s 62-year history, exposed a tight relationship between officials and entrepreneurs in the free-wheeling port city of Xiamen. It has received huge attention in China, where corruption is one of the key causes of public discontent. As the case unraveled in the late 1990s, Lai managed to escape to Canada on a tourist visa, but was deported back to China in July last year after a 12-year battle against repatriation.

He claimed the accusations against him were politically motivated and sought asylum, sparking a diplomatic tug-of-war that tested the countries’ relations.

Lai’s career in crime delivered the material for thousands of media reports and several books, delving into how he paid off officials and entertained them in a lavish private club known as the “red mansion”.

At the time the People’s Daily newspaper - mouthpiece of the Communist Party said the club, with its sumptuous eateries, ballrooms, karaoke bars, saunas, cinemas and bedrooms, was where dozens of highranking officials “resigned themselves to degeneracy and became tools of Lai’s group”. While he was reviled in the national press, Lai was also known to some as a modern-day Robin Hood who would lavish money and goods on local communities near Xiamen where he grew up in poverty. His trial was open to the public and numerous government officials and Lai family members attended, Xinhua said. -AFP

This TV screen grab from CCTV shows Lai Changxing escorted by Chinese authorities after he landed in Beijing aboard a civilian flight in July 2011. (AFP)

time before G-8 Summit convenes

New bill offers Indian women post-divorce security NEW DELHI: Indian women’s groups applauded Friday cabinet approval of amendments to a bill that would for the first time grant women a clearly-defined share of their husband’s property after divorce. The new Marriage Bill will, if passed by parliament, ensure a woman’s right to a 50 percent share of the residential property owned by her husband, whether it was acquired before or after their marriage. Activists said the amendments green-lighted by the cabinet on Thursday threw an important legal lifeline to women who too often find themselves homeless and with no income source after a divorce. -AFP

Candidates fight for ‘change’ vote in Dominican election Tourist pose for photographers with Oxfam activist wearing masks depicting G8 world leaders during a demonstration outside the White House in Washington, May 17. President Barack Obama will welcome G8 leaders to his presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland.(AFP)

QUEUEQ: President Barack Obama meets today with France’s new Socialist president and selfdescribed “normal” guy in a test for U.S.-French relations as Obama tries to shape European economic and military commitments.

The late morning meeting at the White House, the first between Obama and President Francois Hollande, takes place hours before they join other leaders of the Group of Eight nations at a summit at Camp David, the presidential retreat in Maryland.

The agenda for the leaders includes Greece’s debt crisis, global food security and the role of strategic oil reserves in cushioning any economic shocks from a European Union ban on Iranian imports that begins July 1.

Hollande earlier this month became the first Socialist in 17 years to control Europe’s second-biggest economy by defeating Nicolas Sarkozy, with whom Obama developed a close working relationship in dealing with issues from Libya to Iran to Europe’s sovereign debt crisis.While Obama and Hollande will need “to work through” some issues, such as France’s commitments in Afghanistan, “I at this point frankly see a good relationship building between us already,” White House National Security Adviser Tom Donilon told reporters yesterday.

Hollande’s goal in his first meeting with Obama is to reassert the strong ties between the US and France and to reassure that any differences of opinion shouldn’t put the alliance into question, an Hollande

adviser said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

From the G-8 meeting in rural Maryland, most of the leaders will travel tomorrow evening to Chicago for a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) summit where a central topic is a discussion of military issues, including funding and manpower to support Afghanistan after coalition forces leave at the end of 2014.

The economy and the continuing turmoil in Greece will dominate much of the G-8 discussion.

Hollande’s advocacy of more growth and less austerity in Europe puts him at odds with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who opposes adding to nations’ debt burdens. That makes Hollande a potentially valuable ally for Obama, 50, who has advocated a more growth-focused approach.

The US is seeking agreement on a common goal “to preserve the foundations of the eurozone, to address the current crisis facing Europe, particularly as a result of the political events in Greece,” Donilon said.

Greece is scheduled to hold national elections on June 17, with its future in the 17-nation euro area and an international rescue at stake. The nation’s credit rating was downgraded one level by Fitch Ratings on concerns the country won’t be able to muster the political support to meet bailout terms. The Stoxx Europe 600 Index dropped 1.1 percent to 241.63 at the close of trading yesterday, for the longest losing streak since March 22. -Agencies

Russia protesters try new tactics against Putin

MOSCOW: A mass walk led by writers, camping out at night in the city, cat-andmouse games with the police: Russia’s protest movement is trying out novel tactics to keep up pressure on Vladimir Putin.

Political slogans for the moment have been dropped in favour of tea-drinking and discussions in the open air as the protestors seek to test how far the authorities are prepared to let them use their right to assembly.

Police have twice roughly broken up sit-in protests in the centre of Moscow, an action that would have been unthinkable in the Russian capital before the first mass protests sparked

by December’s parliamentary elections. But activists picked up the pieces and moved to a new locale, congregating on park benches even after police detained dozens, took the generator that powered the Wi-Fi network, and reportedly confiscated the donation box.

The general feeling of being fed-up with the current political regime and elections widely

BANGKOK: A Thai court stripped a top “Red Shirt” leader of his parliamentary seat Friday, in a move likely to anger supporters of the movement whose protests in Bangkok in 2010 descended into bloodshed. The Constitutional Court in Bangkok said that Jatuporn Prompan’s election was invalid because his membership of the now-ruling Puea Thai party had been nullified under the constitution when he was jailed on remand in May 2011. The firebrand activist was elected to parliament in July 2011 elections that handed a landslide victory to the political allies of the Red Shirts’ hero, fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra who lives overseas. -AFP

believed to be fraudulent is not going away, one of the camp’s core organisers Yelena Nadezhkina told AFP on a recent evening.

A regular of environmental protests who lived in a camp opposed to logging in a Moscow region forest, Nadezhkina said the sit-in participants don’t follow opposition leaders and come from all over the political spectrum.

“Our goal is to show that society can organise without a dictator,” she said. “The authorities have taken over our country and they’re not letting people live in peace.”

The fluid Internet-based protest is a test for Vladimir Putin, who would be taking a major risk if he underestimates the potential of an increasingly creative opposition over his six year term. Ten thousand people turned up Sunday after detective novelist and opposition supporter Boris Akunin wrote on his blog that he planned to stroll along Moscow’s famous boulevard ring with several other writers to see if he was arrested. He was not.

Letting the crowd march through Moscow and block traffic while outlawing the harmless sit-in show a chaotic approach and lack of a firm position, said political blogger and editor of Russian Journal magazine Alexander Morozov. “Latest events show that Putin does not fully understand what is going on, his position has not formed,” he said. Meanwhile, the protest movement is becoming more varied and trendy, he added.

“The middle class became creative, and political participation became attractive,” he said. A continued crackdown on the peaceful protest movement will only make it less manageable and put its more radical wing in the forefront, observers said.

“A writer’s hunch tells me that many street protests will become unsanctioned, and the authorities will be powerless to do anything,” Boris Akunin wrote on his blog Thursday. “There will be nobody to fine and sentence.” Tensions between the authorities and

the opposition increased after a mass protest rally on the eve of Putin’s inauguration which was violently dispersed by police despite earlier being sanctioned by the city hall.

“A lack of dialogue will only bring radicals to protest,” Gennady Gudkov, one of the few vehemently anti-Putin members of parliament, cautioned his colleagues on Tuesday.

“Do we not understand that we are on the threshold of major civil conflicts?” the Just Russia party deputy asked the assembly, still dominated by the United Russia party that supports Putin. The opposition has said the clashes started because riot police left practically no room for the protestors to pass to the square where the rally was to take place, leading to panic and a push against police ranks.

High-ranking police officers in turn blamed the organisers, and investigators are now questioning detained protest leaders Alexei Navalny and Sergei Udaltsov as part of a criminal probe into the clashes. -AFP

SANTO DOMINGO: Voters in the Dominican Republic’s presidential election on Sunday will choose between two candidates vying to be seen as agents of change, even though one represents the ruling party and the other is a former president. Making the choice even harder, both candidates represent center-left political parties in a race devoid of major ideological differences and lacking a conservative option. Polls show Danilo Medina, 60, of the ruling Dominican Liberation Party (PLD), leading by a comfortable margin of 5 to 10 percentage points over Hipolito Mejia, 70, who is hoping to return to power for the opposition Dominican Revolutionary Party (PRD) eight years after a failed re-election bid.

“There isn’t a young, fresh, new voice,” said Eric Farnsworth, a Latin America expert at the Council of the Americas in New York. “So what you have is both candidates trying to position themselves as the one who is most competent and trustworthy to run the government.”

While the Dominican Republic is far wealthier than Haiti, its poor neighbor on the island of Hispaniola, many Dominicans still struggle to satisfy basic needs, prompting some to seek a better life by slipping in to nearby Puerto Rico, a US territory. The Dominican Republic is a popular resort spot, famous for its white sandy beaches and golf courses, but it also is the leading Caribbean transshipment point for South American drugs destined for the United States and Europe.

Medina, a chemical engineer and cofounder of the PLD, is a former minister of the presidency of the current administration of President Leonel Fernandez, 58, a New York-raised lawyer and academic who is barred from running again after serving two consecutive four-year terms.

Fernandez’s wife, Margarita Cedeno, is running as Medina’s vice president. Popular with women voters, Cedeno, a 44year-old mother of two young daughters, used her position as first lady to work for poverty reduction and children and women’s issues. “She’s a strong and independent woman and her support cuts across all ages and classes,” said Eduardo Gamarra, a professor at Florida International University in Miami who also serves as Fernandez’s political consultant. Medina enjoyed a 20 percent advantage over Mejia among women voters, he said.

Mejia established a large lead early in the race, in part due to government austerity measures in the face of the global economic recession that hit the Caribbean hard.

Mejia burnished his message of change with a populist campaign slogan, “Llego Papa” (Daddy’s Here), that promised a better future “for everyone.” -Reuters

ALWATAN DAILY

news in pics

SaturDAY, MAY 19, 2012

The Carlton Hotel beach is covered with umbrellas during a rainy day of the 65th Cannes Film Festival, May 18, 2012. (Reuters)

Municipal workers lay flowers in the shape of the Euro 2012 mascot Slavek in Kiev, May 18, 2012. Kiev is set to host the final match of the Euro 2012 soccer tournament. (Reuters)

4

Employees carry solar panels at a solar power plant in Aksu, Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region May 18, 2012. (Reuters)

A child looks on while being carried by her mother as she carries water pitchers on her head in the Baramura hill range on the outskirts of Agartala, Tripura, India, May 18, 2012. (Reuters)

A rhesus macaque relaxes in its enclosure after eating watermelon, at the Kamla Nehru Zoological Gardens in Ahmedabad on May 18, 2012. (AFP)

A cleaner works at a polka dot covered lift lobby, part of an installation by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, at Sotheby’s newly opened gallery in Hong Kong May 18, 2012. (Reuters)

A Tibetan nun in-exile spins Mani prayer wheels outside the Dalai Lama’s Buddhist Temple in Dharamsala on May 18, 2012.

(AFP)

Young Turkmens take part in unveiling ceremony of the 47.6-meter (156-foot) Ferris wheel called Alem (The Universe ) in the capital Ashgabat, May 18, 2012. (AFP)

This trace of a moving light is made by Japan’s H-IIA, launched from the Tanegashima space center in Kagoshima prefecture, on Japan’s southern island of Kyushu on May 18, 2012.

(AFP)

Egypt stock market ends week in red zone

saturdAY, May 19, 2012

BUSINESS

CAIRO: Egypt Stock Exchange (EGX) ended the week trading on negative note amid a state of anticipation about the results of the upcoming presidential elections, scheduled May 23-24. The market weekly report showed that that Exchange’s main index (EGX30) fell by 2.48 percent to 4890 points, the small and medium stocks index (EGX70) dropped by 2.97 percent to 420 points, while the big stocks index (EGX100) dived 1.8 percent to 771 points and (EGX20) also down by 4.07 percent to 5625 points.

The traded value reached 2.5 billion Egyptian pounds while the traded volume hit 412 million shares, with regards to 2.9 billion Egyptian pounds and 403 million shares a week earlier. The report, however, noted that the mark capitalization has jumped by 6.8 billion Egyptian pounds. -KUNA

Kuwaiti crude down 62 US cents to $106.05 per barrel Oil drops on Greece, euro zone worries

CAPITALS: The price of Kuwaiti crude oil went down 62 US cents to $106.05 per barrel (pb) in transactions on Thursday, compared with $106.67 on the day before, reported Kuwait Petroleum Corporation (KPC) on Friday. One of the main reason of the fresh decrease was Moody’s Investor Service sweeping downgrade of 16 Spanish banks last Thursday, including Banco Santander, the euro zone’s largest bank, citing a weak economy and the government’s reduced ability to support troubled lenders.

In more news, oil prices slipped in choppy trade on Friday, heading for a third straight weekly loss as Greece’s political uncertainty kept concerns about the euro zone in focus, while short-covering after recent losses helped limit oil’s slide.

European officials are working on contingency plans in case Greece exits the euro zone, the EU’s trade commissioner said on Friday, while Berlin said it was prepared for all eventualities. Oil felt pressure early from data showing Chinese home prices in April fell for a second month in a row from year ago levels. Position squaring after this week’s expiration of Brent’s June contract and US June crude options and caution ahead of the weekend’s Group of Eight meeting, traders and analysts said.

Also in focus is this weekend’s planned start of crude oil flows on the reversed Seaway pipeline.

The reversal is intended to ease a glut of crude in the US Midwest by bringing it via Seaway to the refinery-rich Gulf Coast and reducing Brent’s premium to its US counterpart.

