28 Apr 2013 by Kuwait Times

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SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

21st-century king to take Dutch throne

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JAMADA ALTHANI 18, 1434 AH

Will you earn enough points to win green card?

Injured Indian spy fights for survival

Athletic Bilbao delay Barca’s title party

Damascus dismisses US, UK ‘barefaced lie’ Syria denies chemical weapons claims

SAVAR: A Bangladeshi garment worker lies crushed under the rubble 48 hours after an eight-storey building collapsed in Savar, on the outskirts of Dhaka yesterday. At the disaster scene, where more than 300 have been found dead, exhausted teams of soldiers, firemen and volunteers continued to work through the mountain of mangled concrete and steel for a third day after staying on the job for a second straight night. — AFP (See Page 7)

Kuwait first women’s league

TUPELO: A federal agent wearing a hazmat suit looks behind the air conditioner joined by one of Everett Dutschke’s dogs in connection with the recent ricin attacks. — AP

US widens ricin probe Mississippi man arrested TUPELO: Federal agents arrested a Mississippi martial arts instructor yesterday after his home and a former business were searched as part of an investigation into ricin-laced letters sent to President Barack Obama and two other public oﬃcials. Everett Dutschke, 41, was taken into custody by US marshals at his Tupelo home yesterday morning without incident, the city’s police chief, Tony Carleton said. It was not immediately known if Dutschke has been charged in the ricin investigation. Dutschke faces other charges related to an April 1 indictment for fondling three diﬀerent children between ages 7 and 16, from 2007 to 2013, according to court records. He was released on $25,000 bond in that case. Dutschke’s attorney, Lori Basham, did not return calls seeking comment but said earlier in the week that her client denied having anything to do with the ricin letters. Agents from the FBI and the US

Capitol Police, as well as members of an anti-terrorist response team from the Mississippi National Guard, some wearing hazardous material suits, had searched Dutschke’s home on Tuesday and Wednesday, as well as the premises of a former martial arts studio Dutschke ran in the city. Dutschke was cooperating with federal oﬃcials during the searches this week, the attorney said. The agents had Dutschke’s home under surveillance on Friday afternoon and evening and moved to arrest him about 1 am. US prosecutors dropped charges on Tuesday against another Mississippi man, Elvis impersonator Kevin Curtis, who was released from jail after a search of his home in nearby Corinth revealed no incriminating evidence. Prosecutors said at the time that the investigation had “revealed new information” but provided no details. The case has brought extra scrutiny on the FBI almost 12 years after a 2001 Continued on Page 13

KUWAIT: Kuwait Radio is to air a special program dedicated to the first women’s sports league for basketball, table tennis and athletics, due to be held on May 9. The program will provide live in-depth studio analysis of the games, the radio’s sports programs inspector Hamid Abdullah said. The program will also include interviews with the current and former female athletes, the event’s organizers, referees and sports officials. The move is aimed at shedding light on the dynamic women’s sports movement in the country, and steps being taken on the local front to encourage these activities. Abdullah hailed the Kuwait Women’s Sports Association for their efforts in organizing the event, in addition to facilitating the entry of spectators into the competition’s various stadia. He also hailed the Minister of Information and State Minister for Youth Affairs Sheikh Salman Sabah Al-Salem Al-Humoud Al-Sabah for his efforts aimed at encouraging sports in the country. “Kuwait Radio has launched several programs dedicated to sports in the country, as well as others held regionally and internationally,” he noted. President of the Kuwait Association for Women’s Sports Sheikha Naeema Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah commended “the marvelous initiative”, Kuwait Radio is undertaking. She regarded the move as further encouragement for women to head to sports and for events dedicated to females to thrive and develop in the country. — KUNA

Terror watch lists ‘bloated’ WASHINGTON: US efforts to track potential terrorists are falling short, experts say, pointing to a jumble of overlapping watch lists and miscues that let one of the Boston bombing suspects slip through the cracks despite warnings about him. Tamerlan Tsarnaev, the older of two brothers suspected of planting bombs near the marathon finish line, had drawn the attention of authorities more than once. Russian officials warned their US counterparts of their concern, and the CIA asked the top US counterterrorism agency to add Tsarnaev to a terror watch list. Yet, when he left for Russia in 2012 to a region known for Islamic insurgent stirrings, his trip was flagged by the Department of Homeland Security, but not by the FBI. And his return to the US passed did not ring any alarm bells. “The system didn’t work,” said Christian Beckner, deputy director of George Washington University’s Homeland Security Policy Continued on Page 13

Max 35º Min 16º High Tide 01:52 & 12:50 Low Tide 07:27 & 19:17

DAMASCUS: Syria dismissed as a “barefaced lie” yesterday American and British claims it may have used chemical arms, as staunch ally Russia warned against using such fears to launch a military intervention in the strifetorn country. “First of all, I want to confirm that statements by the US secretary of state and British government are inconsistent with reality and a barefaced lie,” Syrian Information Minister Omran Al-Zohbi said in an interview published on the Kremlin-funded Russia Today’s website. “I want to stress one more time that Syria would never use it-not only because of its adherence to the international law and rules of leading war, but because of humanitarian and moral issues,” Zohbi said. UN chief Ban Ki-Moon has called on Syria to approve a UN mission of inspectors to probe the alleged use of chemical weapons in the spiraling conflict that erupted in March 2011. But Zohbi told RT Damascus could not trust UN inspectors from Britain and the United States. “We do not trust the American and British experts from a political point of view,” Zobhi said. “We also do not trust their qualifications. Their aim is to juggle with facts.” But he said Syria would accept Russian inspectors. “We won’t mind if Russians would be among the experts; quite the contrary, we only welcome this idea. We are quite sure in their high qualification and ability to clearly see into such matters,” he was quoted as saying. Along with China, Russia has blocked several UN Security Council draft resolutions threatening sanctions against President Bashar Al-Assad’s regime. US President Barack Obama warned Syria on Friday that using chemical weapons would be a “game changer,” after the US, Israel and Britain cited signs that Assad’s regime attacked with the deadly agent sarin. But Obama said Washington must act prudently, and establish exactly if, how and when such arms may have been used, promising a “vigorous” US and international probe into the latest reports. “We have to act prudently. We have to make assessments deliberately,” he cautioned. Russia warned against using these reports for a military intervention in Syria. “We must check the information immediately and in conformity with Continued on Page 13

Egypt police arrest 12 ‘Black Bloc’ members CAIRO: Egyptian police arrested 12 members of the “Black Bloc”-a violent group opposed to the Muslim Brotherhood-after clashes outside Cairo’s presidential palace, the oﬃcial MENA news agency said yesterday. Protesters hurled rocks and ﬁre bombs at the walls of the presidential palace in Heliopolis, and torched a police vehicle, a security source said. “Security forces arrested 12 youths who were among rioters involved in the

events around the presidential palace on Friday,” the source said, adding the judiciary would take action against those involved. Police ﬁred tear gas to disperse the masked activists of the Black Bloc movement, a security source said. Footage broadcast on private television station ONTV showed a police vehicle ablaze on the edges of the presidential palace compound. Continued on Page 13

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

LOCAL

KUWAIT: Information Minister Sheikh Salman Al-Hmoud Al-Sabah awarding the Kuwaiti TV reporter Hussa AlLoghani during the ceremony.

Awarding of the Saudi TV reporter Saud Al-Dosari (third left) and Madhi Al-Khamees (first left).

Kuwaiti youth ‘most important, precious wealth of the nation’ Stage ready for Media Forum By Nawara Fattahova KUWAIT: The 3rd Kuwait Media Forum for Youth, to be held from April 27-30, was launched yesterday at the Kuwait Regency Hotel. The forum will be held under the patronage of H.H. the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah. More than 120 media persons from various Arab countries will participate in the event. Sheikh Salman Al-Homoud Al-Sabah, Minister of Information and State Minister for Youth Affairs, said he considered the youth to be the most important and precious wealth of the nation. “Media is one of the most important tools at this time, as we are living in the age of information technology, which needs to be understood better for the development of the Arab community. Media is a profession of honesty and dignity, and should always be

serve the community,” he stated during the launching ceremony yesterday. This forum is a great opportunity for the youth to bring out their energy and creativity. “It also encourages them to engage in volunteer work, which plays an important role in the development of any country. We thank H.H. the Amir for sponsoring this forum, which signifies his interest in youth and their issues,” added the Minister. On the occasion, Dr. Adnan Shihabadeen, who was representing the Kuwait Foundation for the Advancement of Sciences (KFAS), highlighted the role of youth in the national development. “Young people are the main pillars for building the future in all fields. Through them we can achieve the targeted development that will improve the country economically, scientifically and industrially. The youth make up 20 percent of

the world’s population - and in Arab countries, they constitute the majority, accounting for up to 70 percent of the total population. Although the youth in Kuwait makes up more than 50 percent of the total population, their participation in the present development plan is hardly noticeable,” he pointed out. KAFS is supporting science, scientists, inventors and other talented people. “In 2011, the Foundation developed a five-year strategic plan, which was implemented from 2012 onwards. This plan comprises a group of programs in various fields. Also, in 2010, the Sabah Al-Ahmad Center for Giftedness and Creativity was launched under the umbrella of KAFS. This center is running three programs to support inventors and creators and encourage their creativity. This year, the Center held workshops for talented students of mathematics and

sciences at two public schools in cooperation with an American university. And now, the Center is looking forward to expand the program to other schools,” Shihabadeen further said. Dr. Sabah Qadoumi, Deputy Chairman for Academic Services at the Gulf University for Sciences and Technology (GUST), noted that the media now plays a crucial role in the development of national infrastructure. “Media is the main driver of economic, political and cultural success. It also plays a big role in the development of health, sports and national character. A real media person can bring about a change in all these fields, whether it be positive or negative. A media person can also influence public opinion he or she has the proper tools to do that. We are proud that GUST is one of the first local private universities to offer courses in modern media and

information, because we believe in its role in community development,” he said. Madhi Al-Khamees, Secretary General of the Forum, welcomed the forum’s guests and participants, who had come from all over the Arab world. “We meet here today to exchange opinions and discuss ideas about the media profession by getting together participants from various age groups and countries, who have different ideas and experiences. Media is a noble profession and we must ensure its development and rehabilitation for the sake of the youth. That will eventually help improve the quality of media, which is the top objective of this forum,” he explained. The first day was concluded with an honouring ceremony, in which awards were presented to the winners of the Arab Prize for Media Creativity.

Special satellite TV channel for MOE KUWAIT: Undersecretary of the Ministry of Education, Mariam Al-Wetaid, urged the ministry’s committee entrusted with establishing a special satellite TV channel for the MOE to quickly finish preparing the channel’s studios pending launch of its educational programs’ broadcast. The meeting was attended by MOE’s manager of curriculum development and the channel supervisor, Dr. Souid Hilal Al-Harbi, the manager of Al-Oula Art Production Co. (which is the operating company), Khaled Al-Shemmari, directors Mona Abdul Kareem and Emad Al-Sharif in addition to top officials connected with the channel. Notably, the MOE’s Educational Channel aims at broadcasting various educational programs aimed at enhancing the learners’ capacity to assimilate the subjects they study and, ultimately, reduce their dependence on private tuitions. The channel will also broadcast special programs for teachers, parents and school administrations.

News

in brief

One voter-one vote system KUWAIT: Parliament sources revealed that since the constitutional court has set June 16 as the date by which a decision about the one voter-one vote system is to be taken, and the joint priorities committee has agreed to discuss the general state budget for the year 2013/2014 on June 25, it has become necessary to review the scheduled dates in anticipation of the constitutional court’s decision. Sources explained that if the verdict happened to pronounce the decree as constitutional, then things would continue as planned. However, in case the verdict held the decree as ultra vires of the constitution, then the state budget would be stuck in a vicious cycle just as what had happened when the court announced the 2012 council as void. Road development project KUWAIT: Sources at the Ministry of Public Works have stated that the ministry is awaiting the approval of the central tender committee for the project involving road development and sewage system renewal across all the six governorates in Kuwait. The sources said the ministry had already received the approval of Ministry of Finance and other concerned parties to work towards removal of possible obstacles facing the project at the time of its execution. The project, which is part of the government’s infrastructure growth plan, will cost about KD 300 million. Fee hike suggested for expats KUWAIT: A well-informed government source has revealed that the government may follow the UAE in increasing the fees collected for certain services provided to expatriates. “This can be done through the bill submitted to the parliament for discussion,” the source said, noting that a comprehensive reconsideration of all service fees has to be done.Further, the source stated that power and water tariffs would be raised in a way that would not affect citizens with limited income. “Only those citizens who are heavy consumers of such services would have to pay for the fee hikes,” the source explained. GCC joint project KUWAIT: Sources at the GCC council revealed that the GCC States were planning a joint project to support the cooperative societies system in the region by having a unified legal framework. The move would help derive financial benefit from the system. Sources pointed out that the project will achieve balance in goods and services market, and said a decision will be reached about the project as part of the strategic document for cooperative growth in GCC states, expected by October. Sources said that the most important articles of the project would include identifying goods and setting up a unified import system for GCC states that supports the GCC economic system. The measure will help achieve economic integration among the GCC states.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

LOCAL

Egyptians ‘not recruited as maids’ KUWAIT: Kuwait’s Ambassador to Cairo, Dr Rashid Al-Hamad, denied news reports about Egyptian women being recruited to work as maids in Kuwait. He said a number of jobs were restricted for Egyptian women as per the Egyptian law, and no woman from the country was working in such a job in Kuwait. He said during the tenure of former

NBK training programs for Kuwaitis KUWAIT: National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) offers young Kuwaitis hundreds of training programs annually in collaboration with prestigious, worldclass universities and institution such as Harvard University. “Investing in human resources is investing in our future,” said Emad AlAblani, NBK Deputy General Manager, Human Resources Group. “NBK maintains its leading position as one of the country’s largest employers in the private sector and is committed to supporting Kuwaiti nationals and empowering them to realize their potentials. NBK’s training programs include NBK Academy which aims to train and develop the professional skills of fresh graduates, the Summer Internship Program for high school and college students and the new training Al Shabab program, that is specially designed to develop the skills of newly recruited diploma holders.

Al-Ablani added: “NBK’s training programs come as part of our commitment to providing distinctive career opportunities to ambitious young Kuwaitis and to support the country’s aim to encourage young Kuwaitis to assume roles in the private sector.” NBK employees are annually enrolled in professional training and development programs especially designed and provided by world renowned institutions to enhance the skills of the Bank’s young leadership members. NBK High Fliers Program in collaboration with the American University of Beirut is the first of its kind in the region providing future leaders with a wide range of leadership disciplines covering topics such as finance, risk and people management skills and included classroom discussion, case studies and assignments. NBK also organizes an executive training program in collaboration with the

Emad Al-Ablani renowned Harvard University, in line with the bank’s commitment to developing and investing in its key resource and human capital.

‘Oil tender given to Islamists’ KUWAIT: Despite lawmakers’ promises to halt grilling motions till the next parliamentary term, MP Adnan AlMutawwa threatened to grill the oil minister, Hani Hussein, because he did not respond to any of his inquiries about promotions and tenders. “Oil sector tenders are restricted to Islamists regardless of public interest,” said Al-Mutawwa, noting that the prices quoted in such tenders were extremely high and the execution of

the projects was not up to desired quality specifications. He said this “greatly affected the reputation of Kuwait’s oil sector and caused many environmental problems as a result of poor execution of these projects.” AlMutawwa also urged the Prime Minister to take the MPs’ threats to grill some ministers more seriously and shuffle the ministry, chucking out those who were not working according to the government’s agenda and tend-

ed to create tensions between the executive and the legislature. “The ministers’ performance is being closely watched by the MPs and we know that some of them work for the benefit of certain political groups, blocs or tribes,” he added, noting that this kind of performance helped the opposition more than meet public interest. “The interior minister deserves to be grilled for his incapability to ensure security and safety of citizens,” he underlined.

labour minister Dr Ayesha Abdul Hadi, certain such posts were kept for men and women, but with the rider that they would be employed as laborers only in the schools. Al-Hamad emphasized on the strong relations between Kuwait and Egypt and said Kuwait was keen to benefit from the experienced Egyptians working in different fields where they

are permitted. He said recently, contracts were signed with a large number of Egyptian teachers, both men and women, and a committee of the Ministry of Education interviewed them. Their papers are being completed to enable them to travel to Kuwait by next August so that they are ready for the new academic year in September.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

LOCAL Local Spotlight

In my view

Poor health services

Taxation system for expatriates

By Abdallah Bwair

By Muna Al-Fuzai

muna@kuwaittimes.net

local@kuwaittimes.net

hanks be to Allah, the health ministry finally made some recommendations a few days ago to improve the health services. One of the recommendations was to give priority to Kuwaitis in allocating private rooms at all public hospitals but it totally forgot about the long waiting period that citizens have to undergo very serious critical operations sometimes. It also neglected the fact that it only approves very few ‘treatment abroad’ requests in very simple cases while more serious ones are rejected and people are forced to look for a Wasta connection. At times, it is too late by the time someone finds such a connection. About the ambulances, the less said the better. One day we called one for my mother, now deceased. When the ambulance personnel came, they took a blood sample but tests gave different readings each time. The same happened with BP though she had not eaten anything or taken any medication before the test. This shows how we are lagging behind in case of testing equipment that the paramedics use, which is very dangerous.A total of 120 nurses recently went on strike at the Mubarak Al-Kabeer Hospital, bringing to a grinding halt all work in the hospital’s OPDs since these nurses were hired by a private company. This strike led to many appointments being postponed or cancelled. Stories about the poor services at the Ministry of Health abound, including one about the ceiling falling next to a handicapped patient’s head at the Amiri Hospital. This had happened even after his wife had complained many times about the poor condition of the ceiling. A water pipe in the ceiling burst, flooding the room with water. The patient’s wife stressed that she had notified the ward officials two days earlier and asked them to fix the ceiling but they did not. Another incident took place in the Farwaniya Hospital where a citizen was admitted to the intensive care unit for having prescribed a medicine wrongly. There have been reports of numerous mistakes and many violations are committed in the ministry, whether these become known or remain secret.

kuwait digest

It’s not his goodness.... By Nabil Al-Fadhl

nlike others who are liars, we fully accept the judge’s decision to release Musallam Al-Barrak on a KD 5000 bail simply because we respect the judici-

ary. However, accepting the judge’s decision will not stop us from discussing it and its consequences. There are two questions that beg for answers before we proceed any further. The first question is: Where is the Kuwaiti who claimed that Kuwait was a police state? Why doesn’t he show up now and repeat his nasty allegations after the honorable judge made his decision? The second question is: Where on earth is the individual who claimed that Al-Barrak’s trial was a political one? Why doesn’t he show up now to explain how the judge’s decision was politicized to have Al-Barrak released? Musallam did not win his legal dispute, it is the state that lost. An old Kuwaiti saying goes: “It is not his goodness, but because of his bad company.” There is no doubt that releasing Musallam overturned the verdict and tempted many low profile fame-seeking

people to criticize it. It also undermined court orders that were mocked upon by Al-Barrak. He never cared about them and dealt with them contemptuously. He even went so far as to announce that if time turned back, he would have said the same things he said during the seminar in question about the Amir over and over again. He also encouraged children, juveniles and some foolish grownup people to repeat what had already been found incriminating by the judiciary. He also claimed to have a right to see a written arrest warrant delivered to him by a security official of his choice and set that as a condition to turn himself in. It is funny how he filed an appeal, making a request, while he denies knowledge of the verdict. The release also showed that posting police at AlBarrak’s house was not necessary as long he was to be released three days later. He also insulted the interior minister and threatened to send the special force agents, sent to arrest him, back, dead with dirt in their mouths. — Al-Watan

kuwait digest

In my view

An attempt to understand

New seven-lane Govt roads

ccording to some media sources here in Kuwait, the Ministry of Finance has started taking certain measures to implement a new taxation system for residents. The development was reported by a local newspaper, Al-Kuwaitiah daily. This means that foreigners residing in Kuwait will now be required to pay tax on their income and remittances. This seemed an interesting topic to write about. I could not agree with the more than two million expats in Kuwait. We do need to regulate and filter the needs of this small country to ascertain which of the large number of expats were really helping the economy and which ones were not. Those who add value and help execute key projects are required, but others only add to our security worries. I know that many foreign workers are here in Kuwait because their income is not taxed, and this helps them save money. Also, they come from countries where they would have been obliged to pay tax on their income. In another development, the ministry has asked the local banks to provide details about the total transactions done through MasterCard from 2000 to 2010 in order to complete a study on the proposed implementation of the income tax decree number 3/1955, which was amended as decree number 2/2008, and the related bylaws. We have to consider the fact that some expats are making thousands of Kuwaiti Dinars here but there are also those who barely make KD 200. All of them cannot be treated at par, and I personally fear that such laws should not apply to those who may fall below the poverty line. The problem here is that when such laws are drafted, the focus is on how to extract money from the expats. Personally, I think any such step should be taken with due caution. Of course, some expats deserve to be taxed since they earn big bucks and still do not benefit the country in any major way as they work as consultants and with foreign companies who hardly have any local manpower. I think this issue needs to be studied thoroughly in order to make the right decision and categorize those who should pay tax and others who merely earn peanuts at the end of the month.

By Thaaar Al-Rasheedi By Abdullah Khalaf

uzan Lindauer was a CIA liaison officer who was to later reveal how she had been enlisted by the agency and how some presidents were ‘planted’ and ordered to blindly obey orders, played disfiguring roles and were paid fortunes in return for illusionary deals. Listening to an interview with her on ‘Russia Today’ satellite news TV channel, it was so shocking for me to learn how people were fooled because of the media that served lies to make them antagonistic towards certain figures while glorifying others to a level where they posed as gods on a pedestal. “Our best and most beneficial informant was Saddam Hussein, who towards the end, agreed to give us everything, do anything inside and outside Iraq and give free oil,” Lindauer said, noting that he ‘expired’ when his mission was over. She added that he launched the longest war against Iran. He was deluded that he would own the Eastern coast of the Gulf. He also deluded King Hussein that he would give him the rule of the whole Hijaz region. He even declared himself as ‘New Sharif Hussein’ (The Amir of Mecca), falling on Bernard Lewis’ map of the new Middle East which divided the Arabian peninsula into three states, including the ‘Hijaz State’. Lindauer also said that the CIA knew about the entire scenario of the 9/11 attacks on the World Trade Center, New York in advance. In another interview on the Mayadeen TV channel, she admitted that she was one of those who had warned the American authorities about an imminent attack on 9/11. She added that the two planes that collided into the two towers had been remotely controlled by a new mechanism controlling landings in modern airports. In addition, she said that the controlling and guiding process was done from the roof of a nearby building inhabited by Jews who were spotted cheering and applauding in celebration of the impact’s accuracy. Moreover, the former CIA agent and liaison officer stressed that the twin tower blasts could have been stopped. She stressed that besides the remote control, thermal explosives that produce extreme temperatures capable of melting the building’s steel structure when combined with sulfur had been planted in various spots inside the two towers. Lindauer also said that the debris of the two towers’ steel foundations were shipped to Hong Kong to be treated and that the Israeli spy agency Mossad knew about the incident long before it took place. She added that though the truth was no longer concealed from the American people, they were deluded that it would be in the best interests of the American economy and will help reduce tax payers’ burdens. On the other hand, Lindauer acted as a secret link between the CIA and Iraq and let her conscience interfere with her job, which is unfamiliar in intelligence norms as agents are trained to be heartless. She interrogated the manager of the US section in the Iraqi intelligence, Salem Al-Jameeli and sympathized with him. This had her arrested, tried and imprisoned for three years. She also survived two assassination attempts similar to the pre-fabricated crash that killed the former US ambassador to Iraq, April Galspie, to cover up for the message she conveyed to Saddam Hussein from the US administration before he invaded Kuwait. Commenting on the Pan Am flight 130 that was blown over Lockerbie, Scotland with CIA investigators on board and their briefcases full of documents proving the involvement of CIA in drugs smuggling operations from Lebanon and Afghanistan to trade in them, she stressed that the explosion was carried out by the CIA to get rid of both the investigators and the evidence. The CIA did it but accused Libya of it with help from the media that carried out an intensive campaign to convince the world about the US version. They also ordered Gaddafi to admit to doing something he had not done. He was also ordered to pay the compensation. Nevertheless, they later disowned him and allowed Libyans to revolt against him and depose him. These all are attempts to understand ambiguity, as none of us knows what is really going on around us. — Al-Watan

he strange thing about the current parliament is that there are more calls for silence rather than asking people to speak up. Some MPs have been ‘hushing up’ their colleagues. Whenever an MP threatens to grill a minister, the latter self-assuredly asks him to ‘hush up’ the matter. Some members of this parliament have welcomed the unified media law that tells journalists, citizens, expatriates and, even transit visitors to ‘hush up’. Some MPs still believe that the media bill, which HH the PM promised to withdraw after a meeting with local newspapers’ editors-in-chief, was the best way to deal with the chaotic media which we have been suffering. Some MPs suspiciously called everybody to ‘hush up’ as if they were out to establish ‘silence’ as the golden principle. Though we are living in times when even an eight-year-old can find out his political rights and

realize that he has a right to express himself freely even if neither the Sheikhs nor the government liked it, some of these MPs are calling for showing full obedience towards the Sheikhs and maintaining that the government ‘knows better.’ The so-called ‘media chaos’ created by Twitter and Facebook is not really as chaotic as the MPs portray it. It is rather a blizzard of different opinions and views that, thanks to the modern social media networks, came to light recently. Governments were more capable of suppressing their people in the past when they owned, ran and controlled both radio and TV channels. Even the newspapers were more controlled though some were private or independent, thanks to suppressive laws or rules of censorship. The story is different nowadays. No government can regulate the flow of public opinions, and people’s

kuwait digest

Fragrance marketing!

Major financial role for GCC

By Dalal Abdul Razzaq Madooh

hile visiting the Horeca Kuwait 2013, an exhibition held last month focussing in hospitality, food industry and hotel equipment sector, I stopped by a cleaning company booth where the company representative showed me a device that diffuses into the air around various smells and aromas such as those of cocoa, coffee and others. He told me that a number of cafes and hotels that had purchased the device put it to use every morning to spread around the aroma of fresh coffee to attract more customers in for a cup of coffee. He added that some other stores selling chocolate and desserts spread cocoa aroma outside to tempt more customers to step in. In addition, he said that a famous boutique in a GCC state had stopped advertising inside shopping malls where it has presence and asked for a special fragrance to be manufactured and used instead. Scientifically, modern research showed that an average person can identify over 10,000 different aromas. They also showed that the olfactory sense was the most linked to memory compared to other senses, and that we can remember up to 40 per cent of what we behold one month later while we can remember up to 60 per cent of what we smell after one year. Modern experiments also showed that our moods improve by up to 40 per cent on smelling a nice fragrance or perfume and that 75 per cent of our daily emotions can be affected by smells. So, we can see how the olfactory senses can be utilized in marketing and promoting certain products by addressing potential clients’ sense of smell to prompt them to purchase a particular product. The next time you smell coffee or chocolate outside certain stores, remember that it is one of their ways to promote their products. Finally, this reminds me of how Google announced launching its ‘Google Nose’ search engine that would allow users search or look up a topic using their noses to sniff different smells through their computers or smart phones. The whole thing turned out later on to be Google’s April fool’s joke. — Al-Anba

feelings can explode and they can revolt at any time. Kuwait’s constitution calls for more freedoms and bans any freedom-oppressing laws. Nevertheless, some MPs applauded the proposed media bill, forgetting that they should have been on the side of freedom instead. Lawmakers should have stood for and defended our freedoms against any government-proposed bills instead of acting like a seven-lane highway along which the government can pass whatever laws it wished to further suppress us. Finally, I wish to thank HH the PM for withdrawing the bill that should not have been suggested in the first place. Those who drafted, wrote, typed or even discussed it should be held accountable because they either knew nothing about the law, our constitution or wanted to strike against the government with their actions. — Al-Anba

By Ahmed Al-Fahad

n an attempt to understand the rapid changes taking place worldwide nowadays, particularly politically, writer Ahmed Al-Fahad recently interviewed the Kuwaiti strategy expert and chairman of Kuwait strategic studies Center (KSSC) Dr. Sami Al-Faraj on his TV talk show, The Seventh Day, on Al-Watan TV. Responding to a question as to whether there would be war or any sort of offensives between North Korea and the US, Al-Faraj stressed that both N. Korea and Iran were following the same strategies with only one difference, which is breaking out of the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons Treaty (NNPT). “The problem is the mutual acceleration between them and the US”, he added, noting that a special budget was recently approved by president Obama to build 54 anti-missile centers throughout the USA. He also noted that Iran supports N. Korea and finances some missile tests the latter carries out on behalf of Iran, due to the lack of testing areas. Commenting on the situation in Syria, Al-Faraj also stressed that Iran had a significant role in Syria, which they historically consider as an extension of the Persian Empire, and provides them access to the Mediterranean Sea. “To the Syrian’s bad luck, their lands would be the ideal battle land, instead of the Gulf, in case of war with Iran. Moreover, Al-Faraj refused using the term ‘Revolution’ to describe what is happening in some Arab countries. “Revolutions are something else, like what happened in Libya.....but what is going on in Egypt is a revolt that will not be completed into a revolution unless the Muslim Brotherhood controls everything in the Egyptian state.....just like what happened in the Iranian revolution”, he explained, expressing fear of a possible Egyptian-Iranian alliance that might have a joint target in controlling GCC states’ fortunes. “Thanks to being one of the largest financial hubs in the world, GCC states will be the world’s bank by 2020”, he concluded. — Al-Watan

kuwait digest

Try to open your eyes By Saud Al-Samakah

e, so far, did not hear a denial from Ahmad AlSaadoun about what has been said over social media and in papers about the conversation he had with a group from the so-called annulled majority, which asked him to read the speech by Musallam AlBarrak, for which he was sentenced to five years in jail, and he answered them that Musallam is going to jail and he wants to take us with him. I advised him several times to avoid talking about the “Amiri status”, but he is stubborn! When they insisted that he re-reads the speech, he said: “Do you think that politics is the throwing of iqals? “ It is three years, or rather since 1999, the day when you lost the speaker’s chair and formed the so-called Popular Action Bloc, and Kuwait has remained moving in place and its development activities are at a standstill because of the crises that your bloc and its official spokesman, Musallam Al-Barrak, has specialized in creating. The bloc which your colleagues in the annulled majority joined, as all mega economic projects that were to take Kuwait in a qualitative move towards economic development came to a halt because of your bloc’s obstruction and rejection of those projects, then you come today, after all that happened during this time in which you participated to lay the blame on Musallam and the rest of your colleagues in the annulled majority, and you describe them, claiming they do not know politics! Why were you standing in front of people during the Aqaila demonstration and speaking against Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammad by asking them: “Do you want Nasser AlMohammad.. then we will decide it.” Is this a wise political action while being an MP? Since when are issues settled in the streets away from its natural and constitutional place, which is the parliament’s chamber? Or are your actions, when you failed to answer the evidence with evidence inside the national assembly about when you went to Irada Square, and your colleagues, who you describe as having political knowledge that is no more than throwing iqals, spoke with the lowest of languages against HH Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohammad and former Speaker of the House Jassim Al-Khorafi. Are these considered wise political actions? Is the crime of storming the national assembly a legitimate political action, or the signing of the letter you sent to the prosecution in which you deny your predecessor’s letter about the storming incident, is this considered a responsible political action?! And your famous statement in which you said your movement will be without limits from now on! Is there anything more than encouraging to Musallam and others to go past the limits of responsible criticism and insult Head of State HH the Amir, whose entity is protected by article 54 of the constitution which says “the head of state and his entity is protected and cannot be touched”. Now, Musallam became stubborn and your people, from whom you were getting your power, understand about politics only and the throwing of iqals. We knew a long time ago that your group could not be farther from understanding political action, apart from knowing the art of responsible opposition! We also know that those are just individuals made by influential powers in the authority since the start of working with the constitutional system, to use them in facing the true national democratic movement. We advised you many times that your continuation with this kind of opposition will hurt you personally and harm your political image, and will make you lose many of your supporters, yet you did not listen to the advice but, anyhow, to know late is better than not knowing at all! —Al-Qabas

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

LOCAL

Amir visit to Turkey to crown 45 years of close relations Admiration for backing KUWAIT: Scheduled visit by His Highness the Amir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah to Turkey, due to get underway today, will crown 45 years of close relations and mutual cooperation between the two countries in diverse fields-such ties presently expanding particularly in tourism and reality. The Turkish embassy in Kuwait was officially opened in 1971, following coordination with the Turkish diplomatic mission in Lebanon, but the ties between the two states were first established in 1969. And, when Ankara stood on Kuwait’s side against the “Saddami aggression” in 1990, the relations became stronger. The Turks’ stand was not restricted to political level, for they had halted Iraqi exports via the Turkish territories and joined the international USspearheaded alliance that carried out a wide-scale war that drove the occupiers out of the country in 1991. In appreciation for their stand and support, the late Amir, His Highness Sheikh Jaber Al-Sabah, paid a visit following the 1991 liberation of the country to Turkey to express admiration for the backing, and solicit Ankara’s influence to coerce the “Saddami regime” set free Kuwaiti prisoners. Later on, the Kuwaiti-Turkish relations expanded further, expanding in various sectors, with up to 27 accords, a number of which had been signed during era of HH the Amir Sheikh Sabah AlAhmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah In 1991, former Kuwaiti Minister of Commerce Abdullah Al-Jarallah paid a visit to Turkey during which he signed a protocol for commercial cooperation, and in 1991, Abdullah Al-Hajeri, who held the same portfolio, signed an agreement with Turkish authorities for boosting trade exchanges between the the countries. Also in the same year,

former State Minister for Cabinet Affairs Abdulaziz Al-Dakhil visited Ankara and signed a memo of understanding for exchanging expertise in the agricultural sphere and labor employment. In 1993, Former Turkish Prime Minister Suleyman Demirel visited Kuwait where he signed an accord for boosting bilateral relations between Kuwait and Turkey. He also came to the country in 1997 in his capacity as president of Turkey, and signed an agreement to avert double taxation and another for bolstering cultural cooperation. In August 1999, Turkish Foreign Minister Ismael Cem visited Kuwait to deliver a letter from his country’s president to the late Amir, HH Sheikh Jaber Al-Ahmad, reiterating Turkey’s full support for Kuwait in face of possible new Iraqi threats and thanking Kuwait for assistance it provided for victims of an earthquake that hit Turkey. The two states have been bound with solid ties since 1970, when they signed an agreement for economic, technical and industrial cooperation. They have been also linked with a treaty for protection and encouragement of investments since 1988. In 1995, the two sides signed an agreement for trade exchanges and a cooperation protocolvolume of commercial exchanges is currently estimated at $750 million. In 2006, former Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Dr. Mohammad Sabah AlSalem Al-Sabah signed an agreement with his Turkish counterpart, Abdullah Gul, aimed at enhancing level of the bilateral ties, implementing signed treaties, MoUs, and other mutuallysigned documents. Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development (KFAED) is also cooperating with Turkey. The fund gave its first loan to

Turkey in 1979 for construction of an electricity network. Up to November 2009, KFAED had presented a total of 12 loans to Turkey, valued at $106 million. The Kuwaiti fund contributed with KD 42.4 million for a water venture in the ancient city of Istanbul-in two stages in 1993 and 1999. It had also contributed with $53 million to rebuild a road network, devastated in the 1999 earthquake. Kuwait and Turkey presently aspire to lift the level of trade exchanges to $one billion at start of next year. At the philanthropic and relief levels, Kuwait helped victims of quakes with $15 million. Furthermore, these expanded ties are also visible in the increasing number of Kuwaiti tourists and recreation seekers flocking to Turkey, now estimated 65,000 per year, in addition to the mounting number of Kuwaiti entrepreneurs investing in the country’s real-estate sector. Politicians and analysts have pinned high hopes on HH the Amir’s visit to this country, strategically situated at a location between Asia and Europe. Turkey, in addition to abundant resources and potentials, has recently exerted effort to boost ties with Arab and GCC states. Moreover, it is member of the NATO and a favorite destination for tourists from various corners of the globe. Kuwait and Turkey have affirmed support for the Syrian people and backed efforts for resolving other regional questions, namely the Palestinian cause. The Turks’ presence in the Middle East dated back to the times of the Arabled Islam Empire, as well as the Ottoman Empire when the Turks influence extended to the Gulf region, however Kuwait at the time worked out protection treaty with the Britons. — KUNA

Kuwait envoy hails Bush contributions

WASHINGTON: Ambassador Sheikh Salem Abdullah AlJaber Al-Sabah pictured with former president George Bush during the function.