Brent July crude fell 51 cents to $106.98 a barrel by 11:35 a.m. EDT (1535 GMT), having fallen to a 2102 low of $106.40, lowest intraday price

Shell’s Majnoon deal highlights Iraq oil target verdict

Employees set up model apartments as they prepare a real estate exhibition in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. Chinese home prices fell for a second month in April from a year earlier, a trend likely to continue if the government maintains efforts to pull them back to what it calls “reasonable levels” to ease social discontent. (Reuters)

since Dec. 21, and on pace to post a 4-percent weekly loss. US June crude was down 50 cents at $92.06, after dropping to a 2012 low of $91.60, the lowest intraday price since Nov. 3. US crude also faced a 4 percent weekly drop.

The US June contract expires on Tuesday.

The choppy trading trajectory left the Brent/ US crude spread little changed near $14.65 a bar-

rel based on July crude contracts.

“It’s the fear factor that’s driving Brent,” agreed Guy Wolf, macro strategist at Marex Spectron in London. “Finally Europe has reached the key Greece in/Greece out moment.”

If Greece leaves, this could trigger bank runs in Italy and Spain, he added, seeing the possibility of a major impact on growth. -Agencies

Gold rises 1%, eyes weekly gain, as euro recovers

NBK celebrates 60th anniversary

KUWAIT: On May 19th, 1952, the late Amir Sheikh Abdullah Al-Salem Al-Sabah, issued the famous Amiri Decree promulgating the incorporation of the National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) as the first national bank and the first shareholding company in Kuwait and the Gulf.

The commemoration of this inspiring anniversary comes as a culmination of a remarkable story of success, by means of which NBK has been transformed from a small bank that occupies the area of three shops and a handful of employees relying on traditional and manual banking tools to one of the largest and most profitable banks in the region.

Today, NBK has the largest local and overseas banking network encompassing more than 176 branches, representative offices and subsidiaries strategically located within the main international and regional financial centers. NBK was also recently named among the ‘World’s 50 Safest Banks’ for the fifth consecutive time, illustrating the success of the bank’s conservative strategy, prudent risk management, and dedication to excellent customer service.

NBK enjoys the highest credit ratings among all the banks in the Middle East and North Africa region by international rating agencies Moody’s, Standard and Poor’s, and Fitch Ratings.

In its long history, the bank has easily weathered a number of hurdles, the two major ones being the collapse of the stock market in 1982 known as the ‘Manakh Market’ crisis and the economic repercussions brought about by the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990.

Throughout, NBK has remained a key player in contributing to the emergence and development of the nation’s infrastructure and its continuing progress. -KUNA

LONDON: Gold rose more than one percent on Friday, building on the previous session’s hefty gains, as a recovery in the euro prompted fresh buying of the precious metal after prices slid to fivemonth lows earlier this week.

Spot gold was up 1.1 percent at 1,591.10 US dollars an ounce at 1332 GMT, having earlier touched a high of $1,594.10, while US gold futures for June delivery were up $16.50 an ounce at $1,591.40. Gold posted its biggest one-day gain since Jan. 25 on Thursday in a reversal that has put it on track to end the week 0.7 percent higher, snapping two weeks of losses.

“For the first time in ages yesterday, gold divorced itself from the euro and started to improve on the crosses,” said Simon Weeks, head of precious metal at the Bank of Nova Scotia.

“A lot of blame for the move has been laid at the door of (Thursday’s weaker than expected)Philly Fed numbers, but I think the market was overcooked on the downside and having held above $1,522 was ripe for a bounce.”

However, a lack of major volume in the market meant the move did not change his negative view of gold, he added. The euro recovered from a fourmonth lows against the dollar to move into positive territory, taking some pres-

sure off gold, though concerns over a Greek euro exit and instability in the Spanish banking system meant confidence was weak.

Gold bucked the trend in the wider markets to trend lower, with European shares falling 0.6 percent and oil prices slipping to their lowest this year.

The metal’s relationship to heightened risk aversion has been rocky since the start of the euro zone crisis. It rose to record highs last year in part because investors were buying the metal as a safe store of value, but as the dollar and treasuries found greater favor as havens, it slipped back along with the euro. Its price fall to its lowest since January has tempted investors back, however.

“Yesterday, gold defied a stronger dollar, weaker equities, and another raft of negative EU headlines (to rise). It felt like the gold market of yesteryears,” UBS said in a note.

Momentum key

“To see a return of gold reacting positively to macro stresses is indeed refreshing, but it is still far too early to make any firm conclusions from here that gold has indeed turned the corner,” it added.

“Momentum will be key, and followthrough buying will have to kick in to encourage investors to jump in.” -Reuters

LONDON: Shell is pressing ahead with talks over final development of Iraq’s Majnoon oilfield, a senior executive told Reuters, and a lower, more realistic oil production target is a core part of discussions.

Majnoon is one of four southern super giant fields that are vital to Iraq’s ambition to at least double its oil output and put it firmly back among the world’s top producers. But crunch time is approaching.

Iraq awarded service contracts in 2009 to foreign firms who vowed to boost its capacity beyond 12 million barrels per day (bpd) by 2017, but this target has proved too aggressive due to infrastructure bottlenecks and logistical shortcomings.With that in mind, companies are now drafting final development plans due by the start of next year.

“We’re having ongoing exploratory discussions with the Iraqi government, to determine the optimum field development plan for Majnoon,” said Hans Nijkamp, Royal Dutch Shell vice president and country chairman for Iraq.

“But you have to look at it in the bigger context of the optimum aggregate production level for Iraq.” Iraq’s top oil officials acknowledge the need for a more prudent output target and have suggested a level of around 8.5 to nine million bpd.

Other experts see six to seven million bpd by the end of the decade as the most realistic outcome for the war-damaged country. That would imply an output target of around one million bpd for Majnoon, industry sources say.

Shell, with junior partner Petronas of Malaysia, won the Majnoon contract by promising to boost the largely undeveloped field to 1.8 million bpd for a fee of 1.39 US dollars a barrel. Production capacity is now 65,000 bpd.

Oil ministry documents show that Shell has opened discussions on a target of around one million bpd for Majnoon, as part of its full field development plan.

The company, the first to open talks with the ministry of oil, also proposed to extend the field’s plateau period - the time period for which its peak production can be sustained and which is to begin in 2017 - to more than 20 years from seven years now. Those figures are not set in stone. “It depends on what Iraq wants out of Majnoon. You can develop this field in different ways with different plateau levels and durations,” Nijkamp said on the sidelines of an Iraq Britain Business Council event on Thursday.

“The 1.8 million barrels a day that we bid for was a realistic plateau level that we can responsibly develop and produce but obviously for a shorter period of time than a plateau level below 1.8 million.”

Hurdles ahead

The Shell executive said Baghdad is doing its best to overcome myriad infra-

Zuckerberg kicks off Facebook IPO

CAPITALS: Mark Zuckerberg, wearing his trademark hooded sweatshirt, remotely rang the bell to open the Nasdaq Friday, marking a historic share offering for Facebook that confirms the growing importance of the social network giant.

Amid a crowd at Facebook’s California headquarters, Zuckerberg and hundreds of employees cheered as the 28-year-old co-founder rang the bell via video for the New York-based Nasdaq. Facebook shares were to start trading later in the day in the richest-ever initial public offering for a technology firm.

Zuckerberg wore a dark hoodie, unfazed by criticism from some on Wall Street about his casual attire. And most of those on hand for the ceremony were wearing similar sweatshirts or T-shirts.

The company’s stock, priced at 38 US dollars per share, was to begin trading under the symbol “FB” on the Nasdaq, giving the leading website a dizzying value of $104 billion at its market debut.

The initial public offering (IPO) raised more than $16 billion, making it the richest after that of financial giant Visa in 2008, according to Renaissance Capital. The addition of a possible stock “over-allotment” could boost the total to $18.4 billion.

Facebook itself is selling 180 million shares and early investors in the company the remaining 241 million.

With a market value of $104 billion, Facebook is now among the most valuable US companies, ahead of sector giants Amazon ($98 billion) and Cisco ($89 billion), and more than twice the value of Ford Motor Co. ($38 billion).

But it remains behind Google ($203 billion) and Apple ($495 billion).

Facebook employees staged a software coding “hackathon” at the company’s offices in the Silicon Valley city of Menlo Park overnight ahead of the market opening.

Under the share plan, Zuckerberg, who began Face-

Pedestrians walk near the NASDAQ Marketsite at the start of the listing for Facebook in New York May 18, 2012.

Facebook Inc. began trading on the Nasdaq with it’s initial public offering at $38 per share, valuing the world’s largest social network at more than $100 billion. (Reuters)

book with classmates at Harvard in 2004, will hold 55.8 percent of the voting power of Facebook shares, and over 18 percent of the value of the company, which he controls through a dual class stock structure.

Wall Street and investors around the globe have been

girding for a Facebook IPO frenzy over the past few days as Facebook boosted the estimated price for its shares and added to the number being offered by insiders.

Wedbush Securities analyst Michael Pachter said he believed that despite the large number of shares being of-

structure hurdles, but bottlenecks in the export system are choking production gains.

“That will really determine the production capacity - because the production capacity is there from the license round one fields,” he said, referring to the southern fields of Rumaila, Zubair and West Qurna-1 that are already up and running.

Recovering from decades of wars and crippling sanctions, Iraq is unique among producing nations seeking to boost oil flows. But the level of red tape and logistical sluggishness beats regional rivals.

“Things do take time in Iraq - whether it’s entry visas or customs clearance,” said Nijkamp. “Customs clearance in most ports in the region is a matter of days to a week. We have some equipment that’s been stuck for months.” Around $50 billion will be needed to ramp up Majnoon, which straddles the border with Iran.

“These are early days. We’re sticking our toe in the water and learning how to effectively operate in Iraq,” said Nijkamp.

“But to be confident that Iraq is a good place to invest, we need to ensure timely payment. That will really determine ongoing investor confidence.”

Payment sorted

Majnoon has yet to reach cost recovery mode, but the ExxonMobil-operated West Qurna-1 project - where Shell is a minority partner - has been in the money for some time.

A prolonged contractual dispute, however, delayed timely payment of installments totaling some $900 million.

That has finally been sorted out, said Iraqi oil officials, and the companies have now received payment in full. And going forward, Exxon and Baghdad have signed a final agreement for the companies to be able to be paid in oil for work on West Qurna-1.

Shell’s southern gas joint venture, the $17 billion Basra Gas Company (BGC) is also going well, said Nijkamp. The company mobilized a sizable technical team and has seconded technical experts to get compressor units up and running quickly to increase gas throughput.

Shell has meanwhile yet to decide whether it will take part in Iraq’s exploration round at the end of this month.

“We’ll decide very soon whether we’ll put in a bid,” said Nijkamp.

Although the company has its hands full for now on three mega-projects with estimated investment of around $100 billion, future opportunities are not ruled out. “We are in Iraq to stay for the long term - it might be more upstream, maybe gas,” said Nijkamp.

“There is more we can do to add value to Iraq and run a good business that contributes to the reconstruction of the country, including substantial job generation.” -Reuters

fered, Facebook’s stock price will climb quickly.

London-based Hargreaves Lansdown Stockbrokers said Facebook may have a hard time living up to lofty expectations but pointed out that it is “a relatively developed company which can display ‘real’ income and profit.”

“There are extremely high expectations for the company’s prospects and perhaps on that basis it deserves the punchy valuation it has been given,” the brokerage said in a note to clients.

But the brokers said Facebook faces challenges including how to make money from the growing base of mobile users. One of the shadows hanging over Facebook is concerns over privacy.

Some 900 million people use Facebook. But when they realize their private information is being bought and sold, some don’t like it so much.

Some consumer and privacy advocates say Facebook has been too loose with user data, and hope that as a publicly traded company, it may change its tune.

Zuckerberg has repeatedly apologized for privacy lapses amid outrage from users over revelations their online activities were visible to a wide audience of advertisers and other users. Late last year, in a settlement with the US Federal Trade Commission, the social networking giant promised to honor users’ privacy preferences and to stop making claims about the security of personal information that are untrue.

The IPO’s net proceeds to Facebook are estimated at $6.4 billion. The rest of the cash goes to Facebook insiders and others who made early investments in the social network, and to cover the IPO costs.

At the heart of the debate about the wisdom of owning a piece of Facebook is how much revenue it takes in.

Revenue vaulted to $1.06 billion in the quarter which ended March 31 - an improvement year-over-year but down about six percent from the previous quarter. -AFP

saturday, may 19, 2012

SPORTS

Sports Editors Highlights FRANKFURT, Germany: The German soccer federation says it will rule Friday on Hertha Berlin’s appeal of a relegation match that resulted in the team’s demotion from the Bundesliga. Hertha drew with second-division club Fortuna Duesseldorf 2-2 on Tuesday after fan interference forced the referee to halt the game three times.

The capital’s only top-division club claimed that its players were prevented from scoring the winning goal that would have kept the team in the Bundesliga when fans came onto the field 2 minutes from the end. Meanwhile, Duesseldorf police said on Friday that match referee Wolfgang Stark has filed a criminal complaint against a player for assaulting him off the field. Police spokesman Markus Niesczery declined to say which player or team was involved. -AP

Football

Chelsea plays for high stakes in Champions League MUNICH: Chelsea is playing for a place in European soccer history as well as next season’s competition when it meets Bayern Munich on Saturday in the Champions League final.

After nine straight seasons among Europe’s elite, Chelsea’s sixth-place finish in the Premier League means its only entry to next season’s Champions League is as title holder.

The price of defeat is therefore higher. Chelsea can ill afford to lose Champions League income of more than $63 million this season as European soccer’s financial fair-play rules begin to bite.

Life will be easier for all at Chelsea next season if it becomes Europe’s champion club for the first time. But in Bayern Munich it is facing a four-time winner that playing at home.

Philipp Lahm believes home advantage could tip in Bayern Munich’s favor as they prepare to face Chelsea at their own Allianz Arena.

For the first time since AS Roma faced Liverpool at the Stadio Olimpico in 1984, European club football’s showpiece match will see one of the finalists playing at their own stadium here Saturday.

Twenty-eight years ago, however, nerves got the better of Roma as Liverpool went on to clinch their fourth European crown on penalties.

Chelsea boss Roberto Di Matteo has also questioned whether playing at home could heap more pressure on the Bundesliga giants on Saturday.

Bayern skipper Lahm however is adamant that his team can only benefit from their intimate knowledge

of the venue.

“It has been our dream to make it to the final in our own stadium. And here we are,” Lahm said. “It’s great to be here on home turf. We’re here every week, every couple of days we’re at this stadium. It’s our home, we’re at home here.”

Lahm meanwhile dismissed Di Matteo’s comments suggesting Bayern could be overwhelmed by the pressure of playing at home.

“It’s definitely a positive thing to play in our own stadium. We know everything here. So I think it will have a positive effect on us,” he said.

Playing in Munich also has special emotional significance for Lahm, who supported Bayern as a schoolboy before joining the club’s youth team.

It is also the second taste of a Munich Champions League final for Lahm, he acted as a ballboy when Borussia Dortmund beat Juventus in the 1997 final held at Bayern’s former home, the Olympic Stadium.

But Bayern coach Jupp Heynckes sounded a note of caution about the perceived advantage of playing at home. “ Uli Hoeness said two years ago at our general meeting ‘I have a dream’ and this dream is to play the final of the Champions League in our own stadium, and we made it,” Heynckes said. “This is where I would like to limit these declarations , we’re playing tomorrow a team who have huge experience and fantastic organization, with outstanding players. In a Champions League final there are no favorites. Certainly not against Chelsea.” -Agencies

Ronaldo insists that he is the better man

Chelsea’s coach Roberto Di Matteo (left) leaves a bus during the arrival of Chelsea soccer club at a hotel in Munich, May 18, 2012.

(AP)

Liverpool in approach for Wigan coach Martinez LONDON: Liverpool have been given permission by Wigan Athletic to talk to coach Roberto Martinez about becoming the next manager at Anfield, a day after Kenny Dalglish was sacked.

The 38-year-old Martinez left Swansea City to take over at Wigan in 2009 and has been widely praised for keeping the modest Lancashire club in the Premier League. Wigan stayed in the top flight this season after wins over Liverpool, Arsenal, Manchester United and Newcastle United in their final eight games helped them to a respectable 15th in the league, seven points clear of relegation.

Dalglish, who had returned for a second stint as manager at Anfield in Janu-

FILE- Real Madrid’s Cristiano Ronaldo (left) walks past Barcelona’s Lionel Messi after scoring his goal during their Spanish first division “El Clasico” soccer match at Nou Camp stadium, April 21, 2012. (AFP)

MADRID: Real Madrid and Portugal star Cristiano Ronaldo insisted he was “better than Messi” in an interview with American news channel CNN on Friday, before appearing to retract his claim.

“You cannot compare a Ferrari with a Porsche because they have different engines,” tempered Ronaldo, 27, after initially insisting he was superior to the man who has won the Ballon d’Or for the world’s best player in each of the last three years.

“He does his very best for Barcelona and I do my best for Real Madrid.” Few would doubt that the two men are the stand-out players in world football today, with Ronaldo scoring 46 goals as Real Madrid won La Liga, while Messi broke the Spanish league record by notching a remarkable 50 goals for Barca.

Meanwhile, Ronaldo was in little doubt about which of the two clubs had enjoyed a better campaign.

“The table speaks for itself, nine points separate

Real Madrid from Barcelona and that is huge in Spain,” he said. “We have played better than Barca this season, of that I am convinced. I recall the moment, a month ago, when we beat them 2-1 at their place, something no other team managed to do. We are better than them at the moment, but we must still respect them because they are a great team.”

The former Manchester United player also reflected on Madrid’s Champions League semi-final exit at the hands of Bayern Munich, when he was among the players who missed from the spot in a penalty shootout after the second leg at the Santiago Bernabeu.

“It is always hard to lose, and especially when you do so on penalties,” admitted the 2008 Ballon d’Or winner.

“I am not too worried because I still scored that day (twice, in regulation time) but it is true that it was one of the worst days of my career.” -AFP

Arshavin hopes to regain old spark at Euro MOSCOW: Russia’s captain and star striker Andrei Arshavin is hoping at Euro 2012 to show the blazing inspiration that set the last tournament alight after his insipid stint with English Premier League giants Arsenal. Arshavin comes into the Euro tournament hosted

by Poland and Ukraine again as a winner, after helping guide his boyhood team Zenit Saint Petersburg to a storming victory in the Russian Premier League.

The 30-year-old, who has only ever played for two clubs, rejoined Zenit in February on a loan deal from Arsenal and will stay at the Russian club until July. He was instrumental in helping the Saint Petersburgers see off the final challenge from the Moscow giants, scoring in a key April clash with CSKA that all but earned Zenit the title.

His move back to Zenit seems to have brought back some of the old spark in Arshavin, whose muchheralded move to Arsenal in 2009 started promisingly but became marked by injuries and time on the bench.

Arshavin’s dashing runs and flashing strikes at goal were one of the highlights of Euro 2008 and a memorable goal by him against the Netherlands took Russia to the semi-finals where they lost to eventual winners Spain. It was that performance, as well as Zenit’s stunning UEFA Cup win in 2008, that earned interest from big European clubs, including Arsenal but Arshavin never seemed at ease in the Arsene Wenger set-up in north London. For the last half decade, Arshavin, Russia’s biggest footballing name and a heart-on-sleeve patriot, helped Russia win the right to host the 2018 World Cup and travelled with the government delegation for the voting. It was the need to ensure a first-

ary last year, paid the price for a dismal season that saw Liverpool finish 37 points behind champions Manchester City.

The Merseyside club’s American owners the Fenway Sports Group (FSG) had given Dalglish more than £100 million ($159 million US dollars) to spend in the transfer market since he took over from the sacked Roy Hodgson in 2011.

But expensive signings such as Andy Carroll, Stewart Downing and Jordan Henderson largely flopped and Liverpool’s eighth-place finish was their worst season-ending position for nearly two decades, with their lowest points tally since 1954.

They defeated second-tier Cardiff

City on penalties in the League Cup final but lost 2-1 to Chelsea in the FA Cup final earlier this month.

Dalglish voiced his gratitude to fans for their show of support following his dismissal.

“I would hope nobody would prejudge things now,” Dalglish told the Echo.

“The owners have their own reasons for doing what they have done. They came in to help the club at a time when it wasn’t in a great condition. They have improved it, taken it forward and are doing the best they can. Liverpool is still a great football club, still a club that should believe in whoever is going to come in after myself.” -AFP

Kagawa the odd one out as Asians struggle HONG KONG: Japan international Shinji Kagawa looks set to be a highprofile mover in the European transfer market this summer, but Asia’s other big names have endured a tough season on the continent.

The Borussia Dortmund attacking midfielder revealed on Wednesday that he had met Manchester United boss Sir Alex Ferguson, with the deposed Premier League champions believed to head a queue of English clubs chasing Kagawa’s signature. Kagawa, who scored 17 goals to help Dortmund to a league and cup double, has made no secret of wish to move and the German club look set to cash in on the 23-year-old, who cost only 350,000 Euros ($450,000 US dollars) in 2010.

“I want to think hard before making my decision,” said Kagawa, who has been valued at around 13 million Euros, a modest price because he has only a year to run on his current deal. But while Kagawa could be on his way to Manchester United, South Korea’s Park Ji-Sung may be headed for the Old Trafford exit after a disappointing season prompted speculation over his future. Park, 31, made only 10 Premier League starts all campaign culminating in last month’s pivotal Manchester derby, in which he was substituted before the hour-mark. Rivals City won 1-0 and then sealed the title last weekend. This week Park, who has a year left on his contract, said he wanted to retire at Manchester United. “It is true I want to retire at Manchester United,” Park told reporters in South Korea, according to the Korea Times. “But what I want does not always translate to reality. It becomes more feasible when the whole situation clicks.”

FILE - Shinji Kagawa of Dortmund controls the ball during the DFB Cup semi final match between SpVgg Greuther Fuerth and Borussia Dortmund at Trolli-Arena on March 20, 2012. (AFP)

However, Park is at least faring better than his compatriot and Arsenal striker Park Chu-Young, whose season hit a new low on Thursday when he was dropped by the South Korean national side.

Despite hardly featuring for Arsenal since last year’s move from AS Monaco, Park was expected to lead South Korea’s assault in final qualifying for the 2014 World Cup and remains one of their most potent weapons. But South Korea ditched him over an ongoing row about his move to delay compulsory military

service by obtaining a 10-year residency visa for Monaco. “A national team must take into account not only an individual player’s capability but the atmosphere of the whole team,” said coach Choi KangHee, suggesting disapproval for Park in the dressing room.

Striker Ji Dong-Won, 20, is in the squad for two World Cup qualifiers next month, but he also endured a wretched time in the Premier League, scoring two goals all season for Sunderland and spending most his time on the bench. -AFP

Villa Park to host Community Shield

FILE - Russia’s national soccer team captain Andrei Arshavin gestures during a training session at the stadium in Zilina, Oct. 6, 2011. (AFP)

team place for Euro 2012 that encouraged Arshavin to move back to Russia and he scored his first international goal in several encounters during a friendly with Denmark in February. -AFP

LONDON: The Community Shield clash between Manchester City and Chelsea at the start of next season will be staged at Villa Park rather than Wembley. The annual curtainraiser to the new top-flight season is traditionally played at Wembley, but the English national stadium in London is hosting the Olympic football final on the same weekend as Premier League champions City are due to meet FA Cup winners Chelsea.

That has forced a change of plans and Aston Villa’s stadium in Birmingham has been chosen as the host venue for the fixture on Sunday, August 12.

The 43,000-capacity Villa Park has a long history of staging FA Cup semi-finals and the venue also hosted matches at the 1996 European Championships, as well as 16 England internationals.

Alex Horne, FA general secretary, said: “Villa Park is one of English football’s most iconic grounds and has a wonderful tradition of hosting some of the game’s biggest matches.

Once we knew the Olympic football schedule, we worked hard to secure a suitable alternative venue for The FA Community Shield 2012 and are delighted that Aston Villa have agreed to host the season’s traditional curtain-raiser.” -AFP

ALWATAN DAILY

SPORTS

saturDAY, may 19, 2012

Tennis

Djokovic and Nadal move closer to showdown

Novak Djokovic, of Serbia, returns the ball to Juan Monaco, of Argentina, during their match at the Italian Open tennis tournament, May 17, 2012.

(AP)

ROME: Novak Djokovic and Rafa Nadal moved a step closer to another possible final showdown after recording straight-set wins in the quarter-finals of the Rome Masters on Friday.

Down to No. 3 in the rankings this week, Rafael Nadal showed he’s still a major threat on clay with a 6-4, 7-5 win over Tomas Berdych on Friday to reach the Italian Open semifinals.

Berdych was coming off a runner-up performance at the Madrid Open. He lost to Roger Federer, who then replaced Nadal at No. 2.

Nadal broke in the opening game to take control of the first set. He recovered a break midway through the second before pulling ahead for good in his quest to win the French Open warm-up event in Italy for a record sixth time. Nadal dominated from the baseline, committed just 10 unforced errors and hit 34 winners against his opponent’s 28.

Nadal’s semifinal opponent will be sixth-seeded David Ferrer, who beat Richard Gasquet 7-6 (4), 6-3 Holder and top seed Djokovic survived a tight first set to beat Frenchman Jo-Wilfried Tsonga 7-5 6-1 while Nadal, striking the ball better than he has done in months, recorded an impressive 6-4 7-5 victory over in-form Czech Tomas Berdych.

Djokovic and Tsonga exchanged two service breaks apiece but the Serb clinched the opening set when the

fifth seed served his first double fault.

The Serb then ran away with the second set to set up a clash with either world number two Roger Federer, or Andreas Seppi of Italy.

Nadal, who slipped behind Federer in the rankings after the Swiss won the Madrid title last weekend, produced an outstanding performance to beat seventh seed Berdych.

The Spaniard, chasing a sixth title in Rome, came from a break down in the second set to clinch victory, celebrating with his arms above his head.

“I played one of my best matches of the year today,” Nadal told a news conference. “Tomas is a player with a lot of confidence and playing very well, so I am very happy with how I played. I did one fantastic thing, in my opinion. I stepped inside the court a lot, with my forehand and my movements were fantastic.”

Nadal beat Ferrer to win the title in Barcelona last month, but said he would need to play better on Saturday if he is to make the final.

“I was a little bit lucky in some moments in Barcelona,” he said. “I didn’t play my best tennis that day.

I know I can play better than that and I will have to play my best tennis against David because he is a great player. But I am very happy with the way I am playing and the way I have played the whole claycourt season.” -Agencies

Formula one

Unpredictable F1 filled with questions so far

Romain Grosjean of France and Lotus heads a train of cars as he drives during the Spanish Formula One Grand Prix at the Circuit de Catalunya on May 13, 2012.

(AFP)

BARCELONA, Spain: Teams and drivers emerged from the Spanish Grand Prix with more questions than answers on just who is the Formula One favorite after five races. Pastor Maldonado’s maiden victory gave Williams its first F1 triumph in eight years and the season’s fifth different winner. It’s the most varied start since 1983 and the 12 teams’ inability to get to grips with the Pirelli tires is one the main reasons. Sebastian Vettel dominated last year to win the title with races to spare.