WASHINGTON: Kuwait Ambassador to the United States Sheik h Salem Abdullah Al-Jaber Al-Sabah attended the dedication of George W. Bush Presidential Center at the campus of S o u t h e r n M e t h o d i s t U n i ve r s i t y i n Dallas city, Texas. The State of Kuwait contributed to the construction of the center which was built by former president George W. Bush, according to a statement issued by Kuwait Embassy on Friday. The center was inaugurated by President Barack Obama at a grand ceremony which brought together Bush and his father ex-president George H.W. Bush, as well as former presidents Jimmy Car ter and Bill Clinton along with former and incum-

bent government figures and lawmaker s. Ambassa d or S he i k h S a l e m expressed, in a statement after the ceremony on Thursday, great pride in Kuwait contribution to the center and the car ving of Kuwait name on the memorial wall of the center. He ex tolled former president George W. Bush for the outstanding con tr ibution s he of fe re d to t he enhancement of the Kuwaiti-US relationship. The center includes a large library housing printed and digital documents, a research center and an exhibition h all sh owc a s i ng t he m a j or events in Bush’s era notably the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the Twin Towers. —KUNA

Book on Constitution KUWAIT: Two Kuwaiti researchers published a book on Kuwait Constitution’s establishment and formation as an effort to document the country’s road to democracy. Book authors Ibrahim Dashti and Shams Alduha Maarafei said that the book focuses on documenting the efforts of the Constituent Assembly in formulating the importanB political document which came to light on Nov 11,

1962. “The publication aims at objectively conveying the efforts carried out by the Constituent Assembly and forefathers of Kuwaiti politics in order to formulate what we have now as the Constitution,” said both researchers. The book also touched on Kuwait’s independence and the first National Assembly elections which were held at that time, said the researchers. — KUNA

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

LOCAL

Drugs found hidden inside TV set in central prison Telephone store employee stabbed KUWAIT: Director of central prison Maj Gen Khalid Al-Dayeen ordered an inspection campaign in the drugs ward. The campaign started at 2.30 am and all the inmates’ belongings were searched.The source said that officers noticed a prisoner whose eyes repeatedly remained frozen on a television set in the ward. When they decided to check out the television, they found 210 grams of heroin concealed therein. Prison officials questioned several inmates, and a number of them said the drugs belonged to a Kuwaiti inmate who sells these in the prison. The concerned inmate denied any link with the drugs and said he was not aware how the drugs came to be there. He was sent to the concerned authorities on suspicion of trading in drugs. In a second case, a security source said one of the inmates, a Kuwaiti who returned from court, was searched by ward officers who found 50 grams of shibo drug hidden in a sensitive area of his body. The source said the inmate refused to say who provided him with the drug, but claimed he found it in one of the bathrooms in the Palace of Justice. The inmate was referred to the concerned authorities. One gram of heroin

after mixing is sold for KD 100 inside the prison. Murder threat A Kuwaiti woman accused her ex-husband of threatening to hurt her on the eve of her marriage to a different man because of a dispute over the custody of their daughter. She told Sulaibkhat police that she has a daughter from her first husband, and because of her differences with him over custody of their daughter, he threatened to hurt her if she married anyone as in that case she will automatically win custody of her child according to the law. The ex-husband asked her to give up custody of the daughter before re-marrying but she refused. Suicide threat Capital police succeeded in preventing a non-commissioned officer from killing himself by jumping from the Second Ring Road Bridge. Police, led by Maj. General Tariq Hamada, arrived at the scene and found the person was a Kuwaiti who was terminated from the police force. A security source said Maj. Gen. Hamada negotiated with the terminated officer and was able to make him change his mind, and give himself up. He asked for a

meeting with the interior minister to explain his behavior. He said that he was under family pressure because of debts. Farwaniya robbery A telephone store employee in Farwaniya area was stabbed in the back by members of a four-strong gang which stormed the store and stole equipment and recharge cards. A security source said Farwaniya police received a call about a theft at a telephone store. When police personnel arrived, they found the injured employee who was taken to a hospital. The source said that pedestrians present on the spot were able to catch one of the suspects, a Bedouin, who said he along with the other three robbed the store at knife point before escaping. Police are investigating. Drunken man Qadisiya policemen awakened a drunken man asleep in front of the Qadisiya medical center but he claimed he was waiting for the graduation ceremony from the Saad AlAbdallah Academy. A security source said police received a call about a person sprawled in front of the Qadisiya police station. A

patrol went to the scene and asked him why he was sleeping there. The man responded, “I just graduated from the police academy and I am waiting for my certificate.” The source said the man was taken to the police station and charged with being found drunk in public. Minor kidnapped Capital detectives arrested a citizen who had ‘kidnapped’ an Iraqi woman from Fahaheel area and had sex with her in a Farwaniya flat. The father of the victim told the police in Ahamadi that his minor daughter had gone to a mall in Fahaheel and did not return home. Capital detectives were able to arrest the girl who was with a citizen. She said that she met her friend in the Fahaheel mall and went with him to Farwaniya where they had sex. The citizen was charged with kidnapping a minor. Man found dead A woman found her husband dead in his room in Jahra. He was in his 40s. Policemen noticed some blood nearby and the woman said her husband was using certain substances she knew nothing about. The body was recovered for criminal evidence.

‘Road rage’ man threatens to kill citizen By Hanan Al Saadoun KUWAIT: Security sources said that a Kuwaiti man brandished a gun against another citizen on the street in public, just because the other man did not give him the right of way. Sources said that a Kuwaiti citizen told officers at the Sulaibiya police station that a driver on the Sixth Ring Road towards Jahra threatened to kill him. Sources added that the man gave the police the plate numbers of the vehicle driven by the alleged aggressor. He said he was driving his car along the Sixth Ring Road with a vehicle behind him trying to overtake him. When the trailing driver could not find enough room to

overtake, and was refused the right of way, he whipped out a gun. Police called the accused driver and would be investigating the complaint. Abandoned children Two boys, Yasser, an Ethiopian, and Mohammed, an Indonesian, are victims of similar sufferings and apathy of the people at the Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor. Their tale of woes began over 30 months ago. Yasser was born to an Ethiopian woman at the Farwaniya Hospital. The mother fled as soon as she delivered the baby, leaving the newborn behind. The boy was named Yasser by the nursing staff and, ever since, he has been receiving charity from the hospital’s social serv-

ice office, the nursing staff and doctors. In addition, the hospital administration has been trying to make the MSAL exempt the child from the ‘unidentified parents’ condition so that he can be admitted to its care house where he will better escape the daily threat of being afflicted by any disease as a result of staying at the hospital. A medical source at the Farwaniya Hospital stressed that the Ethiopian embassy totally ignored the boy when it was contacted by the hospital administration. The other boy’s story is not much different. The poor boy was the result of a rape, according to police reports. However, the mother died during labor and the child has been living in ward number 11 of the hospital ever since.

Kuwaiti leaders credited for credibility

Burgan Bank hosts first audit conference for banking industry KUWAIT: Burgan Bank recently hosted the 1st Internal Audit Conference for Banking Industry in Kuwait, which took place recently at the Sheraton Kuwait Hotel. The conference included heads of audit departments from local and foreign banks that are members of the Kuwait Banking Association. The event provided a platform for representatives from international audit firms such as Ernst & Young, KPMG, PWC, Deloitte and Protivity to highlight the emerging internal audit trends and best practices. Amr El Kasaby, Burgan Bank’s Group Chief Internal Auditor said: “It is important to recognise the significant role an internal audit function plays within an organization. In banks, these units are crucial for operational effectiveness and make major contributions to the working and regulatory relationship between management.” “At Burgan Bank, we believe that a strong internal audit department is part of sound corporate governance. We continue to provide more practical training for our employees as well as our subsidiaries with an aim to constantly enhance our overall performance,” added El Kasaby. Burgan Bank continues to demonstrate its leadership by hosting professional conferences, and applying best practice methods across its wide operations, with an aim of ensuring consistent high quality delivery of banking solutions in the region. Established in 1977, Burgan Bank is the youngest commercial Bank and third largest by assets in Kuwait, with a significant focus on the corporate and financial institutions sectors, as well as having a growing retail and private bank customer base. Burgan Bank has five majority owned subsidiaries, which include Gulf Bank Algeria - AGB (Algeria), Bank of Baghdad - BOB (Iraq & Lebanon), Jordan Kuwait Bank - JKB (Jordan) Tunis International Bank TIB (Tunisia), and fully owned Burgan Bank - Turkey, (collectively known as the “Burgan Bank Group”). The Bank has continuously improved its performance over the years through an expanded revenue structure, diversified funding sources, and a strong capital base. The adoption of state-of-the-art services and technology has positioned it as a trendsetter in the domestic market and within the MENA region. Burgan Bank’s brand has been created on a foundation of real values - of trust, commitment, excellence and progression, to remind us of the high standards to which we aspire. ‘People come first’ is the foundation on which its products and services are developed. Earlier this year, ‘Brand Finance’ - the international brand valuation company- rated Burgan Bank

brand as AA with positive outlook. The rating places Burgan Bank Brand at 2nd amongst the most valuable banking brands in Kuwait. Excellence is one of the Bank’s four key values and Burgan Bank continually strives to maintain the highest standards in the industry. The Bank was recertified in 2010 with the ISO 9001:2008 certification in all its banking businesses, making it the first bank in the GCC, and the only bank in Kuwait to receive such accreditation. The Bank also has to its credit the distinction of being the only Bank in Kuwait to have won the JP Morgan Chase Quality Recognition Award for twelve consecutive years. Burgan Bank won the prestigious “Banking Web Awards” prize in the commercial and corporate Category for Kuwait. In 2010 Burgan Bank was awarded with the “Best Internet Banking Service award” from Banker Middle East Awards. Burgan Bank was recognized in 2011 as Kuwait’s “Best Private Bank”, by World Finance. The bank also won, in 2011, the coveted “International Platinum Star for Quality” award from Business Initiative Directions, and “The Best Technical Award” from Banking Web Awards. In 2012, Global Banking and Finance Review online magazine recognized Burgan Bank as the “Best Banking Group in the MENA” as well as the “Best Corporate Bank in Kuwait”. The bank also won the coveted “Best Bank Branding” award by the Banker Middle East. For the second consecutive year in 2012, Burgan Bank also won World Finance’s “Best Private Bank” award, as well as the “Best Private Bank in Kuwait 2012” award from Capital Finance International. The bank recently won the “Best Bank in Kuwait” award from EMEA Finance. Burgan Bank, a subsidiary of KIPCO (Kuwait Projects Company), is a strongly positioned regional Bank in the MENA region.

STOCKHOLM: The State of Kuwait has maintained political weight and substantial credibility at international level due to guidelines and instructions of the sagacious leaders of the Gulf country, affirmed the Kuwaiti Ambassador to Sweden. Ali Al-Nukhailan stated, “Our dear State of Kuwait enjoys historic and deep-rooted ties with the friendly Kingdom of Sweden and also enjoys great weight and credibility at the international level, as a result of instructions of the political leaders. Diplomatic relations between Kuwait and Sweden were established in 1964, when the two countries signed an agreement in this respect. Kuwait opened its embassy in Stockholm in 1994. This step was result of continuing improvement of the relations between the two countries at political, commercial, cultural, scientific and academic levels. Al-Nukhailan described as “very effective and successful” the visit, paid, last week to Sweden, by Kuwaiti Minister State for Planning and Development Affairs, Minister of State for National Assembly Affairs Dr. Rola Dashti, who took part in the 9th meeting of the National Recruitment Services and UN Organizations on Associate Professional Officers Program (APO) and Junior Professional Officers Program (JPO). Dr. Dashti’s visit and her participation in the international meeting reflected the Kuwaiti State interest in development in general and the youth in particular, the ambassador said, noting that the Kuwaiti leadership “considers the young generations as the basic resource” of the country. Sweden, which adopts a neutral policy on the international stage, stood on Kuwait’s side against the 1990 aggression by forces of the executed Iraqi ruler Saddam Hussein. Sweden had also contributed to the military campaign that ousted the occupiers out of the country. Moreover, Several Swedish personalities had been involved in tackling some of the thorny issues related to the Iraq-Kuwait questions; namely Rolf Ekeus who had served as the representative of the UN Secretary General on armament. At the political level, Kuwait aspires to benefit from the Swedish expertise in sectors such as investments, clean energy and education, the diplomat noted in the remarks to the Kuwaiti news agency. He also affirmed that selection of Kuwait to host the next meeting at this international level signaled confidence accorded to the Gulf State on part of the international community. — KUNA

Municipality inspections at Sulaibiya cold stores By Hanan Al Saadoun KUWAIT: The director of imported food stuff at Kuwait municipality, Eng Istiqlal AlMusallam, went on a surprise field tour of the cold stores at Sulaibiya, accompanied by a number of foodstuff inspectors. The team recorded samples of certain food items that contained different dates of expiry for the same item. Al-Musallam said that inspectors took samples from the frozen food items as per the date mentioned on these after thawing the food stuff to take it apart. Samples were sent to laboratories to find out if they were suitable for human consumption before being released for sale and use by consumers. All formalities were followed in recording these samples from the cold stores as most of the items were frozen and separating them required a lot of time.

She emphasized that all food items arriving in Kuwait were checked as per accompanying documents that also include a list of components and ëbest beforeí dates. In case any violation is suspected, these are detained till laboratory tests clear them as being suitable for human consumption. She said such measures were routine and the aim was to protect the consumers. She said the team included a number of women inspectors who entered the cold stores after putting on necessary gear to take samples and keep them in the ice box. She added that participation of women officers was aimed at encouraging them to do the field work under all conditions. She said that the administration trains the students of Health Science College at the PAAET every year in field work before they pass out. She said this gesture encourages graduates to work with the administration.

EQUATE hosts annual local customers event KUWAIT: EQUATE Petrochemical Company said that its 2012 sales to local Kuwaiti plastics producers exceeded $45 million. During “EQUATE’s Annual Local Customers Gathering,” EQUATE President & CEO Mohammad Husain said, “Since 1998, EQUATE’s sales volume to local customers has increased by over 300% from 11,000 metric tons annually (MTA) to over 40,000 MTA. This is a demonstration of EQUATE’s continued growth within Kuwait and beyond, as well as its unwavering support and commitment towards our customers.” Husain added, “In addition, EQUATE has played a role in supporting local manufacturers to launch export operations outside Kuwait. Such an achievement presents considerable added value to the Kuwaiti industrial sector, as well as our national economy to exemplify ‘Partners in Success’.” Husain noted, “As part of its customer centric strategy, EQUATE does not only provide its customers with premium products, it is also committed to supporting them

with distinguished ser vices, such as Research & Development (R&D) solutions to ensure their success, growth and sustainability.” At this annual event, EQUATE presented the guests with an overview of the petrochemical sector’s developments, challenges and trends. Grouping over 50 persons representing local customers, the gathering was attended by senior members of EQUATE management. Established in 1995, EQUATE is an international joint venture between Petrochemical Industries Company (PIC), The Dow Chemical Company (Dow), Boubyan Petrochemical Company (BPC) and Qurain Petrochemical Industries Company (QPIC). Commencing production in 1997, EQUATE is the single operator of a fully integrated world-scale manufacturing facility producing over 5 million tons annually of high-quality petrochemical products which are marketed throughout the Middle East, Asia, Africa and Europe.

Mohammad Husain addressing attendees.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

21st-century king to take Dutch throne

Will you earn enough points to win new US green card? Page 10

SAVAR: Bangladeshi rescue workers take a break on the rubble of a building that collapsed in Savar, near Dhaka, Bangladesh. —AP

Page 9

Bangladesh death toll hits 341 Bosses arrested over building disaster

SAVAR: Bangladesh yesterday made a series of arrests over the collapse of a factory complex which killed at least 341 as rescuers braved the stench of rotting corpses to detect further signs of life. Twenty-three people were pulled alive yesterday morning from the ruins of the eight-storey Rana Plaza compound which caved in at around 9:00am on Wednesday while thousands of garment workers were stitching clothes for Western brands. But emergency workers warned their task was getting steadily harder as survivors were losing their strength to call for help. News of the arrests of two factory owners along with two engineers came after Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina vowed those responsible for the country’s deadliest industrial disaster would be hunted down. Bazlus Samad, the chairman of New Wave Buttons and New Wave Style factories, and Mahmudur Rahaman Tapash, a managing director, were detained shortly after midnight, Dhaka’s deputy police chief Shyaml Mukherjee said. Police had filed a case against them for “death due to negligence”, said Mukherjee. The overall owner of the building had still to be traced, he added. The senior investigating officer Kaiser Matubbor told AFP that two municipal engineers who had given the building the all-clear after an inspection on Tuesday night had also been arrested and would face similar charges. Survivors have said the building developed visible cracks on Tuesday, but bosses ordered staff to return to the production lines.

Five factories were based in the complex at Savar, just outside Dhaka. Hundreds of relatives of missing workers have massed at the site to witness the search for their loved ones. Akram Hossain, a deputy director of the fire service said there were still some survivors trapped in pockets of the wreckage but warned their chances were “diminishing by the minute”. Rescue workers, who include volunteers and soldiers, said survivors were becoming too weak to call out for help. “The stench of dead bodies is so strong that we have to work with one hand and air freshener in the other,” Al Amin, a volunteer, told AFP. Naim, a fellow volunteer, spoke of the traumatic conditions facing rescuers. “Inside the wreckage it’s too smelly, hot and humid. I saw ashen color decaying bodies with their intestines burst out,” he told reporters. Mahbubur Rahman, the fire service’s director of operations, said rescuers were carving tunnels through the wreckage and bodies could be seen everywhere. “There are some survivors. We can hear their feeble cries or them talking to each other,” he said. “Pillars and beams are the biggest problem. Sometimes even if we can locate survivors, we can’t reach them because of these beams. They take a lot of time to cut through.” Rescuers have so far only used hand tools like cutters and drills, fearing heavier equipment could dislodge masonry. Although the discovery of more survivors gave fresh impetus to the rescue effort, there was growing

anger at its pace. “I’ve been here since Wednesday. We still don’t know what happened to my aunt and sister-inlaw,” said Harunur Rashid. “The rescue work is going on very slowly. There are too many people, yet too little work. Had they stepped up cutting of the concrete, I think they could save quite a lot of people,” he said, clutching photos of his relatives. Merina Begum, among those rescued yesterday, said she and seven fellow workers trapped in the same area had been without food or water since Thursday. “This morning when the rescue workers brought juice, ice cream and cold water, it was tastiest food I’ve ever had,” she said. With many of Bangladesh’s 4,500 factories shut due to protests, bosses declared yesterday a holiday and unions called a strike for Sunday. Several thousand garment workers protested yesterday near the disaster site but they were dispersed by police firing rubber bullets and tear gas. Bangladesh is the world’s number two garment manufacturer and the industry is the mainstay of the economy. But it has a shocking safety record, with a factory fire killing 111 people in November. Britain’s Primark and Spain’s Mango have acknowledged having their products made in the block, while other brands including Walmart are investigating. The accident has prompted new accusations from activists that Western firms place profit before safety by sourcing their products from a country where textile workers often earn less than $40 a month.—AFP

Iraq points to Syria over deadly ‘sectarian’ strife BAGHDAD: Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki yesterday pointed to the civil war in Syria for the return of sectarian strife to Iraq, as Kurdish forces deploying near a disputed northern city further raised tensions. Maliki also called on anti-government protesters to expel “criminals” who targeted Iraqi forces, and the head of the Sahwa anti-Al-Qaeda militia threatened war if militants who killed soldiers were not handed over. More than 215 people have been killed in five days of bloody violence that began with clashes between security forces and protesters in the north on Tuesday and have sent tensions soaring. Sectarian strife “came back to Iraq, because it began in another place in this region,” Maliki said in televised remarks, in an apparent reference to Syria. The civil war in neighboring Syria pitting mainly Sunni Muslim rebels against the regime of President Bashar Al-Assad, a member of the Alawite offshoot of Shiite Islam, has killed more than 70,000 people. Sunni-Shiite sectarian violence in Iraq,

which peaked in 2006 and 2006, killed tens of thousands. “Sectarianism is evil, and the wind of sectarianism does not need a licence to cross from a country to another, because if it begins in a place, it will move to another place,” Maliki said. “Strife is knocking on the doors of everyone, and no one will survive if it enters, because there is a wind behind it, and money, and plans,” he added. A wave of violence began on Tuesday when security forces moved against Sunni anti-government protesters near the northern Sunni Arab town of Hawijah, sparking clashes that killed 53 people. Subsequent unrest, much of it apparently linked to the Hawijah clashes, killed dozens more and brought the death toll to more than 215 yesterday. Kurdish peshmerga security forces have deployed near the northern city of Kirkuk, part of a swathe of territory that the autonomous Kurdistan region wants to incorporate over Baghdad’s strong objections. “After consultations with the gover-

nor of Kirkuk, there has been a decision for peshmerga forces to fill the vacuums in general, and especially around the city of Kirkuk,” Jabbar Yawar, secretary general of Iraqi Kurdistan’s peshmerga ministry, said in a statement. Yawar said the deployments were aimed at combating militants and protecting civilians, but a high-ranking Iraqi army officer said soldiers had been put on alert, and that “the army sees the move of the peshmerga as a (political) maneuver and not to fill any vacuum.” Maliki, meanwhile, called in a statement for anti-government protesters to “expel the criminals who targeted Iraqi army and police forces,” after five soldiers were killed near a protest site. And Iraqiya state television quoted Sahwa chief Sheikh Wissam Al-Hardan as saying that if those who have killed soldiers are not handed over, “the Sahwa will take the requested procedures and do what it did in 2006.” Sahwa militiamen fought pitched battles against Sunni militants from 2006, helping to turn the tide of the Iraq war. —AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

I N T E R N AT I O N A L

DIY gas masks as rebels wary of chemical attack LATAKIA PROVINCE: An empty soda bottle, crushed charcoal and cola-soaked gauze-Syrian rebels are scrambling to protect against chemical attacks by regime forces by cobbling together DIY gas masks from household items. US President Barack Obama has renewed a warning to Damascus that the use of chemical arms would cross a “red line” as evidence emerged the deadly nerve agent sarin may have been used against the rebels. Now, fear of a chemical attack looms large in the mountainous province of Latakia-the heartland of President Bashar Al-Assad’s minority Alawite sect as Syria’s civil war stretches into its third year. The courtyard of one Free Syrian Army base in the province bustled with activity as rebels took a crash course in how to cobble together a gas mask from household items. Abu Tarek, 72, is no physicist but fellow fighters from the FSA’s Al-Ezz bin Abdul Salam brigade put aside their Kalashnikovs and listened attentively. First, he cut the top off a large soda bottle, boring a hole for air in the cap, heaping a few spoons of ground charcoal onto a piece of cola-soaked gauze. He then pushed the gauze into the bottle, and covered it with wet cotton, fixing it in place with cardboard. The mask was then fitted snugly over his face with a piece of elastic. “It’s very simple,” Tarek said at the base, a whitewashed house in a sprawling village hemmed between the green slopes of the Jabal al-Turkman and Kurdish mountains. Tarek, in olive-green fatigues, acknowledged his masks only offer limited protection, failing for instance to guard against corrosive gases that attack the skin. But they were better than a wet towel

LATAKIA: Abu Tarek, a 74-year-old retired army officer tries on a homemade gas-mask assembled using a plastic bottle, coal, cotton, gauze, cola, and cardboard, for protection against chemical weapons. — AFP

and could allow time for an escape from poisonous fumes or advanced nerve agents within minutes of an attack, he said. Tarek struggled to explain how his crude device works, but said he had picked up the recipe from military service and from information found on the Internet. With lack of international support, the rebels are desperately banking on makeshift masks-which he said will also be taught to civilians. The rebels have heard that regime forces have vacated five Alawite-dominated front line villages on their side in the past week and that Assad’s army has been distributing gas masks-real ones-to its troops. Such information is impossible to corroborate independently, as government-held areas are off-limits to foreign journalists, but the rumors have triggered a sense of foreboding among the rebels. “Why are they vacating their front line villages?” asked brigade commander Abu Basir, combing his beard with his fingers. “It’s a great sign that something big is coming.” In the distance the war raged on: government helicopters buzzed overhead, dropping bombs on mountain villages. Raids like these have become the lynchpin of regime forces’ strategy, which gives them an advantage over the rebels who have no air power. It has been difficult adapting to this new kind of warfare-rebels no longer gather in huge numbers, not even to pray in mosques, and make sure their hardware is concealed under leafy trees. The biggest fear among some rebels is that one day, the helicopters will drop a chemical bomb without warning. Emerging allegations of likely chemical attacks by Assad’s regime have stirred international outrage, piling pressure on Obama for a military intervention. “Should (the) evidence be confirmed as conclusive and intervention of some type be supported by allies, the Obama administration will need to respond... to this latest and most egregious provocation by the Syrian regime,” said Mona Yacoubian, a senior adviser for the Middle East at the Washington-based Stimson Center. “The allegations... certainly appear to cross a red line,” she said. But this “red line” stance evokes amusement among the rebels. Abu Tarek says his feelings are best summed up by a cartoon by Ali Farzat, a renowned Syrian satirist, in which Assad crosses numerous US-demarcated red lines drawn in the sand to step on the final one that says “chemical weapons”. “When he (Assad) used planes to bomb his own people, he crossed a red line. When he bombed cities, towns and neighborhoods, he crossed a red line. When he began using scud missiles on civilians, he crossed a red line,” he said. — AFP

Obama warns, but urges prudence on Syria arms WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama issued a new warning to Syria yesterday that using chemical weapons would be a “game changer” as he faced rising pressure at home and abroad to intervene in the civil war. But a day after US officials said they suspected that the deadly agent sarin had already been fired off in smallscale attacks, Obama warned Washington must act prudently, and establish exactly if, how and when such arms were used. Obama, who had previously told Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad the use of chemical weapons would cross a “red line,” promised a “vigorous” US and international probe into the latest reports. But he appeared wary of launching military action based on initial intelligence reports of chemical weapons use, even as other official comments and media suggested that is exactly what had happened. Obama did reiterate that the use of chemical weapons would be “a game changer,” as he met Jordan’s King Abdullah II in the Oval Office. “I think all of us, not just in the United States but around the world, recognize how we cannot stand by and permit the systematic use of weapons like chemical weapons on civilian populations,” he said. But the US leader, who has been reluctant to plunge the US military into action in Syria after extricating it from Iraq, warned: “We have to act prudently. We have to make assessments deliberately.” “We have seen very bad movies before when intelligence is perceived to have driven policy decisions that in the full light of day have proven wrong,” a US defense official said on condition of anonymity. The

official was referring to assertions-later proven false-by former president George W Bush’s administration of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the justification for a 2003 invasion that brought eight years of war that killed nearly 4,500 US soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis. The likely use of chemical weapons in Syria ramps up pressure on Obama to act, but any military options are limited and risky for a leader haunted by Iraq. The White House has made clear that it is not rushing into the conflict and stopped short of saying that Syrian President Bashar AlAssad had crossed what Obama famously called the “red line” of chemical weapons. Obama repeated Friday that chemical weapons would be a “game changer” but called for a vigorous investigation after the United States, Israel and Britain all cited signs that the regime attacked with the deadly agent sarin. “We have seen very bad movies before when intelligence is perceived to have driven policy decisions that in the full light of day have proven wrong,” a US defense official said on condition of anonymity. The official was referring to assertionslater proven false-by former president George W Bush’s administration of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, the justification for a 2003 invasion that brought eight years of war that killed nearly 4,500 US soldiers and tens of thousands of Iraqis. Andrew Tabler of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy said that the use of chemical weapons would show that Assad was testing US red lines and trying to frighten the rebels into surrendering in the two-year civil war. —Agencies

HOMS: A picture shows smoke rising after shelling in Houla in Syria’s Homs province. The opposition National Coalition has accused the regime of using chemical weapons in the northern province of Aleppo. — AFP

Backing rebels risks attacks on America Syrian warns Washington over Islamist fighters DAMASCUS: US support for Syrian rebels may lead to more attacks on American soil like those of September 11, said a senior Syrian official who warned that Islamist fighters would spread “the fire of terrorism” around the world. Western powers are alarmed at Al-Qaeda militants joining a revolt that began two years ago with rallies for democracy and President Bashar AlAssad has seized on that unease; now, 10 days after the Boston Marathon bombings, Syria’s deputy foreign minister told Reuters that US aid to the rebels may backfire. “Once the fire of terrorism spreads in Syria it will go everywhere in the world,” Faisal Mekdad said in an interview. Referring to foreign jihadists whose presence has made the United States and European allies wary of arming Syrian rebels, he said: “These chickens will go back to roost where they came from because encouraging terrorism definitely backfires ... Once these terrorists succeed in Syria, they will go everywhere.” Speaking in fluent English at the heavily guarded white, stone-clad complex in central Damascus which houses the Foreign Ministry and prime minister’s offices, Mekdad drew a comparison, made also by Assad himself, with the US-backed Muslim holy war against Soviet occupiers in Afghanistan that fostered Al-Qaeda. And asked whether the Boston bombings, blamed on radicalized Muslim immigrants, might change American views of a Syrian conflict that Assad has long painted as a war on terrorism, he replied: “I hope the American administration will remember again the Sept. 11 attack - which we strongly condemned in Syria - and not repeat these policies which encourage terrorism.” Of 37 nationalities of “terrorist” he said were fighting in Syria, many were European, Mekdad said, including some from Russia’s Chechnya region, ancestral home of the Boston suspects. Assad’s critics have argued that he himself is paying a price for helping Islamists from Syria and elsewhere - letting them cross into Iraq to fight US forces there; some of those seasoned fighters have now joined the campaign to

overthrow him. Like other senior officials interviewed lately in Damascus, Mekdad projected a breezy confidence in Syrian forces’ ability to win the civil war and denied the rebels were gaining ground. While condemning support for the mainly Sunni Muslim rebels from Sunni neighbors such as Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey, as well as the Western powers, he said his government enjoyed broad international support, not limited to Russia or to Iran, whose Shiite branch of Islam is close to Assad’s Alawite minority. “I would like to say, with all confidence, that all Syria is controlled by the government but there are places where armed groups have been armed, financed, by certain circles namely Qatar, Saudi Arabia, France and the UK and other European countries - who due to logistical reasons may control this or that part of Syria,” he said. “But this is moving every day.” A man living near the Foreign Ministry, who did not want to be identified, told Reuters the complex had been attacked four times in recent months, twice with mortars and twice by men firing machineguns: “We are very frightened,” he said, recalling how he took cover during the last mortar attack 10 days ago. Asked when the government might win, Mekdad said it was combating “terrorist groups and usually in all those countries which have suffered the plague of terrorism it takes time”. “Once this support from neighbouring and European countries ceases we can easily deal with it,” said Mekdad, who hails from Deraa where protests began in March 2011 after teenagers were jailed for pro-democracy graffiti inspired by the Arab Spring. He cited apparent success in offensives in Homs and near the western border, where rebels say Lebanese Hezbollah fighters are supporting Syrian troops. Going was also slow, he said, due to “the care practiced by the government with civilians”. The United Nations has said more than 70,000 people, have been killed and many countries have condemned shelling and aerial bombing by Syrian forces of residential areas.