He looked to have Red Bull back in command after a wire-to-wire victory in Bahrain, but the two-time defending F1 champion was sixth in Barcelona. Fernando Alonso won the Malaysian GP then dropped off, but his Ferrari returned to deliver the Spanish driver’s fourth runner-up spot at the Catalunya Circuit.

McLaren errors continue to haunt Lewis Hamilton, as the British driver was favored to win from the pole before a qualifying penalty dropped him to last.

Jenson Button seems to be scratching his head over why he can’t match his teammate’s pace since winning in the season-opening Australian GP. Maldonado has elevated Williams into the mix, while Lotus is also in the running even if driver Kimi Raikkonen doesn’t understand why his car performs the way it does.

Answers? F1 only seems to be riddled with questions going into the Monaco GP on May 27.

“You arrive in Monaco next Wednesday and you

don’’t know if you will be a winner or if you will be out of the points. That’s what we feel at the moment, not only for us,” said Alonso, who shares the overall lead with Vettel with 61 points. “It’s very strange.

We were 57 seconds behind Vettel in Bahrain, and we were lapping Webber here. No one understands, probably. Not us, either.”

Pirelli’s tires came under criticism from drivers before Spain, with extreme degradation confounding and frustrating the grid.

“Delivering what you want out of those tires is the next challenge,” McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh said. “No one here convinces me that they understand these tires on a comfortable basis. It’s become an incredible feature of this championship and it’s creating the extraordinary season we are seeing.”

An offseason reshuffle at Williams is paying dividends, although a fire in the team’s Spanish GP garage after Maldonado’s victory may set it back as the British team’s IT equipment and infrastructure was badly damaged.

Red Bull leads the constructors’ championship by nine points over McLaren. With victories uncertain, teams know consistency, upgrades and improvements are key. But even that doesn’t spell success.”

We have probably the most difficult start of the championship in my three years in Ferrari, with a car that was not competitive at all, and now we finish the first quarter of the championship, and we are leading the championship,” Alonso said. -AFP

7

Sharapova storms past Venus and into Rome semis ROME: Defending champion Maria Sharapova shattered hopes of a Williams sisters double act at the Rome International by breezing past Venus Williams 6-4, 6-3 on Friday to reach the semi-finals. But Serena Williams, the ninth seed, advanced 4-0 when Italian opponent Flavia Pennetta withdrew with a right wrist injury. Sharapova, seeded second, and the winner on clay in Stuttgart last month, demolished the elder Williams, who ended her afternoon with a fifth double-fault on match point to exit the event she won 13 years ago as a teenager. Sharapova will face either fourth seed Petra Kvitova or Germany’s Angelique Kerber on Saturday for a place in the final. Serena Williams, last week’s winner in Madrid, won her 17th consecutive match on clay.

“No-one wants to win like that, but I’m happy to get half a day off,” said the American of Pennetta’s retirement. “I’ve been playing a lot of days in a row. I even practiced on Sunday. It’s a shame it had to end because I was really getting into the match.”

The American said that her form going into the French Open, which starts a week on Sunday, is good. “I’m feeling better on clay than I did at the US Open (where she lost a bad-tempered final to Samantha Stosur). I have a better ranking and my fitness is better. I feel I can play on any surface and that’s the right attitude for me. I’m enjoying my tennis. This is where I belong and what I do best.”

Williams needs two more wins on the red Rome clay to notch a third straight WTA title on the surface, after winning Charleston last month and claiming the honors in Madrid. Five of the 30year-old’s 41 career titles have been won on clay, and she previously triumphed in Rome a decade ago. Pennetta took a lengthy medical treatment time-out when trailing 3-0 in the first set and looked clearly out of sorts. After getting her wrist taped, the last Italian woman in the field tried one more game before giving up.

Pennetta, ranked 21 in the world, and a clay finalist in February in Acapulco, was playing in her third quarter-final of 2012.Williams will next face China’s Li Na, who fought off a case of late jitters to beat Slovak Dominika Cibulkova 6-1, 7-6 (7/4). French Open champion Li was leading comfortably 6-1, 5-2 when her game became crippled by caution with the Chinese star only managing to snatch the win in a tense tiebreaker. “I’m not worried about the forehands or the backhands, it’s finishing the matches that is my problem,” said Li, the world number nine, who has not won a title since her Paris triumph almost a year ago. -AFP

Russia’s Maria Sharapova returns a ball during her quarterfinals match against US Venus Williams at the WTA Rome tournament, May 18, 2012. (AFP)

Basketball

Wade loses cool in Heat’s 94-75 loss to Pacers INDIANAPOLIS: Dwyane Wade lashed out in frustration during the worst playoff game of his career. His target wasn’t wearing an Indiana uniform. Wade confronted his coach as the Miami Heat melted. The star had an animated exchange with Erik Spoelstra on the sideline in the third quarter, a disturbing low point on a night when nothing went Miami’s way, and the Heat were throttled 94-75 by the Pacers in Game 3 of the Eastern Conference semifinals.

Indiana center Roy Hibbert had 19 points and 18 rebounds, George Hill scored 20 and Danny Granger 17 as Indiana, pushed by a crowd that stood and chanted “Beat The Heat” at every opportunity, took a 2-1 lead in the best-of-seven series. Game 4 is Sunday at raucous Bankers Life Fieldhouse.

James scored 22 - 16 in the first half before wearing down - and Mario Chalmers made up for Wade’s abysmal night by adding 25 for Miami, which again played without All-Star forward Chris Bosh, who is out with a strained abdominal muscle and is not expected to return for this series.

The Pacers made big shots, challenged everything the Heat tossed in the air and didn’t back down from a Miami team that appeared poised to make an easy run to the NBA finals after top-seeded Chicago lost Derrick Rose and was eliminated in the first round.

In the second half, Indiana forward David West flung James to the floor in the lane, and Granger later got in the superstar’s face after a foul on a breakaway. After winning Game 2 in South Florida by three points, the Pacers wanted to show that victory was no fluke and that they’re for real.

With his team down 20 in the closing minutes, Spoelstra waved the white flag and pulled out first Wade, then James, who quickly removed his headband as he got to the bench and then pulled out the mouthpiece in scripted with 16, the number of wins it takes to get a championship.

Indiana busted open a grind-it-out game with a 17-3 run in the third quarter, doing it with an inside-outside attack that had the Heat wondering what was coming next.With their boisterous crowd decked out in mustard-yellow “Gold Swagger” T-shirts, the Pacers pushed their lead to 69-55 after three and then held off one brief run by the Heat in the fourth quarter.

Despite playing almost 21 minutes and exerting himself on defense, James had enough energy to throw down a vicious lefthanded dunk in the final minute of the first half, pulling the Heat even at 43-all. He looked back at the Miami bench as if to say, “How about a little help out here?”

Wade, on the other hand, was lost. He missed all five field-

LeBron James #6 of the Miami Heat drives between George Hill (3) and Paul George (24) of the Indiana Pacers in Game Three of the Eastern Conference Semifinals in the 2012 NBA Playoffs, May 17, 2012. (AFP)

goal attempts, made two turnovers and ran around like a playoff rookie and not a superstar appearing in his 95th career postseason game.

Wade finally made his first field goal with 10:22 left in the third to put Miami up 47-45, but the Pacers went on a 10-1 run with Granger dropping a 3-pointer in front of the Heat bench to make it 55-48 and then playfully skipping down the sideline as Miami called a timeout. The Pacers were in control. -AP

Streaking Spurs go up 2-0 on Clippers SAN ANTONIO: On his 30th birthday, Tony Parker first kept the San Antonio Spurs on pace for what might be another lopsided playoff sweep. Then the All-Star who’s always quick to needle Tim Duncan about his age finally acknowledged his own.

Chris Paul, meanwhile, isn’t acknowledging anything: Not his aching body that everyone but him is talking about, or the Los Angeles Clippers’ season careening toward the end this weekend unless things change fast.

Parker scored 22 points, Duncan had 18 and the Spurs beat the fading Clippers 105-88 on Thursday night, taking a 2-0 lead in their Western Conference semifinals and winning their 16th in a row with yet another playoff blowout.

For the 13th time in a winning streak that seldom run this long in the NBA playoffs, the Spurs won by double digits.

Only two other teams have sustained a longer winning streak in the playoffs: the 2004 Spurs (17) and the 2001 Lakers (19).

“I think for us, is to not look at that,” Parker said about the streak. “Concentrate on the task. We know Game 3 is going to be very, very hard. I think we should focus on that and not focus on the winning streak, or what we’re doing good.”

Paul responded to his awful Game 1 with only a slightly better encore, scoring 10 points as the Clippers now head home desperate to steer out of what’s starting to get the feel of a sweep. Game 3 is Saturday in Los Angeles, and Game 4

is Sunday.

When the Clippers land in California early Friday, they’ll be home for the first time in nearly a week. They’ve played seven games in 13 days, and they’ll have played nine in 16 by the time the weekend is over.

Clippers coach Vinny Del Negro knows his team needs rest. Blake Griffin scored 20 points but added another injury to the list, this time what he described as a hip flexor strain.

He’s already battling a sprained left knee and shaking off a turned ankle in Game 1.

The All-Star matchup of Paul vs. Parker went from a Game 1 bust to a lopsided mismatch, and appeared to prove Paul is hurting more than he’s letting on. Del Negro says his star is still struggling with an aching hip and groin, even as Paul insists he’s OK. This is only the third time in the woeful 41-year history of the franchise that Los Angeles’ long-maligned “other” team has survived to the second round. Their momentum started with a stunning 27-point comeback on the road against Memphis in their playoff opener, but the Clippers haven’t made a rally stick in San Antonio.

A bumbling start had the Clippers already down by 15 in the first quarter before clawing back with a 9-2 burst. Getting to within 46-42 at halftime had the Clippers’ bench heading to the locker room clapping and Spurs coach Gregg Popovich storming off fuming. -AP

8

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Awqaf & Islamic Affairs Commerce & Industry Communications Defense Education Health Higher Education Electricity & Water Finance

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Foreign Affairs Housing Information Justice, Legal & Administrative Affairs Energy Planning Social Affairs & Labour Public Works

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RESTAURANT • Café Library Lounge Al-Manshar Rotana Hotel Tel: 23931000 Hang.Out Lounge Galleria 2000 Tel: 25755588 Song Bird Café Hilton Kuwait Resort Tel: 23725500 Chit Chat Café Restaurant Safir Hotel & Residences -Fintas Tel: 25455555 Lounge Café Safir Hotel & Residences -Fintas Tel: 25455555 The English Tea Room Sheraton Hotel Tel: 1835555 Waterlemon Al-Raya Tel: 22244797 Marina Mall Tel: 22997666 Le Pain Quotidien Palms Beach Hotel Tel: 25633684 Marina Crescent Tel: 22244942 Avenues Tel: 24954632 • Casual Dining Applebee’s Bneid Al-Gar Tel: 22407536 Fintas Tel: 23714559 Burgerhub Gulf road Tel: 22464818 Chili’s Bneid Al-Gar Tel: 22452200 Chili’s Al-Bida’a Tel: 22253120/1 Hard Rock Café Salmiya Tel: 25710004 Ruby Tuesdays Bneid Al-Gar Tel: 22444454 T.G.I. Fridays Bneid Al-Gar Tel: 22544300

• Chinese China Hut Tel: 25656226 China Express Jabriya Tel: 25342399 Salwa Tel: 25653230 China House Salmiya Tel: 25713339 / 60 China Lake Al-Blajat St. Tel: 25713072 / 3 China Town Salmiya Tel: 25652541 Greens Al-Wafra Complex Tel: 22516031

Tel: 1815050 • French Le Notre Gulf Road Tel: 25758888 • Indian Dawat Restaurant Bneid Al Gar Tel: 22411728 Abu Halifa Tel: 23724251 Al Alamia Mall, Jahra Tel: 24554642 Taal Restaurant Salmiya Beda’ Tel: 22253142 Winner’s Salmiya Tel: 25739954 Abu Halifa Tel: 23711374 / 5 Riggae Tel: 24895501 / 2 Jahra Tel: 24560088/8800

Gulf Royal Tel: 23925390-Fintas 22622556-Hawalli 25710448-Salmiya 22244795-Marina

Asha’s Tel: 22244502/3/9 Marina Crescent Tel: 24954700

Noodles Salmiya Tel: 25712233

Bukhara Sheraton Hotel Tel: 22422055

The Peacock Radisson Blu Hotel Tel: 25673000

Tourist Restaurant Kuwait City Tel: 22411702

Noodle Factory Avenues Tel: 24954751

Mugal Mahal Farwaniya Tel: 24726126/7 Fintas Tel: 23915588 Salmiya Tel: 25722223/4 Sharq Tel: 22425132

• Continental Casper & Gambini’s Kuwait City Tel: 22430054 La Marina Sharq Mall Tel: 22426672 • Fast Food Burger King Tel: 22444466 Domino’s Pizza Tel: 1800800 Hardees Tel: 1888333 KFC Tel: 1888666 Little Caesar’s Tel: 1888855 Pizza Hut

Tikka Tel: 1822833 • International Al-Bustan Radisson Blu Hotel Tel: 25673000 Al-Hamra Sheraton Hotel Tel: 22422055 Al-Marsa Restaurant Le Meridien Tel: 22510999 Atrium Restaurant Courtyard Marriott Hotel

Tel: 22997000

L I S T I N G S

Beit 7 Kuwait City Tel: 22450871 Café Rio Al-Fanar Tel: 25732226 Dunes Ritz Hotel Tel: 22499911 Failaka Al-Manshar Rotana Hotel Tel: 23931000 La Brasserie JW Marriott Tel: 22455550 Ritz Shamiya Tel: 24820184 Shuwaikh Tel: 24844350 Square International Tel: 22437681 Test n’ Taste Villa Moda Tel: 24827010 Teatro Hilton Kuwait Resort Tel: 23725500