CHEMICAL ‘LIE’ Mekdad dismissed Western and Israeli claims that government forces had used chemical weapons, saying it was a “big lie” that Syria was blocking a UN investigation into the allegations. He said Damascus had an initial agreement with the UN to look into claims that chemical weapons were used in the Khan alAssal area near Aleppo but matters were complicated when the UN wanted to broaden the probe to include other allegations: “We are ready to receive immediately the team to investigate the case of Aleppo, to provide all the logistics, help and support and protection and it is the responsibility of the UN

to intervene in unspecified ways in the conflict - so far, however, Washington has said firm evidence is lacking. Mekdad denied that Damascus was receiving arms and military support from Russia or fighters from Iran or Hezbollah, Tehran’s Lebanese Shiite ally; foreign supporters were providing only humanitarian aid and Syria had ample reserves of its own. “We are not isolated, we don’t feel isolated,” he said of efforts to impose international sanctions. “Besides Russia, we have China, India, South Africa and we have almost all Latin American countries, and Africa and other Asian countries.” He warned the EU against

LATAKIA: Photo shows a plastic bottle, coal, cotton, gauze, cola, and cardboard that are used by members of the Al-Ezz bin Abdul Salam brigade to assemble homemade gas-masks for protection against chemical weapons. — AFP secretariat if this delegation doesn’t arrive in Syria.” A former Syrian ambassador to the United Nations, Mekdad accused Britain and France of trying to complicate the UN investigation to prevent evidence emerging of rebel use of chemical shells, but did not offer evidence for the allegation. The United Nations wants inspectors to investigate claims of chemical weapons use in Homs in December; France and Britain say the mission should look into a third alleged case in Damascus. President Barack Obama has warned Assad that deploying chemical weapons would cross a “red line” that could prompt the United States

helping rebels sell oil from captured fields in the north: “That is a direct theft of Syrian property,” he said. “We are still a government and a strong government. We will stop them,” he added without elaborating. Mekdad reflected the government’s contention that Syria has been targeted by US-allied Sunni Arab powers because it was part of “an axis of resistance”, along with Iran and Hezbollah, and accused Sunni-led states of secretly supporting Israel: “We believe the main objective in attacking Syria is to weaken it as a major power and to implement Israel’s policies in the region in connivance with the United States and Western interests.” — Reuters

Chemical weapons: Mysterious arsenal

SALMA: A Syrian rebel walks past a destroyed building in Salma in the coastal province of Latakia. The number of Syrians who have fled their conflict-ravaged homeland has surpassed 1.4 million, the United Nations refugee agency said, warning that it was no longer able to meet their medical needs. — AFP

NICOSIA: Syria’s arsenal of chemical weapons has existed for several decades and is considered one of the biggest in the Middle East, but its exact makeup and size remain guesswork as few facts have emerged. The White House said Thursday that Syria had likely used chemical weapons against rebel forces on a “small scale,” during the conflict which has raged in the country for the past two years. However it emphasized US spy agencies were still not 100 percent sure. Britain said it has “limited but persuasive” evidence of the use of chemical weapons in Syria, including sarin gas. On April 8, Syria refused to accept a chemical weapons team, as proposed by UN chief Ban Kimoon, to probe the alleged use of chemical weapons in the country’s conflict. The Syrian regime acknowledged for the first time on July 23, 2012 that it had chemical weapons and threatened to use them in case of a Western military intervention, but never against the Syrian population. The government and the armed

opposition accuse each other of having used chemical weapons during the conflict. Syria is one of the few countries not to have signed the Chemical Weapons Convention and is believed to have a large stockpile of sarin and other nerve gases. The Syrian program was launched in the 1970s with the help of Egypt and the former Soviet Union. In the 1990s Russia provided support, followed by Iran since 2005, according to the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), an independent organization tracking data on arms of massive destruction. According to an analyst at the non-proliferation and disarmament program of the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS), at stake is the biggest chemical weapons program in the Middle East, created at the start with the goal of counterbalancing Israel’s nuclear program. The analyst says that important information on the program has been collected following the defection of several Syrian military officers, but that the information is “far” from being

complete. According to an expert at the Monterey Institute for International Studies in the United States, Syria has “hundreds of tons” of diverse chemical agents. “Their armory of chemical agents is quite strong,” according to a French specialist in chemical weapons at the Foundation for Strategic Research. “The Syrians have managed to master the synthesis of organophosphorus’, that’s the last generation, the most efficient and most toxic of chemical weapons. In this family, one finds sarin and VX, as well as...mustard gas,” he said last July. On January 30, the Israeli air force bombarded a site of ground to air missiles and an adjacent military complex near Damascus suspected of holding chemical agents, with Israel saying it feared the transfer of chemical weapons to the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah, according to a US official. According to the New York Times, the raid could have damaged Syria’s main research centre into biological and chemical weapons. — AFP

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I N T E R N AT I O N A L

Iceland votes in general election EU talks hanging in the balance

AMSTERDAM: An overview of the center of Amsterdam, The Netherlands shows preparations for the abdication of Dutch Queen Beatrix and the investiture of Prince Willem Alexander as King next April 30. —AFP

21st-century king to take Dutch throne THE HAGUE: The Netherlands’ Willem-Alexander becomes Europe’s youngest monarch Tuesday when Queen Beatrix abdicates and his country hails the avowedly 21st-century king with a massive orangehued party. Willem-Alexander, 46 will be the first Dutch king since 1890 and the first of a new wave of European monarchs, whose ageing blue blood-average age 71 - is increasingly watered down. Amsterdam’s population is set to double with at least 800,000 visitors flooding the city’s streets and canals as Beatrix, 75, ends her 33-year reign by signing the act of abdication at the royal palace. While Beatrix was known for her formal court, Willem-Alexander has already said that he and his glamorous Argentine-born queen consort Maxima, 41, will not be “protocol fetishists”. Parliament last year stripped his mother of her last remaining role in forming governments, and the new king has said he would accept a purely ceremonial role should parliament so decide. The Dutch monarch’s current political role is restricted to signing laws and meeting regularly with the prime minister. The king will be sworn in rather than crowned at the deconsecrated Nieuwe Kerk, a stone’s throw from the palace, before a joint session of the houses of parliament. Sixteen MPs have refused to take an oath in front of the king, saying that they have already pledged allegiance to the constitution and cannot now do so to a person. Four Socialist MPs are staying away, and the other 12 have been told to sit at the back of the church. Beatrix’s enthronement in 1980 was marred by violent protests and running street battles over a housing crisis that left the city looking like a war zone. Anti-royalists this time have been allotted six locations in Amsterdam to stage protests. But as of Thursday only one had been booked by Republicans planning playful protests, including by wearing white. Republicans have started a petition to reduce the king’s 825,000-euro ($1.1-million) salary to get the matter debated in parliament. Willem-Alexander noted

ahead of his enthronement that if his budget were cut then he would have to reduce his staff, adding to the ranks of the country’s ever growing unemployment rate, currently 8.1 percent. Preparations for the day have been overshadowed by a rancorous debate about the event’s official song, known as the Koningslied. An online petition rejecting the song, an unusual mix of traditional and rap music, garnered 40,000 signatures within a few days. Composer John Ewbank withdrew the song but the enthronement organizing committee stuck with it. The nation will now sing the Koningslied as one on Tuesday evening, just before the royal family heads off on a water pageant behind Amsterdam’s central train station. A cornucopia of concerts and club nights has been organized around the city, including an open-air set by world-famous Dutch DJ Armin van Buuren, and orange-themed street parties are planned across the nation. The day will also be tinged with sadness for Maxima, whose father, Jorge Zorreguieta, and mother will be notable by their absence. Zorreguieta, 85, a minister under the notorious Argentine regime of general Jorge Videla in the 1970s, also had to miss his daughter’s 2002 marriage because of doubts over his role in the murderous junta. Maxima is largely responsible for having made her husband popular after an allegedly boozy youth which earned him the nickname “Prince Pils”. The ever-smiling Maxima has mastered the Dutch language and even took a charity swim in Amsterdam’s canals, endearing herself further in a country that expects their royals to be at once normal and regal. Willem-Alexander’s brother Friso will also be missed, in a coma following a skiing accident in Austria in February 2012. Speaking ahead of the enthronement, Willem-Alexander said that “People can address me as they wish because then they can feel comfortable.” He stressed he wanted to “be a king that can bring society together, representative and encouraging in the 21st century”. —AFP

REYKJAVIK: Icelanders voted yesterday in a general election likely to mark the end of the nation’s accession talks with the EU, following a campaign focused on voter discontent with the leftist government’s austerity measures. The right-wing Independence Party and the centrist-agrarian Progressive Party, who both want to end the northern Atlantic nation’s EU accession talks, are expected to form a new coalition. The biggest party traditionally picks the prime minister but polls in the final weeks of campaigning have put the two parties neck-and-neck. What’s clear is that the country will have a new leader after the vote, with social democratic Prime Minister Johanna Sigurdardottir, 70, having announced her retirement. She leaves behind her a country that’s economically healthier than it was four years ago, but an electorate struggling to cope with a combination of government austerity measures and a high level of household debt. The two men battling to succeed her are the Independent Party’s Bjarni Benediktsson, 43, and his counterpart Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson, 38, of the Progressives. Benediktsson was expected to cast his ballot in Reykjavik, while Gunlaugsson will be in the sparsely populated eastern part of the country, reflecting his party’s more rural profile. Skies were overcast in Iceland’s capital when polls opened, and temperatures of four degrees Celsius slightly higher than they have been over the past week. Campaigning has been muted, with none of the rallies, baby-kissing or even posters often seen in elections. Politicians have preferred wooing vot-

ers through word of mouth instead, sticking to an Icelandic tradition of meeting constituents in the workplace. Another major platform this year has been Facebook, reflecting Iceland’s high level of Internet penetration. Extravagant campaign rallies and glossy advertisements have become even less effective in the wake of the past decade’s financial excess, with some voters seeing it as a sign of profligacy and political corruption. Voter discontent has spawned an unprecedented number of political parties with no less than 15 vying for the 63 seats in the Althing, or parliament which is elected by proportional representation. One of them, the online file-sharing activist movement Pirate Party, could be the first of its kind elected to a national parliament. The party has pledged to spend literally nothing on its campaign, but claims to be the third biggest party on Facebook by number of “likes” received. A Gallup poll conducted between April 18 and 25 suggested the Independence Party would win 27.9 percent of votes while the Progressives would garner 24.7 percent. Sigurdardottir’s leftist coalition was swept to power in 2009 amid a wave of angry protests. Icelanders blamed the then centre-right coalition government for allowing the country’s financial sector to balloon out of control, causing the three main banks to collapse and pushing the nation to the brink of bankruptcy. Polls opened at 9:00 am yesterday and will close at 22:00, when the first estimates of the outcome are expected. The final results will be announced today morning. —AFP

News

in brief

Blast kills 10 in Pakistan KARACHI: At least 10 people were killed and 17 wounded when a car bomb exploded near a secular party’s election office in Pakistan’s commercial hub Karachi late Friday, officials said, the latest violence ahead of historic polls next month. The powerful explosion went off as a candidate for the Pashtun-dominated Awami National Party prepared to address a corner meeting in the city’s poor western neighborhood of Mominabad, local police officer Mohammad Khan said. Bashir Jan, who is standing for election in the country’s national parliament, escaped unhurt according to Qadir Khan, a member of his party. The blast was heard from several kilometers away and damaged nearby shops and houses, witnesses said, while police added it destroyed some 10 cars and a dozen motorcycles. “It was huge blast, I thought it was an earthquake,” resident Gul Ahmed said. “We rushed out and saw smoke, there was blood every where at the blast site, we put the casualties in the private cars and ambulances,” he said. 2 dead as roof collapses BHOPAL: Two people were killed and 16 injured when the ceiling of a hospital in central India came crashing down, trapping patients and employees under the rubble, officials said yesterday. Rescue workers smashed through giant slabs of concrete and combed through other debris to search for victims after the ceiling of the first floor of the women’s wing of the Kasturba Gandhi Hospital in Bhopal caved in Friday. “The bodies of two persons were found when the rescue team started removing debris from the collapsed structure,” Nikunj Shrivastava, chief district administrative officer, told reporters at the scene. He said the casualty toll was not expected to rise and rescue efforts had been completed. The two-storey hospital, run by state-owned power equipment maker Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd (BHEL), was undergoing repairs. Patients on the ground floor had already vacated the nearly 50-year-old building before the collapse. “The building is old but its maintenance was carried out every year. We will conduct a probe into it,” Shashi Ranjan Prasad, executive director of BHEL said.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

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New life for Fritzl victims after incest horrors VIENNA: When Elisabeth Fritzl emerged in April 2008 to her first breath of fresh air and ray of sunlight in a quarter of a century, she had been raped countless times by her father Josef and had born him seven children. Five years after the horrors of Austria’s Fritzl case shocked the world, revealing 24 years of incest rape, captivity and childbirth in a damp cellar, victims and perpetrator are noticeable by their absence from the public eye. International media initially converged on the small town of Amstetten, 100 kilometers west of Vienna, to report on this shocking case, and paparazzi besieged the clinic where the victims were held. But even today, there is no snapshot of Elisabeth, now 47, and the six surviving children she gave birth to in the windowless dungeon below her parents’ flat. The family was given new identities and moved to an undisclosed location where they have lived quietly, with no details seeping out even in the Austrian tabloids, usually so eager to report on scandalous cases. Josef Fritzl, now 78, has been similarly quiet. Found guilty of murder for the death of one of Elisabeth’s babies, as well as incest, sequestration, grievous assault and 3,000 instances of rape, he was jailed in

2009 for life-a sentence carrying a minimum 15 years in Austria. His name has now become synonymous with horror and depravity, with foreign media quick to label particularly horrific incest cases as the Brazilian, Chinese or British “Fritzl.” But the “Monster of Amstetten,” as he was dubbed by the press here, has given only one interview since his trial, telling the German daily Bild in November 2010 that he loved his wife Rosemariewith whom he also had seven childrenand hoped to get out of prison one day to take care of her. He refused to comment on his crime. A contrast to Kampusch-Elisabeth was 18 when she was locked in her father’s purpose-built cellar in 1984. Fritzl told his trusting wife that their daughter had joined a sect and over the years, brought three of the dungeon children upstairs to live with him and Rosemarie, pretending Elisabeth had left them at their door to take care of. Three other children lived their entire lives underground, never seeing the sun. The Amstetten case eventually broke in the media on April 27, 2008 after the oldest cellar child, 19-year-old Kerstin, fell inexplicably ill and had to be hospitalized. The search for the young woman’s mother brought the 24-year

incest ordeal to the surface, quite literally. What will happen to the “House of Horrors” has long been a topic of debate, with authorities initially concerned it may become a gruesome tourist attraction. Fritzl’s lawyer said in 2011 that a precondition of any sale of the building, which Fritzl owns, would be to fill in the basement. “Nobody will ever enter the cellar again,” said Walter Anzboeck. At Stein prison in northern Austria where he is serving his sentence, Fritzl was well-integrated and there were “no noticeable problems,” according to prison authorities. His only appearance in the news recently was an Austrian report that he had divorced his wife because she never visited him in prison. Earlier reports said the children he had with Rosemarie wanted nothing to do with him. The noticeable silence on the Fritzl case has stood in sharp contrast to the never-ending media obsession with another shocking Austrian criminal case, that of Natascha Kampusch, kidnapped at age 10 and held captive for eight years before she managed to escape in 2006. While investigators regularly pour over the Kampusch case, looking for missed clues and alleged accomplices, international media coverage on Fritzl has died

ST POLTEN: File picture shows defendant Josef Fritzl (center) pictured prior to the proclamation of his sentence during the fourth day of his trial for incest, at the provincial courthouse in St Poelten. — AFP Filmmakers like Markus Schleinzer and down since his March 2009 trial. The two cases, which occurred within Ulrich Seidl have also drawn from these two years of each other, prompted cases for their work, including the Palme much soul-searching in Austria, amid d’Or-nominated “Michael.” But five years fears the country could be known as a after their first taste of freedom, “Land of Dungeons.” New cases of Elisabeth and her children have been incest-confirmed or not-have immedi- allowed an anonymous life, away from ately made national headlines. scrutiny. — AFP

Will you earn enough points to win new US green card? Green cards could be doled out on merit

DALLAS: (From left) Former President Bill Clinton, his wife, former first lady and former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, former President Jimmy Carter, and his wife, former first lady Rosalynn Carter listen during the dedication of the George W Bush presidential library on the campus of Southern Methodist University in Dallas on Thursday, April 25, 2013. — AP

Iraq lurks at Bush’s Texas-sized party DALLAS: Something was unmentionable in polite company gathered to dedicate George W Bush’s presidential library: the words “Iraq war.” But memories of the US invasion in 2003 lingered anyway, like an uninvited guest, as living US presidents came to Dallas to honor one of their own. The gathering of the powerful clan was hardly the place to reargue one of the most divisive issues yet in 21st century US politics. But the silence was notable nonetheless, because the Iraq war may be the defining political moment for presidents Bush and Barack Obama. Iraq, barring a democratic turnaround that becomes an example in the Middle East, threatens to permanently stain Bush’s legacy following his failure to find the weapons of mass destruction he used to justify war. Obama, meanwhile, built his entire 2008 campaign on fierce opposition to what he blasted as a “dumb” war and at the end of 2011 fulfilled his core promise to bring all US troops home. As the party went ahead in Texas, new fears of sectarian warfare stalked Iraq, where 4,400 Americans and tens of thousands of civilians died in a violent decade after 2003. Another 179 people perished in Iraq in the last three days alone, in attacks and unrest that again highlight the long-term implications of Bush’s decision to wage war, and Obama’s to complete a full US withdrawal. Bush said in interviews before the ceremony that he remained “comfortable” with his decisions on Iraq, and his museum makes the case that he had no option but to use force after Saddam Hussein refused to bend to UN resolutions. In his speech, Bush made an impassioned case that his actions abroad were based on the cause of expanding “freedom.” Freedom is what Bush and top aides say they provided to the Iraqi people, despite botched US management of the post-war period that sparked an insurgency and tortured politics. “We liberated nations from dic-

tatorship,” Bush said, as he honored service members who laid down their lives to keep America safe “and to make other nations free.” Obama, with a delicate task of praising Bush the man, while skipping over their disagreements, chose to concentrate on his predecessor’s role after the September 11 attacks in 2001. The closest he got to Iraq was a gentle reference to their differences over the war and Bush’s empathy for those he sent into battle. “Even as Americans may at times disagree on matters of foreign policy, we share a profound respect and reverence for the men and women of our military and their families,” Obama said. “And we are united in our determination to comfort the families of the fallen and to care for those who wear the uniform of the United States.” Other guests also had a case of “don’t mention the war.” Former president Jimmy Carter, who once called the war “unnecessary” and “unjust” chose to praise Bush for fighting HIV and AIDS in Africa. Across the stage sat the wheelchair-bound 88-year-old George H W Bush, whose own presidential legacy was marked by his decision not to go on to Baghdad after ejecting Iraqi forces from Kuwait in 1991. In the audience sat a cowboyhatted Dick Cheney, who ran the Gulf War for Bush as defense secretary, but turned hawkish and was a key voice as vice president in the march to war in 2003. Another guest also had an Iraq war storyHillary Clinton. The former first lady and secretary of state’s Senate vote to authorize the invasion emerged as the biggest liability of her 2008 race for the White House against Obama and alienated the Democratic base. And Bush was not the only one with a tricky Iraq legacy in Dallas. His old comrade-in-arms Tony Blair sat in a place of honor-his enduring popularity in the United States in contrast to the fury over the former British prime minister’s war record at home.—AFP

WASHINGTON: For years, millions of immigrant applicants hoped they would be lucky enough to win the US green card lottery. Under reform being considered in Congress, they may soon be asking: “Am I skilled enough?” By 2017, according to a proposed revamp of laws governing admission to the United States, permanent residency permits known as green cards could be doled out not on luck but “on merit,” via a points system that would put more qualified applicants at the front of the line. Are you a French computer scientist with a strong command of English, already living in the United States on a visa but whose employer is reluctant to sponsor you for permanent residency? The new system may work in your favor. Nothing is set in stone yet, but an 844-page measure, the most comprehensive immigration reform in a generation, is working its way through the Senate, and members of the House say they, too, are hopeful a bill can be signed into law this year. Ten criteria for immigrant applicants will be taken into account in the system, which has a theoretical maximum of 100 points. Under the new system, a university degree will be worth five points, a master’s degree 10 and a doctorate 15. Each year of work experience will provide an applicant from zero to three points, depending on the employment level, for a maximum of 20 points. Are you a programmer, computer scientist, or software developer? 10 points. If your job is in an occupation related to your degree: 8-10 points. A TOEFL English language proficiency score of 80 or more? Chalk up another 10. Contractors who employ at least two people: 10 points. Clearly, skills and experience count under the proposed system-but so does

NEW YORK: Tibetan immigrant children ask questions during an after-school program for asylum immigrants run by the International Rescue Committee (IRC) in the Queens borough of New York City. —AFP youth. Those age 25 and under will receive eight points; 25-32 year old are awarded six points; and age 3337 years, four. Those age 38 or above receive no bonus. A sibling of a US citizen earns 10 points, as does the married child, 31 or older, of a US citizen. Community service will help. Those who can prove their “civic involvement” will be allocated five points. A final clause gives five points to those from countries with low immigration, which rules out Mexicans, Chinese and Indians. 120,000 green cards by 2017 Unlike other countries that have adopted the points scheme, including Britain and Canada, the exact bar for immigration admission

Tamerlan-the other suspect in the attack died in a wild shootout with police last week as they tried to flee Boston in a hijacked car. Word of the transfer came a day after officials said the brothers had planned to detonate more explosives in Times Square in New York as they were being hunted by police. New York police chief Ray Kelly said the pair made a snap decision to go to New York as they raced around the Boston suburbs in a hijacked black Mercedes with at least six bombs in tow. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev confessed the plan to Federal Bureau of Investigation agents in his hospital bed, Mayor Michael Bloomberg said, calling it a “horrific reminder that we remain targets for terrorists.” “Last night, we were informed by the FBI that the surviving attacker revealed that New York City was next on their list of targets,” Bloomberg told reporters. —AFP

Gregory Siskind said. “So the points system will give you an alternative to relying on your employer to get a green card,” he added. “For a lot of people, that’s going to mean freedom.” Until 2013, a lottery offered 55,000 visas per year. But Republican lawmakers have sought to end the program, which makes no distinction between skilled and unskilled immigrants. In addition to the points system, the Senate proposal provides quota-free green cards for extraordinarily qualified researchers, scientists and graduates of US universities. “I don’t think that the long waits that we’ve had for a while are going to be a problem for a couple of years.”— AFP

Violence kills 25 in Nigeria’s north Survivors of Baga bloodbath still in hiding MAIDUGURI: An attack in restive northern Nigeria where suspected Islamists stormed a police station and stole nearly $60,000 from a bank killed 20 insurgents and five officers, the local police chief said. “Five policemen and 20 gunmen have been confirmed dead when some Boko Haram Terrorist attacked police formations in

Gashua town,” the Yobe state police commissioner, Sanusi Rufai, told journalists yesterday. Nigeria’s military had previously given a toll of seven dead. Boko Haram, a group that says it is fighting to create an Islamic state in the north, has carried out scores of attacks in Nigeria’s northeast. The latest violence in Yobe came

Teen marathon bomb suspect transferred to prison hospital NEW YORK: The teen Boston Marathon bombing suspect, recovering from wounds suffered in a getaway attempt, has been moved from a hospital to a prison medical facility, the US Marshals Service said yesterday. Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, was sent to the Federal Medical Center Devens near Boston, spokesman Drew Wade said in a one-sentence statement, which gave no reason for the transfer or details on the suspect’s condition. The facility is about 40 miles northwest of the Boston-area hospital where Tsarnaev had been convalescing since he was found critically wounded in a boat after a citywide manhunt, days after the twin blasts that killed three and wounded 264. The Federal Bureau of Prisons describes Devens as a facility housing male offenders requiring “specialized or long-term medical or mental health care.” Tsarnaev’s 26-year-old brother

under the proposed US system remains a mystery: other factors are also at play. But if your score is among the top 60,000, you will gain a green card. Another block of 60,000 will also be awarded permanent residency based on criteria that favor lower-skilled labor such as construction. The merit system will come into force from October 2017, provided that the immigration reform law passes President Barack Obama’s desk this summer. Over the years, the number of green cards could rise to 250,000. “For many at a bachelor level,” or for someone whose employer doesn’t want to serve as a sponsor, “you’re in a bind,” immigration attorney

BAGA, Nigeria: Photo shows a burnt motorcycle in Baga, after a twoday clash between officers of the Joint Task Force and members of the Islamist sect Boko Haram. — AFP

after what was likely the deadliestever episode in the insurgency when 187 people were killed last week in brutal clashes in neighboring Borno state. Aside from the raids on the police in Yobe, a common Boko Haram target, Rufai said the gunmen also “carted away nine million naira ($57,000 44,000 euros) and two vehicles”. The Boko Haram conflict is estimated to have cost more than 3,000 lives, including killings by the security forces. Meanwhile, many survivors of brutal clashes last week in a remote Nigerian town are still in hiding and rescue workers are trying to convince them to return to a home ravaged by sweeping fires, an emergency official said yesterday. Nearly half the town of Baga was razed during the violence between soldiers and suspected members of the radical Islamist group Boko Haram, which killed 187 people. The National Emergenc y Management Agency (NEMA) has set up 10 camps for those displaced and is trying to distribute relief materials, but the work has been complicated in a community traumatized by the carnage, NEMA spokesman Manzo Ezekiel said. “ The people were initially skeptical,” he said. “They weren’t skeptical because of NEMA but at first they ran away because NEMA

came with soldiers,” Ezekiel added. “Many people are still in hiding.” Soldiers have been accused of firing indiscriminately on civilians while setting fires to scores of homes and a market after gun battles with Islamists broke out. Thousands of people were reported to have fled to the bush outside of Baga while tr ying to escape the bloodshed. The militar y has fiercely denied any wrongdoing and has claimed that only 37 people died in the fighting last Friday. “Part of our work there is to build confidence,” the NEMA spokesman said. “We need to show people that what we have now in Baga is assistance, not any more attacks.” The violence in the town near Lake Chad was likely the deadliestever episode in the Boko Haram insurgency, which has cost more than 3,000 lives since 2009, including killings by the security forces. The regional Governor Kashim Shettima has called the events in Baga “barbaric.” Northeast Nigeria has been the epicenter of the insurgency, which Boko Haram says is aimed at creating an Islamic state in northern Nigeria, where most people are Muslim. The southern half of the country, Africa’s most populous and top oil producer, is mainly Christian.— Agencies

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Karabakh leader urges action on Azerbaijan threats PARIS: The international community must take Azerbaijan’s threats of regaining the disputed region of Nagorny Karabakh seriously and condemn Baku’s ongoing arms-buying spree, the breakaway territory’s leader said yesterday. Seized by ethnic Armenian separatists in a war in the early 1990s that left more than 30,000 dead, Karabakh is at the heart of long-simmering tensions between ex-Soviet neighbors Azerbaijan and Armenia. Violence continues to flare on its borders, with a least six soldiers killed so far this year, and a new conflict would threaten to draw in regional powers like Armenia’s ally Russia, Azerbaijan’s ally Turkey and Iran. Baku has vowed to retake control of the small mountainous region, whose self-declared independence has not been recognized by any state, including Armenia. In France for a three-day visit, the region’s president Bako Sahakian said he saw no signs of a breakthrough in peace talks and warned that Azerbaijan was stoking ten- PARIS: The president of the Nagorny Karabakh region’s unrecognized government, Bako Sahakian (right) is sions with enormous arms purchases. “We seen during an interview in Paris. —AFP can only be worried by the policy of militarization and over-arming undertaken by euros) - almost 15 percent of the entire state term last year, said that while talks have ticipants from Nagorny Karabakh,” Sahakian Azerbaijan, because there are also clear and budget. Officials from Christian Armenia and failed to result in a peace deal, they have at said. He said he believed a negotiated soluexplicit threats against our country,” he said. Muslim Azerbaijan have met repeatedly for least been useful in preventing another war. tion was possible and insisted authorities in “The international community must react to peace talks since a ceasefire was signed in But he said the negotiations should be Karabakh would not be the ones to start a this situation,” he said. 1994, with negotiations mediated by the expanded to include representatives of the new war. “It is a complex conflict, you cannot Fuelled by the oil-rich country’s energy Minsk Group chaired by France, Russia and authorities in Karabakh, which is home to expect a solution from one day to the next. exports, Azerbaijan’s defense spending has the United States. about 150,000 people. “To have real and seri- But there is no alternative to peace and diaskyrocketed in recent years, with this year’s Sahakian, a former soldier and security ous progress in the negotiating process the logue,” Sahakian said. Experts have warned military budget at $1.9 billion (1.4 billion service chief who was elected to a second format must be re-established to have par- that a fresh conflict would be even more

Injured Indian spy fights for survival Indian on death row in Pakistan LAHORE: An Indian national on death row in Pakistan who was attacked by fellow inmates armed with bricks has been put on a ventilator as he fights for his life, officials said yesterday. Sarabjit Singh, who was sentenced to death 16 years ago on espionage charges, was rushed to hospital on Friday with multiple wounds, including a severe head injury, after an argument in Lahore’s Kot Lakhpat Jail. “Singh’s condition is critical with multiple wounds on his head, abdomen, jaws and other body parts,

police officer investigating the case told AFP, identifying the suspects only by single names Aamir and Mudasir. “These inmates attacked Singh while he was doing his evening walk. We don’t exactly know at the moment what was the reason for this attack but initial investigation reveals that they had exchanged hot words with Singh,” he said on condition of anonymity. Singh’s lawyer Owais Sheikh told AFP his client had received threats following the execution of a Kashmiri separatist

AMRITSAR: Dalbir Kaur (right), sister of Sarabjit Singh, an Indian prisoner held in Pakistan, is checked by a doctor as family members look on in Amritsar yesterday. —AFP and he has been put on ventilator,” a senior doctor in Lahore’s Jinnah hospital said on condition of anonymity. Singh is fighting for his life in the hospital’s intensive care unit (ICU), and the next 24 hours are critical, the doctor said, adding that the head injury was “quite severe”. “He needs surgery but the doctors are not performing it because they don’t want to take any chances and want him to stabilize,” he said. Singh was hit with bricks and other blunt objects by two inmates, a

in India. Mohammed Afzal Guru was hanged in New Delhi on February 9 for his part in a deadly Islamist attack on the Indian parliament in 2001. The Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) condemned the attack as a “dastardly act” and called on the government to make a thorough inquiry into the matter and punish the guilty persons. “The authorities have obviously failed to do their elementary duty” of providing him safety and security, the commission said in a state-

ment. The attack on Singh was frontpage news in Indian newspapers yesterday, with Indian television stations running frequent updates on his condition and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh describing it as a “very sad incident”, according to the Press Trust of India news agency. Sarabjit Singh’s sister, Dalbir Kaur, said Indian government officials had told her that Pakistan has granted visas for four family members to travel to Lahore and is also allowing one person to stay with him in the hospital. “We want to be with Sarabjit in this difficult time. He is all alone. We don’t even know what his condition is,” Kaur told AFP in Amritsar, a holy Sikh city in northern India. Pakistani foreign office spokesman Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry confirmed, in a statement, that the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi has been instructed to facilitate the provision of visas to Singh’s family members. Chaudhry also said that “the government provided timely consular access and permitted two officials of the Indian High Commission in Islamabad to travel to Lahore and visit the prisoner late last night”. Singh was arrested following a bombing in the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore in 1990 in which 14 people were killed. He was sentenced to death after being convicted by a Pakistani court on spying charges. His family has filed mercy petitions to Pakistani authorities seeking Singh’s release. Pakistan maintains he was an Indian spy, but Singh’s family say he is a farmer who accidentally crossed the border into Pakistan while drunk. Pakistan last year released an Indian man who had served three decades in a Pakistani jail on espionage charges. Muslim-majority Pakistan and Hindu-majority India have fought three wars since the division of the subcontinent in 1947, two of them over the Himalayan region of Kashmir, which is divided between them and claimed by both. —AFP

Hope and tight security for Tunisia’s Jewish pilgrimage DJERBA: Jewish pilgrims took part on Friday in an annual ritual at Tunisia’s Ghriba synagogue, the oldest in Africa, amid hope that this year will mark a turning point despite a rise in Islamist unrest across the region. After a sale of ornaments and sacred objects that raised about 1,000 euros for Tunisia’s tiny Jewish community, about 200 people joined a short, joyful procession near the synagogue, which they ended by singing the national anthem. Dozens of police and soldiers armed with automatic rifles supervised the march, on the Mediterranean resort island of Djerba, with the Jewish quarter cordoned off. “A big thanks to the Tunisian authorities. It has made us so welcome that I’m sure next year there will be 10,000!” said Marco, who helped with the auction. After Saturday, the Jewish day of rest, the organizers hope to welcome at least 1,000 pilgrims for the main day of the pilgrimage. Around half of them will be foreigners, including several dozen Israelis coming for the first time since the 2011 revolution. The Islamist-led government has deployed tight security for the two-day pilgrimage to prevent any attacks by radical Muslim groups, blamed for a wave of violence since the mass uprising that toppled ex-dictator Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. More than a dozen army trucks were stationed at Ghriba, where an Al-Qaeda attack in 2002 killed 21 people, and police checkpoints were set up around the Jewish neighborhoods and on the road linking the airport to the tourist zone. The discreet crowd of faithful began the rituals late-morning, gathering inside the 2,500-year-old synagogue barefoot and with their heads covered, lighting candles, drinking a local fig wine and receiving blessings from the rabbis. Amid the cries of the women, singing and prayers, dozens of people wrote the names of their loved ones on candles, or on

eggs that they placed inside a cave, in supplication for fertility, peace or prosperity. “Thank God this year is as it should be, not like in the last two years. I came then, but out of solidarity. There were no real festivities,” said Meyer Sabbagh, 63. The real estate developer, who left Djerba for Paris after the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, said his cousin had also come from Israel, and praised the security laid on by the authorities. The anticipated number of pilgrims is still far below the 8,000 that came before the 2002 attack, and even the 3,000 that had returned prior to the uprising that forced Ben Ali to flee in January 2011. The event was cancelled that year with the country on edge after the mass uprisings, but it resumed discreetly in 2012. Kamel Essid, an adviser at the religious affairs ministry, said he had come “to show our Jewish brothers that we respect all religions,” adding that it was the government’s duty to make every effort to ensure the gathering’s success. Friza Haddad, known as Micha, a Tunisian singer and familiar voice at the annual Ghriba ceremonies, said he wanted to believe there was a future for the pilgrimage, on an island where Jews and Muslims have coexisted harmoniously. “Here there is no problem; we live as a community. There are Jews here, and Muslims there. But it’s only on Djerba that things are like that. In the last two years there have been problems elsewhere” in Tunisia, said the old man. As well as the attacks by Islamist militants, some groups have raised concerns in recent months over an apparent rise in anti-Semitic language in Tunisia. A minorities support group in March accused the judiciary of failing to prosecute individuals inciting hatred, including Ahmed S’hili, an imam who called openly for a “divine genocide” of the Jews in a sermon late last year. —AFP

devastating than the 1992-1994 Karabakh war-one of the bloodiest of the many regional conflicts that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. Karabakh survives thanks largely to financial and military backing from Armenia and supporters in the widespread Armenian diaspora, including in France. Sahakian said he was hoping to drum up investment in France in the hopes of boosting the region’s small economy, which relies mainly on agriculture, manufacturing and some mining. He said he also expected progress soon on one of the region’s key efforts resuming commercial flights into a revamped airport in the capital, Stepanakert. Karabakh is deeply isolated, accessible only by an eight-hour drive from the Armenian capital Yerevan along a winding mountain road that is often unusable in winter. Sahakian said Karabakh was “not very far” from being prepared to restore flights into the region and that he hoped they could resume this year. The Armenians have been under diplomatic pressure to move carefully on restoring flights, after Azerbaijan warned it will not tolerate planes bound for Karabakh violating its airspace. “This initiative must not be linked with resolving the conflict or be seen in this context,” Sahakian said. “Civil flights that will be established between Yerevan and Stepanakert are aimed simply at helping us emerge from the isolation that has been imposed on us.” —AFP

Taleban declares ‘spring offensive’ KABUL: Taleban insurgents in Afghanistan yesterday announced the start of their annual “spring offensive” against the USbacked government, vowing a nationwide series of attacks as foreign troops withdraw. The Islamist extremists said that multiple suicide bombings, “insider attacks” by Afghan soldiers and “special military tactics” would target international airbases and diplomatic buildings to inflict maximum casualties. They warned Afghans working for President Hamid Karzai’s “stooge” regime to distance themselves from the government to avoid being caught up in the promised violence, and called for young people not to join the police or army. This year’s “fighting season” is seen as crucial to

Afghanistan’s future as its much-criticized security forces pit themselves against the insurgents who have fought against the Kabul government since 2001. NATO combat operations in Afghanistan are due to end next year, and coalition commanders say that the local army and police have made enough progress to provide security and keep the Taleban at bay. Afghanistan’s fighting season traditionally begins in April or May as snow recedes from the mountains, and in recent years the Taleban have marked the occasion with a public declaration of their intent to bring down Karzai. The insurgents’ latest statement celebrated the start of the NATO withdrawal, saying that “the enemy, with all its military might, has been over-

whelmed and finally forced to flee from their military bases”. It added that this year’s offensive, named after 7th-century general Khalid bin Waleed, would start on Sunday “in unison throughout the country... against the transgressing invaders and their degenerate backers”. Last week a study by the Afghanistan NGO Safety Office found attacks by the Taleban and other insurgents rose 47 percent in JanuaryMarch compared with the same period last year. The United Nations has separately reported a rise of almost 30 percent in civilian casualties in the first quarter compared with the same period last year, with 475 civilians killed and 872 wounded. —Agencies

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The Pyongyang power couple behind dynastic dictator Kim Couple trying to cement power amid military purges

PAJU: A South Korean car carrying products made in inter-Korean Kaesong Industrial Complex in North Korea, arrives at a gate of the inter-Korean transit office in the border city of Paju yesterday. — AFP

South Korean workers quit troubled joint factory zone PAJU: Dozens of South Korean workers returned from a jointly run factory park in North Korea yesterday as part of an evacuation of the flagship project following months of military tensions. The move plunges into doubt the future of the Kaesong complex-once a rare symbol of cooperation across the world’s most heavily militarized border, and a crucial source of hard currency for Kim Jong-Un’s isolated nation. The workers’ return came on the same day that the North announced it would put a Korean-American arrested in November on trial for trying to overthrow the communist regime-a move sure to add to frictions with the West. Seoul said Friday that it had decided to pull all remaining employees from Kaesong after Pyongyang rejected its ultimatum to join formal negotiations on restarting the stalled operations. A total of 126 people, including one Chinese national, returned yesterday through a border checkpoint in Paju in dozens of vehicles loaded with assembled goods and other materials salvaged from the complex. “I feel more worried than relieved being back home for the first time in a month,” Cho Yong-Joo, a manager for a Seoul electronics firm said after crossing the tense frontier. “Kaesong ought to survive but things are not good,” he said. Some of the workers burst into tears when reunited with colleagues waiting to welcome them home. The roughly 50 people remaining at the industrial zone-mostly government employees who manage the site as well as telecom and electrical engineers-are

expected to be pulled out on Monday, according to Seoul. South Korean companies with factories at the site have expressed shock at the abrupt withdrawal. “I was so full of dreams and hopes seven years ago,” said Park Yun-Kyu, the head of a Seoul clothing company. “Now things look so grim and I don’t know what to do,” he told AFP while waiting for his last two employees to return. The complex is the victim of a cycle of escalating tensions triggered by a nuclear test by the North in February, which came just over a year after Kim Jong-Un took power following the death of his father Kim Jong-Il. A spokesman for the North’s General Bureau for Central Guidance to the Development of the Special Zone slammed Seoul’s pullout as “sheer sophism and hideous provocation of confrontation maniacs”, saying the “puppet south Korean regime” was plotting the collapse of Kaesong. “One cannot but express concern over to what catastrophe the stupid and reckless confrontation maniacs will push the interKorean relations,” he said, according to the North’s state media. Pyongyang, which has demanded the end of UN sanctions and a halt to all South Korea-US joint military exercises, decided on April 3 to block all South Korean access to Kaesong although it has allowed workers to leave. Days later, the North pulled out its 53,000-strong workforce and suspended operations, angered by the South’s mention of a “military” contingency plan to protect its staff at the site. — Reuters

Myanmar looking to revive abandoned ‘Death Railway’ THANBYUZAYAT: An elegant cemetery in strife-torn southeast Myanmar has long stood as a lonely testament to the fate of thousands of prisoners of war who died building Japan’s “Death Railway”. As the fast-changing nation now opens to the world, a reformist regime is considering rebuilding a stretch of the notorious World War II track to attract tourists and help develop border areas, where memories of the line have been eclipsed by conflict and poverty under decades of junta rule. Local gardeners pluck weeds and tend flowers between neat lines of graves at the Thanbyuzayat War Cemetery in Mon state for some 3,000 Allied troops who died building the line between Myanmar and neighboring Thailand. “After seeing this cemetery people do not want to see war. There should not be war in the whole world,” gardener Myat Soe said. “Because the soldiers died the way they did the world remembers them with sorrow. Dying fighting is honorable, but dying like this is very sad.” Many epitaphs at the site, funded by the Britain-based Commonwealth War Graves Commission, are a heart wrenching testament of how bewilderingly distant the country then called Burma was for the families of those killed. “We were not there to clasp your hand, you passed away without a last good-bye,” reads the epitaph for 26year-old Lance Serjeant Harry Dawes, of the Loyal Regiment, who died in September 1943. Exhaustion, starvation, disease and torture were the chief causes of fatalities among those impelled by the invading Japanese to gouge a rail route through dense jungle and solid rock between October 1942 and December 1943. About 13,000 prisoners of war-many captured in Singapore, the Malay Peninsula and what was then the Dutch East Indiesdied during construction, along with up to

100,000 civilians, mostly forced labor from the region. BUILT WITH PICKAXES, SHOVELS Robert Goodwin, an Australian veteran who worked on the infamous “Hellfire Pass” cutting on the Thai side of the border, said the men’s relentless toil involved hacking through rock almost completely by hand. “Every day that we worked, if anyone seemed to be slowing up they’d be belted with not just hands or pickaxes but with wire whips, with anything they could lay their hands on. The Japanese were cruel by anybody’s standards.” On the Thai side, hordes of foreign visitors flock to see the track and bridge made famous by the film “The Bridge Over the River Kwai”, and to ride on a stretch of the line still in operation. The town of Kanchanaburi, a popular destination about three hours drive from the capital Bangkok, generated tourism revenue of over 2.4 billion baht ($84 million) last year, according to Thai officials. That fact is not lost on Myanmar authorities keen to encourage development in the southeast of their country-a region emerging from isolation after years of civil war. Ceasefire deals were reached last year between local ethnic Karen and Mon rebels under a new quasi-civilian government which took power two years ago after decades of harsh military rule ended. Surveys have now begun to trace the route from Thanbyuzayat to Three Pagodas Pass at the Thai border, according to an official from Myanmar Railways, who asked not to be named. “This is primarily for tourism. If we can connect the railway track on the Thai side, it will help tourism develop,” he said. Phyoe Wai Yar Zar, of the Myanmar Tourism Board, said there is “huge potential” to develop tourism around the “Death Railway” in Myanmar. — AFP

THANBYUZAYAT: Photo shows a locomotive sitting on the last remaining portion of the ‘Death Railway’ near Thanbyuzayat, in Myanmar’s eastern Mon state. — AFP

SEOUL: Kim Kyong-hui has battled alcoholism and the killing of her lover to stand alongside her nephew, North Korea’s youthful leader Kim Jong-un, as a reminder that he is the true heir of the dynasty’s blood-line. The 67-year-old daughter of North Korea’s founder Kim Il-sung cuts a rare female figure in Pyongyang’s male-dominated hierarchy and ranks as a four-star general, often sporting her trademark dark glasses at important events. She is married to Jang Song-thaek, seen as the second most powerful man in the North, who has survived purges and official displeasure to reach the pinnacle of his career, thanks largely to his sometimes tempestuous marriage to Kim. This Pyongyang power couple has formed a kind of regency in the obscurantist political world of the North behind its young and mercurial leader, who succeeded his father Kim Jong-il in December 2011. In recent weeks, the 30-year-old dictator has threatened the United States with nuclear attack, declared a “state of war” with South Korea and announced he was restarting a plutonium reactor at the Soviet-era Yongbyon nuclear plant - all on top of conducting a third nuclear test in February and a long-range rocket test in December. The couple’s reach is augmented by their control over the ruling Korean Workers’ Party’s secret funds that handle the Kim family’s finances both at home and abroad, according to An Chan-il, a former North Korean military officer who defected to the South and has become an expert on the North’s power elite. North Korea is one of the most heavily sanctioned states, and uses its diplomats to smuggle cash and contraband, according to South Korean officials and experts on its opaque finances. BROTHER AND SISTER Kim Jong-un’s aunt rarely appeared in public until it was clear to the Pyongyang elite in 2010 that former ruler Kim Jong-il’s health was deteriorating rapidly. Jang Sung-min, a former South Korean member of parliament who has met Jang Song-thaek, said that while Kim Kyong-hui was a hugely symbolic figure for North Korea as the daughter of the revolutionary leader, she would not otherwise be a public figure. “If Kim Kyong-hui, a woman in a very male dominated society like North Korea, has to go around showing her face on camera, then things must be really desperate,” Jang said. Kyong-hui’s mother died in her 30s in 1948. With Kim Il-sung soon plotting the 1950 Korean War and later remarriage, Kyong-hui and her brother Jong-il were left to form close bonds, according to Hwang Jang-yop, a former Workers’ Party secretary and the most senior North Korean to defect. Hwang was an ideologue who helped Kim Il-sung formulate the country’s Juche philosophy that fuses Marxism, extreme nationalism and a call for self sufficiency. Hwang, who died in South Korea in 2010, was a close family friend of Jang and Kim, and his son would later marry Jang’s niece. One of Kyong-hui’s brothers was reported to have died at a young age in a swimming accident at a family villa in Pyongyang, according to another North defector. “Kim Jong-il is extremely close to Kim Kyong-hui, his little sister,” Hwang wrote in a recollection of the ruling family. Other North Koreans confirmed the siblings’ closeness and said Kyong-hui occupied a crucial role

PYONGYANG: North Korean women walk together as they offer flowers to statues of their late leaders, Kim Il Sung (left) and Kim Jong Il, at Mansu Hill in Pyongyang marking the 81st anniversary of the founding of North Korean army. — AP between her father and brother. Kim Jong-il supported her when her father opposed her decision to marry, said Jang Jin-song, a North Korean defector who previously worked at the Workers’ Party United Front Department, a propaganda unit tasked with destabilizing South Korea. “But she was also very distrustful of him (Kim Jong-il),” Jang said, recalling she was caught in a power struggle between father and son as the junior Kim was being groomed to succeed on Kim Il-sung’s death in 1994. “It’s around this time that she started drinking,” said Jang, who said he had seen Kim and her husband bicker at public functions while he was working as a state TV reporter. Jang defected to the South in 2004 and now works as a writer. TROUBLESOME HUSBAND While the love-hate relationship between Kyong-hui and her late brother can no longer harm North Korea’s new leader, her troubled marriage to Jang could, according to defectors and experts on the North. Jang, 67, has survived purges and been rehabilitated to stand at the peak of power as Vice Chairman of the National Defence Commission, the country’s top military body, and is a member of the ruling Workers’ Party Politburo. Recently, Pak Pong-ju, a close ally of Jang, was appointed prime minister, making a comeback from an earlier purge and further cementing the influential uncle’s power. Pak was previously director of the Worker ’s Party Light Industry Department, where he succeeded Kim Kyong-hui. “Jang is both the greatest benefactor and the greatest threat (to Kim Jong-un)”, said Park Hyeong-jung at the state -run Korea Institute of National Unification in Seoul, who has extensively studied the North’s ruling elite. Kim and Jang met when they were students at Kim Il-sung University. He had good looks and charm, was popular and outgoing, known more for partying and deftness with the accordion than his academic achievements, said Hwang, the senior defector, who was head of the school at the time. “I thought she was just young before, but then realised she was very confident

Iranian pair deny Thai bomb plot BANGKOK: An Iranian man whose legs were blown off during an alleged botched bomb plot last year against Israeli diplomats in Bangkok said he found the explosives and was trying to dispose of them safely when they detonated. Saeid Moradi, 29, told a Bangkok court that he was about to leave Thailand when he found four bombs hidden inside radios in a cupboard at a rented house in the city. Two of the devices exploded as he ran into the street to throw them into a nearby canal, the second tearing off his legs, he said. Moradi and Mohammad Khazaei, 42, are among five Iranians suspected of involvement in the February 2012 blasts that followed attacks in India and Georgia and saw Israel accuse Tehran of waging a terror campaign. Moradi said he accidentally triggered one of the bombs when he opened a cupboard in the apartment. “I was stunned and threw it into the corner, believing it was a smoke bomb,” the wheelchair-bound suspect said via a translator, adding he grabbed two other bombs and ran outside to throw them into a nearby canal. He did not refer further to the fourth device. Prosecutors accuse Moradi of hurling one bomb at a taxi and a second at two police officers as they approached him on the street, but it instead detonated near the suspect. However, the defendant said he dropped one of the devices near the taxi by mistake, and tried to throw the other away as the policemen approached, fearing it would detonate and hurt them. “I knew if the police stopped me I’d have to drop the bomb which may have endangered them and people nearby. “So I threw it about a meter in front of me,” he said, adding he blacked out and woke up at hospital later to find his legs had been torn off in the blast. Fellow defendant Khazaei, who smiled and gave a two-finger victory sign to journalists as he arrived from prison for the hearing, said the pair were due to travel to Kuala Lumpur when Moradi came across the devices. The court heard that Khazaei ran out of the house after the first explosion and headed to the airport where police arrested him at the boarding gate. “I didn’t commit a crime. I am innocent,” he said. The pair have already pleaded not guilty to charges including attempted murder and possessing explosives. Speaking earlier outside the court, their lawyer Kittipong Kiattanapoom vowed that “we will fight every charge”. In June last year a Malaysian court ordered the extradition to Thailand of another of the Iranian suspects, Masoud Sedaghatzadeh. Sedaghatzadeh was arrested at Kuala Lumpur’s international airport a day after the Bangkok blasts. Two other suspects are believed to have returned to Iran. The court is expected to give a ruling on June 20. — AFP

and determined,” Hwang said of Kim. Her future husband’s humble background made Jang a less than ideal suitor for the headstrong daughter of North Korea’s founder. Yet Kim Kyong-hui did not let her father’s objections stop her from marrying - with the help of her brother, said Jang Jinsong, the defector. The marriage was not a happy one, said Jang Jin-song. As Jang Song-thaek started rising through the ranks of the Workers’ Party, he became less attentive to his family. It was an open secret that he partied hard and womanised, said defectors now in Seoul and South Korean politicians who met Jang on a 2002 visit as part of an economic delegation touring the South’s industrial successes. Their daughter Kum-song, died in an apparent suicide while attending school in France, ironically because her parents objected to her boyfriend, according to Jang Jin-song. DOOMED AFFAIR Kim Kyong-hui herself had an affair with a young pianist, Kim Song-ho, who taught her daughter, according to Jang, who recalled that a classmate of his at the Pyongyang University of Music and Dance had been a rival for Kim’s affections. The piano teacher, a former child prodigy and household name, and who was 10 years younger than his paramour, would soon disappear. Kyong-hui would be told he had committed suicide. But Jang the defector said Kim knew her husband had her lover killed, one of a vast number of people who fell victim to a reign of terror Jang Song-thaek orchestrated in the late 1990s to bolster the power of his brother-in-law. Kim and Jang, while never divorcing, would separate. Before he became the power behind the throne under Kim Jong-un, Jang was ejected from the elite in 2004 for angering Kim Jong-il by hosting lavish parties, according to media reports and assessments by South Korean thinktanks. Two years later, he was back, and in 2011 was widely credited with orchestrating the ouster of Army chief of staff, Ri Yong-ho, a major rival who had been a loyal aide to the father of Pyongyang’s current leader. — Reuters

Japan executes two death-row gangsters TOKYO: Japan has hanged two death-row inmates, in the first executions since a trio of convicted killers died in the gallows two months ago and drawing immediate protest from human rights groups. Justice Minister Sadakazu Tanigaki told reporters that Katsuji Hamasaki, 64, and Yoshihide Miyagi, 56, two members of Japan’s notorious Yakuza organized crime syndicates, were executed for the shooting of two rival gangsters in Chiba, southeast of Tokyo, in 2005. The executions bring to five the number of death-row inmates hanged since Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s conservative government swept to power in landslide December elections. “I deplore the execution,” said EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton. “While recognizing the serious nature of the crimes involved, I reiterate the longstanding policy of the European Union in opposition to capital punishment in all cases and without exception. “I call again on the Japanese authorities to reflect on the continued use of capital punishment and reconsider the policy in the light of the worldwide trend towards abolition.” Japan now has 134 inmates on its death row. Amnesty International Japan, the

Japanese branch of the global rights group, protested Friday. “We strongly condemn the five executions conducted since the launch of the new government, which goes against calls by the international community and indicates the government’s intention to pave the way for mass executions,” it said in a statement. Tokyo did not execute any condemned inmates in 2011, the first full year in nearly two decades without an execution amid muted debate on the rights and wrongs of a policy that enjoys wide public support. But in March last year, Tokyo resumed its use of capital punishment with an unapologetic government minister signing death warrants for three multiple murderers. Apart from the United States, Japan is the only major industrialized democracy to carry out capital punishment, a practice that has led to repeated protests from European governments and human rights groups. International advocacy groups say the system is cruel because death row inmates can wait for their executions for many years in solitary confinement and are only told of their impending death a few hours ahead of time. — AFP

North Korea puts US citizen on trial SEOUL: North Korea said yesterday that it would put a US citizen on trial for trying to overthrow the communist regime, in the face of soaring tensions between Pyongyang and the West. The North’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said Pae Jun-Ho had admitted to the charges and would soon face “judgment”. The announcement follows a monthslong standoff on the Korean peninsula stoked by the North’s nuclear test in February, which prompted the UN Security Council to impose fresh sanctions on the isolated nation. Pae, who is believed to be a KoreanAmerican tour operator, was arrested in November as he entered the northeastern port city of Rason. KCNA said a “preliminary inquiry” had been completed. “He

admitted that he committed crimes aimed to topple the DPRK (Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) with hostility toward it. His crimes were proved by evidence. “He will soon be taken to the Supreme Court of the DPRK to face judgment,” according to the report, which did not say what the charges were based on. Seoul-based activist Do Hee-Yoon told AFP that he suspected Pae was arrested because he had taken photographs of emaciated children in North Korea as part of efforts to appeal for more outside aid for them. The North’s announcement came hours before US Deputy Secretary of State William Burns met South Korean Foreign Minister Yun Byung-Se for talks in Seoul. The US diplomat did not publicly comment on the trial. — AFP

NEWS

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

PFORZHEIM: This combo of photos shows participants in the German beard championships. Participants show their beards during the Whiskers Freestyle category of the International German Beard Championships at Congress Centrum in Pforzheim, Germany yesterday. Prices are awarded in 18 different categories. — AP

Fight against terror takes pals to the White House WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama had gone to his residence after a difficult week when an urgent email brought him rushing back to the Oval Office. The suspect in the Boston bombings had been apprehended. “They have him in custody, it is white hat,” White House counterterrorism adviser Lisa Monaco wrote chief of staff Denis McDonough. That was reference to the cap that 19-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev was seen wearing in surveillance video that led to his capture. Soon Monaco was briefing the president on developments. Elsewhere in the West Wing, Tsarnaev’s apprehension got White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler thinking about what legal rights the suspect should have. She consulted with the FBI on the legal rationale to initially question Tsarnaev without notifying the suspect of his Miranda rights, to quickly learn whether anyone else was in danger, and she advised Obama on the conclusion not to prosecute him as an enemy combatant. For Monaco and Ruemmler, the events were another step in more than a decade of teamwork for friends who first met amid the shock and confusion of the Sept. 11 attacks and worked together as prosecutors and at the top levels of the Justice Department. The Boston bombings were Monaco’s first high-profile test since she replaced John Brennan, the current CIA director, as Obama’s homeland security and counterterrorism adviser. She was the first to brief the president on an attack that hit close to home for her. Monaco is from the Boston suburbs, she graduated from Harvard and her brother lives near the finish line, but was unharmed. Monaco kept Obama updated day and night, along with developments in the investigation of possible poisonous letters sent to the president and the Senate, and the explosion that killed 14 in a small Texas town. Ruemmler, who joined the White House in 2010, has become a trusted member of Obama’s tight-knit inner circle, a rarity in a White House that has proved difficult to navigate for outsiders. When Obama attended a memorial service in Boston on April 18, Ruemmler went along to keep him prepared to respond to any developments in the investigation. Tsarnaev was captured the next night, and Ruemmler updated Obama on the FBI’s decision

to have agents interview the hospitalized prisoner before notifying him of his right to remain silent under the public safety exception. Ruemmler also advised Obama on the debate over whether to prosecute Tsarnaev as an enemy combatant before a military tribunal. She helped conclude that wasn’t an option because Tsarnaev is a naturalized US citizen entitled to a federal trial. The issues are familiar for Ruemmler, 42, and Monaco, 45, who for years have been at the heart of the country’s battle against the terrorism threat. As director of the Justice Department’s national security division for the past couple years, Monaco approved the prosecution and requests for secret surveillance of suspected terrorists. From the White House, she is now responsible for helping determine the targets of drone attacks. Ruemmler oversees legal strategy on the drone strikes and handling of terrorism suspects at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, along with every other important legal issue for Obama. The women have worked closely together since their days as assistant US attorneys in the District of Columbia, where they rose from the entry level of prosecuting misdemeanors to the high-profile Enron Task Force. They met in a training class along with Ann Petalas, who remains friends with them. She recalls when their instructors’ pages started going off simultaneously early on the second day of class. Monaco left the room to check what was happening, and returned to announce that a hijacked plane had flown into the World Trade Center, Petalas said. Soon the devastation hit much closer to home. “We were on the ninth floor, and I remember seeing smoke rising” over Washington, Petalas said. “And we weren’t sure whether it was the Pentagon or the White House at the time.” But it was clear Washington had been hit, and their office was evacuated in fear the hijackers might target another federal building. Like many people in those cities gripped by terror that day, they took off with no instruction where to go. Petalas said she and Ruemmler fled northwest on foot. Monaco and Ruemmler declined to be interviewed for this story. But in a speech on the 10th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks, Monaco spoke of the

Egypt police arrest 12 ‘Black Bloc’ members Continued from Page 1 State television reported early yesterday that “clashes between the police and the Black Bloc at the presidential palace wounded 20 people.” A security oﬃcial said that three security personnel, including two oﬃcers, were among those hurt. Demonstrators, hooded and masked and dressed in black from head to toe, appeared in January in Cairo and other provinces, calling themselves the Black Bloc. They present themselves as the defenders of protesters opposed to Islamist President Mohamed

Morsi’s rule. On their Facebook page, the activists say they are a “generation born of the blood of the martyrs” from the 2011 revolution that toppled former president Hosni Mubarak. Prosecutor general Talaat Abdallah accused the group of “terrorism” three months ago. For the past ﬁve months, Egypt has been suﬀering a grave political crisis, marked by deadly clashes between supporters and opponents of Morsi. The palace in Heliopolis has already been the scene of similar violence, notably in December, when tens of proand anti-Morsi demonstrators died in clashes. — AFP