Kuwait City Tel: 22400737

Nino Gulf Road Tel: 22541900 Pizza Express Abdullah Al-Salem Tel: 22560273 Al-Bida’a Tel: 22253166 Airport Tel: 24342681 Tel: 23725500 Ricardo Sheraton Hotel Tel: 22422055 • Japanese Edo Shaab Tel: 22659590 Kei JW Marriott Hotel Tel: 22422650 Korea & Japan Restaurant New Park Hotel Tel: 25634200

Sakura Crowne Plaza Hotel Tel: 24742000

AlRoshinah Restaurant Safir Hotel & Residences -Fintas Tel: 25455555

Shogun The Palms Hotel Tel: 27070022

Il Forno Restaurant Courtyard Marriot Hotel Tel: 22997000 Johnny Carino’s Salmiya Tel: 22667050 La Piazza Kuwait City Tel: 24246639 Lorenzo

Manousha Salmiya Tel: 25722607 / 8

Al-Noukhaza Crowne Plaza Hotel Tel: 24742000

Fakhr Al-Din Restaurant Kuwait City Tel: 22423180

Villa Fairouz Shaab Tel: 22652030

Shrimpy Gulf Road Tel: 22563118 Totally Fish Marina Crescent Tel: 22244960/1

Garden New Park Hotel Tel: 25634200

Yeldes Palace Kuwait City Tel: 22455212

Kabab-Ji Tel: 1861616

Zahrat Tunis Hawalli Tel: 22662444/333

Mais Al-Ghanim Kuwait City Tel: 22402590

• Persian Kabab Al-Hijja Bnaid Al-Gar Tel: 22517512

Palm Palace Salmiya Tel: 25756331 Saj Express Kuwait City Tel: 22497822 Sarai Al-Bida’a Tel: 22253180/1 Shisha &

Sushi Club Al-Blajat St. Tel: 25712144 Wasabi Al-Bida’a Tel: 22253112 Kuwait City Tel: 22494000 • Lebanese Al-Berdawny Palace Tel: 25661117 Ayam Zaman Holiday Inn Tel: 18477777 Burg Al-Hamam Gulf Road Tel: 22529095

• Steak House Relais De L’Entrecote Al-Fanar Complex Tel: 25729600 Terrace Grill JW Marriott Hotel Tel: 22455550

Shabistan Crowne Plaza Hotel Tel: 24742000

The Gaucho Grill The Palms Hotel Tel: 25667370 -

• Seafood Al-Ahmadi Crowne Plaza Hotel Tel: 24742000

• Tex-Mex Chi Chi’s Salmiya Tel: 25625811

Al-Boom Radisson Blu Hotel Tel: 25756000

Tumbleweed Southern Grill Al-Bida’a Tel: 22253154/5

Maki Al-Blajat St. Tel: 25733561 Marina Waves Tel: 22244560

Flavors Restaurant Safir Hotel & Residences -Fintas Tel: 25455555

• Italian Ciro’s Pomodoro Kuwait City Tel: 22424004

Saj Express Kuwait City Tel: 22497822

Te l : 1 8 3 9 0 9 0

Salmiya - Jabriya - Keifan www.healthstop.com.kw

HOTELS

FIVE STAR Al-Manshar Rotana Hotel Crowne Plaza Kuwait Hilton Kuwait Resort JW Marriot Kuwait City Hotel Kempinski Julai’a Hotel & Resort The Regency Hotel & Resort Le Meridien Le Meridien Tower Marina Hotel Kuwait Movenpick Albid’a Movenpick Palms Beach Hotel & Spa Radisson Blu Hotels & Resorts Refad Palace Safir International Hotel Kuwait Sheraton Kuwait Hotel & Towers Safir Hotel & Residences Kuwait

23931000 24772000 23725500 22455550 1 844 444 25766666 22510999 22831831 22244970 22253100 24610033 22824060 25673000 23908630 22530000 22422055 25455555

FOUR STAR Carlton Tower Hotel The Courtyard by Marriott Kuwait El Joan Resort Four Points by Sheraton Kuwait

22452740 22997000 23281897 22415001

Ghani Palace Hotel Holiday Inn Khalifa Resort Kuwait Continental Hotel New Park Hotel Al Bastaki Hotel Al Dana Hotel Heritage Village Palace Hotel Shiik Flamingo Hotel & Resort Swiss-Belhotel Plaza Kuwait

25710301 1 847 777 23280144 22527300 25634200 22555081 23902760 22520600 1 821 111 25725050 22436686

THREE STAR Imperial Hotel Oasis Hotel Safari House Hotel Second Home Hotel Spring Continental Hotel Ibis Hotel Salmiya Ibis Hotel Sharq

22528766 22465489 22443136 22532100 25742410 25713872 22928080

TWO STAR International Hotel Kuwait Residence Hotel

25741788 22467560

LIFE

Rev up metabolism by alternating speed, intensity in workouts

Doing the same workout routine can get to be a habit. Not only should you alternate your routine to prevent burnout or boredom, but to give your body a surprise jolt. If you normally walk at 4.0 miles per hour on the treadmill or take 20-minutes to walk a mile, change up by going 5.0 miles for just 30 to 60 seconds during your workout. Do this every five minutes or so. Each time you workout, increase the time of the faster speed in small increments. This will rev up your metabolism without being overly taxing.

saturDAY, may 19, 2012

4,700 potentially dangerous asteroids lurk near Earth: NASA WASHINGTON: A new NASA survey has pinned down the number of asteroids that could pose a collision threat to Earth in what scientists say is the best estimate yet of the potentially dangerous space rocks according to SPACE. The survey found there are likely 4,700 potentially hazardous asteroids, plus or minus 1,500 space rocks, that are larger than 330 feet (100 meters) wide and in orbits that occasionally bring them close enough to Earth to pose a concern, researchers said. To date, only about 30 percent of those objects have actually been found, they added.

Potentially hazardous asteroids, or PHAs in NASAspeak, are space rocks in orbits that come within 5 million miles (8 million kilometers) of Earth and are large enough to cause damage on regional or global scale if they were ever to hit our planet.

The new study was based on observations from NASA’s Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE), an infrared space telescope. While the telescope data returned an estimate of the potentially dangerous near-Earth asteroid population that is similar to previous projections, it also revealed some surprising new results.

According to the survey, about twice as many asteroids are in so-called “lower-inclination orbits” - which are more closely aligned with Earth’s path around the sun than other objects - than previously thought researchers said. [Video: WISE Telescope’s Asteroid Census] “A possible explanation is that many of the PHAs may have originated from a collision between two asteroids in the main belt lying between Mars and Jupiter,” NASA officials explained in a statement. “A larger body with a low-inclination orbit may have broken up in the main belt, causing some of the fragments to drift into orbits closer to Earth and eventually become PHAs.” Those low-inclination space rocks also appear to be

smaller and brighter than other near-Earth asteroids and are more likely to encounter Earth, researchers said.

“Our team was surprised to find the overabundance of low-inclination PHAs,” Amy Mainzer, of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., said in a statement. Mainzer is principal investigator of WISE’s asteroid-hunting mission, which is called NEOWISE. “Because they will tend to make more close approaches to Earth, these targets can provide the best opportunities for the next generation of human and robotic exploration.”

Scientists made the new near-Earth asteroid estimate based on observations of 107 asteroids by WISE, which launched in 2009 and mapped the entire sky twice before ending its primary mission in 2011. Before shutting down, the observatory made a concerted search for near-Earth asteroids as part of an extended mission dubbed NEOWISE. The $320 million WISE telescope snapped images of about 600 near-Earth asteroids, with about 135 of them being completely new discoveries. The telescope also observed millions of other objects, including distant galaxies and star nurseries.

“NASA’s NEOWISE project, which wasn’t originally planned as part of WISE, has turned out to be a huge bonus,” Mainzer said. “Everything we can learn about these objects helps us understand their origins and fate.”

During its asteroid hunt, the WISE telescope searched for space rocks within about120 million miles (195 million km) of the sun. For comparison, the Earth is about 93 million miles (150 million km) from the sun.

The data from NEOWISE, when combined with other asteroid data observations, helped NASA announce in 2010 that about 90 percent of the largest near-Earth asteroids that come close to our planet had been identified.

FILE - This diagram illustrates the differences between orbits of a typical near-Earth asteroid (blue) and a potentially hazardous asteroid, or PHA (orange). PHAs have the closest orbits to Earth’s orbit, coming within 5 million miles (about 8 million kilometers), and they are large enough to survive passage through Earth’s atmosphere and cause significant damage. (AFP)

UN talks take first steps on 2015 climate deal Education important for escaping poverty: Researchers NEW YORK: People born into poverty are likely to continue to live that way as adults. But researchers are discovering a way out - education according to LiveScience.

Children reared in disadvantaged communities and poor families earn less money and experience more health problems as adults than do children raised without adversity, according to researchers.

“Early adverse life experiences, such as community or family poverty, have a detrimental effect on young adults’ social economy attainment - income, assets and job quality,” study researcher Kandauda Wickrama, of the University of Georgia, said in a statement. “Living in an adverse environment during childhood has a persistent, long-term affect on young adults.

Although you can change the place where you live, clearly early adverse experiences are under your skin.”

The new research found that level of educational achievement moderates these influences of earlier life experiences on young adults’ socioeconomic attainment.

Community poverty, African-American and Mexican-American ethnic status and being female negatively influenced the level of young adults’ assets significantly, while Asian and Cuban ethnic status, family income, consistently married parents and self-esteem increased the level of young adults’ earnings significantly.

Using the proportion of families liv-

ing below the poverty line as a measurement for community poverty, the research showed about a $10,000 decrease in asset value for each doubling in percentage of people living below the poverty line. But, this negative effect for lower educated younger adults is large, a $141,000 reduction in asset value.

Using a nationally representative sample of more than 12,000 adolescents from a longitudinal study by AddHealth, the research shows that minority race and ethnicity status also adversely impacts young adults’ socioeconomic attainment. On average, African-Americans earn $5,330 less per year than Caucasians from the same community. Mexican-Americans earn $3,960 less yearly when compared to similar Caucasians.

“The literature shows that these are irreversible damages, but our findings show you can reverse some of this,” he said, “specifically through education.”

Educational improvement This gap can be lessened with education, the researchers said. For African Americans, average annual income increases $6,700 for each gain in education, from high school graduation through college.

“In general, early community poverty has a negative influence on young adults’ assets, income and job quality,” said Wickrama. “However, this negative influence is not significant for highly educated young adults.”

Eating on a schedule helps avoid weight gain

NEWYORK: Weight gain may caused in part by eating on an odd eating schedule, rather than only by eating too many calories, a new study in mice suggests according to LiveScience.

Mice in the study that were fed a high-fat diet and allowed to eat whenever they wanted to, not surprisingly, gained weight. In contrast, mice that had their feeding restricted to eight hours a day were protected against obesity, despite the fact that they consumed just as many calories as the unrestricted mice.

The findings suggest that restricting meal times might be an underappreciated way to help people keep off the pounds, the researchers said.

“Every organ has a clock,” said study researcher Satchidananda Panda, of the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, Calif. That means there are times that our livers, intestines, muscles and other organs work at peak efficiency, and other times when they are - more or less - sleeping, Panda said.

These metabolic cycles are critical for processes such as cholesterol breakdown, and they should be turned on when we eat and turned off when we don’t, Panda said.

When mice or people eat frequently throughout the day and night, it can throw off those normal metabolic cycles, he added.

Over the 18-week study, the time-restricted mice were protected from the adverse effects of their high-fat diet, and showed improvements in their metabolism compared with the unrestricted mice. They gained 28 percent less weight than unrestricted mice and suffered less liver damage.

Further work is needed to show the same thing happens in people, the researchers said. More studies should collect information on when people eat, and not just what they eat, Panda said.

Panda said there is reason to think our eating patterns have changed in recent years, as many people have greater access to food and stay up late into the night, even if just to watch TV. And when people are awake, they tend to snack, Panda said.

PARIS: UN members on Thursday took their first steps in a marathon to negotiate a new global pact by 2015 that for the first time will place rich and poor under a common legal regime to tackle climate change.

Meeting in Bonn, the 195 parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) began wrangling over how to work towards the target enshrined at their landmark conference in Durban, South Africa, last December.

Maite Nkoana-Mashabane of South Africa, who presided over the maiden session, urged countries as they embarked on the long road to set aside “old and unhelpful negotiating practices,” a reference to the bickering that typically dogs climate talks.

“Time is limited and we need to take very seriously the desperate calls of some of our brethren, especially the small island states,” she said, referring to low-lying nations threatened by rising seas. The inaugural session of the ad-hoc working group, webcast over the Internet, took place in UNFCCC talks at senior level running in the former German capital to May 25.

If all goes well, a new accord will be wrapped up in 2015 and take effect in 2020, placing rich

and poor under the same legal roof for tackling greenhouse-gas emissions that drive climate change. At present, legal constraints under the UN’s climate banner are divided among developed and developing countries -- a format dating back to the 1990s that critics say is badly out of date. Rich countries bear most of the historical responsibility for global warming today.

But they say it is unfair to shoulder the burden for fixing the problem in the future.

Their places in the league table of emitters are being taken by emerging giants such as China, India and Brazil, which are massively burning coal, oil and gas as they battle to rise out of poverty.

Small-island states and African countries on Thursday sounded a loud alarm over the “ambition gap” – the difference between pledges for cutting emissions and what is needed to avoid dangerous warming. Scientist say current emissions are stoking possible warming of four degrees Celsius (7.2 degrees Fahrenheit), twice the 2 C (3.6 F) goal set by UNFCCC parties in 2011 as a safe maximum.

“The inadequate mitigation pledges... risk temperature increases that will have catastrophic impacts worldwide, and particularly for Africa,”

said Seyni Nafo, spokesman for the African group.