Damascus dismisses US, UK ‘barefaced lie’ Continued from Page 1 international criteria, and not use it to achieve other objectives. It must not be a pretext for an intervention in Syria,” deputy foreign minister and Middle East envoy Mikhail Bogdanov said during a visit to Beirut yesterday. “We have the past experience of another violent intervention in Iraqi affairs under the pretext of the presence of nuclear weapons, and it turned out in the end that there was nothing,” he added. The specter of the invasion of Iraq and subsequent conflict, which killed tens of thousands of Iraqis, looms large. The Syrian opposition has stepped up pressure by urging the UN Security Council to take immediate steps, possibly even by imposing a no-fly zone on Syria. And British Prime Minister David Cameron said the growing evidence that Assad had turned chemical agents on his own people was “extremely serious”. The fighting in Syria, which the UN says has killed more than 70,000 people so far, showed no signs of abating yesterday. At least 10 people were killed in shelling on the Syrian town of Douma, northeast of the capital Damascus, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said. Nearby, in Moadamiyet al-Sham, the group

reported air raids and tank fire, as well as shelling of the Barzeh district of the capital, which has been under fire for three straight days. Elsewhere, troops carried out air raids against parts of Damascus and Aleppo province and strikes were also reported in western Latakia and southern Daraa. On Friday, at least 127 people were killed in violence throughout the country, according to a toll from the Observatory. Analysts said Syria’s neighbors face a growing risk of the conflict spilling across their region as Assad turns to ever more desperate acts to halt rebels. They said Lebanon and Jordan will be the most vulnerable if the conflict spreads, while Iraq will also be affected along with Israel and Turkey. “It is a very vulnerable region and there is a risk of escalation,” said Anthony Skinner of British risk consultancy Maplecroft. Indeed, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri AlMaliki alluded to Syria yesterday, saying sectarian strife growing in his own country “came back to Iraq because it began in another place in this region.” “Sectarianism is evil, and the wind of sectarianism does not need a license to cross from a country to another, because if it begins in a place, it will move to another place,” he said. — AFP

importance of remembering that day “not only as a turning point in history, but as a human tragedy with ﬂesh-and-blood victims, heroes and murderers.” “The shock and suﬀering of September 11th left every American asking how could people do something so terrible and how can we prevent it from happening again? For those charged with protecting our nation, it became clear that there was much that could be done to stop another attack,” Monaco said. She noted that two stumbling blocks to preventing the attacks included information-sharing and coordination between intelligence and law enforcement - something she would play an important role in shaping. On his second day as president, Obama signed executive orders ordering a review of America’s detention and interrogation policies and the Guantanamo Bay detention facility, whose closure remains an unrealized goal. Ruemmler and Monaco were among a small group assigned to get Obama’s Justice Department up and running, summoned to the White House Situation Room and asked to start the review process. “It was just an extraordinary amount of work and it had to be done yesterday,” said Matthew Miller, the Justice Department spokesman at the time. Miller said the women impressed colleagues with their handling of the job. “The national security world isn’t completely male-dominated, but it’s high testosterone

as the entire legal profession can be.” At the time, Ruemmler was the top political appointee at the Justice Department and Monaco was her chief deputy on national security issues, having worked for President Bill Clinton’s attorney general, Janet Reno, and as chief of staff to President George W. Bush’s FBI director, Robert Mueller. Monaco has been mentioned as a possible replacement for Mueller when he steps down in September; it’s job no woman has ever held. In 2011, Obama nominated Monaco to direct the national security division, created in 2006 to improve coordination among law enforcement and intelligence agencies against terrorist attacks and espionage plots. She oversaw terrorism prosecutions and took a special interest in strengthening pursuit of the rapidly spreading threat of cyberattacks against US national security interests. As Monaco was confirmed, Obama promoted Ruemmler as lead White House counsel after she’d been serving as the No 2 in that office. Among the many debates she’s weighed in on, Ruemmler was on the winning side of a split among Obama’s advisers over the defense of his health care law before the Supreme Court last year. Some in the White House opposed making the argument that the government could fine people who don’t buy insurance under its taxing powers. Ruemmler was among those who pushed to make that case. — AP

US WIDENS RICIN PROBE Continued from Page 1 letter-borne anthrax attack in the wake of the Sept. 11 attacks in New York and Washington. It took investigators seven years to solve the anthrax case. Letters addressed to Senator Roger Wicker, a Mississippi Republican, and Democratic President Barack Obama were retrieved last week at off-site mail facilities before reaching their intended victims. A state judge also received a ricin-laced letter. The discovery added another layer of anxiety as authorities dealt with bombings at the Boston Marathon. Ricin, which is made from castor beans, can be deadly to humans and is considered a potential terror weapon, particularly if refined into an aerosol form. Dutschke’s name first surfaced in a federal court hearing on Monday for

Curtis where his attorney suggested her client had been framed by someone. She mentioned a running feud between Dutschke and Curtis, albeit over a number of seemingly petty issues. Suspicion had originally fallen on Curtis because of wording contained in all three ricin letters that appeared to incriminate him. “Maybe I have your attention now / Even if that means someone must die,” the letters read in part, according to the affidavit. The letters ended: “I am KC and I approve this message.” The initials “KC” led law enforcement officials to ask Wicker’s staff if they were aware of any constituents with those initials, and the focus of the investigation then turned to Curtis, according to an affidavit from the FBI and the Secret Service filed in court.— Reuters

Terror watch lists ‘bloated’ Continued from Page 1 Institute, “maybe because of a different spelling of his name.” “That was a real missed opportunity because of a complicated system,” he lamented. Michael German, a former FBI agent who is now a terrorist expert at the American Civil Liberties Union, agreed: “the fact that multiple agencies keep these lists, different lists with different populations, is a huge problem.” Further muddying the waters, he added, “the lists are so blended with so many innocent people and irrelevant information, they’re no longer reliable.” The main list, compiled by the National Counterterrorism Center, is called the Terrorist Identities Datamart Environment, or TIDE. It contains a half-million names. “I don’t think anybody really supposes that there’s half a million terrorists,” German said. The FBI also has a monitoring list, as does the Department of Homeland Security and US Customs, not to mention the “No Fly List” that bars certain individuals from boarding any aircraft. “If there’s any suspicion, people end up on the list, often without real factual basis,” the ACLU analyst emphasized. “If you just happen to have a name similar to a real terrorist on the list, that will cause the US government to focus on you and divert resources away from real threats.” And then there are the various aliases, double identities and different spellings of names from different alphabets, which complicate the matter and lead to mistakes. Despite efforts to standardize the system after the 9/11 terror attacks, “the principal problem is lack of

coordination between different agencies,” said Jeffrey Addicott, director of the center for terrorism law at St Mary’s University in Texas. “This is just human nature: different agencies compete for information with each other, there’s a human jealousy, there’s a ‘I got it first’” mentality, he said. He recalled the case of Umar Faruk Abdulmutallab, the socalled “underwear bomber,” who tried to launch an attack on a US-bound airplane on Christmas in 2009. “His dad went to the State Department and complained about his son being a potential terrorist, and this information was never passed on to the other agencies,” Addicott said. The FBI, the DHS and the National Counterterrorism Center each have different criteria for deciding to put a person under surveillance-criteria that are subjective and undisclosed, he added. “An agency might think you’re a potential threat, another might say no, no, it’s just free speech,” he explained. In 2010, a report by the Inspector General-tasked with detecting and deterring waste, abuse and fraud in the Justice Departmentfound that the FBI list included political activists who had never posed any kind of threat. The report said the FBI didn’t add names “at the appropriate time, and they don’t take people out of the lists once they’ve been cleared from investigation,” exagent German said. But the real challenge, according to Addicott, it’s that the US lacks something standard in many countries, including France: a national identity card. “That’s why it’s so hard to track people. Without it, it’s an impossible task.” — AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

ANALYSIS

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Issues

The Tripoli I know By Aisha Habli

ebanon’s second largest city Tripoli has a violent reputation due to ongoing conflict in the neighborhoods of Bab Al Tabbaneh and Jabal Mohsen. Previously one neighborhood, these two communities were divided along political lines during Lebanon’s 15-year civil war (1975-1990). And due to Lebanon’s complicated political history with Syria, tensions have been inflamed by the neighboring conflict, resulting in sporadic armed conflict. But the Tripoli I know is different. When visiting friends, I join them in shisha (waterpipe) lounges, we go out for ice cream at the renowned Hallab Palace for Desserts and take evening walks at the Mina Port, enjoying sweetened tea with milk from a vendor with a wheeled-cart. Tripoli is no warzone, and I am hopeful that a number of recent youth initiatives in the city can help restore peace to these two neighborhoods. Residents of these parallel neighborhoods often go to work together; their children go to the same schools, and they sometimes intermarry. Originally one neighborhood called Bab Al Tabbaneh, it was divided during the Lebanese civil war. Bab Al Tabbaneh’s Alawite community (a Muslim minority group that accounts for 12 per cent of the Syrian population with pockets in both Lebanon and Turkey) gradually clustered on the side of the mountain (Jabal Mohsen) overlooking Bab Al Tabbaneh. This was in part due to tensions between the Lebanese Arab Democratic Party which supported the Syrian regime during the civil war and the Sunni Islamist Tawhid Movement in Tripoli at that time. As a result, today many generalize that Bab Al Tabbaneh’s Sunni residents support the Free Syrian Army, and Alawite Jabal Mohsen residents support the Syrian regime. Media also too often portrays the conflict as sectarian, a ghostly resemblance to the Lebanese civil war. These two neighborhoods are also among the most poverty-stricken in Lebanon. Illiteracy, unemployment and population density are all high. Basic needs like electricity, running water and security are not met, enabling power brokers to fuel armed conflict in the area. But today, there are several initiatives that aim to bridge gaps and create opportunities for dialogue between residents living in Bab al Tabbaneh and Jabal Mohsen. One unique initiative is TEDxAzmiStreet, named after a busy street that links many parts of Tripoli. TEDxAzmiStreet is a licensed and independently organized smaller version of the well-known TED conference that aims to share “ideas worth spreading.” During a TEDxAzmiStreet event, live and telecasted speakers give talks on creativity, innovation, personal success stories and solutions to Tripoli’s social, technical, educational and economic challenges. After a TEDx talk, the audience engages in dialogue related to the event’s theme. Nazih Fino, TEDxAzmiStreet’s curator, explained how audience engagement gives people a chance to express themselves in a place where everyone is heard and thus better understand the needs of one another. I attended the first TEDxAzmiStreet event in Tripoli in mid-2012. It was a tough time, with heavy gunfire exchanged in Bab Al Tabbaneh and Jabal Mohsen the night before. Event organizers found themselves in front of a full-house. “Nobody expected that people would be able to attend, but they did. They came to say that we are against [the violence] and we can change the future by improving ourselves, taking personal action and improving our chances to live better,” said Fino. The audience’s synergy, the hope in their voices and their strong desire to be heard, communicate and condemn the armed conflict in Tripoli was palpable. Another initiative, We Love Tripoli - one of the larger online communities in Tripoli started out in 2007 as a Facebook group of youth from different religious and political backgrounds who wanted to “change Tripoli’s image as an extremist-driven and violent city”. The members of this online community organized themselves and are today a non-government organization with the mission to “trigger the collective passion to serve our community through advocacy projects, volunteer activities and social media”. On their Facebook page, which has more than 15,000 likes, they promote messages of peace like a photo showing a man holding a message saying: “Alawite, Sunni, Christian, we are all Lebanese”. When I asked Fino about the common needs of citizens in Jabal Mohsen and Bab al Tabbaneh, he said, “They both need to become engaged as one society and they both need peace.” Initiatives like TEDxAzmiStreet and We Love Tripoli create opportunities for youth to engage one another and keep them off the streets. Providing individuals - particularly youth- with platforms for open dialogue and chances to engage in constructive projects in civil society, entrepreneurship, activism and technology will surely help make armed conflicts obsolete in Tripoli. —CGNews Aisha Habli works as a public relations and media representative and freelance event manager. She is a member of the Lebanese Peace Journalists and MasterPeace Lebanon.

All articles appearing on these pages are the personal opinion of the writers. Kuwait Times takes no responsibility for views expressed therein. Kuwait Times invites readers to voice their opinions. Please send submissions via email to: opinion@kuwaittimes.net or via snail mail to PO Box 1301 Safat, Kuwait. The editor reserves the right to edit any submission as necessary.

Syria spillover risk as Assad turns desperate By Ahmad Khatib

yria’s neighbors face a growing risk of the conflict spilling across their region as Bashar Al-Assad turns to ever more desperate acts to halt rebels-including the alleged use of chemical weapons. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki voiced such concerns yesterday when he said a new wave of sectarian strife in his country stemmed from violence elsewhere, although he did not name Syria. But analysts say Lebanon and Jordan will be the most vulnerable if the conflict spreads, while Iraq will also be affected along with Israel and Turkey. “There is a significant risk of an increased spillover,” said Anthony Skinner of British risk consultancy Maplecroft. “It is a very vulnerable region and there is a risk of escalation. The whole region may increasingly become involved in the conflict.” Jordan hosts more than 500,000 Syrian refugees, while Lebanon is home to 400,000, but the two countries face other tough challenges. Amman has found itself dragged closer to the conflict with the deployment of more US troops on its territory amid a warning by Assad the kingdom could be

engulfed by the war, and accusations of allowing fighters into Syria. “Jordan had been pushed because of the escalation next door and because of its concerns regarding militant Islam and Salafists. Jordan is concerned about the potential chaos that may follow for years or decades in the likely event that Assad will eventually be toppled,” Skinner said. “Another key concept relates to the Jordanian Salafists who have crossed the borders into Syria in order to topple the regime.” Lebanon has witnessed frequent shelling from Syria of both Sunni Muslim and Shiite areas of its north and east. It has adopted a policy of neutrality despite being torn between the Iranbacked Hezbollah and its allies that support Assad, and the Sunni-led March 14 movement that backs the revolt. Opposition activists in Syria have accused Hezbollah of sending elite fighters to battle alongside Assad’s troops in Qusayr, an area near the border. “Lebanon could be plunging into a state of war-this is a very real risk,” Skinner said. For Yezid Sayigh of the Carnegie Middle East Centre in Beirut, “the main impact on Jordan and Lebanon is the

refugees, which puts them under severe pressure. “Even those who support the Syrian opposition, are becoming fed up with the refugee influx. If the situation develops, more Syrians, maybe millions, will flee to Jordan and Lebanon,” exacerbating the chances of conflict in the host countries, he said. Syria’s conflict is increasingly becoming a proxy war, with the rebels backed by US allies Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Turkey, and Assad by Hezbollah, Iran and Russia. Assad’s forces are too stretched to retaliate against those who back the rebels, but occasional cross-border shelling is conceivable, said Skinner. “Though, these attacks would not be deemed large enough to provoke a strong counter-punch, it’s conceivable that Assad would use proxies that are not so clearly linked to his line of command.” Turkey and Israel are worried about the fallout. “The threat of the Syrian conflict has pushed Turkey to engage in what appears to be a serious peace process with the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party),” said Skinner. Israel fears Syria’s chemical weapons arsenal

could fall into the wrong hands. “The United States and Israel have limited options to deal with the chemical weapons. They do not want things to develop, which might give the Syrian regime the chance to use the weapons,” said Sayigh. The opposition has urged the UN to act immediately, possibly even by imposing a no-fly zone, but US President Barack Obama is awaiting a “definitive” probe into their alleged use before taking any action. Iraq was “obviously affected and there are sectarian tensions,” said Sayigh. “Things might develop if the Iraqis failed to address their problems.” Emile Hokayem, analyst at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, said the conflict was “sucking” in neighbors, an effect at least partly due to Syrian “mischief”. “Syria has used a lot of mischief and pressure on its neighbors to punish them, keep them in check or conduct a form of blackmail to remind them of the regional cost of pushing the regime too far,” he said. “A spillover has already happened. The situation is only going to worsen... intensification of cross-border fighting, direct and indirect attacks, more refugees.” —AFP

In force-feeding detainees, Obama has courts on his side By David Ingram and Jane Sutton

s detainees at the US military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, press ahead with a widening hunger strike nearly three months old, President Barack Obama has come under increasing criticism for his policy of force-feeding them. But US law is on his side, an analysis of court rulings shows. Most US judges who have examined forced feeding in prisons have concluded that the measure may violate the rights of inmates to control their own bodies and to privacy - rights rooted in the US Constitution and in common law. But they have found that the needs of operating a prison are more important. Courts generally view a prison hunger strike as a suicide attempt, and they have ruled wardens have authority to stop suicide attempts as part of their mandate to preserve order. “If prisoners were allowed to kill themselves, prisons would find it even more difficult than they do to maintain discipline, because of the effect of a suicide in agitating the other prisoners,” Judge Richard Posner wrote for a Chicago-based appeals court in 2006 in a case involving a Wisconsin prison that punished a disobedient inmate by refusing him food. As of Thursday, 94 of the 166 prisoners were on a hunger strike in Guantanamo, meaning they had refused at least nine consecutive meals. According to a military count, 17 had lost enough weight to be force-fed liquid meals through a nasogastric tube, and three were in the hospital for observation. Army Lieutenant Colonel Samuel House, a spokesman for the detention camp, said none of the detainees in the hospital had a life-threatening condition. Striking inmates began refusing to eat around early February, alleging rough handling of the Koran during searches for contraband and protesting their prolonged imprisonment. General John Kelly, head of US military forces in Latin America, said assertions about the Koran were untrue. OPPOSITION VOICED A New York Times opinion piece last week by Samir Naji Al Hasan Moqbel, a Yemeni man detained at Guantanamo since 2002, launched debate over the forced feedings. Like others there, he was captured abroad on suspicion of supporting terrorism. “I will never forget the first time they

passed the feeding tube up my nose. I can’t describe how painful it is to be force-fed this way,” Moqbel said in the op-ed dictated through an interpreter to his lawyers. As described by Guantanamo officials, a feeding tube is lubricated and inserted through the nose down to the stomach for the two hours it takes liquid food to pass through. In general, hunger strikers continue to drink water. Human rights advocates and many doctors decry forced feeding of hunger strikers as a violation of personal liberty and medical ethics with risks of medical complications such as discomfort, bleeding, nausea and throat sores. The 65-year-old World Medical Association, made up of 100 national medical associations, has said it is unethical and never justified to force-feed a mentally competent adult. Carlos Warner, a federal public defender who represents 11 Guantanamo detainees, including Kuwaiti hunger striker Faiz Al Kandari, said detainee lawyers are split on the issue. Some “have a clear position that the government should not be force-feeding,” and have unsuccessfully made their argument in federal court in Washington, DC, Warner said. “Other lawyers are of the opinion that their clients should not die of hunger before we have a chance to free them.” The Constitution Project, a US legal group that includes Democrats and Republicans, said last week that forced feeding at Guantanamo “is a form of abuse and must end.” George Annas, a Boston University professor of health law who opposes the forced feeding of hunger strikers on medical ethics grounds, said US law is “very permissive” of the practice. He described the attitude of American prisons as: “Do we care about indignity? No, you’re a prisoner, we’ll treat you the way we want.” BARRIERS TO LEGAL CHALLENGE The US military argues forced feeding is not only legal but also humane. A federal judge agreed in 2009, ruling against Mohammed Bawazir, a Yemeni national held at Guantanamo since 2002. Bawazir called forced feeding torture. Bawazir cited pain he experienced and use of a chair with “six-point restraints” that kept in place his forehead, limbs and torso. US District Judge Gladys Kessler in Washington, DC, said officials acted out of a need to preserve life.

A further barrier to any suit is the Military Commissions Act of 2006 which bars US courts from hearing cases about Guantanamo detainee treatment. Even if they were to hear a challenge to forced feeding, the overriding evidence is the courts would rule against the detainees. International law, which prohibits the inhuman or degrading treatment of prisoners, is not necessarily any help to Guantanamo detainees either. The European Court of Human Rights has ruled at least twice that forced feeding amounted to torture, in a 2005 case out of Ukraine and in a 2007 case out of Moldova, but it stopped short of barring the procedure. The court said it may be used to preserve the life of hunger strikers if shown to be medically necessary and not done for punitive reasons. Other reports of non-US countries using forced feeding are rare, although experts said there is a lack of data. The practice has been described in news reports in Bahrain, China and Greece during the past decade. Ten British-held Irish Republican Army prisoners, including former IRA commander Bobby Sands, starved to death in the Maze prison in Northern Ireland during a 1981 hunger strike during which they sought recognition as political prisoners. It ended when the families of the remaining hunger strikers authorized doctors to begin life-saving intravenous feeding as soon as the prisoners lost consciousness. One early US case involved Mark David Chapman, convicted in the 1980 killing of former Beatle John Lennon. Chapman broke a 26day fast in 1982 only under a New York court-ordered threat he would be force-fed. Now 57, he is serving a prison sentence of 20 years to life. Chapman had said he wanted to draw attention to starving children, but the court ruled the state’s obligations to protect life and maintain order in its institutions outweighed Chapman’s rights to free expression and to privacy. BALANCING TEST Most federal and state courts have agreed. In Rhode Island, for example, finding that prisons have a duty to protect inmates’ health, the State Supreme Court ruled in 1995 that “it would be in total disregard of this duty to stand idly by while a healthy adult decided to end his or her life by starvation just as it would if he or she decided to end his or her life by some more dramatic means such as hanging, slashing of wrists, or swallowing some type of poison.” Courts in three states - California, Florida and Georgia - have been exceptions, restricting forced feeding on various grounds, Mara Silver wrote in a 2005 Stanford Law Review article on the constitutional question of self-starvation. California was the most sweeping. Prison officials must demonstrate “a threat to institutional security or public safety,” not merely the conjecture of one, before denying an inmate the choice not to eat, the state’s high court ruled. Those are the exceptions however. “The federal courts analyze the issue by balancing the prisoner’s right to autonomy against the prison’s right to maintain order, and they nearly always find that force-feeding is constitutional,” said Margo Schlanger, a University of Michigan law professor with expertise in prisons. —Reuters

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

S P ORTS

Lee, Tago to clash for India Open title

Coutts and Sprenger win berths at worlds

NEW DELHI: World number one Lee Chong Wei of Malaysia moved into the men’s singles final of the India Open badminton tournament with a hardfought win over Thailand’s Boonsak Ponsana in New Delhi yesterday. The Malaysian needed 53 minutes to complete a 21-11, 18-21, 21-8 victory over his seventh-seeded rival and make his third successive appearance in the final of this tournament. Lee will now clash with sixth-seeded Japanese Kenichi Tago, who registered a 21-16, 21-11 win over India’s Anand Pawar in the other semi-final. The women’s singles final will be contested between second-seeded German Juliane Schenk and third seed Ratchanok Intanon of Thailand. Schenk defeated Indonesian Aprilla Yuswandari 21-18, 21-18 while Intanon, 18, posted a crushing 21-12, 21-6 win over 17-yearold P.V. Sindhu of India in a battle of teenagers. Top-seeded Lee won the opening game comfortably, but Ponsana lifted his performance to win the second. — AFP

ADELAIDE: Olympic gold medallist Alicia Coutts yesterday captured two national titles, while Christian Sprenger beat close rival Brenton Rickard, with all three securing places on the Australian team for the Barcelona world championship. Coutts, a five-time medallist at last year’s London Olympics, won the 100m butterfly in the Adelaide trials and set the world’s best time this year in the 200m individual medley. The 25-year-old, who almost gave up swimming after London, clocked 2:08.63 in the medley to boost her medal chances at the world championship in July. She led home London teammate Emily Seebohm (2:11.11), with both swimming under the qualifying time and securing their places at the worlds. Coutts earlier claimed the 100m butterfly to win a third consecutive national title, coming home in 57.18 ahead of Brittany Elmslie (58.02). Sprenger held off Rickard to claim his third national title in the men’s 100m breaststroke and book his place to Barcelona. Sprenger, who was beaten for Olympic gold in the event by South African Cameron van der Burgh, was the favourite following excellent heat and semi-final swims and touched the wall ahead of national record holder Rickard in 59.31. —AFP

Ferguson backs Liverpool LONDON: Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson believes Liverpool were right not to take disciplinary action against striker Luis Suarez before he was handed a 10-match ban by the Football Association for biting Chelsea’s Branislav Ivanovic. Ferguson said the incident reminded him of the treatment United received from the FA after French striker Eric Cantona launched a kungfu kick at a Crystal Palace fan in 1995. Ferguson claims the FA assured the club they would not take further action if United punished the player, but although United suspended him for four months, English football’s governing body subsequently increased the ban to eight months. As a result, Ferguson said he understood Liverpool’s decision not to take preemptive action against Suarez. “I bet they are glad they didn’t. It didn’t work for us,” he said. “David Davies (then the FA spokesman) promised us if we did it there would be no more action taken. “Think about that-a nine-month ban. It is quite incredible. I still can’t get my head round it.” Manchester City manager Roberto Mancini has also expressed surprise at the severity of Suarez’s punishment. “He made a mistake, he said sorry to everyone,” said the Italian, who said Suarez was his player of the season. — AFP

Yankees beat Blue Jays NEW YORK: David Phelps struck out a career-high nine in four innings after relieving the injured Ivan Nova, Chris Stewart threw out two baserunners to quash potential rallies as an emergency fill-in for Francisco Cer velli and the New York Yankees beat the wild Toronto Blue Jays 6-4 Friday night. Lyle Overbay hit a go-ahead RBI triple and Vernon Wells had a sacrifice fly off Aaron Laffey in an inning the fill-in starter for Josh Johnson walked four, helping New York overcome two homers by Edwin Encarnacion. David Robertson yielded a long homer to Jose Bautista in the eighth but Brett Gardner restored New York’s two-run lead with a homer in the bottom half of the inning. Mariano Rivera loaded the bases with two outs in the ninth but struck out Colby Rasmus to end it for his eighth save in eight chances. Phelps (1-1) earned the victory. Brad Lincoln (0-1) took the loss. RANGERS 4, TWINS 3 In Minneapolis, Adrian Beltre homered and rookie Justin Grimm won his second consecutive start and the Rangers beat the Twins. Lance Berkman, Nelson Cruz and Ian Kinsler each had RBI doubles for the Rangers, who won for the seventh time in their past eight games. Grimm (2-0) followed up his career-best nine-strikeout effort against the Seattle Mariners by shutting out Minnesota for seven innings, allowing five hits and no walks with four strikeouts. The 24-year-old right-hander, filling in for the injured Matt Harrison, has allowed just one earned run in his past 15 1-3 innings. Rookie outfielder Oswaldo Arcia hit a three-run homer off Joe Nathan in the ninth inning after Joe Ortiz allowed a pair of hits, but he got Ryan Doumit to fly out to earn his eighth save. Scott Diamond (1-2) gave up three runs and 12 hits in 6 1-3 innings as the Twins lost their third straight and were shut out for the second time this season. WHITE SOX 5, RAYS 4 In Chicago, Jake Peavy pitched well into the seventh and the White Sox supported him with three homers to rally from a three-run deficit and beat the Rays. Peavy (3-1) gave up home runs to Matt Joyce and Evan Longoria and fell behind 30 in the fourth, but the White Sox overpowered Rays starter Roberto Hernandez (1-4) for their first three-game winning streak of the season. Peavy allowed three runs and six hits, with seven strikeouts, in 6 2-3 innings. Hector Gimenez, Tyler Greene and Conor Gillaspie all homered for the White Sox. RED SOX 7, ASTROS 3 In Boston, David Ross cleared the Green Monster twice with solo home runs and Ryan Dempster struck out 10 for the Red Sox in a win over the Astros. David Ortiz homered for the second

straight night at Fenway Park. The Red Sox are having one of the best Aprils in club history. Boston (16-7) is two wins short of tying the club record for the month with three games remaining. Erik Bedard (0-2) allowed five runs on eight hits over three innings for Houston. The Astros lost for the fifth time in seven games and fell to 0-5 at Fenway. Boston finished with 17 hits and nine were for extra bases, including back-toback homers by Will Middlebrooks and Ross to open the fourth. ORIOLES 3, ATHLETICS 0 In Oakland, Wei-Yin Chen pitched eight strong innings, giving up only two hits to help the Orioles beat the Athletics. Jim Johnson completed the three-hitter by getting the final three outs for his ninth save. The Orioles have won seven of their last nine games while the A’s have dropped seven of eight. Chen (2-2) was brilliant, not allowing a runner to reach third base. He struck out five and walked two. The Orioles broke a scoreless tie in the seventh inning as J.J. Hardy lead off against Tommy Milone (3-2) with a single that A’s right-fielder Josh Reddick bobbled for an error allowing Hardy to go to second. After an out, Steve Pearce drove him in with a sharply hit ball past diving A’s shortstop Adam Rosales. Baltimore added two runs in the ninth against Oakland reliever Ryan Cook on an error and sacrifice fly. ANGELS 6, MARINERS 3 In Seattle, Hank Conger and Mark Trumbo each hit two-run homers and C.J. Wilson worked out of a pair of basesloaded jams to help give the Angels a victory over the Mariners. Wilson (2-0) went 5 1-3 innings, allowing seven hits and three runs. He walked two and struck out a season-high nine. Ernesto Frieri pitched the ninth for his third save in three chances. The Angels would not let Mariners’ starter Aaron Harang (0-3) settle in. They scored in each of the first three innings for a 5-0 lead, chasing Harang before the fourth. INTERLEAGUE GAME TIGERS 10, BRAVES 0 In Detroit, Anibal Sanchez struck out 17 in eight marvelous innings for Detroit, confounding the Braves in a dazzling performance. Sanchez set a team record for strikeouts in a nine-inning game, and he had a mathematical chance of tying the major league mark of 20 when he was pulled after eight innings and 121 pitches. Sanchez (3-1) took off his hat as he was leaving the field following the top of the eighth, acknowledging a huge ovation at Comerica Park after he struck out Dan Uggla, his final hitter. Paul Maholm (3-2) allowed eight runs in 3 2-3 innings after giving up only three in his first four starts. Detroit’s Matt Tuiasosopo homered and drove in a careerhigh five runs. —AP

ST. LOUIS: Starter Lance Lynn No. 31 of the St. Louis Cardinals dodges an inside pitch while attempting to bunt against the Pittsburgh Pirates during the sixth inning. —AFP

Nationals, Cardinals advance WASHINGTON: Jordan Zimmermann was terrific in his second complete game of the season and the Washington Nationals limited the Cincinnati Reds to one hit for the second straight game in a 1-0 victory on Friday night. Zimmermann (4-1) struck out four and walked one while improving to 3-0 with a 1.36 ERA in five career games against Cincinnati. The right-hander needed only 91 pitches to record his third career complete game. It was the first time the Reds managed just one hit in consecutive games since July 5-6, 1900, against Brooklyn, according to research by the Elias Sports Bureau that the team provided. The Houston Astros from Sept. 14-15, 2008, were the last major league team with such a streak. Xavier Paul led off the third with a single to center for Cincinnati’s only hit off Zimmermann. Homer Bailey (1-2) allowed one run and six hits in seven innings for the Reds. The Nationals’ only run came in the third. Bryce Harper tripled to right and scored on Jayson Werth’s single to right. CARDINALS 9, PIRATES 1 In St. Louis, Carlos Beltran homered from both sides of the plate and drove in three runs to lead Lance Lynn and the Cardinals to the victory. Lynn (4-0) struck out nine in seven innings, allowing one run and two hits. The right-hander improved to 9-0 with a 2.63 ERA in his last 10 regular-season appearances. Matt Carpenter and Beltran started the game with home runs for the Cardinals, who have won four straight and five of six. Pirates starter Jonathan Sanchez (0-3) was ejected in the first inning after he hit cleanup hitter Allen Craig with a pitch. When manager Clint Hurdle came out to argue, he also was ejected. Pirates hitting

coach Jay Bell was tossed in the fifth inning when he argued with plate umpire Tim Timmons after leadoff hitter Starling Marte was hit by Lynn for the second straight time. PHILLIES 4, METS 0 In New York, Kyle Kendrick pitched the best game of his career, throwing a three-hitter for Philadelphia and getting home-run help from Ryan Howard. The Phillies ended their threegame skid and dropped the Mets under .500 for the first time this season. Kendrick (2-1) scattered three singles and didn’t permit a runner beyond second base. Philadelphia broke a scoreless tie in the sixth inning when Michael Young hit an RBI single and Howard followed with a long three-run homer off Dillon Gee (1-4). ROCKIES 6, DIAMONDBACKS 3 In Phoenix, Troy Tulowitzki hit a bases-loaded double with two out in the fifth inning, leading Colorado to the victory. Michael Cuddyer had two-out, two-run single in the first, and Wilin Rosario added a solo homer in the sixth for the Rockies. Juan Nicasio (3-0) pitched long enough to earn the win, going five innings and allowing three runs and four hits. Rafael Betancourt earned his eighth save with a scoreless ninth inning. Brandon McCarthy pitched six innings for Arizona and was charged with six runs and nine hits. He struck out seven but dropped to 0-3 on the season with a 7.48 ERA. PADRES 2, GIANTS 1 In San Diego, Andrew Cashner pitched six effective innings and contributed a big hit at the plate, helping the San Diego to the win. Cashner (1-1) allowed one run and five hits, struck out

five and walked one. He retired the last 12 batters he faced, avenging a 2-0 loss to Tim Lincecum and the Giants last Saturday. Cashner also picked up his second major league hit and scored San Diego’s first run in its two-run third inning. Lincecum (2-1) struck out nine and allowed six hits in seven innings. Huston Street worked the ninth for his fourth save. CUBS 4, MARLINS 2 In Miami, Anthony Rizzo had two home runs and four RBIs to power the Cubs to back-to-back wins for the first time this season. Rizzo’s second career two-homer game gave him eight on the season, the most by a Cubs lefthanded hitter in April. Billy Williams (1970) and Henry Rodriguez (2000) each hit seven. Scott Feldman (1-3) allowed two runs in 6 2-3 innings, and Kevin Gregg recorded his second save. Darwin Barney had three hits for Chicago, which beat Miami 4-3 on Thursday and had been 0-6 following a win. Wade LeBlanc (0-4) gave up four runs in six-plus innings and Joe Mahoney hit his first career homer for the Marlins. DODGERS 7, BREWERS 5 In Los Angeles, Adrian Gonzalez drove in the tying and go-ahead runs with a two-out double in the seventh inning, Carl Crawford homered and the Dodgers beat the Brewers. Justin Sellers greeted reliever Burke Badenhop (0-2) with a leadoff single in the seventh and advanced on a sacrifice bunt by Jerry Hairston Jr. Nick Punto drew a two-out walk from Michael Gonzalez, and Adrian Gonzalez followed with a drive off the glove of center fielder Carlos Gomez as Sellers and Punto scored to give Los Angeles a 5-4 lead. — AP