Speaking for small island states, Marlene Moses of Nauru warned that the “ambitions gap” was now so wide that by 2015, the negotiations could be dealing with how to relocate people from countries that had become inhabitable.

So far, the 2015 canvas is blank, except for the requirement that it meets the UNFCCC principle of “common but differentiated responsibilities.”

This term distinguishes between the demands that should be placed on poorer and richer economies respectively. Who will curb their emissions and by how much, the pact’s compliance regime and even its legal status are among the many issues that will have to be agreed in a hugely complex, multi-track arena.

Developing countries are demanding a show of goodwill from rich economies.

They want the European Union and its allies to renew and deepen their vows under the Kyoto Protocol, the world’s only treaty that specifies cuts in greenhouse gases.

In contrast, the United States, which refuses to ratify Kyoto, is leading the charge for emerging giants to beef up their emissions pledges and open their vows to scrutiny. -AFP

Japanese satellite to watch solar eclipse from space WASHINGTON: As people across the United States scramble for a good position to observe the solar eclipse this Sunday (May 20), a Japanese satellite will get great looks from orbit according to SPACE. The Hinode spacecraft will cross the path of Sunday’s annular solar eclipse a total of four times - and it won’t have to worry about its view being blocked by any pesky clouds. No other sun-observing satellite will be able to watch the dramatic event.

“Given the low altitude of the orbit, if Earth is eclipsed, so is the spacecraft,” said Jonathan Cirtain of NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala. Cirtain is a co-investigator for the X-ray telescope onboard Hinode.

On Sunday, the moon will pass in front of the sun from Earth’s perspective, blocking out about 94 percent of our star’s light.

Because the moon is near apogee at the moment - the most distant point in its orbit around our planet - it will be too small in the sky to cov-

FILE - An artist’s concept of the Hinode spacecraft in its low orbit around Earth during the sun’s uneclipsed activity. (Agencies)

er the sun’s face completely. So favorably placed skywatchers will be treated to an annular solar eclipse, in which a ring of sunlight blazes around the moon’s circumference.

Weather permitting, the annular eclipse will be visible from parts of East Asia, the Pacific region and western North America. Other areas will see a partial eclipse; check out this video for skywatching tips.

And by all means, be careful. NEVER look at the sun - either with the naked eye or through a telescope or binoculars - without proper filters or other equipment. Serious and permanent eye damage, including blindness, can result.

“Don’t look at the sun without protection,” said Bill Cooke, head of the Meteoroid Environment Office at NASA Marshall. “I can’t emphasize that enough.”

The Hinode spacecraft, named for the Japanese word for “sunrise,” orbits the Earth from pole to pole, less than 400 miles (630 kilometers) above our planet’s surface.

Because it is constantly zipping around the Earth - rather than hovering over a single point - it will travel through the path of the eclipse four times.

Each pass will keep it within the eclipse shadow for 10 to 15 minutes, providing ample opportunity to collect information about the sun.

Hinode carries the first large optical space telescope dedicated to studying the sun, researchers said.

It also boasts an X-ray telescope to provide full and partial images of the sun’s outer atmosphere at a variety of temperatures, and an instrument called the Extreme-ultraviolet Imaging Spectrometer, which measures the speed of gases traveling in the sun’s atmosphere.

Launched in 2006 by the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), Hinode has exceeded its three-year mission to study the magnetic energy of the sun, but it continues to monitor our star.

Hinode is a joint mission between JAXA, the National Astronomical Observatory of Japan, NASA and the Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council.

10

ALWATAN DAILY

CULTURE

saturDAY, MAY 19, 2012

LVMH looks to burnish Vuitton mystique and buoy sales PARIS: French luxury giant LVMH is struggling to retain its image as exclusive and high-end creators of $10,000 alligator handbags and goat-lined fur coats, while opening enough stores and reaching enough customers to keep profits high.

Thus far LVMH has managed the balance well, but it is taking no chances, offering customers increasingly expensive and bespoke services in an effort to retain a high-end mystique around brands in danger of becoming ubiquitous.

LVMH is taking particular care to protect the image of Louis Vuitton, the group’s signature brand, which accounts for 45 percent of operating profit, and has boasted double digit percentage growth through the financial crisis.

It is the company’s cash cow - with estimated revenues of 6.5 billion euros ($8.41 billion) - and analysts estimate that if handled well, Louis Vuitton could see its sales nearly double within seven years, with much of the growth coming from Asia.

“LVMH remains very conscious of the risk that its bags, tied to the relative accessibility of the monogrammed bags, might become too common,” said Serge Carrieria, a specialist in luxury brands and professor at the French university L’Institut d’Etudes Politiques de Paris.

Louis Vuitton’s revenues are almost double those of rival luxury goods group PPR’s Gucci, widely considered its closest French competitor.

incredible. Even if you buy a bag for 600 euros everything is done to give you the feeling of acquiring an exceptional product,” said one analyst who requested anonymity.

A Slow Rollout

The Hermes Model

The company is trying to counter the image that the Louis Vuitton monogram is both too common and easily copied by offering certain customers bespoke leather bags that cost two or three times more than the standard 800 euro Louis Vuitton bag.

In this LVMH is taking a page from Hermes, the family run luxury concern that boasts 30 percent operating margins and in which LVMH recently took a 22 percent stake.

Hermes retains an aura of rare exclusivity by maintaining long waiting lists for some items, like its 4,000 euro Kelly bag, and charging up to 100,000 euros for a snakeskin

FILE - Tourists are pictured in front of a Louis Vuitton boutique in Hollywood, California March 20, 2012. (Reuters)

coat.

Much of Hermes’s leather goods are still handmade, allowing the company to charge eye-popping prices for even small items such as wallets and key rings.

At Louis Vuitton, customers can choose from 26 patterns and eight different animal skin colors for the leather goods they want. Artisans in a suburb of Paris will produce

the product in four to six weeks and guarantee that few if any replicas will be produced.

Such bespoke items can cost anywhere from 5,000 euros to several times that, and customers are encouraged to feel that they are not just buying a luxury object, but participating in the creation of a brand’s image.

“In all the Louis Vuitton stores the buying experience is

But while LVMH tries to burnish the image around its products, an iron hand over the distribution network allows it to not only control margins but make sure that its marketing decisions are adhered to. In order to protect the sense of timelessness around the brands, LVMH does not allow Louis Vuitton items to go on sale, a move that would be more difficult for PPR, which does not control its distribution network to the same extent.

LVMH is also careful about the roll-out of new stores none were opened in 2011 - aware that the brand would suffer from too much visibility. At the same time, Louis Vuitton, which now has 461 stores in 50 countries, favors increasing floor size at existing stores.

It is also gradually rolling out well-located megastores exceeding 1,000 square feet. Another sign of the tension between the brand’s mass-market appeal and the necessity of preserving its up-market appeal.

The stores, located in high traffic areas such as the Champs Elysee in Paris, Bond Street in London and 5th Avenue in New York, can carry pricey rents, but customers are given the full-on Louis Vuitton experience from clothes to bags to the smaller leather goods which are extremely profitable.

LVMH believes so strongly in the concept of megastores that it plans to open another six stores exceeding 1,000 square feet to add to the 14 that exist.

“They focus on offering their products in increasingly large shops,” said another analyst who requested anonymity. “This optimizes the network and maximizes sales per square meter.”

Even as the megastores lure thousands, they minister to their favored customers in separate “salons” that offer the luxurious custom bags that the tourists and curiosity seekers who flock to the stores can only dream of. -Reuters

Italian university switches to English for success MILAN: Italians do it better. At least that’s what the T-shirts say. The problem is in what language?

Politecnico di Milano, one of Italy’s leading universities, thinks it should be English.

The 149-year-old university, located in Italy’s business capital Milan, is set to become the first Italian place of higher learning to teach all its graduate courses in English when it kicks off its academic year in 2014.

The aim is to kit out its students with the right stuff to gain access to the global jobs market. It’s also meant to attract top-class inter-

national students at a time when competition among universities worldwide is hotting up.

“We need to prepare all our graduates for a professional world that demands a rigorous international outlook,” Politecnico rector Giovanni Azzone told Reuters. The university - one of the world’s top 50 engineering schools according to QS World University rankings - will offer all its Master of Science and PhD courses in English and will invest 3.2 million euros to attract international faculty.

Azzone said that in today’s modern world it’s crucial young people know how to work

with different cultures.

“Our graduates very often have to work on projects with scholars from China, India and many other countries,” he said. “Getting them used to an inter-cultural environment prepares them better for the world of work.”

With Italy’s job market shrinking in a cold economic climate and emerging markets adding more jobs by the day, Italian universities are adapting to the new reality.

Increasing the number of courses taught in English and internationalizing higher education to make it more competitive is a key part

Poe letter to Mary Had a Little Lamb author sells for $164,000 LITTLETON, New Hampshire: A one-page 1837 letter from the writer Edgar Allan Poe to the editor of a popular women’s magazine has been sold for $164,000 at auction.

Poe wrote to Sarah Josepha Hale, herself a wellknown literary figure and author of the children’s poem “Mary Had a Little Lamb,” to decline an invitation to publish an article in a magazine she edited at the time.

“You usually don’t see a lengthy handwritten letter like this by Poe,” said Bobby Livingston, vice president of RR Auctions, a New Hampshire-based firm which handled the transaction Wednesday.

“To have him writing to the author of ‘Mary Had a Little Lamb’ is pretty amazing.”

Written eight years before he published his most famous poem, “The Raven,” Poe, then a literary critic for a magazine in Richmond, Virginia, tells Hale he is too busy with other work after a recent illness.

“To send you a crude or hastily written article

would be injurious to me, and an insult to yourself - and I fear that I could, at present, do little more,” Poe wrote.

Godey’s Lady’s Book, the magazine Hale edited, was among the most popular of the period and published writers including Nathaniel Hawthorne, Oliver Wendell Holmes and Washington Irving. Hale is also known for her role advocating the creation of a Thanksgiving holiday in the United States.

The letter was purchased by a West Coast collector who wished to remain anonymous. The first eight stanzas of the poem ‘For Annie’ written in Poe’s hand sold for $690,000 in 2009.

The same auction also featured documents signed by three of the most famous Americans to die fighting Mexican troops at the Alamo in San Antonio in 1836.

An 1835 letter by Davy Crockett sold for $47,652; an 1829 pay order signed by James Bowie was auctioned for $65,048 and 1834 court document signed by William B. Travis was purchased for $26,895. -Reuters

of Education Minister Francesco Profumo’s policy as the government looks for ways to stimulate growth.

Italy’s most prestigious business school, Bocconi, was the first to offer undergraduate classes in English back in 2001. Today it teaches about 50 percent of its graduate courses in English. And the number is set to grow.

“The lingua franca for business is English and you need to know it. Our students are very active on international markets and demand an international environment,” Dean of International Affairs at Bocconi University

Fulvio Ortu said. Politecnico di Milano teaches science, engineering and design and counts among its alumnae Nobel prize winner Giulio Natta, who discovered polypropylene, and top international architect Renzo Piano.

Globalization is increasing the demand for skilled workers around the world, especially in science, while in Italy even small and mediumsized companies are now looking to international markets.

“Overseas job offers for our graduates rose 42 percent in 2011 and I don’t see the trend falling off,” Azzone said. -Reuters

Hong Kong in global art bonanza - but will it last?

Two men chat in front of a polka dot covered Sotheby’s signage, part of an installation by Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, at Sotheby’s newly opened gallery in Hong Kong May 18, 2012.

(Reuters)

TRAVEL

Stay in a tree house, enjoy a party atmosphere in Olympos, Turkey OLYMPOS, Turkey: Located on the Mediterranean coast in southern Turkey, Olympos has developed a reputation as a top party location for alternative lifestyle lovers. The region boasts some of Turkey’s most stunning stretches of coastline, with clear blue water and clean sand. Once part of Ancient Lycia, the city of Olympos was incorporated into the Roman Empire and abandoned in the 15th century. Today, the area has become popular with hippies and backpackers and is home to various tree house hostels, including Kadir’s Top Tree House, which - from the outside - resembles a fort with its wooden fences and entrance.

Kadir’s is the oldest tree house hostel in Olympos and could almost be considered a small village. Music can be heard emanating from several of its two-storey wooden houses, each with their own balconies, while a couple of residents play beach volleyball on the street.

There are dormitories and also real tree houses, with names such as Wall Street, Champs Elysees, Melrose Place and Hotel California.

During the day, the area is a haven of peace and quiet. However, once the evening arrives, it transforms

FILE - The masonry remains of Olympos even show up in the sand on the beach.

Most beachlovers barely notice because the clear blue water of the bay beckons. (dpa)

into a party spot in the numerous other wooden bungalows, tree houses, restaurants and bars. Even the shops are made out of wood. In daylight, everything centers around the beach. However, kayaking, rock climbing, mountain biking, and whitewater rafting at the nearby Koprulu Canyon are also options. On the road to the beach, there is also the choice of exploring the ruins of the ancient city, situated on both sides of a brook that dries up in the summer.

Large stone blocks, windows, doorways and the remains of a church are among the ruins still recognizable, despite being heavily covered with bushes and trees. The most important sites are fenced off, but the majority of ruins are easily accessible to the public and, for the most part, treated as a sort of playground by revelers on their way to the beach.

There are even some ruins on the beach itself. But, by that stage, most visitors have lost interest and are instead more captivated by the expanse of the bay and its inviting clear blue waters. They lay out their towels and lie in the sun, conserving energy ahead of another wave of parties and dancing through the night. -dpa

HONG KONG: The eyes of the global art world are fixed on Hong Kong - for now.

Hong Kong’s art scene has been expanding for the past few years, but this week’s flurry of high profile international gallery openings alongside the city’s annual art fair has brought a hype and frenzy unlike anything seen before.