Volkswagen Behbehani sponsor second Annual Junior Masters Tournament Kuwait teams qualify as 1st & 2nd runner-up

NEW YORK: Jose Bautista No. 19 of the Toronto Blue Jays connects an eighth inninghome run against the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium. —AFP

KUWAIT: Volkswagen Behbehani, recently held the second annual Volkswagen Junior Masters Middle East Championship in Kuwait. Organized on an annual basis since 11 years, the Junior Masters Tournament is a Volkswagen group initiative through which Volkswagen Behbehani sponsors and supports a youth tournament aimed at boys under the age of 13 who compete in regional qualification rounds in the GCC. Eight teams from Kuwait took part in a local first-round football knockout stage from which two teams qualified as 1st and 2nd runner-up. The qualifying teams will head to Dubai to compete in the regional championship where the first and second place teams from Kuwait will be competing against the other first and second teams from neighboring GCC countries. Commenting on the Volkswagen Junior Master Tournament, Abdullah Ali, Volkswagen Behbehani General Manager, Kuwait, said: “The Volkswagen Junior Masters tournament is now in its second year in the Middle East and aims to bring together talented players, under the age of 13, who are passionate about football and enjoy being part of the team. The tournament is one of the largest of its kind organized worldwide and Volkswagen Behbehani is proud to present to our younger generation with a platform where they can exhibit and practice their favorite sport skills amongst other talented young athletes from all over the world. We wish the Kuwait team best of luck as they proceed to Dubai for the set of next rounds” The objective of the Junior Masters

Tournament falls in line with Volkswagen Behbehani’s commitment to the society as it continuously strives to promote initiatives designed for the well-being of younger generation. Volkswagen Behbehani encourages and supports youngsters interested in the “people’s sport”, football to participate in up-coming matches held in an exciting and competitive environment. The team qualifying as the Middle

East winner will represent the region at the Junior Masters World Championships in a friendly match, taking place in Germany. In addition to it, the qualifying team will also be given a tour of the Volkswagen factory where the young boys will have a chance to have an enriching and unmatchable experience at the automotive site. For more information please visit www.behbehanimotors.com.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

S P ORTS

Two-handed Belmonte back at his Australian roots ALEXANDRA HEADLAND: Jason Belmonte left Australia nearly five years ago to ply his trade on the Professional Bowlers Association tour in the United States. A relative stranger from a country with a limited international bowling pedigree, he arrived with plenty of confidence, some definite lane cred - 34 perfect 300 games - and, most strikingly of all, a very unusual style. About that delivery: two-handed from the right side, with the ball spinning at up to 600 revolutions per minute, nearly 20 percent more than bowlers using a conventional, one-handed style. It’s a huge departure from the norm, both on the PBA Tour, where Belmonte has exceled and is still one of only three men using that style, or among the millions of social bowlers. But on this day Down Under, not long after becoming one of only two foreign

players to win one of the four PBA tour’s “majors” - the USBC Masters in February the now No. 1-ranked Belmonte was back at his roots, conducting a bowling “boot camp” at a modest, 20-lane alley on the Sunshine Coast north of Brisbane in Queensland state. The setting was Aussie style. While Belmonte, voted 2009 rookie of the year on the PBA Tour, held court with his group of 44 enthusiasts on one side of the hardwood lanes, a young girl’s birthday party was being celebrated at the other. In between, young families were enjoying a Saturday morning of bowling with the kids. On another lane, a serious-looking blond-mop of a kid no more than 10 was rolling ball after ball down the lane, looking over at Belmonte from time to time to try to cheekily pick up any free advice. Some of those who showed up for Belmonte’s boot camp, and they ranged

in ages from their early teens to a woman in her late 60s, paid up to $415 for the two-day training clinic and a pro-am. And six or seven of the group being tutored by Belmonte and Chicago native Diandra Asbaty, a winner of one of the women’s tour majors, were two-handers. “It’s very much the concepts and lessons that we teach, and 97 percent of them are for one-handed or two-handed styles,” Belmonte says, explaining how his style doesn’t stop him being able to transfer the tricks of the trade to the novices. “We certainly don’t want to limit ourselves with certain styles. There are some specific things I discuss with twohanded players, but I pull them aside to work with them separately.” Everyone appeared to go home happy. “Jason is the consummate professional,” says John Griffin, one of the Suncity Tenpin directors. “One of our young (attendees) had a

rather peculiar style, and when I watched her yesterday, at the foul line and with her swing, she’s already made changes for the better,” he said. Belmonte, now 29, first picked up a bowling ball at the age of 2 at his parent’s 16-lane alley, the Orange Tenpin Bowl, west of Sydney in New South Wales state. He first came to international attention in the final of the World Masters in Barnsley, England, in 2007 when he beat American star and 2007-08 PBA bowler of the year Chris Barnes in the semifinals. “At first glance it seems like a joke,” Barnes said at the time when asked to describe Belmonte’s two-handed style. “Then it gets a little scary.” It’s not so shocking anymore. Belmonte proudly talks of the “little army” of two-handed bowlers he’s seen crop up in his travels. “It’s kind of happened,” he says. “Maybe many of those

people began to do it because of the success I’ve had.” And more of that success this year. Heading into the PBA’s “summer swing” in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from May 20 to June 2, he leads the tour in averages and competition points, and is third in the 2012-2013 earnings period that began in November and ends on Dec. 31 with more than $130,000. Belmonte has just under $500,000 in career earnings in the U.S. And he’s now up to 60 perfect 300 games. “Leading the points and averages is something - if you are leading those categories, you are probably doing fairly well,” Belmonte says. “But in the last couple of years, I have always improved my ranking. I started in the 20s, went to 8, 6 and then 2nd. When I got to 2, I thought if I keep going in that direction there is only one place I can go. And now I’m No. 1.” — AP

Glover leads by one as Guan makes cut

The official partnership announcement took place during a press conference

VIVA signs five-year sponsorship agreement with Kuwait Football Association (KFA) KUWAIT: VIVA, Kuwait’s fastest-growing telecom operator, announced a five-year partnership with the Kuwait Football Association (KFA). VIVA was announced the exclusive sponsor of all national football teams that fall under KFA and the Kuwaiti league for the 2013-2014 to 20172018 football seasons. The official partnership announcement took place during a press conference held yesterday at the Regency Hotel, Al Bidaa. The partnership signifies VIVA role as the supporter of the Kuwaiti football teams in regional and international competitions. VIVA also took this opportunity to confirm its commitment towards supporting various sport events and raising Kuwait’s name sporting events as well as developing Kuwaiti football through supporting the local football league. The agreement was signed by KFA’s Chairman, Sheikh Dr. Talal Al-Fahad Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah, and VIVA’s Chief Executive Officer, Eng. Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Badran during the press conference. Commenting on the agreement, KFA’s Chairman, Sheikh Dr. Talal Al-Fahad Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah stated: “Kuwait has a special passion for football, therefore, partnering with a company that shares the same passion for this sport, such as VIVA, is essential to guarantee a successful and fruitful partnership. This partnership is the first of its kind in Kuwait, and we are certain that granting this sponsorship to such an innovative company will open the doors of opportunity for more players to take on this profession, on the local and international front.” Sheikh Talal added, “This sponsorship will allow players to shine in Kuwaiti clubs’ fields and we look forward to meeting new faces that will contribute to developing the future of Kuwaiti football.” Sheikh Talal pointed out that this sponsorship will apply to the participation of the various Kuwaiti football teams in friendly and official matches, including the premier national football team, substitute, Olympic, youth, or junior football teams, in addition to closed field, beach football and female football teams. VIVA’s Chief Executive Officer, Eng. Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Badran said: “We are very proud to be the first telecom operator to make such a significant sponsorship in the sports field. This also marks the continuation of our collaboration with KFA that was initiated in 2011. The sports sector has been one of the company’s main strategy focuses since its inception, and this sponsorship falls within that strategy. VIVA will spare no efforts in

supporting the various Kuwaiti teams in Gulf, regional and international tournaments.” VIVA enjoys a prominent track record of sports sponsorships that includes former agreements made with renowned international football teams; Manchester United Football Club and Real Madrid.

Chairman, Sheikh Dr. Talal Al-Fahad Al-Ahmad AlSabah, and VIVA’s Chief Executive Officer, Eng. Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Badran during the signing of the contract

AVONDALE: Lucas Glover reacts after making a putt on the 13th hole during the second round of the Zurich Classic of New Orleans. —AFP “You just keep piling on confithe second round with eight birdies dence, trying to do the right things, and three bogeys. “I haven’t been here in a while. I take advantage when you get a good haven’t been in this position in a long number and be aggressive when you time so it will be nice to get some rest choose to be. “So I am just trying to this afternoon and just keep doing build my confidence right now and make as many birdies as I can when I what I am doing.” Glover, who clinched his only am able.” British world number four Justin major title at the 2009 US Open, made a fast start with five birdies in his first Rose, the highest-ranked player in the seven holes, building on the welcome field, returned a 69 to sit five strokes confidence he had gained with his off the lead at seven-under, one better putter in the opening round. “It was than 2012 Masters champion Bubba good,” the three -times PGA Tour Watson, who fired a best-of-the-day champion said. “It just kind of piled on 65. Defending champion Jason Dufner, from yesterday. I made some (putts) who clinched last year’s New Orleans early and got the confidence up. “I had some hiccups but nothing title in a playoff with South African Els, too bad. It’s not easy out there now, carded a 70 to squeeze through right it’s a little breezy, but it was there for on the cutline. Seventy professionals and amateur the taking this morning.” Asked how it felt after posting Guan advanced to the weekend, with back-to-back low rounds at the TPC former major winners Keegan Bradley, Louisiana, Glover replied: “It’s just Lee Janzen, Mike Weir and Justin steps. Yesterday was a good step, Leonard among those who missed out. — Reuters today was a good step.

Noren nudges ahead in windy Seoul Chairman, Sheikh Dr. Talal Al-Fahad Al-Ahmad AlSabah, and VIVA’s Chief Executive Officer, Eng. Salman Bin Abdul Aziz Al-Badran

Godolphin doping scandal puts ‘The Sport of Kings’ in the dock PARIS: The powerful Godolphin stable may have described the doping scandal that has engulfed them as a “dark day” in their illustrious history but the same could be said for the whole of racing. The sport that thrives on its historical status as “The Sport of Kings” has made great play over the years about how integrity is crucial to a sport that derives the vast majority of its income for prize money on cash investments by ordinary punters. Despite several race-fixing scandals, those punters and sponsors have stayed loyal to racing because they have largely believed that the sport was honest, with horses running on their merits. But the revelation on Monday that 11 horses of one of Godolphin’s trainers Mahmood Al Zarooni had tested positive for banned anabolic steroids has put a huge dent in that perception, even if such cases are rare. Racing, though, has had its issues with doping over the years. In Australia, pre-race testing was introduced in the 1970s when a Sydneybased gang was caught after they doped several horses to stop them from winning. Western Australia had a spate of doping cases in the following decade when several horses were tested positive for the stimulant etorphine, sometimes referred to as “elephant juice”. Its use only came to light when one horse powered from last to first

NEW ORLEANS: While Chinese prodigy Guan Tianlang stunningly made his second consecutive cut on the PGA Tour, American Lucas Glover surged into a one-shot lead in Friday’s second round of the Zurich Classic of New Orleans. Former US Open champion Glover maintained red-hot form with his putter at the rain-softened TPC Louisiana, firing a five-under-par 67 after teeing off on a relatively calm morning in Avondale, Louisiana. Seeking his first PGA Tour victory in nearly two years, the 33-year-old rolled in an 18-foot birdie putt on his final hole, the parfive 18th, to post a 12-under total of 132. Fellow American Boo Weekley, who holed out from 105 yards to eagle his opening hole, the par-four 10th, was alone in second after carding a 68 with compatriot D.A. Points a further stroke back, also after a 68. Four-times major winner Ernie Els was four shots off the pace after shooting a 69 while China’s 14-yearold Guan once again caught the attention of the golfing world as he ended the round at three-under 141, right on the cutline. “I think I played a very good round today,” eighth-grade schoolboy Guan, who became the youngest player to make the cut in a major championship at the Masters two week ago, told Golf Channel after mixing five birdies with two bogeys on the way to a 69. “I made a lot of birdies and got a couple of good up-and-downs, so it was still a pretty good round.” Asked what his goals were for the weekend, Guan replied: “Play my best golf to go further.” Guan’s remarkably poised display in front of large galleries at the TPC Louisiana took some of the limelight away from Glover, who was delighted to be in contention for his first PGA Tour title since the 2011 Wells Fargo Championship. “I am excited,” Glover told Golf Channel after taking early control in

in a flash of the eye, all but refused to be pulled up and then dropped dead when it returned to the winner’s enclosure. The United States, too, has come in for criticism from European rivals for allowing horses to run on the diuretic furosemide, marketed as Lasix, which prevents them from bleeding, a common occurrence among horses when under stress. European trainers taking horses to the United States have said the use of furosemide was an unfair advantage. The use of the drug will be banned at the prestigious end of season Breeders’ Cup this year, despite protests from US trainers. “ There’s no doubt that Lasix improves a horse’s performance,” reigning English champion trainer John Gosden, who had a successful spell training in California, told The Guardian newspaper before the last edition of the race. “One basic reason is that it reduces body weight (via fluid loss). It also reduces pressure on the capillaries, so there’s no doubt that as a drug, it helps horses to run faster. “If you’re having a so-called world championship, from that point of view you probably need to have it drug-free.” The irony of the Godolphin case is that the stable’s supremo, Dubai ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum fought hard for doping rules to be reviewed in the United States. Now he finds Godolphin-who have recorded over 2,000 winners in

14 countries including 200 Group One winners since his brainchild came to fruition in 1992 — in the spotlight for different reasons. The British Horseracing Authority (BHA) formally charged 37-year-old Al Zarooni on Wednesday, warning that he could be stripped of his training licence if found guilty at a disciplinary hearing on Thursday. He has described his administration of the drug to the 11 horses-and four others who were not tested-as a “catastrophic error”. It will also dent the public perception of Godolphin’s famous blue silks and Sheikh Mohammed, who once famously stayed in the stable with his superstar Dubai Millennium as he lay dying from colic. “Sheikh Mohammed is an incredibly proud man, the horse to him is almost like family and this scandal will have hurt him very deeply,” a racing manager for a leading owner told AFP under condition of anonymity. “Racing is a huge part of his life. His (own maroon and white) silks and those of Godolphin racing abroad are like a statement about Dubai and its international status and prestige and this scandal will to him have shamed both him and his country but through no fault of his own. “The stigma that will attach itself to those of his horses running in the future is unquantifiable and it will be interesting to see how the crowd reacts when his first winner returns to the enclosure.” — AFP

SEOUL: Swede Alexander Noren birdied the last hole to take a one-shot lead after the third round of the Ballantine’s Championship in Seoul yesterday. The 30-year-old, seeking a fourth European Tour title, fired a threeunder-par 69 at the Blackstone Golf Club in Icheon to finish on nine under for the championship, one ahead of Spain’s Pablo Larrazabal (68) and Scotland’s Peter Whiteford (69). Australian duo Marcus Fraser and Brett Rumford shot 69s to sit tied fourth at the co-sanctioned Asian Tour event. “It was a nice way to finish, and it was a long, tough day, a lot of wind,” Noren told reporters. “My short game I think held it together, and I didn’t have that many chances but I took care of

them when I got chances for birdies and made the important pars when I needed. So it was a big fight day.” Noren’s last tour titles came in 2011 when he lifted the Nordea Masters crown a few weeks after winning the Wales Open. The world number 60 said he was looking forward to the battle today. “I’m just trying to play well tomorrow, and it’s going to be a really fun day,” Noren said. “I haven’t been in the lead in a long time, and I’ve had some good finishes, but it will be a lot of fun. But I’m just trying to play good and make birdies and try to make more birdies than the other ones.” Rain, lightning and poor visibility forced delays to the tournament over the first two days and Noren

was one of the lucky players to finish his second round on Friday and avoid an early start. Noren was one back on six under after rounds of 71 and 67 but the Swede recorded four birdies and a lone bogey at the par-four ninth in his third round to take control of the 2,205,000 Euro ($2.87 million) event. Jose Manuel Lara of Spain, joint second-round leader, could only manage a level par 72 to leave him three back in a tie for sixth. South African former British Open champion Louis Oosthuizen was a further shot adrift after a 71. Thai duo Kiradech Aphibarnrat (75) and Arnond Vongvanij (76) dropped out of title contention and home hope Park Sanghyun (69) led the Asian charge in tied 10th. —Reuters

ICHEON: Alexander Noren of Sweden tees off during the Ballantine’s Championship at Blackstone Golf Club. —AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

S P ORTS

Lakers face elimination

GERMANY: Russia’s Maria Sharapova reacts during the semi-final versus Germany’s Angelique Kerber at the WTA Porsche Tennis Grand Prix in Stuttgart. —AFP

Sharapova holds on to reach Stuttgart final STUTTGART: Defending champion Maria Sharapova yesterday booked her place in the final of the Stuttgart WTA tournament after seeing off Germany ’s Angelique Kerber with a 6-3, 2-6, 7-5 victory in yet another three-set tussle. The 26-year-old Russian has also been taken to three sets in both her previous matches, when she saw off Lucie Safarova, then Ana Ivanovic in Friday’s semi, and showed some grit to see off Kerber, who was cheered on by the crowd. French Open champion Sharapova has played seven-and-a-half hours in her three matches here on clay, but comfortably took the first set with two breaks, before Kerber returned the compliment in the second. The third-set was a battle royal as the pair shared five breaks and third-seed Kerber refused to yield until the final phase of the 2hrs, 16mins match. The German played some great line shots to frustrate the Russian and level at 5-

5 before Sharapova held her serve, then used her third and final break to take the match. “All credit to Angelique, she played a great match,” said Sharapova, who won last year’s tournament here on her Stuttgart debut before going on to win the fourth Grand Slam title of her career at Roland Garros. “I won this tournament last year on the way to the French Open so I am really pleased to get back into the final again.” In today’s final, Sharapova will face either second-seed Li Na of China or qualifier Bethanie Mattek-Sands of the USA, ranked 104th in the world, who has made it through to the semi-finals on her first appearance in the main draw. Sharapova has never lost to MattekSands in their five previous meetings, but Li won their last match in January’s Australian Open semi when the Chinese won 6-2, 6-2; her fifth win over the Russian, who has beaten her eight times. —AFP

Oilers rout Wild, Sabres roll ST. PAUL: Corey Potter and Nail Yakupov both scored two goals, and the Edmonton Oilers prevented the Minnesota Wild from clinching a spot in the Western Conference playoffs with a 6-1 rout on Friday night. Taylor Hall and Jordan Eberle each added a goal and two assists for the Oilers, who won for the second time in 11 games but will miss the playoffs for the seventh straight season. Nikolai Khabibulin stopped 38 shots. Mikko Koivu scored for the Wild, who could have gotten into the playoffs for the first time in five seasons with a win. Instead, Minnesota will enter late yesterday’s season finale at Colorado tied with Columbus for eighth place in the West, one point behind seventh-place Detroit. Minnesota owns the tiebreaker and can secure a postseason spot with a win. If Detroit gets a point in its season finale, Columbus wins, and Minnesota loses, the Wild would be eliminated. SABRES 2, ISLANDERS 1 In Bufallo, Thomas Vanek scored the lone goal in the shootout, and Ryan Miller made 30 saves before the tiebreaker to give Buffalo a victory over New York in the regular-season finale for both teams. Miller, playing in his 500th game with the Sabres, sealed the win when he stopped John Tavares’ shot in the third round of the shootout. Brian Flynn scored in regulation for the Sabres, off an assist from Vanek. Keith Aucoin scored and Evgeni Nabokov made 21 saves through overtime for the Islanders, who moved up to sixth place in the Eastern Conference but will need help to stay there. The Islanders (24-17-7) lead the New York Rangers and Ottawa

Senators by one point, but the Rangers have one game left, and Ottawa has two remaining this weekend. Buffalo will miss the playoffs for the second straight season and fourth in six years. The Sabres head into the offseason with questions about the futures of general manager Darcy Regier, interim coach Ron Rolston, and Miller, who is entering the final year of his contract. BLACKHAWKS 3, FLAMES 1 In Chicago, Patrick Kane and Jonathan Toews scored 3:28 apart in the first period, and Chicago beat Calgary. Marcus Kruger added a goal in the third period for the Blackhawks, who are 11-12 in their past 14 games. Chicago (36-65) will wrap up the regular season on Saturday at St. Louis. Corey Crawford was sharp in making 25 saves and keeping the Blackhawks in the lead throughout. The only goal he allowed was Chris Butler’s short-handed tally - Butler’s first goal in 65 games. Joey MacDonald stopped 35 shots in the final game of the season for the Flames (19-25-4), who failed to qualify for the playoffs for the fourth straight year. The Blackhawks clinched the Presidents’ Trophy, given to the NHL team with the best regular-season record, on Wednesday. Kane and Toews both have a team-leading 23 goals. Kruger’s score was his first goal in 32 games. AVALANCHE 5, COYOTES 4 In Glendale, Matt Duchene scored in a shootout and had three assists, helping Colorado beat Phoenix in what may be the Coyotes’ final home game in the desert. — AP

LOS ANGELES: Tim Duncan had 26 points and nine rebounds, and the San Antonio Spurs pushed the Los Angeles Lakers to the brink of first-round playoff elimination with a 120-89 victory in Game 3 on Friday night, the worst home playoff loss in franchise history. Tony Parker had 20 points and seven assists as the Spurs methodically seized control of the series by dominating their third straight meeting with the short-handed Lakers, who played without their top four guards due to injury. Dwight Howard had 25 points and 11 rebounds, and Pau Gasol added his first career playoff triple-double with 11 points, 13 rebounds and 10 assists, but the Spurs were far too much for a team without Kobe Bryant and Steve Nash. Andrew Goudelock scored a career-high 20 points in his first playoff start. The Spurs can close it out in Game 4 today. The Lakers exceeded their 29-point home loss to Portland on May 22, 2000, the previous worst home defeat for the 16-time NBA champion franchise. With Bryant and Nash joined by Jodie Meeks and Steve Blake on the injured list, the Lakers started Goudelock and Darius Morris, using a starting five that had never started together for the second time in three games. Morris added 24 points, getting 12 in the fourth quarter of the historic blowout. KNICKS 90, CELTICS 76 In Boston, Carmelo Anthony scored 26 points and New York moved to the brink of its first playoff series victory in 13 years, routing Boston in Game 3. Quickly taking the crowd out of it in the first NBA game here since the Boston Marathon bombings, the Knicks built a 16-point halftime lead and now are on the verge of taking out the Celtics. Raymond Felton added 15 points and 10 assists for the Knicks, who haven’t advanced in the playoffs since reaching the 2000 Eastern Conference finals. They will go for the sweep here Sunday afternoon. They’ll have to hope they have JR Smith, who inexplicably threw an elbow right into Jason Terry’s face with 7:06 left and was thrown out of the game with a flagrant foul 2, an automatic ejection. The league office will review the play and can fine or suspend Smith. Jeff Green scored 21 points for the Celtics, who will try to become the first NBA team to win a series after trailing 3-0.

LOS ANGELES: Lakers forward Pau Gasol (right) of Spain, and San Antonio Spurs forward Tim Duncan battle for a rebound during the second half in Game 3 of a first-round NBA basketball playoff series. — AP WARRIORS 110, NUGGETS 108 In Oakland, Stephen Curry played through a sprained left ankle to score 29 points and Golden State beat Denver Nuggets to take a 2-1 series lead. Curry also had 11 assists, Jarrett Jack added 23 points and seven assists, and Harrison Barnes and Carl Landry each scored 19 points to help the Warriors rally from 13 points down in the third quarter. Golden State still had to sweat out Andre Iguodala’s missed 3-pointer as the buzzer sounded, setting off a gold-confetti celebration throughout the announced sellout crowd of 19,596. Ty Lawson had a career playoff-high 35 points to go with 10 assists, and reserve Corey Brewer scored 16 points as Denver dropped its second straight game - and its grip on the best-of-seven series. Game 4 is today in Oakland. — AP

Bangladesh tighten grip on Test against Zimbabwe HARARE: An 84-run partnership between Shakib Al Hasan and Mushfiqur Rahim tightened Bangladesh’s grip on the second Test against Zimbabwe, but it was fast bowler Robiul Islam who deserved the plaudits on day three at Harare Sports Club. Robiul became the first seamer to take five wickets in consecutive innings for Bangladesh as Zimbabwe were bowled out for 282 — a firstinnings deficit of 109 — but the tourists required a calm stand from Shakib and Mushfiqur to rescue their second innings after a calamitous start. Although Shakib was out to part-timer Hamilton Masakadza for 59 shortly before the close, Mushfiqur’s unbeaten 50 took Bangladesh to stumps on 163 for five, giving them an overall lead of 272. Zimbabwe were aided by some controversial umpiring as they bounced back from their disappointing first innings to reduce Bangladesh to 18 for three, with Tamim Iqbal dubiously given out caught behind and Mohammad Ashraful adjudged lbw. However with the Decision Review System not in place due to the prohibitive costs, the decisions from umpires Tony Hill and Ian Gould were final. Mominul Haque helped rebuild the innings with a steady 29 in a patient stand with Shakib, before he became Shingirai Masakadza’s third wicket when he was caught by the bowler’s older brother, Hamilton. At that stage Bangladesh’s ability to set Zimbabwe a difficult target was under question, but Shakib and Mushfiqur ensured their dominance, and also enjoyed some fortune as Shakib was dropped twice. “We’re in a pretty good position going into the last couple of days,” said Bangladesh assistant coach Corey Richards. “It hasn’t all been smooth sailing today but fortunately a bit of experience showed in Shakib and Mushy putting on a pretty important partnership for us.” Nevertheless Robiul was undoubtedly the star of the day, following up his 6 for 71 in the second innings of the first Test by charging in for 33 overs to claim figures of 5 for 85 in the first innings of the second. When Elton Chigumbura’s career-best 86 threatened to turn the tide in a brisk 85-run partnership with Richmond Mutumbami, who made 42, Robiul promptly dismissed both batsmen with the second new ball. — AFP

HARARE: Bangladesh’s captain Mushfiqur Rahim (left) bats as Zimbabwe’s fielder Vusi Sibanda looks on day three of the second Test cricket match. —AFP

SCOREBOARD HARARE: Scoreboard at tea on the third day of the second Test between Zimbabwe and Bangladesh yesterday: Bangladesh first innings 391 all out (Shakib Al Hasan 81, Nasir Hossain 77, Mushfiqur Rahim 60, E. Chigumbura 3-75, K. Meth 2-41) Zimbabwe first innings V. Sibanda c Mushfiqur b Robiul 10 R. Chakabva c Mushfiqur b Robiul 12 H. Masakadza b Shakib 14 B. Taylor c Shakib b Sohag 36 M. Waller c Shakib b Sohag 32 E. Chigumbura b Robiul 86 R. Mutumbami lbw b Robiul 42 G. Cremer not out 11 K. Meth c Mushfiqur b Sohag 16 S. Masakadza c Mushfiqur b Robiul 5 K. Jarvis b Sohag 0 Extras (5b, 11lb, 1wd, 1nb) 18 Total (all out, 96 overs, 424 mins) 282 Fall of wickets: 1-23 (Chakabva), 2-26 (Sibanda), 3-45 (H. Masakadza), 4-97

(Taylor), 5-163 (Waller), 6-248 (Mutumbami), 7257 (Chigumbura), 8-274 (Meth), 9-281 (S. Masakadza), 10-282 (Jarvis). Bowling: Robiul 33-11-85-5; Sajidul 16-5-48-0; Ziaur 7-3-8-0; Shakib 19-4-66-1; Sohag 19-1-59-4; Ashraful 2-2-0-0. Bangladesh second innings T Iqbal c Mutumbami b S. Masakadza 7 J Islam c Mutumbami b S. Masakadza 2 Mohammad Ashraful lbw b Jarvis 4 Mominul Haque not out 15 Shakib Al Hasan not out 13 Extras (2lb) 2 Total (3 wkts, 16 overs, 73 mins) 43 Fall of wickets: 1-7 (Tamim Iqbal), 2-12 (Jahurul Islam), 3-18 (Mohammad Ashraful). Still to bat: Mushfiqur Rahim, Nasir Hossain, Ziaur Rahman, Sohag Gazi, Sajidul Islam, Robiul Islam. Bowling: Jarvis 8-0-28-1; S. Masakadza 7-2-10-2; Cremer 1-0-3-0.