But it also comes at a time when Chinese growth is slowing, raising concerns about sustainability.

Auction house Sotheby’s official opening of its 15,000 square foot gallery space on Friday comes after blue-chip galleries such as London based Simon Lee, Shanghai’s Pearl Lam, Parisian dealer Galerie Perrotin and Paris gallery NeC opened earlier this week.

Hong Kong’s Art HK fair, now owned by international art show Art Basel, which also holds an annual show in Miami, has attracted close to 70,000 people. Sales for the fair have been strong and expectations for the next two days are solid, said dealers.

But even though art excitement appears palpable in the financial city, local gallerists and international art consultants are warning that the market feels a little frothy.

“Whilst this hype brings an air of excitement to the city’s art scene, it’s very telling of the possible fragility of the market and whether it’s sustainable,” said Natasha Whiffin, gallery manager at Saamlung in Hong Kong.

The rate at which galleries have set up shop here is almost unheard of in the recent history of world arts hubs such as London, Paris, New York, she added.

Market research firm ArtTactic said in its May 12 report that confidence in the Chinese contemporary art market is slowing down after 3 years of rapid growth.

“The biggest change from 12 months ago, is the decrease in confidence at the very high end of the market,” said the London based agency.

High Expectations

Simon Lee and Pearl Lam’s galleries, that this week opened in Hong Kong’s historic Pedder building, joined American art dealer Gagosian, which opened in 2011, and British gallerist Ben Brown, who set up in the colonial etched building in 2009.

Yet dealers have warned that the flood of galleries which have headed eastwards ought to scale back expectations that growth will remain as robust as it has been.

“I think there will be quite a lot of disappointment. If we expect that things will grow like hell, I don’t really think so,” said Urs Meile, who represents artists including Ai Weiwei and Li Dafang, and operates Galerie Urs Meile in Switzerland and Beijing.

“If you look long term, it will be a good market, but I am not that sure it will grow fast,” said Meile, standing in front of Ai Weiwei’s “Cong” being exhibited at

Art HK. “Cong,” which consists of 123 framed letters from various Chinese government ministries regarding Ai Weiwei’s investigation of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake, is among the big name pieces being exhibited by the 266 galleries participating.

Commitment

Art Basel’s name has increased credibility for the Hong Kong fair and attracted a higher caliber of international galleries and buyers, but the domestic art market remains very small and the city is a vastly different place when the fair closes.

“They have to rely on the Asian market to be the ones who are buying here, and I am not sure that the Asian market is quite yet there to absorb this kind of material,” said Michael Frahm, director of Frahm Ltd and an art adviser based in London.

While Chinese buyers make up over 40 percent of the global auction market they have not been buying from individual galleries, said Frahm, adding that it will take a lot of hard work to get to know the collector base and know the scene.

For now, Hong Kong seems the place to be for art and culture lovers with 55 pieces of Picasso’s original works on show from May 19 to July 22 at the city’s heritage museum.

“There are a lot of people interested, but it’s very early stages in that people are still very insecure in terms of what they are buying,” Frahm said. -Reuters

ALWATAN DAILY

entertainment Song Of The Day

saturDAY, MAY 19, 2012

11

Legendary Arabic diva Warda dies aged 72

Fahad AlSabah Staff Writer

Song: Loving Me 4 Me Artist: Christina Aguilera Album: Stripped Genre: Hip-Hop/R&B In short: Christina Aguilera has fired her whole team and assembled another one of her choosing after taking full creative control over her sophomore album Stripped, a very risky move so early in her career. One of the main producers behind the record was Scott Storch, who have crafted “Loving 4 Me 4 Me”, “Walk Away”, “Can’t Hold Us Down”, “Infatuation”, “Underappreciated”, and “Fighter”, all of which have become anthems in their own rights.

Needless to say, Aguilera’s creative control has paid off greatly.

To listen to the song visit www.alwatandaily.com E-mail your feedback to falsabah@alwatandaily.com

The Buzz American Idol down to final 2 singers “American Idol” finalist Joshua Ledet won’t be belting it out on this season’s final showdown. The booming 20-year-old vocal powerhouse from Westlake, La., was revealed Thursday to have received the fewest viewer votes on the Fox talent contest, leaving bluesy 21-year-old crooner Phillip Phillips of Leesburg, Ga., and sassy 16-year-old budding diva Jessica Sanchez of San Diego to compete for the show’s record deal grand prize on next week’s finale. “I just feel that we’re all winners at this point,” Ledet said before his eviction. “If I end up not making it and my friends make it, I’ll be voting for both of them.” Ledet had been one of the judges’ favorite finalists, earning more than a dozen standing ovations from the panel for his renditions of such songs as James Brown’s “It’s a Man’s Man’s Man’s World” and Bruno Mars’ “Runaway Baby.” However, the gospel singer wasn’t able to win over enough voters. He twice appeared as a low vote getter before Thursday’s dismissal. -AP

Private family funeral planned for Donna Summer Donna Summer’s funeral will be a private one for family and close friends. Publicist Brian Edwards said in a statement Friday that Summer’s family is overwhelmed and appreciates the outreach from fans and friends, but that her funeral services will remain private. He didn’t provide details on when and where services would be held. Summer died Thursday morning of lung cancer at age 63 in Naples, Fla. Edwards also said that the singer did not smoke. Summer earned the title of Queen of Disco after releasing a string of dance hits in the 1970s, including “I Feel Love,” ‘’Love to Love You Baby” and “Last Dance.” -AP

Van Halen postpones summer concert dates

Algerian singer Warda, pictured here in 2008, whose powerful vocal range and patriotic songs earned her legendary status throughout the Arab world, died of a heart attack late on Thursday aged 72, her family said. (AFP)

CAIRO: Algerian singer Warda, who died in Cairo aged 72 late on Thursday, was a regional icon whose powerful patriotic tunes were matched in popularity by her romantic ballads.

Known throughout the region as Warda Al-Jazairia (the Algerian Rose), she performed for presidents and popular audiences, reinventing herself over the decades to appeal to old and young alike.

Algerian Culture Minister Khalida Toumi said here death meant “one of the most beautiful voices of Algeria and the Arab world has just become silent forever.”

She “has gone, leaving behind her a deafening silence and a profound sadness,” Toumi said in a message of condolences published

File picture dated November 1, 1999 shows Algerian singer Warda acknowledging applause at a concert in Algiers. (AFP)

by the APS news agency.

Born Warda Fatouki in France in 1939 to an Algerian father and Lebanese mother, the singer spent most of her adult life in Egypt.

She began singing in her teens, performing at a club her father owned in Paris.

Her introduction to the Arab masses came through her performance of “Al-Watan Al-Akbar” (the greater homeland), a panArabist song composed by Mohammed Abdel Wahab, himself a regional star.

Warda took music lessons from renowned Egyptian singers, including Oum Kalthoum, Abdelwahab and Abdelhalim Hafez, before performing her own songs to music composed by her Tunisian mentor, Sadeq Thuraya.

Shortly after Algeria’s independence from

French colonial rule in 1962, Warda went to her homeland for the first time, where she married and quit singing at the request of her husband.

But when then president Houari Boumediene asked Warda to sing for the celebrations to mark the 10-year anniversary of independence, she agreed. It was a decision that would cost her marriage. She later moved to Cairo and married renowned composer Baligh Hamdi, and together they created some of her most famous work.

Known for a classical style of Arabic singing, she adopted more pop tunes in the 90s, earning her a huge younger fan base with her hit tune “Batwanes beek” (I enjoy your company) that was followed by a string of hits.

NEW YORK: Herbert Breslin, the harddriving manager who helped propel Luciano Pavarotti to international fame during the 36 years they worked together, has died, his wife said Thursday. He was 87.

Breslin collapsed at his hotel in Nice, France, on Wednesday and died at a hospital there, his wife, Carol, said from their apartment in New York. She said she was told doctors believed he died of a heart attack. His death was first reported by Anne Midgette of The Washington Post, co-author with Breslin of the 2004 book “The King and I,” which detailed Breslin’s work with Pavarotti.

Under Breslin’s guidance, Pavarotti moved beyond opera houses to become an entertain-

ment star who performed at arenas, stadiums and even Las Vegas. The rotund tenor also appeared on television shows and an American Express commercial.

“That I think was the essence of our plan together,” Breslin said during a 2004 interview on radio station WQXR. Born on Oct. 1, 1924, Breslin became an opera fan as he grew up in New York.

After working in public relations for Chrysler and the BulovaWatch Co., he became an unpaid publicist for the Santa Fe Opera, then started his own company in New York near Carnegie Hall, Herbert Breslin Public Relations. His first three clients were sopranos Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, Joan Sutherland

and Marilyn Horne. He also played a big role in the career of pianist Alicia de Larrocha.

Known for boasting about his clients and his sometimes profane language, Breslin started with Pavarotti in 1967, six years after the singer’s professional debut and a year before he first appeared at the Metropolitan Opera.

They were introduced by Terence McEwen of London Records when Pavarotti was the cover singer for Carlo Begonzi for a Carnegie Hall performance of Verdi’s Requiem with conductor Herbert von Karajan and the orchestra of Milan’s Teatro alla Scala.

Breslin started as Pavarotti’s publicist and became his manager. They worked together through 2002 - five years before Pavarotti’s

Sorkin says Jobs movie won’t be straight biography

Kelsey Grammer comedy, Dick Wolf drama among USA’s new shows

Adele notches up two Ivor Novello songwriting awards British singer Adele won two Ivor Novello awards for songwriting on Thursday, adding to a lengthening list of musical accolades, but she lost out in the best album and song categories. The 24-year-old chart queen picked up two coveted Ivor Novello prizes for the most performed song of 2011 (“Rolling in the Deep”) and songwriter of the year. She was also nominated for best song musically and lyrically (Rolling in the Deep) but was beaten by Ed Sheeran’s “The A Team”, and in the album category Adele’s record-breaking “21” was shortlisted but lost out to PJ Harvey’s “Let England Shake”.

In a year dominated by female artists, it was little surprise to see rising US star Lana Del Rey win the best contemporary song award for “Video Games”, co-written by Briton Justin Parker. -Reuters

Warda, with her expressive brown eyes and elegant mannerisms, will be remembered throughout the Arab world as an icon of her generation.

She died in her Cairo apartment after a sudden heart attack just weeks after recording a song to celebrate Algeria’s 50th independence anniversary, Egyptian state media said.

“She was in good health and had not been complaining of anything,” her son Riad was quoted as saying by the Egyptian MENA news agency.

Algeria has sent a military plane to Cairo to carry Warda’s body back home. She will be buried at the Al-Alia cemetery in Algiers, her son said. -AFP

Pavarotti manager Herbert Breslin dead at 87

Van Halen is postponing some dates on its summer concert tour. A source familiar with the tour who was not authorized to speak publicly confirmed to The Associated Press that some of the group’s long-scheduled performances this summer are being postponed. The band’s website lists active tour dates through June 26. Dozens of additional shows had been planned and there was no immediate reason given for the postponements. Representatives of the band and AEG, which is promoting the concerts in some regions, did not respond to messages from the AP on Thursday. -AP

USA Network announced its slate of upcoming projects Thursday, including a comedy project from Kelsey Grammer and a drama from Dick Wolf that the network is developing.

Grammer, who’s currently starring in the Starz drama series “Boss,” will executive-produce “The DiCicco Brothers,” about a dot-com entrepreneur whose brash style clashes with the politically correct environment of Silicon Valley. The story comes from Chirs Cannistraci and Ed Cannistraci, while the latter wrote the teleplay. The Universal Cable Productions project will also be executive-produced by Brian Sher and Stella Stolper, with Grammnet Productions.The untitled project from “Law & Order” producer Wolf, meanwhile, will focus on an insurance investigator who gets divorced and marries a woman who turns out to be a man. Wolf’s “Law & Order” partner Peter Jankowski and Wolf Films’ Danielle Gelber are also working on the project, which is being produced by Wolf Films for Universal Cable Productions. USA also picked up the pilot for the reality offering “Bride or Best Man,” described as a “bromantic comedy,” and is developing the Mark Burnett reality project “Romancing the Globe.” -Reuters

File picture dated September 10, 1979 shows Cairo-based Algerian diva Warda al-Jazairiya during her performance at the Olympia music hall in Paris. (AFP)

FILE - Customers walk past a display of the biography of Steve Jobs, sold at a bookstore in Quezon City, Metro Manila Oct. 24, 2011. (Reuters)

NEW YORK: Screenwriter Aaron Sorkin hasn’t yet figured out how to put the life of Apple co-founder Steve Jobs on the silver screen, but he is certain it’s not going to be a straightforward biography.

Sorkin, who won an Oscar for his screenplay of Facebook film “The Social Network” and created TV drama “The West Wing”, said on Thursday he would be looking for an element of tension or an obstacle in Job’s life on which to hang the movie.

Movie studio Sony Pictures announced on Tuesday that Sorkin would adapt Walter Isaacson’s best-selling biography of the enigmatic genius behind the iPod and the iPhone. Jobs, 56, died in October after a long struggle with pancreatic cancer.

“I know so little about what I am going to write. I know what I am not going to write. It can’t be a straight ahead biography because it’s very difficult to shake the cradle-to-grave structure of a biography, “ Sorkin told reporters at a news conference for his upcoming HBO drama “The Newsroom.”

Sorkin noted that “The Social Network” saw the Facebook story through the lens of an acrimonious lawsuit that pitted CEO Mark Zuckerberg against his Harvard friends over the creation of the social media network.

“Drama is tension versus obstacle. Someone wants something, something is standing in their way of getting it. They want the money, they want the girl, they want to get to Philadelphia - doesn’t matter ... And I need to find that event and I will. I just don’t know what it is,” Sorkin said.

Sorkin said he would turn his full attention to the Jobs film in late June, once he has launched “The Newsroom”, which is set behind the scenes at a television network.

He said that Apple co-founder SteveWozniak has been hired by the film studio as a “tutor” on all the technical aspects of computers and on Jobs himself.

Wozniak and Jobs founded Apple from a garage in 1976. Wozniak stopped working for the company in 1987 but kept in touch with Jobs until his death. -Reuters

death.

Their relationship soured in their later years together, especially after Pavarotti signed with promoter Tibor Rudas for Three Tenors concerts with Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras.

In “The King and I,” Breslin detailed Pavarotti’s behind-the-scenes life, telling tales of gluttony and mistresses and confirming rumors that the tenor couldn’t read music.

“He didn’t like to study at all,” Breslin said during the WQXR interview. In addition to his wife of 57 years, Breslin is survived by daughter Andrea, son Eric and four grandchildren. His wife said she had not yet determined funeral arrangements. -Reuters

Larry King says talk show to resume this summer

NEW YORK: Larry King said Thursday that his talk show will resume this summer on the new digital network Ora. TV, earlier than he or the network had anticipated. The show “Larry King Now” will mark the startup of the network financed by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim. Executives had originally intended to launch in the fall.

But King said he wanted to “get into the political mix.” The Democratic and Republican national conventions to name presidential nominees are this summer.

King said he expected the format of his show to be similar to “Larry King Live,” which aired on CNN in prime time for 25 years, and he’s retained much of his old production staff. The new show will generally be 30 minutes in length, instead of an hour, although there will be flexibility to go shorter or longer depending on who’s being interviewed, said Jon Housman, Ora.TV’s CEO. Fresh episodes will be posted online about 5 or 6 p.m., as opposed to the 9 p.m. start time of King’s TV show, although viewers will be able to watch it whenever they want. King, who’s 78, said he misses the nightly show.

“The night I missed it the most, when it really hit me, was the night Osama bin

Laden was killed,” he said, adding his show would have spent a week on the topic. Ora.TV said it expects King’s show to set the tone for a network that will largely consist of talk shows. It will be available in multiple ways online, through streaming and apps, and at several locations beyond Ora.TV’s own website. Housman said he was not ready Thursday to announce any specific distribution deals, but said it will be made clear before “Larry King Now” starts the various ways it will be available.

Ora.TV is laying the groundwork for King’s return through efforts to make him available in ventures where younger people who might be more inclined to watch a digital network will see him. For instance, King has a new skit that will be made available on the website Funny or Die next week.

King wouldn’t pinpoint a guest for the first night of his new show but said he’s shooting high - aiming for President Barack Obama or Mitt Romney. He said he still expects to book quality guests because of his long relationships in the business, even though a digital network has less visibility than traditional TV. “It’s not Harvey Glick saying ‘please come on the Harvey Glick show,’” he said. -AP

Miss World boss plans Fiji trip after fiasco HOLLYWOOD: The head of the Miss World beauty queen franchise says she plans to travel to Fiji “as soon as possible” to address the problems that turned last month’s pageant in the island nation into a fiasco.

“Sadly I am aware of many problems that have occurred,” wrote Julia Morley in an email sent to The Associated Press on Friday. Morley, who co-chairs the organization from its London headquarters, said she wants to work with a “specially selected team,” including this year’s Miss World Fiji pageant director, to “find solutions” for future Fiji pageants. The Fiji director, Andhy Blake, has been at the center of criticism after 16-year-old Torika Watters was crowned winner last month. First there were complaints Watters looked too Western to represent her country. Then, two weeks after the pageant, Watters was

told she was too young to compete in the international competition in China. The crown has been handed to the 24-yearold runner-up, Koini Vakaloloma.

This week, one of the six international judges said the judging was a sham because Blake pressured them into picking Watters as the winner. In a post on the Miss World Fiji website Thursday, Blake acknowledged he had preselected Watters as a semifinalist and gave the judges his personal opinion that she should win, but denied that made the event a sham.

“Yes I selected her as a semifinalist,” he wrote. “Yes I gave my opinions to the judges of who I saw fitting for the title, but no, I never juggled the results to allow this young woman to win. Torika Watters was selected because she impressed the international judges with her charm, personality, grace, maturity...” -AP

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ALWATAN DAILY

AROUND TOWN / TIME OUT

SATURDAY, MAY 19, 2012

If you have an event you wish to include, please email: aroundtown@alwatandaily.com

Feature o f

graffiti

the day

moderately confused

OSN bringing to viewers unparalleled coverage of the Olympics

Sudoku KUWAIT: OSN, the leading Pay TV network in the Middle East and North Africa is inviting viewers to watch unrivaled live coverage of the London 2012 Olympics at their own convenience on 13 channels across multiple media platforms with over 225 hours of the most comprehensive coverage every day.

OSN will showcase all 26 Olympic sports from the 16-day sporting extravaganza. The coverage will be screened across 8 sports TV channels of which 3 are brand new including a 24/7 Olympic news channel.

OSN viewers can enjoy the games in full high definition 1080i with Dolby Digital surround sound providing the best possible viewing experience.

With OSN Play, the region’s first online TV platform, OSN customers will be able to watch the games

Month a t

LIVE via 5 dedicated channels enabling sports enthusiasts to watch the Olympics whilst they are on the move.

OSN Play, which is offered at no additional cost to OSN customers, is designed to ensure viewers don’t miss a single minute of the action, even when they are away from their TV screen.

Fans will be able to record the Olympics, using the OSN Showbox HD to watch their favorite sport, competition or athlete at a time that is convenient to them.

With multiple events taking place at the same time viewers will no longer have to make tough choices on which event to follow. OSN’s Electronic TV Guide will make it easier for customers to discover and enjoy the best of the Olympics.

Elementary

Advanced

Intermediate

General A n n o u n c e m e n t s

a glance eny from hell fire (Quran 66:6) on Thursday at Jamiyatul Islah Auditorium Rawdah, adjacent to highway 40. Dinner packet shall be served after the program. Contact: 99037240|66037944|66218674 for more details.

Carnatic concert May 24/ 6:30 p.m. / Jleeb Al Shoyoukh: Kalanjali Kuwait is organizing “Padma Vibhushan” “Chevalier” Dr. Mangalampalli Balamuralikrishna Carnatic Concert at the Integrated Indian School auditorium, Jleeb Al Shoyoukh. Accompanying artistes are Violin - Lalgudi Vijayalakshmi (D/o Padma Vibhushan Dr. Lalgudi Jayaraman), Mrudangam - “Padmasri” Dr.Yella Venkateswara Rao, Ghatam - Sri Giridhar Udupa and Thambura - “Kalaimamani” Dr. Saraswathi.

For more details send an email to kalanjaliq8@gmail.com

K’S PATH invites applicants for the adoption of pets Sepp is a Domestic Long Haired (DLH) male cat. He will be 2-years-old April 2012. This friendly, laid-back boy loves a good cuddle and likes a high vantage point in a cat tree or ledge to look out from. He would do best in a home with children over 12 years of age.

To adopt, contact +965 67006122 or visit the website www.kspath.org

International bazaar Golden era club May 11 and 25/ 5 p.m. - 7 p.m. / Rumaithiya: Golden Era Club presents ‘The Eight Fold Path to Yoga’. Yoga here! Yoga there! Yoga everywhere! Yet, few comprehend Yoga’s true nature! Join Yoga Guru - Aacharya Shashikala Pushkarna - on this unique journey to the true ‘union’ between the mind, body and spirit. All seniors (60+) are cordially invited. Venue- House #34, next to Abu-Tammam Intermediate School for Boys, Sate Alhusari St., Block 2, Rumaithiya. For registration call 97172788/ 66208183 or drop a line to goldenera60@yahoo.com

French Summer Classes May 19/ TIES Center: For the sake of the welfare of kids, and in cooperation with the management of the TIES Center, the TIES French Speaking Club (TIES FSC) is pleased to announce the summer course schedule for kids, starting Saturday. For more information please contact 25231015/6 or 97198222 or visit website www.tiescenter.net

IMAK organizes public program May 24/ Rawdah: Indian Muslim Association-Kuwait cordially invites you with family and friends for a public program - Protect yourself and your prog-

May 26/ 10 a.m.-3 p.m. / TIES Center: Stop by and have the opportunity to see and even own some international antiques on display and taste the delicious foods on display. Also have your name inscribed in Arabic calligraphy at no cost and have a taste of our Arabic ice cream. Various items will be available for sale, such as pashmina shawls, accessories, jewelry, Mexican food, Indian food, cosmetics, cookies, handbags, traditional Kuwaiti - style dresses and many more. For more information please contact 2523105/6 or 97228860.

Mario is a gentle and affectionate 6-years-young Spitz male. This friendly boy does great with people and dogs of all ages.

New Toastmasters Club Second and fourth Tuesday/ 7 p.m. - 9 p.m. / Jabriya: A new Toastmasters Club is being formed and encouraging new members to join. Toastmasters International is a world leader in communication and leadership development. It is a non-profit international organization dedicated to improve member’s communication and leadership skills by attending and participating toastmasters meetings. For more information, please contact Khaled Al-Hashem at 65588824.

Brainbang session October 7-April/ 11:45 a.m. -1:45 p.m. /Salmiya: BRAINBANG, the creative arm of Friends of CRY Club (FOCC) invites all students aged 11 and above, to join us fortnightly on Fridays. The areas of development are: Creativity in learning, tools and techniques to empower your mind, profile based learning, activity, fun, games and worksheet based assignments, practical experiments, mind gymnastics and application of learning techniques to conventional study.

E-mail: brainbang@focckwt.org or call 25660835/25618471/97677820.

Dilbert

Open House for Indian Citizens Ambassador of India would be holding an Open House for Indian citizens to address their problems\grievances on Wednesdays of the second and the fourth weeks of every month between 1500 hrs and 1600 hrs in the Embassy. In case Wednesday is an Embassy holiday, the meeting will be held on the next working day. To ensure timely action/follow-up by the Embassy, it is requested that, wherever possible, Indian citizens should exhaust the existing channels of interaction/grievance redressal and bring their problems/issues in writing with supporting documents.

Royal Thai Embassy The Royal Thai Embassy in Kuwait wishes to invite Kuwaiti companies that deal business with Thai companies or those agencies of Thai commercial companies to visit the Embassy’s Commercial Office to register their relevant information to be part of the embassy’s business and trade database. The Royal Thai Embassy is located in Jabriya, Block 6, Street 8, Villa No. 1, Telephone No. 25317530 -25317531, Ext: 14.

Nancy

Horoscopes Aries: March 21 - April 19

Aries, this is an ideal moment to address once and for all the questions that have been on your mind for the last few weeks. Pay particular attention to questions that touch on your sentimental life. If you’re fretting about an unanswered request, let it go. No response is forthcoming.

Taurus: April 20 - May 20

Something is coming to an end concerning your lack of confidence in yourself, Taurus. You’ve been hesitant to stand in the spotlight for quite a while now, perhaps feeling you weren’t quite ready. Well, no more excuses! Ready or not, you’re going to have to push forward. The only thing you risk losing is your pride.

Gemini: May 21 - June 21

It’s possible that the last few weeks have allowed you to become a little bit clearer concerning certain questions you have about your vocation, Gemini. It would now be better for you to stop thinking about such things and let life take over. Remember, you’re well armed for this, so don’t let go!

Cancer: June 22 - July 22

These last few weeks have been good for your equilibrium, Cancer. It was a question of becoming a bit more involved in life than usual, and showing what you’re capable of. You may have noticed that this or that about yourself needs improvement, but isn’t that true for everyone? So relax and unwind.

Leo: July 23 - August 22

It’s never very agreeable to have to question oneself, Leo, but this is the main objective of today’s celestial aspect. You’ll soon be launched into new adventures. This isn’t an easy exercise, to be sure, but it will do you some good. Just be honest with yourself and go ahead full steam!.

Virgo: August 23 - September 22

The great period of meditation that started for you a few weeks ago is now finished, Virgo. This means that you are going to have to get back into the real world again! You are going to have to test out how the “new and improved” you operates in everyday life. Get ready. You can expect some real changes!

Libra: September 23 - October 22

If you have grievances to voice about your love life, Libra, this is the day to speak up. Indeed, anything less than total honesty won’t be tolerated today.

You can expect to confront the “other,” whether mate, friend, or family member, on the basis of truth and righteousness. Know that you’ll command their attention!

Scorpio: October 23 - November 21

Are you thinking of switching careers, Scorpio, or traveling to the other side of the world? Perhaps you just want to pull a “Greta Garbo” and stay home with the shades drawn tight. A series of small incidents you’ve recently experienced at work is likely to inspire the most outlandish ideas.

Sagittarius: November 22 - December 21

You’re likely to find people somewhat irritating today, Sagittarius. It’s as though nothing is good enough and nobody seems to know exactly what he or she wants. You’ll reign supreme within this conflict and dissatisfaction. You may even be asked to step in and restore order.

Capricorn: December 22 - January 19

You may have felt an oppressive mood hanging in the air when you woke up this morning, Capricorn.

Unfortunately, that haze of misunderstanding and conflict is likely to last all day. However, it makes this an ideal time to speak up about anything that’s bothering you! Don’t be shy about going on the warpath today.

Aquarius: January 20 - February 18

The mood you’re in today is the stuff of which memorable encounters are made, Aquarius. You’ll be wary at first, perhaps even somewhat hostile to someone who dares to intrude on your freedom.

Then suddenly you’ll realize that this person is someone special, intriguing, and definitely out of the ordinary.

Pisces: February 19 - March 20

More than ever before, you’ll feel as though it’s time to take matters into your own hands and build your future, Pisces. You’re fed up with living on hope and putting your happiness off until tomorrow. Your determination will be so strong that you may even surprise yourself. Today is the first day of a new life for you.