Te’o, Smith, Barkley go pro a year late NEW YORK: The next time some college football fan gripes about his favorite player going to the NFL before his senior season, we’ll have a ready reply. Three of them, actually. Manti Te’o. Geno Smith. Matt Barkley. The trio returned for a fourth year of college football and look what it got them. Heartache. Embarrassment. And, certainly in the case of Barkley, a much lighter wallet than he would’ve had a year ago. The first round of the NFL draft came and went. All three were left waiting by the phone. It never rang. That’s a harsh lesson every rising junior with pro aspirations should heed. Think only of yourself. If there’s a chance to dramatically improve your draft position, then stay in school. If you’re already projected as a firstrounder, it’s time to get started on your real job. Rest assured, the school will get along just fine without you. Sure, a college degree is great to have, but you can always finish up those last few classes in the offseason. After getting passed over Thursday night, Te’o must’ve been having second thoughts. We’ll never know for sure if the Notre Dame linebacker would’ve been a first-round pick in 2012, as many projected, going on the assumption that he wouldn’t done any better in the 40-yard dash than the painfully slow time he turned in at this year’s combine. But at least he wouldn’t have been lugging around all that off-the-field baggage - a ruse of a relationship with a girlfriend that wasn’t - plus a stinker of a performance against Alabama in the national championship game. Even if the whole sordid affair with the fake girlfriend had still occurred, chances are it wouldn’t have been discovered until Te’o had already signed a pro contract. The money would’ve already been in the bank. Instead, he’s left to wonder how much money he left on the table by returning to the Fighting Irish

for what seemed a dream season until it took an oh-so-wrong turn at the end. Ditto for Smith, who blossomed as a junior in West Virginia’s wide-open offense, throwing for more than 4,300 yards with 31 touchdowns and just seven interceptions. If he had decided to go pro at that point, the last bit of tape NFL scouts would’ve had on him was a 70-33 rout of Clemson in the Orange Bowl, when he threw for a record six touchdowns and 401 yards to earn the MVP award. Smith kept it going through his first give games as a senior, when he was the hands-

down favorite to win the Heisman Trophy and looked every bit like a guy who would be the top pick in the draft. He and the Mountaineers were unstoppable, averaging more than 50 points a game. Unfortunately, the season still had eight games to go. There was another side to the mountain, and it was all downhill. Smith still put up some dazzling numbers 4,205 yards passing, 42 touchdowns, just six interceptions - but West Virginia dropped six of its last eight, including a blowout loss to Syracuse in the Pinstripe Bowl. Suddenly,

INDIANAPOLIS: In this Feb. 25, 2013 file photo, Notre Dame linebacker Manti Te’o runs a drill during the NFL football scouting combine in Indianapolis. Te’o made it to the NFL a day later than he expected, motivated to play well because he was snubbed in the first round of the draft. —AP

everyone was finding flaws in Smith’s game. His confidence was shaky. He setup and delivery were faulty. He was too emotional, too loose with the ball. Heck, some pointed out that he didn’t play well in poor weather which comes off as the ultimate bit of nitpicking. Even so, Smith still expected to go somewhere in the first round, maybe even among the top 10 picks. That’s why he turned up at Radio City Music Hall in New York with all the other projected first-rounders. For most of them, their dreams came true. All Smith could do was look on glumly as one player after another went ahead of him - even a teammate he helped look so good, receiver Tavon Austin, selected at No. 8 by the St. Louis Rams. Te’o stayed away from New York, allowing him to sort out whatever anger or humiliation he was feeling in private. That was the right call, showing he does have the ability to make good decisions beyond the online dating world. On Friday - finally! - both Te’o and Smith heard their names. Back to back, no less. The Notre Dame star went to San Diego in the second round with the 38th overall pick; Smith was selected next by the New York Jets. Barkley was still waiting. Amazingly, he wasn’t picked in the first three rounds - passed over through a total of 97 selections. The last four rounds will be held late yesterday. The guess here is that Te’o will turn out to be a good, solid pro, while Smith has a shot at greatness. Certainly, no other rookies will have a bigger chip on their shoulders. When asked to analyze Te’o, former NFL coach-turned-TV analyst Jon Gruden said, “He’s got a real good football aptitude. He plays faster, I think, than people give him credit. I think he’s a very good, instinctive, high-effort, well-coached inside linebacker that’s got to prove he can play on every down. There is no question about that. But I’m really confident

that he can do it.” As for Smith: “It’s very underestimated what this kid can do from a football standpoint. He does a lot above the neck as well as making plays with his arm and his mobility.” Then there’s Barkley, who was being mentioned in the same breath with Andrew Luck and Robert Griffin III before last year’s draft. Not anymore. Barkley, for some reason, returned to Southern Cal for one more year. Maybe he was counting on less competition at the quarterback position in the 2013 draft (and, indeed, only one QB was taken Thursday). Maybe he truly wanted to take another shot at a national championship with a team that was pegged as the preseason No. 1. Whatever the case, Barkley couldn’t have been more wrong in his decision, at least from a financial point of view. The Trojans didn’t come close to living up to the hype, barely finishing with more wins than losses (7-6). He threw twice as many interceptions and wound up spraining his shoulder in a late-season game, which raised more doubts in the eyes of the scouts. Barkley’s stock dropped so severely that, frankly, it would’ve been a surprise if he had been picked in the first round. “I think Barkley’s going to be a starter in the league at some point,” Gruden said, not sounding nearly as upbeat as he did about the other two. “He’s going to be a guy that relies on his system, complete execution around him. I think his supporting cast is going to be important to him.” Now, Barkley will tell you that he has no regrets about his decision to return to USC. He’ll tell you that getting the chance to be a leader during tough times will help him down the road. Hogwash. Barkley blew it. So did Te’o and Smith. All those juniors-to-be out there better not to make the same mistake. —AP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

S P ORTS

Bilbao puts Barca title party on ice BARCELONA: Barcelona conceded a late equalizer to spoil what would have been another heroic eﬀort by Lionel Messi, with the 2-2 result at Athletic Bilbao yesterday meaning the leaders must wait another week for a chance to clinch the Spanish League title. With his team trailing 1-0 and limited in its ability to threaten Bilbao’s area, Messi went oﬀ the bench in the 59th to transform his side and in 10 minutes the visitors were in front. Messi began by extending his record run of scoring in 20 straight league appearances when he dribbled through a pack of defenders to level in the 67th.

champions continued their dominance over Atletico Madrid by rallying for a 2-1 win at Vicente Calderon Stadium. Messi started on the bench resting his right hamstring that kept him out of the previous three rounds and with Barcelona hosting Bayern Munich on Wednesday needing to overcome a 40 deficit to reach the Champions League final. “Messi is slowly recovering and we hope to have him back to full strength,” Roura said. “The more fit he is, the better chance we have to fight back against Bayern.” Messi had looked sluggish in the thrashing at Bayern last Tuesday, but

SPAIN: Real Madrid’s Portuguese defender Pepe (right) vies with Atletico Madrid’s midfielder Koke (left) and Atletico Madrid’s midfielder Mario Suarez during the Spanish League football match. —AFP He then set up for ward Alexis Sanchez two minutes later, and Barcelona looked set to collect the three points at San Mames until Bilbao’s Ander Herrera pounced on a loose ball to shoot just inside the post in the 90th. Barcelona can win what would be its 22nd league title in the next round against Real Betis. “We drew at a diﬃcult ground and the title will come when it does because none of these games are easy,” said Barcelona assistant Jordi Roura. “Messi is the best and it makes a diﬀerence when he is on the pitch.” Barcelona remained 13 points ahead of Real Madrid after the defending

he was electric in Bilbao after coming off the bench. His goal took his league-leading total to 44 and was his 58th in all competitions this campaign. Barcelona started well enough with Alexis hitting the post, but Bilbao’s up-tempo attack struck first in the 27th when Aritz Aduriz dribbled by Gerard Pique before putting in a low cross for Markel Susaeta to streak in and poke home at the far post. Susaeta grazed a second goal in the 56th when he curled a free kick off the corner of the goalframe as Barcelona continued to look pedestrian without its star.

But ever ything changed when Messi went on. His first touch turned into a gallop down the middle of Bilbao’s half and a pass to Pedro Rodriguez, who fired into the arms of goalkeeper Gorka Iraizoz. Messi, then, apparently decided to just do it all himself. Messi showed why he’s considered to be the best player in the world with a gorgeous goal. Bilbao looked to have Messi surrounded and safely in check when he received the ball outside the area. But seven slick touches, three blinding changes of foot, and he was suddenly through four defenders and slotting the ball into the corner of the net with his favorite left boot. Not done, Messi momentarily put his team on the cusp of the title - still needing Atletico to beat Madrid later by heading down a cross from Dani Alves to Alexis, who controlled the ball with his chest before turning and rifling it in. Bilbao, however, didn’t despair and a late push paid off when Adriano’s clearance of a cross destined for Fernando Llorente fell to Herrera, who drove the ball just beyond the reach of goalie Victor Valdez. Madrid’s win kept it unbeaten against Atletico in 25 straight games dating to 1999 and maintained its psychological advantage over its crosstown rival heading into their clash in the Copa del Rey final on May 17. Madrid was without top scorer Cristiano Ronaldo healing a muscle injur y for Tuesday ’s Champions League semifinal against Borussia Dortmund when it must overturn a 41 loss. And Atletico couldn’t have had a better start with Radamel Falcao scoring four minutes in. Madrid, however, without sparkling at any stage, still managed to squeak out the win in an effortless fashion. Atletico defender Juanfran Torres deflected Angel Di Maria’s free kick into his own net in the 13th, and Di Maria grabbed the winner from a pass by Karim Benzema in the 63rd. In its run, Madrid has won 19 and drawn six against the lowly Atletico. Also, Celta Vigo won 1-0 at Levante to provisionally escape the relegation zone with its first back-to-back victories of the season. —AP

Udinese up to fifth as Bologna snatch draw MILAN: A well-taken second-half strike from Argentinian midﬁelder Roberto Pereyra sealed a precious 1-0 win for Udinese away to Cagliari to keep the northerners’ push for a place in Europe on track yesterday. Cagliari, who started the day only two places but nine points behind

Udinese in 10th, ﬁnished the match with 10 men after Mauricio Pinilla was shown a straight red for a ridiculous shove from behind on Giampiero Pinzi. However, by then the damage had been done as Udinese moved up to ﬁfth ahead of the rest of the week-

ITALY: Cagliari’s Nicola Murru (right) challenges Udinese’s Polish midfielder Piotr Zielinski during a Serie A soccer match. —AP

end’s programme. Elsewhere Saturday Atalanta were denied victory against Bologna by a superbly-worked goal from Alberto Gilardino. Atalanta had the edge over the Rossoblu in rainy Bergamo and came close to breaking the deadlock in a lively second half thanks to Croatian teenager Marko Livaja. Minutes later, a poor punched clearance by Bologna goalkeeper Gianluca Curci from Davide Brivio’s left-wing cross fell to Giorgi Luigi, who with an acrobatic bicycle kick bundled the ball into the net. Atalanta’s celebrations lasted all too brieﬂy, however. When Alessandro Diamanti powered down the left he was given space to deliver an inch-perfect cross into the area for Gilardino, who controlled well before turning the defence and beating Andrea Consigli in the home goal. In yesterday’s late second-placed Napoli travel to Pescara knowing that anything but a win could see Juventus clinching a second successive Serie A title if they beat Torino in the Turin derby today. Juventus have an 11-point lead on Napoli, with AC Milan in third a further seven points adrift ahead of today’s visit of Catania. — AFP

Photo of the day

Aniol Serrasolses performs at Las Nubes, Chiapas, Mexico. www.redbullcontentpool.com

Bayern’s reserves claim record STUTTGART: Bayern Munich made ten changes from their stunning Champions League semi-final, first leg win over Barcelona, but still beat Freiburg 1-0 at home yesterday to break the record for the number of points in a Bundesliga season. Centre-back Jerome Boateng was the only survivor from the starting line-up which blitzed Barcelona 4-0 last Tuesday at the Allianz Arena as coach Jupp Heynckes rested his stars for Wednesday’s return leg at the Camp Nou. Swiss winger Xherdan Shaqiri hit the winner when he fired in a direct free -kick on 35 minutes to give Bayern, who were confirmed as champions three weeks ago, their 27th win from their 31 league games this season. With 84 points this season, they have now passed Borussia Dortmund’s previous record of 81, set in May 2012, for the most Bundesliga points collected in a season, but were made to work by a dogged Freiburg side. It was also Heynckes’ 50th Bundesliga victor y since taking charge at Bayern in July 2011 with his team bidding to become the first German team to win the treble of European, league and cup titles. “We all have one goal, we want to win titles,” said Bayern centre-back Daniel van Buyten, a first-leg substitute against Barcelona. “We’re all moving forward, we have a strong bench and no one is envious.” Despite the defeat, Freiburg remain fifth in the league but only two points separate the five teams bidding for fourth spot and a play-off for a Champions League place next season. Second-placed Dortmund, who routed Real Madrid 4-1 last Wednesday in their Champions League semi-final, first leg, also made 10 changes for their 2-1 win at Fortuna Duesseldorf. Centre-back Mats Hummels was the only survivor from the Real win

when striker Robert Lewandowski scored four goals and the Poland star failed to score after coming off the bench for the last 20 minutes, bringing to an end his club record-run having scored in 12 consecutive games. Midfielder Nuri Sahin put Dortmund ahead with a stunning goal from 35 metres out before Poland captain Jakub Blaszczykowski scoring in the 70th minute, 60 seconds after coming off the bench. But Duesseldorf midfielder Adam Bodzek pulled a goal back with a header two minutes from time before Dortmund’s Australian goalkeeper Mitchell Langerak pulled off a stun-

GERMANY: Munich’s Mario Gomez (right) and Freiburg’s Oliver Baumann challenge for the ball during the German First Division Bundesliga soccer match. —AP ning save in added time to push beat Nuremberg 2-1 to keep their survival hopes alive. The team that finishMartin Latka’s shot onto the post. Bayer Leverkusen remain third with es 16th enters a promotion/relegation a 1-0 home win over Werder Bremen play-off against the side that finishes who suspended Austrian bad-boy third in the second division. Fuerth, striker Marko Arnautovic and Dutch who host Freiburg in a fortnight, have forward Eljero Elia after the former now just one home match left to was cautioned by police for speeding avoid becoming the first Bundesliga team to go an entire campaign withon Friday. Germany striker Stefan Kiessling out a single home victory. — AFP

Dundee still alive

Arsenal jeers won’t rile Van Persie — Ferguson LONDON: Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson says he has no concerns about the prospect of Robin van Persie facing abuse from fans of his former club Arsenal when the teams clash at the Emirates Stadium today. Van Persie left Arsenal in an acrimonious £24 million ($37 million, 28 million euros) transfer last year and has been a revelation in his first season at Old Trafford. His hat-trick at home to Aston Villa on Monday took his tally for the campaign to 24 league goals and secured the title for United, which Arsenal have pledged to acknowledge by forming a guard of honour for the visiting team. The sight of Van Persie being applauded on to the pitch as a league champion by his former team-mates is liable to provoke strong feelings among the Arsenal support, but Ferguson believes the Dutchman will not be fazed. “I don’t bother about it, and I don’t think Robin should bother about it either,” said the United manager. “There was a bit of booing when he played (against Arsenal) at Old Trafford, and I expect a portion of fans will do that. That is the modern generation, I am afraid. “For Arsenal to have one of their players go to their biggest rivals of the last 20 years doesn’t sit well with their fans, nor Arsene (Wenger, the Arsenal manager) for that matter. “But it does happen. You just have to move on. Arsenal have moved on now. They are challenging for a Champions League place and have every chance of

getting one.” Ferguson has urged United to go on and break the Premier League points record of 96 by winning their four remaining games, but Sunday’s showdown will be of far greater significance to the fight for Champions League qualification. Arsenal, in third, fourth-place Chelsea, and fifth-place Tottenham Hotspur are currently separated by just two points, but Wenger’s side are at a disadvantage as they have played a game more than both of their rivals. However, their form is excellent, with six wins in their last seven matches, and Wenger believes his side’s performances prove that Van Persie has not been unduly missed. “What you want to focus on is that when the big players go, you just want to get around it and try to find a new organisation that is efficient,” he said “You always miss a big player. The only thing I can say is it took us a while to get around it, but if you look at the number of goals we’ve scored, it’s similar to last season (1.91 goals per game compared to 1.95). “It took us a while to find a different way because the game went through him (Van Persie) a lot. We had to find a new balance between defending and attacking, but now we are stabilised.” Wenger finds himself with another striker-shaped hole to fill ahead of Sunday’s game, as Olivier Giroud is suspended after he lost an appeal against the red card he received in last weekend’s 1-0 win at Fulham. — AFP

netted a 35th-minute penalty which confirmed Bayer’s Champions League place for next season with a ten-point lead over fourth-placed Schalke 04 and three matches left. Mid-table VfL Wolfsburg ran out 30 winners at home to Borussia Moenchengladbach, but the relegation battle heated up with two of the bottom three teams picking up wins. After their 3-2 defeat at home to Hanover 96, bottom side Greuther Fuerth’s relegation was confirmed as 16th placed Augsburg romped to a 30 win at home to German Cup finalists VfB Stuttgart. Second-from-bottom Hoffenheim

FRANCE: Marseille’s Ghanaian forward Andre Ayew (right) vies with Lorient’s French midfielder Yann Jouffre (left) during the French League football match. —AFP

Marseille squeeze past Lorient PARIS: Marseille strengthened their grip on Champions League football next season while retaining an outside chance of pipping bitter rivals Paris Saint-Germain to the Ligue 1 crown with a 1-0 win away to Lorient yesterday. Mathieu Valbuena struck the decisive goal after 25 minutes at Stade du Moustoir as Marseille secured their 12th 1-0 victory of the campaign to extend their unbeaten run in the league to eight matches. The win moved Elie Baup’s side to within six points of leaders PSG, who are away to relegation-threatened Evian on Sunday, with four games remaining and gave them a five-point advantage over third-placed Lyon, who host Rhone derby foes Saint-Etienne, in the race for the final automatic Champions League qualification spot.

Defeat for Lorient saw the Brittany club remain seventh, leaving success in the French Cup as their only realistic hope of playing in Europe next term. The home side almost took the lead when Maxime Baca saw his attempt cleared off the line by Lucas Mendes after Steve Mandanda had only partially saved the full-back’s low strike. Marseille capitalised on that stroke of fortune, though, with Valbuena putting the visitors in front moments later as he drilled home from the edge of the area after Andre Ayew’s initial strike was repelled by goalkeeper Fabien Audard. Yann Jouffre had an equaliser correctly ruled out for offside at the other end before the break, while Mandanda produced a marvellous fingertip save to thwart Maxine Barthelme in the second half. — AFP

GLASGOW: Dundee kept their slim hopes of avoiding relegation from the Scottish Premier League alive with a 10 win over Hearts at Dens Park in a match where both sides ended with 10 men. Hearts were reduced to 10 men after 28 minutes when defender Andy Webster was shown a second yellow card. Brian Easton sent a header against the woodwork for Dundee before Ryan Conroy’s 35-yard free-kick took a deflection off the defensive wall to send keeper Jamie MacDonald the wrong way as the Dark Blues took the lead in the 82nd minute. Nicky Riley was sent off a minute before the end of normal time but the Dens Park side, who appointed John Brown as their permanent manager in midweek, held on for the win. With St Mirren being held to a 3-3 draw away to Hibernian it means that Dundee’s battle for survival continues until next weekend at least. Their third straight victory means they are now only eight points behind the Paisley side with three games remaining. Niall McGinn’s 20th goal of the season secured a 1-0 victory for Aberdeen over Kilmarnock to give new Dons boss Derek McInnes a winning debut at Pittodrie. Steven MacLean kept St Johnstone’s European hopes alive with a late winner against ten man Inverness Caledonian Thistle. Inverness defender David Raven saw red in the 12th minute for a foul on Rowan Vine. Both Gregory Tade and Mehdi Abeid hit the woodwork as St Johnstone pressed but the breakthrough didn’t come until the 77th minute when Nigel Hasselbaink crossed for MacLean to head past Antonio Reguero. — AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

S P ORT S Soccer results/standings English Premier League results Everton 1 (Pienaar 16) Fulham 0; Manchester City 2 (Aguero 28, Y.Toure 83) West Ham 1 (Carroll 90); Newcastle 0 Liverpool 6 (Agger 3, Henderson 17, 76, Sturridge 54, 60, Borini 74); Southampton 0 West Brom 3 (Fortune 6, Lukaku 67, Long 77); Stoke 1 (Adam 46) Norwich 0; Wigan 2 (Boyce 11, McManaman 49) Tottenham 2 (Bale 9, Boyce 90-og). Playing today Arsenal v Manchester Utd, Chelsea v Swansea, Reading v QPR. Playing tomorrow Aston Villa v Sunderland English Football League results Championship Barnsley 2 Hull 0; Blackburn 1 Crystal Palace 1; Blackpool 2 Derby 1; Bristol City 1 Huddersfield 3; Cardiff 1 Bolton 1; Ipswich 3 Birmingham 1; Leeds 1 Brighton 2; Middlesbrough 2 Charlton 2; Millwall 0 Nottingham Forest 1; Peterborough 1 Sheffield Wednesday 0; Wolves 1 Burnley 2. Division One Brentford 0 Doncaster 1; Bury 3 Yeovil 2; Carlisle 0 Colchester 2; Crawley 2 Hartlepool 2; Crewe 2 Walsall 0; Leyton Orient 1 Oldham 1; Notts County 2 Coventry 2; Scunthorpe 3 Swindon 1; Sheffield Utd 0 Preston 0; Shrewsbury 3 Portsmouth 2; Stevenage 0 Milton Keynes Dons 2; Tranmere 0 Bournemouth 0. Division Two AFC Wimbledon 2 Fleetwood Town 1; Accrington 0 Oxford 3; Burton 3 Gillingham 2; Cheltenham 0 Bradford 0; Chesterfield 4 Exeter 0; Dagenham and Redbridge 0 York 1; Northampton 2 Barnet 0; Rochdale 1 Plymouth 0; Rotherham 2 Aldershot 0; Southend 0 Morecambe 1; Torquay 3 Bristol Rovers 3; Wycombe 1 Port Vale 1.

Italian Serie A results Atalanta 1 (Giorgi 67) Bologna 1 (Gilardino 76); Cagliari 0 Udinese 1 (Pereyra 56). Playing today Chievo v Gerona, Palermo v Inter, Parma v Lazio, Roma v Siena, Sampdoria v Fiorentina, Torino v Juventus (all 1300), AC Milan v Catania (1800) Scottish Premier League results Aberdeen 1 (McGinn 4) Kilmarnock 0; Dundee 1 (Conroy 82) Hearts 0; Hibernian 3 (Griffiths 31, 86, Caldwell 67) St Mirren 3 (Goncalves 60, McAusland 78, 82); St Johnstone 1 (MacLean 77) Inverness CT 0. Playing today Motherwell v Celtic Scottish Football League results First Division Airdrie 0 Livingston 2; Cowdenbeath 2 Dumbarton 3; Morton 0 Hamilton 2; Partick 3 Dunfermline 3; Raith 0 Falkirk 0. Second Division Alloa 4 Albion Rovers 1; Ayr 0 Arbroath 1; Brechin 1 Stenhousemuir 2; Queen Of The South 2 East Fife 2; Stranraer 0 Forfar 3. Third Division Berwick 0 Annan Athletic 2; East Stirling 2 Rangers 4; Montrose 1 Queen’s Park 2; Peterhead 3 Clyde 0; Stirling 1 Elgin City 1. German Bundesliga results Bayern Munich 1 (Shaqiri 35) Freiburg 0; Bayer Leverkusen 1 (Kiessling 35-pen) Werder Bremen 0; VfL Wolfsburg 3 (Arnold 34, Olic 61, Diego 75) Borussia M’gladbach 1 (Mlapa 52); Hoffenheim 2 ( Weis 11, Salihovic 19) Nuremberg 1 (Simons 58-pen); Augsburg 3 (Moelders 61, de Jong 83, Ji 86) VfB Stuttgart 0; Fortuna Duesseldorf 1 (Bodzek 88) Borussia Dortmund 2 (Sahin 20, Blaszczykowski 70). Playing today Mainz 05 v Eintracht Frankfurt, Schalke 04 v Hamburg

English Premier League table after yesterday’s matches (played, won, drawn, lost, goals for, goals against, points): Man Utd

34 27

4 78 35 84 — champions Man City 34 21 8 5 61 31 71 Arsenal 34 18 9 7 65 35 63 Chelsea 33 18 8 7 66 35 62 Tottenham 34 18 8 8 60 43 62 Everton 35 15 14 6 52 38 59 Liverpool 35 14 12 9 67 42 54 West Brom 34 14 6 14 46 44 48 Swansea 33 10 12 11 43 42 42 West Ham 35 11 9 15 41 49 42 Fulham 35 10 10 15 44 53 40 Stoke 35 9 13 13 31 41 40 S’ampton 35 9 12 14 47 57 39 Norwich 35 8 14 13 33 54 38 Sunderland 34 9 10 15 38 45 37 Newcastle 35 10 7 18 43 66 37 Aston Villa 34 8 10 16 36 63 34 Wigan 34 8 8 18 39 62 32 QPR 34 4 12 18 29 56 24 Reading 34 5 9 20 37 65 24 Note: Top four teams qualify for the Champions League and the bottom three clubs will be relegated English Football League tables Championship Cardiff 45 25 11 9 70 43 86 — champions Hull 45 24 6 15 59 50 78 Watford 45 23 8 14 84 56 77 Brighton 45 18 18 9 67 43 72 Crystal Palace44 18 14 12 70 60 68 Bolton 45 18 13 14 67 59 67 Nottingham 45 17 16 12 61 56 67 Leicester 45 18 11 16 68 46 65 Charlton 45 16 14 15 61 58 62 Birmingham 45 15 15 15 62 68 60 Ipswich 45 16 12 17 48 59 60 M’brough 45 18 5 22 61 68 59 Derby 45 15 13 17 64 62 58 Burnley 45 15 13 17 60 60 58 Blackpool 45 14 16 15 60 61 58 Leeds 45 16 10 19 55 65 58 Blackburn 45 14 15 16 54 61 57 Huddersfield 45 15 12 18 51 71 57 Sheffield 45 15 10 20 51 61 55 Millwall 44 15 10 19 51 61 55 P’borough 45 15 9 21 64 72 54 Barnsley 45 14 12 19 54 68 54 Wolves 45 14 9 22 55 67 51 Bristol City 45 11 8 26 58 80 41 — relegated Division One Doncaster 46 25 9 12 62 44 84 — champions Bournemouth46 24 11 11 76 53 83 — promoted Brentford 46 21 16 9 62 47 79 — play-offs Yeovil 46 23 8 15 71 56 77 — play-offs Sheff Utd 46 19 18 9 56 42 75 — play-offs Swindon 46 20 14 12 72 39 74 — play-offs Leyton 46 21 8 17 55 48 71 Milton 46 19 13 14 62 45 70 Walsall 46 17 17 12 65 58 68 Crawley Town46 18 14 14 59 58 68 Tranmere 46 19 10 17 58 48 67 Notts County 46 16 17 13 61 49 65 Crewe 46 18 10 18 54 62 64 Preston 46 14 17 15 54 49 59 Coventry 46 18 11 17 66 59 55 Shrewsbury 46 13 16 17 54 60 55 Carlisle 46 14 13 19 56 77 55 Stevenage 46 15 9 22 47 64 54 Oldham 46 14 9 23 46 59 51 Colchester 46 14 9 23 47 68 51 Scunthorpe 46 13 9 24 49 73 48 — relegated Bury 46 9 14 23 45 73 41 — relegated Hartlepool 46 9 14 23 39 67 41 — relegated Portsmouth 46 10 12 24 51 69 32 — relegated Note: Coventry deducted 10 points for going into administration, Portsmouth deducted 10 points for failure to comply with Football League Insolvency Policy Division Two Gillingham 46 23 14 Rotherham

46 24

Port Vale

46 21 15

Burton Albion46 22 10 Cheltenham 46 20 15 Northampton46 21 10 Bradford

46 18 15

9 66 39 83 — champions 15 74 59 79 — promoted 10 87 52 78 — promoted 14 71 65 76 — play-offs 11 58 51 75 — play-offs 15 64 55 73 — play-offs 13 63 52 69 — play-offs

Chesterfield 46 Oxford Utd 46 Exeter 46 Southend 46 Rochdale 46 Fleetwood 46 Bristol Rovers 46 Wycombe 46 Morecambe 46 York 46 Accrington 46 Torquay 46 Wimbledon 46 Plymouth 46 Dagenham 46 Barnet 46 Aldershot

18 19 18 16 16 15 16 17 15 12 14 13 14 13 13 13

13 8 10 13 13 15 12 9 13 19 12 14 11 13 12 12

15 19 18 17 17 16 18 20 18 15 20 19 21 20 21 21

60 60 63 61 68 55 60 50 55 50 51 55 54 46 55 47

45 67 61 65 62 64 55 61 70 61 57 60 69 60 60 60 61 58 60 55 68 54 62 53 76 53 55 52 62 51 59 51 — relegated 46 11 15 20 42 60 48 — relegated

Stoke close to safety after win over Norwich Stoke 1

Norwich 0

STOKE-ON-TRENT: Stoke City can begin preparing for a fifth consecutive season in the Premier League after a scrappy 1-0 win at home to Norwich City yesterday sent them eight points clear of the relegation zone. Charlie Adam scored the decisive goal moments after half-time to give Stoke a second consecutive victory and move Tony Pulis’ side to the 40-point mark usually synonymous with topflight survival. Norwich are only two points and two positions worse off in 14th place, but Chris Hughton’s side will want at least another victory from their final three games to make sure of their place among the English elite. In a poor-quality first half at the Britannia Stadium, the only real chance of note saw Stoke striker Cameron Jerome thwarted by one of his own players. The former Birmingham City striker met Adam’s 22nd-minute corner with a well-hit halfvolley, but his goal-bound effort was inadvertently blocked by midfield colleague Steven Nzonzi. Jerome’s frustrations got the better of him minutes later when he was booked for clattering into visiting goalkeeper Mark Bunn, while Norwich striker Grant Holt and Stoke centre-forward Peter Crouch were also cautioned as the first half drew to a fractious close. Adam broke the deadlock in the first minute of the second period with a trademark Stoke goal. Crouch flicked on a long ball from the back and the Scotland midfielder nodded the ball away from a defender before driving a low shot past Bunn. Crouch should have doubled Stoke’s advantage just after the hour, but he committed a dreadful miss, failing to even make contact

LONDON: Stoke City’s Steven NíZonzi (centre) battles with Norwich City’s Robert Snodgrass (right) during the English Premier League match. —AP with the ball when Adam picked him out from the byline on the right. Nzonzi then threatened to extend Stoke’s lead when he forced a smart

save from Bunn, while Crouch produced another forgettable miss, only to have his blushes spared by the assistant referee’s flag.—AFP

Everton’s Euro bid on track Matches on TV (Local Timings)

Scottish Premier League table Celtic 34 22 6 6 82 31 72 — champions Motherwell 34 16 9 9 59 44 57 Inverness 35 12 15 8 59 54 51 St Johnstone 35 12 14 9 42 40 50 Ross County 35 12 13 10 45 45 49 Dundee Utd 35 10 14 11 49 56 44 Aberdeen 35 11 12 12 39 41 45 Kilmarnock 35 10 12 13 47 45 42 Hibernian 35 10 12 13 43 50 42 Hearts 35 10 10 15 35 46 40 St Mirren 35 8 13 14 44 56 37 Dundee 35 7 8 20 25 61 29 Note: Table split in half for final weeks of the season, so teams below the line cannot finish above side above it regardless of points total Scottish Football League tables First Division Partick 35 23 8 4 76 28 77 — champions Morton 35 20 7 8 72 43 67 Livingston 35 14 10 11 56 53 52 Hamilton 35 14 9 12 51 42 51 Falkirk 35 14 8 13 48 47 50 Raith 35 10 13 12 42 46 43 Dumbarton 35 13 3 19 58 83 42 Dunfermline 35 14 7 14 61 57 34 Cowdenbeath35 7 12 16 48 64 33 Airdrie Utd 35 4 7 24 39 88 19 Note: Dunfermline deducted 15 points for going into administration Second Division Queen of South3528 Alloa Brechin Arbroath Forfar S’housemuir Ayr Stranraer East Fife Albion

35 34 35 35 35 35 35 35 34

19 7 17 4 15 7 16 3 12 13 12 5 9 7 8 8 7 3

Third Division Rangers 35 24 Peterhead 35 Queen’s Park 35 Berwick 35 Elgin 35 Montrose 35 Stirling 35 Annan Athletic35 Clyde 35 East Stirling 35

16 8 16 8 14 7 12 10 12 10 11 9 11 9 12 4 8 5

2 91 23 89 — champions 9 61 35 64 13 67 59 55 13 47 56 52 16 65 73 51 10 58 57 49 18 52 63 41 19 41 70 34 19 50 62 32 24 45 79 24

3 86 29 80 — champions 11 49 28 56 11 60 51 56 14 59 54 49 13 64 67 46 13 59 67 46 15 57 57 42 15 53 64 42 19 41 64 40 22 47 94 29

Italian Serie A standings Juventus 33 24 5 4 64 20 77 Napoli 33 19 9 5 61 32 66 AC Milan 33 17 8 8 56 36 59 Fiorentina 33 17 7 9 62 42 58 Udinese 34 14 12 8 46 39 54 Inter Milan 33 16 5 12 51 45 53 Roma 33 15 7 11 64 54 52 Lazio 33 15 6 12 40 40 51 Catania 33 13 9 11 41 39 48 Cagliari 34 11 9 14 41 53 42 Bologna 34 10 10 14 44 43 40 Parma 33 10 9 14 39 43 39 Chievo 33 11 6 16 33 48 39 Atalanta 34 11 8 15 36 49 39 Sampdoria 33 10 9 14 38 49 38 Torino 33 8 13 12 43 49 36 Siena 33 9 9 15 34 45 30 Palermo 33 5 14 14 30 46 29 Genoa 33 6 11 16 33 51 29 Pescara 33 6 4 23 25 67 22 Note: Sampdoria (one point), Torino (one point), Atalanta (two points) and Siena (six points) all docked points for involvement in the “Calcioscommesse” illegal betting scandal.

English Premier League Reading v QPR Abu Dhabi Sports HD 3 Abu Dhabi Sports HD 5 Chelsea v Swansea Abu Dhabi Sports HD 6 Arsenal v Man United Abu Dhabi Sports HD 3 Abu Dhabi Sports HD 5

15:30

17:00 18:00

Spanish League

LIVERPOOL: Fulham’s Eyong Enoh vies for the ball with Everton’s Steven Pienaar (right) and Marouane Fellaini, during their English Premier League match at Goodison Park. —AP

Everton 1

Fulham 0

LIVERPOOL: Everton remain firmly in the hunt to secure a place in Europe next season after South Africa midfielder Steven Pienaar inspired his side’s 1-0 win over Fulham yesterday. Pienaar struck early in the first half at Goodison Park and that was enough to see off the lacklustre Cottagers and keep Everton in contention for both the Champions League and Europa League berths. A spot in the second-tier Europa League is the more likely scenario for David Moyes’ men as they are three points behind fourth placed Chelsea, who have two games in hand in the battle for Champions League qualification. Fulham had lost their previous 19 league visits to Goodison Park and the way Martin Jol’s side played for long periods suggested they knew it would be another fruitless exercise. Their supporters clearly had little hope that the barren run would end as only a couple of hundred made the trip to

Merseyside. Everton were on top from the start as Marouane Fellaini’s early header was saved by goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer. The decisive moment arrived in the 16th minute when Kevin Mirallas and Leon Osman combined to play in Seamus Coleman close to the byline and he cut the ball back to the penalty spot where Pienaar ran in unchallenged to side-foot home. Since his return to Everton from Tottenham the South African has now scored 10 goals in 46 league matches. Victor Anichebe looped a long-range header wide for Everton as the hosts kept pressing, while Fulham suffered a blow when former Manchester United striker Dimitar Berbatov limped off injured. Fellaini had Everton’s two best chances before halftime, curling one effort wide after neat interplay by Pienaar and Nikica Jelavic, before Anichebe blocked his goalbound effort. Fulham improved in the second half, but Urby Emanuelson should have hit the target from Alex Kacaniklic’s cross 10 minutes after the interval. Mirallas drew a fine save from Australian international Schwarzer after flicking the ball over Stanislav Manolev. Fellaini could have wrapped up victory five minutes from time but somehow bundled over Leighton Baines’ cross from close range while substitute Ross Barkley forced a good save from Schwarzer when put clean through in stoppage-time.—AFP

Espanyol v Granada Aljazeera Sport +2 Malaga v Getafe Aljazeera Sport +2 Valladolid v Sevilla Aljazeera Sport +6 Sociedad v Valencia Aljazeera Sport +2

13:00 18:00 20:00 22:00

Italian League Chievo Verona v Genoa Aljazeera Sport +1 Aljazeera Sport 1 HD Palermo v Internazionale Aljazeera Sport +9 Parma v SS Lazio Aljazeera Sport +7 Sampodria v Fiorentina Aljazeera Sport +5 AS Roma v Siena Aljazeera Sport +2 AC Milan v Catania Aljazeera Sport +1 Aljazeera Sport 1 HD FSV Mainz v Eintracht Dubai Sports Schalke v Hamburger Dubai Sports

16:00

16:00 16:00 16:00 16:00 21:45

16:30 18:30

French League Lyonnais v Saint Etienne Aljazeera Sport +4 Nice v ES Troyes Aljazeera Sport +4 Evian Thonon v Saint-Germain Aljazeera Sport +4

15:00 18:00 22:00

West Brom thrash Saints Southampton 0

West Brom 3

SOUTHAMPTON: Southampton were more sinners than Saints yesterday as they slumped to a 3-0 home loss to West Bromwich Albion, ending up with nine players in a stormy encounter which also saw their rivals have a man sent for an early bath. The rot set in for the hosts, still not entirely out of the relegation picture with this loss, after

just six minutes, as Marc-Antoine Fortune drove in from close range. Southampton lost their opening four games and it looked likely they would struggle to survive after successive promotions, but the sixgame unbeaten run they brought into this match had moved them towards mid-table safety. Even so, Mauricio Pochettino’s men pressed the self-destruct button in some style as Romelu Lukaku set up the opener for West Brom and then poached the second with a low strike in the 66th minute after Fortune returned the earlier compliment with a neat through ball. Saints had earlier come close to levelling through Nathaniel Clyne but visiting keeper Ben Foster pushed his shot onto the crossbar. West Brom, comfortable in eighth spot at

start of play on the back of a strong opening half of the campaign, made light of the unavailability of captain Chris Brunt with a knee injury. And three minutes after the second goal, Southampton’s hopes of a recovery faded still further as substitute Gaston Ramirez was redcarded after elbowing Shane Long - though Fortune joined him in being sent off after manhandling the Uruguayan. With 13 minutes left, Long put the result beyond all doubt when he fired through the legs of home goalkeeper Artur Boruc for 3-0, Lukaku again instigating the move. Daniel Fox completed Saints’ misery when he left them down to nine men with eight minutes remaining, picking up a second booking after tangling with Steven Reid.—AFP

Sharapova holds on to reach Stuttgart final

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

Bayern’s reserves claim record

Te’o, Smith, Barkley go pro a year late

Page 17

NEWCASTLE: Liverpool’s English midfielder Jordan Henderson (right) vies with Newcastle United’s French defender Mathieu Debuchy during the English Premier League football match. — AP

Liverpool hit Newcastle for six Newcastle 0

Liverpool 6

NEWCASTLE: Liverpool proved there is life after Luis Suarez by thrashing Newcastle United 6-0 yesterday to leave their hosts nervously hovering above the Premier League relegation zone. Leading scorer Suarez has been handed a 10-match ban for biting Chelsea defender

Branislav Ivanovic, but his absence was barely noticed at St James’ Park as Liverpool returned to winning ways in style after a run of three draws. Goals from Daniel Agger and Jordan Henderson put the visitors 2-0 up at the interval, before Suarez’s replacement Daniel Sturridge claimed a brace early in the second half. Substitute Fabio Borini added a fifth and after Mathieu Debuchy was sent off, Henderson completed a brace of his own as Newcastle fell to their heaviest home defeat of the Premier League era. Victory left Brendan Rodgers’ side in seventh place, five points below Everton ahead of next weekend’s Merseyside derby at Anfield.

Newcastle, meanwhile, remain at risk of being drawn into the relegation zone. Although they have a ﬁve-point lead over third-bottom Wigan, they have played a game more than all four of the teams below them. Newcastle’s fans were still settling into their seats when Liverpool took the lead in the third minute, with Agger beating goalkeeper Rob Elliot to Stewart Downing’s cross and nodding the ball home. As the visiting fans serenaded their absent Uruguayan striker, Rodgers’ side made it 2-0 in the 17th minute with a goal of slick simplicity. Sturridge cushioned a high ball and laid it oﬀ to Philippe Coutinho, before running onto the Brazilian’s through pass and squaring the ball for Henderson to tap into an empty net.

City overcome West Ham Man City 2

West Ham 1

MANCHESTER: Sergio Aguero and Yaya Toure gave deposed Premier League champions Manchester City a 2-1 win at home to West Ham United yesterday, although victory also featured an uncharacteristic error from goalkeeper Joe Hart. Moments after being injured while making a save from West Ham striker Andy Carroll, Hart allowed a shot from the same player to squirm through his grasp, and his legs, as he gifted the visitors an injury-time consolation. Earlier, Aguero’s 16th goal of the season, his 11th in the Premier League, put the hosts in control after 28 minutes of a contest that was predictably subdued, coming at the end of a week in which City had ﬁnally seen their league title move across the city to Manchester United. Samir Nasri exchanged neat passes with both Toure and David Silva on his way into the West Ham area, where, having reached the left-hand by-line, he pulled the ball back for Aguero to convert clinically from six yards. City had to wait until the 83rd minute to be certain of the three points, when Toure collected a short pass from Nasri and sent a stunning 20yard shot soaring into the roof of the West Ham goal, but victory should have been far more comfortable. Moments after the opening goal, defender Pablo Zabaleta almost doubled the lead when West Ham goalkeeper Jussi Jaaskelainen failed

to hold a sharp, long-range shot from Nasri. The Finn made up for his error, however, with a reflex block to deny the Argentine’s follow-up attempt. There was also a gilt-edged chance for Aguero mid-way through the half, after Silva’s pass had been deflected into his path, but on this occasion, the City forward hit the foot of the post from 12 yards when a goal looked a certainty. In response, Carroll placed a header over the crossbar, although the forward’s major contribution to the first half was a trip on Silva that earned him a 19th-minute caution; the fourth consecutive game in which he has been booked. The visitors opened the second half in more enterprising fashion, although City came closest to adding to the goals tally, after 54 minutes, when Nasri’s excellent pass split the West Ham defence and played in Carlos Tevez, who showed poor technique in flashing a shot over the bar from eight yards. Tevez returned the compliment six minutes later with a pass that put through the Frenchman, whose fierce shot from the corner of the six-yard area was well saved by Jaaskelainen. As the City pressure mounted, Tevez was again denied when a desperation block from Joey O’Brien stopped his six-yard shot after more good approach play from Aguero. West Ham’s increased desire to commit men forward was allowing City more room to play and yet another incisive counter-attack ended with Tevez delivering a superb low cross from the right with which Nasri somehow failed to connect from point-blank range, with an open net gaping. Wayward efforts from James Collins and Carroll threatened the home goal late in proceedings, before the on-loan Liverpool striker embarrassed Hart with a powerful shot from 12 yards. —AFP

The hosts were left to rue a gilt-edged opportunity to equalise nine minutes before half-time, when the unmarked James Perch headed Massadio Haidara’s inviting cross wide from close range. The game became niggly in the minutes approaching half-time. Newcastle midfielder Cheick Tiote was at the centre of it, tangling with Liverpool right-back Glen Johnson and then producing a crude stamp on Sturridge that went undetected by the match officials. Newcastle manager Alan Pardew introduced Hatem Ben Arfa and Yoan Gouffran at the break, only for Liverpool to extend their lead in the 54th minute with a goal that owed everything to the brilliance of Coutinho. Picking up the ball wide on the left, the

January signing from Inter Milan ran at the retreating home defence before scooping a pass through a narrow gap to Sturridge, who composed himself before lashing a shot high into the net. Henderson returned the compliment to Sturridge on the hour, unselfishly laying the ball square for the former Chelsea man to claim his second goal, before Borini came off the bench to prod home his first Liverpool goal after a long spell on the sidelines with a shoulder injury. The hosts’ misery was complete moments later when Debuchy was shown a second yellow card for a two-footed lunge at Coutinho, and from the resulting free-kick, Henderson curled in a sixth. — AFP

Hapless Boyce foils Wigan’s escape plot Wigan 2

Tottenham 2

WIGAN: Emmerson Boyce’s late own goal handed Tottenham Hotspur a 2-2 draw yesterday that dealt a major blow to Wigan Athletic’s hopes of avoiding relegation from the Premier League. With Arsenal and Chelsea not in action until today, a Spurs win would have moved them up to third in the table and they took an early lead when Gareth Bale capitalised on a Joel Robles error to open the scoring. But two minutes later, Boyce headed the hosts level before Callum McManaman’s ﬁrst Premier League goal put Wigan ahead just after the interval. However, Boyce inadvertently diverted a Tom Huddlestone free-kick into his own net at the death as Spurs secured a point that leaves them in ﬁfth place, while Wigan remain in the relegation zone, two points adrift of Aston Villa. In an engaging contest at the DW Stadium, Huddlestone hit the Wigan post with a free-kick from a narrow angle after just a couple of minutes. But Wigan conceded the opening goal for the 22nd time in 34 Premier League matches LONDON: Tottenham’s Jermain Defoe (left) fights for following some woeful defending in the the ball against Wigan Athletic’s Paul Scharner dur- ninth minute. Maynor Figueroa played the ing their team’s 2-2 draw in their English Premier ball back to Robles, only for the Spanish goalLeague soccer match. — AP keeper to return the ball to his defender.

When Figueroa knocked the ball back to Robles yet again, the goalkeeper’s attempted clearance caught the bottom of the onrushing Bale’s boot and flew into the net to gift the Welshman his 19th Premier League goal of the season. Less than two minutes later, Wigan pulled level when Shaun Maloney swept over a corner from the right and Boyce steered a header inside the back post. Tottenham continued to press and American forward Clint Dempsey just missed the target with a shot from distance, while midfielder Scott Parker poked narrowly over the bar after swapping passes with Bale on the edge of the area. The Latics threatened once again when a long ball from Paul Scharner picked out Jordi Gomez and the Spaniard laid the ball back for Arouna Kone, whose shot dropped just over the bar. Bale was being restricted by Jean Beausejour and James McCarthy but played a fine pass through for Kyle Walker, whose cross eventually fell for Parker to shoot narrowly over the bar. When Kyle Naughton’s deep cross gave Bale a first proper sight of goal, he could not keep his header down. Robles went some way to redeeming himself by pulling off two close-range blocks from Jermain Defoe and Parker after Tottenham had burst into the area. Shortly after the interval, Wigan substitute Ronnie Stam hit a powerful cross that was pushed away from the top corner by France goalkeeper Hugo Lloris. But three minutes into the second period, McManaman received a pass from McCarthy and darted inside Naughton before thumping a glorious shot past Lloris to put Wigan in front. — AFP

Business

Egypt bourse struggles under govt heavy hand Page 22 Travelers could crack open US budget door Page 23

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

Central banks, economic data to steer investors

Oula achieves KD4.7m in operating profits for 2012 Page 25 Page 26

ADDIS ABABA: An Ethiopian Airlines’ Boeing 787 Dreamliner prepares to take off from Addis Ababa airport in Ethiopia yesterday. — AP

Ethiopian Airlines first to resume Dreamliner jets Regulators approve new battery design ADDIS ABABA: Ethiopian Airlines yesterday became the world’s first carrier to resume flying Boeing Co’s 787 Dreamliner passenger jets, landing the first commercial flight since the global fleet was grounded three months ago following incidents of overheating in the batteries providing auxiliary power. The flight from Addis Ababa to Nairobi was the first since regulators grounded all Dreamliners on Jan 16 after two lithiumion battery meltdowns that occurred on two jets with other airlines within two weeks that month. US regulators approved a new battery design last week, clearing the way for installation and a resumption of Dreamliner flights by airlines around the world. The battery faults raised fears of a possible mid-air fire, drawing worldwide attention to Boeing and denting the reputation of its flagship plane. “I wasn’t aware that I was going to be on the 787 Dreamliner until on my way to the airport. It was a good service and the flight was pleasant,” said Senait Mekonnen, an Ethiopian restaurateur, moments after the plane landed. The fully booked flight

arrived at Nairobi’s Jomo Kenyatta International Airport just after 9.30 GMT, with passengers giving the crew a round of applause upon landing. The grounding of the Dreamliner fleet has cost Boeing an estimated $600 million, halted deliveries of the aircraft and forced some airlines to lease alternative planes. The Dreamliner cost an estimated $20 billion to develop and represents a quantum leap forward in design, offering a 20 percent reduction in fuel burn and added cabin comforts such as higher humidity, larger windows and modern styling. But by sparking fears of a dangerous mid air fire, the battery problems drew worldwide attention to both aircraft safety and the technology behind lithium-ion batteries, which are widely used in laptops, mobile phones, electric cars and other products. The scrutiny turned from what are often called normal “teething pains” for a new plane into a serious crisis for Boeing. As the plane goes back into service, what caused the fire is still unknown. The battery that overheated on a parked Japan Airlines 787 in Boston caught fire and

Saudi Arabia may seize unused land for housing RIYADH: Saudi Arabia’s housing minister said urban land left undeveloped could be confiscated to build much needed homes, local media reported yesterday. The world’s top oil exporter and biggest Arab economy is pushing to reform its housing and labor sectors to make it easier for citizens to get places to live and jobs at private companies. A shortage of land in big cities has frustrated efforts to build half a million homes, a project ordered by King Abdullah in 2011 which analysts say was one of several steps taken to avert ‘Arab Spring’, style unrest. Wealthy Saudis have bought residential land plots around the country as long-term investments, pushing up prices and making them too costly for developers of lower-income housing. Under a previous system, other plots were awarded as land grants to citizens who could not afford to develop them. A royal decree earlier this month ordered ministries to give up land for development to the Housing Ministry. “The expropriation of properties for the public interest is done around the world. We might do it in a limited way,” said Housing Minister Shuwaish Al-Duwaihi in comments in a television interview reported by the Arab News newspaper. Unused military land will also be used for future housing, he added. “We are coordinating with military sectors to take their lands which they don’t need,” he said. —Reuters

burned for more than hour before firefighters put it out. The plane was on the ground and empty. The second incident, which has not officially been termed a fire, occurred during a flight in Japan. An odour of smoke in the cabin and warnings in the cockpit prompted the All Nippon Airways pilots to make an emergency landing and evacuate the aircraft. Boeing said both incidents showed its safeguards had worked. After the second incident, airlines were swiftly barred from flying the 250seat aircraft, which carries a list price of $207 million. The US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) launched a full scale investigation to find the root cause of the Boston fire and examine the process by which the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved Boeing’s design. The NTSB has not yet found the cause, and after hearings last week the investigation continues. The last time an airliner fleet was grounded was more than a generation ago, when the US Federal Aviation Administration banned the McDonnell

Douglas DC-10 jet in 1979 after a crash in Chicago killed 273 people. Boeing spent thousands of hours and millions of dollars redesigning the battery system, drawing on its vast staff of engineers and experts in everything from fighter planes to rockets and satellites. The changes include a revamped battery less prone to heat build-up, a redesigned charger and a stainless-steel enclosure capable of withstanding an explosion and equipped with a metal exhaust tube to vent fumes and gases outside the jet, if the battery overheats. International airlines have been slowly putting the Dreamliner back into their schedules. United Airlines, the only US carrier with the jet, said it will begin commercial flights on May 31. All Nippon Airways plans to conduct its first test flight of the revamped 787 today but has yet to decide when to resume passenger flights. Ethiopian Airlines previously said its fleet did not suffer any of the technical glitches experienced by other Dreamliner jets, though it withdrew the planes from service to undergo the changes required by the FAA.—Reuters

Obama urges US Congress to end ‘dumb’ budget cuts WASHINGTON: President Barack Obama yesterday called on the US Congress to end the “reckless” and “dumb” budget cuts known as the sequester, and to adopt a plan of “smarter” cuts to fuel economic growth. Obama’s weekly address comes after Congress on Friday over whelming approved a bill putting furloughed air traffic controllers back on the job, thus undoing one of the most high profile effects of the so called sequestration, the $85 billion in automatic budget cuts that took effect March 1 and hit federal spending across the board. “This week, the sequester hurt travelers, who were stuck for hours in airports and on planes, and rightly frustrated by it. And, maybe because they fly home each weekend, the members of Congress who insisted these cuts take hold finally realized that they actually apply to them too,” Obama said. “Republicans claimed victory when the sequester first took effect, and now they’ve decided it

was a bad idea all along. Well, first, they should look at their own budget. If the cuts they propose were applied across the board, the FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) would suffer cuts

three times deeper.” According to Obama, Congress on Friday “passed a temporary fix, a BandAid. But these cuts are scheduled to keep falling across other parts of the government that provide vital services for the American people. And we can’t just keep putting Band-Aids on every cut.

It’s not a responsible way to govern.” The president said there were plenty of people, including low income children being cut from government education programs and seniors dependant on food programs, who are suffering from the “reckless” automatic budget cuts. “I hope members of Congress will find the same sense of urgency and bipartisan cooperation to help the families still in the crosshairs of these cuts,” Obama said. He urged the legislature to adopt his proposed budget, which “replaces the next several years of these dumb cuts with smar ter cuts; reforms our tax code to close wasteful special interest loopholes; and invests in things like education, research, and manufacturing that will create new jobs right now.” Obama’s Republican foes accused his administration of “needlessly” disrupting thousands of passengers for political gain in the dragged- out battle over mandatory budget cuts.—AFP

French attacks on Merkel turns heat on Hollande PARIS: An unusually virulent attack on Chancellor Angela Merkel by Francois Hollande’s party has raised the pressure on France’s president to stand up to his German counterpart and reignited the austerity debate in the crisis-hit euro-zone. In a document on Europe released on Friday, Hollande’s Socialist Party pilloried Merkel for what they said was a “selfish” insistence on austerity as the solution to Europe’s three-year-old debt crisis. The document also accused conservative Merkel, who faces elections on September 22, of being obsessed with “Berlin’s trade balance and her electoral future”. While also championing measures to boost the eurozone’s ailing economy and create jobs, Merkel has stressed the importance of first slashing debt and implementing structural reforms. Hollande came to power a year ago vowing to reverse this course and place the focus squarely on breathing life back into the 17-nation zone but critics say he has failed to stand up to Merkel, Europe’s paymaster and political powerhouse. The French president, at a new low in the polls after a torrid few weeks domestically, has called for a “friendly tension” with Merkel but other urged him to go further. “For me, it should be just tension and confrontation if that’s what it takes,” said Claude Bartolone, the president of France’s lower house of parliament, in an interview with the Le Monde daily on Thursday. And the Socialists’ attack has re-encouraged those who believe a focus on austerity is holding Europe back in tackling the crisis. Martin Schulz, president of the European Parliament, who hails from Germany’s opposition Social Democrats, said: “On a national level, we have gone much too far with austerity policies.” “The argument that investor confidence will return with the reduction of public deficits is undoubtedly false,” he told Belgian daily L’Echo. Belgian Prime Minister Elio Di Rupo echoed the thought, telling the La Libre Belgique daily that things had “evolved” and it was time to change course. “Listen to the IMF, the OECD ... what do they say? That the policies of austerity have to stop, the eurozone being the worst off in the world in terms of (economic) recovery,” added Di Rupo. European Commission President Jose Manual Barroso said earlier in the week a “new narrative” was needed that could “unite citizens and come up with a new vision.” But Berlin appeared to be standing firm, with the finance ministry insisting Europe “stay the course” on repairing public finances. Sources close to Hollande said that “one cannot flip the tables in one go” and that “subtle” changes were needed to “re-orient” the debate. But the Socialists’ undiplomatic broadside at Merkel and her economic policy will do little to improve ties between France and Germany, seen as the driving force behind European integration. After talks with German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble, former French prime minister Francois Fillon said on Friday relations between Paris and Berlin had “rarely been as bad”. He added that political forces in Germany were “worried about the risk of seeing France tempted by an antiGerman policy.” Political scientist Thomas Klau, from the European Council on Foreign Relations, said “mutual incomprehension” had broken out between the parties governing the two key powers.—AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

BUSINESS

Egypt bourse struggles under govt heavy hand

Bayt.com report

Seven ways to engage and retain top talent By Lama Ataya

Investors see unsympathetic attitude CAIRO: Egyptian fund manager Mohamed Ayad watched his clients lose money for months until he himself became a victim of the stock market’s slump. “I was fired with many others when trading volumes went down,” said Ayad, a man in his 30s who worked for a securities firm in Cairo until last year. “I have been unable to find a new job as many other people working in the financial sector have also been laid off.” Over two years after Egypt’s revolution ousted president Hosni Mubarak, the stock market continues to sag, plagued by sluggish trading turnover, a lack of new equity issuance and the reluctance of many big foreign investors to commit money. The effect is being felt well beyond

dence to return, analysts and investors say. After Mubarak’s overthrow the Muslim Brotherhood, which took the lion’s share of political power, mounted a public relations campaign to reassure investors that its Islamist ideology did not conflict with their desire to make money. By late last year the campaign appeared to be working; the main stock index, which halved in the months after the revolution, had recovered almost two thirds of those losses. But early this year, a series of regulatory incidents hit the market. One was a clash between authorities and Orascom Construction Industries, the market’s largest stock. In late February the Egyptian Financial Supervisory Authority (EFSA) inter-

CAIRO: Egypt stock exchange’s benchmark index has tumbled 43 per cent since January 2008. —AFP the community of finance professionals in Cairo and Alexandria, the market is viewed as a barometer for business confidence, and its weakness is preventing companies from using it to raise money. Although Egypt’s economy is struggling, the market’s problems are as much political as economic. Investors feel the government is unsympathetic to them, and inclined to intervene in the market to obtain money or settle political scores. Two official decisions this month have raised hopes that the government’s approach to the market is changing, and that it can reach an accommodation with investors. But the decisions will need to be followed by the resolution of other long running issues for confi-

vened to suspend a multi-billion dollar offer for Orascom’s Amsterdam-listed affiliate OCI NV to buy out the shares of the Cairo-listed company. The EFSA said it wanted more information about the transaction, which could result in Orascom being delisted from Cairo. Then in early March, the government slapped a travel ban on Orascom chief executive Nassef Sawiris and his father Onsi Sawiris, two of the country’s most prominent businessmen, in a probe into alleged tax evasion by the company. Later that month, authorities spooked the market by imposing a new tax covering investment gains on an offer by Qatar National Bank (QNB) to buy shares in National Societe Generale Bank (NSGB), and

telling shareholders about the tax only after they had agreed to sell. Taken together, the incidents suggested the government’s attitude to the market was not as benign as it had claimed. A fledgling recovery of foreign fund inflows into the market was halted; the index is down 11 percent from its January peak. The market is still debating authorities’ motives. One theory is that the government, with its budget deficit officially projected to rise to 197.5 billion Egyptian pounds ($28.5 billion) in the fiscal year that will start on July 1, is increasingly desperate to raise money, and that it sees the market as a tempting source of cash. If this theory is right, the government may be disappointed. Much of the money it raises in the short term could be lost in the long term as investors become more reluctant to trade stocks and companies shy away from listing their shares on the market. “They make less than $10 million, $9 million from this tax, a very small amount for making all this trouble,” said Karim Abdelaziz, who manages an Egyptian share fund worth 1 billion pounds at Cairo based Al-Ahly Fund & Portfolio Management. Another possibility is that as Brotherhood backed President Mohamed Mursi consolidates power, his administration is becoming more eager to settle political scores with businessmen who prospered under the old regime. The Sawiris, and wealthy stock market investors, fall in that category. In the long run, that strategy could also be counter-productive, by deterring the business investment which Egypt needs to create jobs and repair its economy - and which the Muslim Brotherhood will need to retain its political support. Abdelaziz said the Orascom tax case could lead to a lengthy court battle, which would risk scaring off more investors who were already concerned about land sales that have been revoked by the government. Authorities accuse some real estate firms of having paid too little for land because of cosy relationships with officials in the Mubarak era. A third theory is that officials making decisions affecting the stock market, some of them new to government after being excluded from power by Mubarak, are simply too inexperienced - or perhaps too distracted by other challenges - to make policies with investor confidence in mind. Hani Helmy, chairman of El Shorouq Brokerage in Cairo, said the government was too busy dealing with street violence, fuel shortages and power cuts to focus on helping the stock market. “I think since the revolution until now, the stock exchange is not a priority to deal with, maybe we are number 10, number 20,” he said. —Reuters

Gulf Bank announces winners of Al-Danah daily draws KUWAIT: Gulf Bank held its Al-Danah daily draws on April 21st 2013, announcing the names of its winners for the week of April 14th to April 18th. The Al Danah daily draws include draws each working day for two prizes of KD1000 per winner. The winners: (Sunday 14/4): Zahrah Sulaiman Ali Al-Qattan, Ahmad Ghazi Jasi Al-Azmi (Monday 15/4): Mohammed Hamed Ghareeb Jamal, Khaled Bader Dhaher Eidan (Tuesday 16/4): Saleh Ayman Saleh Semony, Kholoud Al-Rasheedi (Wednesday 17/4) Hour Khaled Abdullah Al-Ansari, Younus Ali Saifuddin ( Thursday 18/4) Lamia Hamad

Abdulmohsin Al-Hamad, Mariam Mustapha Jumaa Shaaban. Gulf Bank’s Al-Danah 2013 draw lineup includes daily draws (2 winners per working day each receive KD1000), as well as two additional prizes per quarter. Al-Danah’s 2nd Quarterly draw will be held on 27 June (KD250,000, KD125,000, and KD25,000), 3rd Quarter - 26 September (KD500,000, KD125,000, and KD25,000) and the final draw held on 9 January, 2014 announcing winners of KD50,000, KD250,000 and the Al-Danah millionaire. Gulf Bank’s Al-Danah allows customers to win cash prizes and simultaneously encourages them to save money. Chances increase the more money

is deposited and the longer it is kept in the account. Al-Danah also offers a number of unique services including the Al-Danah Deposit Only ATM card which helps account holders deposit their money at their convenience; as well as the AlDanah calculator to help customers calculate their chances of becoming an Al-Danah winner. To be part of the Al-Danah draws, customers can visit one of Gulf Bank’s 56 branches, transfer on line, or call the Customer Contact Center on 1805805 for assistance and guidance. Customers can also log on to www.e-gulfbank.com/aldanahwinners, to find out more about Al-Danah and who the winners are.

KUWAIT: A recent poll by Bayt.com shows that 77 percent of professionals consider themselves very loyal to their company and 72 percent actually like the company they work in. But only 58 percent are satisfied with their job. As an employer you would have jumped through hoops of fire in order to source and attract the very top talent you want in your organization, and then spent a fortune on orientation, induction and training activities. Now the question is how do you ensure these coveted gems remain on your headcount? Below are a few reminders the HR experts at Bayt.com, the Middle East’s #1 Jobsite would like you to keep in mind in order to retain your stars, keeping them engaged and satisfied. 1. Keep communication channels open At Bayt.com communicating frequently, openly and honestly is one of the key values, and every effort is made to keep communication channels across the firm healthy and robust. Companies can encourage open communications in a myriad ways ranging from open-plan office spaces to open door policies, structured internal communications and regular meetings at all staff levels to communicate vision and mission and articulate progress. According to Bayt.com’s Work Satisfaction in the Middle East and North Africa poll, 36 percent of professionals feel communication channels in their own organisation are open “but not enough”, and 30 percent indicate they are not open. 2. Incorporate CSR elements into your mission Companies enjoying high employee satisfaction and retention levels often cite they feel they are part of a greater mission and are proud that what they do impacts the greater community positively. CSR can play a key role in making your employees feel part of a larger picture and find more meaning, pleasure, pride and satisfaction in their work and employer’s brand. In a Bayt.com poll, 78 percent of professionals said they find their job “very meaningful” and 62 percent said they are very proud of their employer’s brand. 3. Compensate fairly 32 percent of professionals say that what they would most like to change about their current job is their salary. Unfair or uncompetitive compensation levels are often cited as the main reason professionals look for another job. The data on Middle East salaries obtained from leading jobsites and specialized salaries platforms such Salaries by

Bayt.com have made regional salaries very transparent, and empowered jobseekers in all roles and industries to compare their salaries with their peers. Remember you can be creative with compensation and complement basic salaries with performance bonuses and extra perks and benefits. These benefits could include gym memberships, free parking, special allowances, extra time off for extended weekends, compressed work weeks, flexi-time, part-time and telecommuting. 4. Recognize and reward Professionals crave and expect reward and recognition. The best managers recognize and reward their top performers publicly and often. Performance appraisals should not be an annual event associated with much fear and trepidation; make constructive appraising and feedback part of the daily fabric and culture of your organisation. 5. Invest in training and development 20 percent of professionals say that what they would most like to change about their job is their training and development path. Today’s professionals have for the most part espoused the life-long learning path and seek companies who will generously and proactively invest in their training and development. 6. Provide adequate career planning Visibility, consistency, fairness and transparency are essential when it comes to career planning and employers are well advised to establish formal frameworks for this whereby every employee is aware of the path they are on and versed in the skills they need and milestones that must be reached to progress to the next rungs up the career ladder. 39 percent of professionals cited in a Bayt.com poll that there are no opportunities for advancement and promotion in their company, and 14 percent said they feel they are not growing and learning on the job. 7. Keep it challenging Another reason cited by many ambitious professionals for leaving their job is that they find it unchallenging. The good news revealed on Bayt.com’s Work Satisfaction in the Middle East and North Africa poll is that 58 percent of professionals in the region are actually very challenged in their job and 26 percent are somewhat challenged, only 17 percent say they are unchallenged. Don’t be afraid to raise the bar and take risks to encourage growth, innovation and creativity and to keep top talent at all times poised, enabled and empowered to learn and accomplish more.

EXCHANGE RATES Commercial Bank of Kuwait US Dollar/KD GB Pound/KD Euro Swiss francs Canadian Dollar Australian DLR Indian rupees Sri Lanka Rupee UAE dirhams Bahraini dinars Jordanian dinar Saudi riyals Omani riyals Egyptian pounds US Dollar/KD GB Pound/KD Euro Swiss francs Canadian dollars Danish Kroner Swedish Kroner Australian dlr Hong Kong dlr Singapore dlr Japanese yen Indian Rs/KD Sri Lanka rupee Pakistan rupee Bangladesh taka UAE dirhams Bahraini dinars Jordanian dinar Saudi Riyal/KD Omani riyals Philippine Peso

.2770000 .4310000 .3680000 .3020000 .2780000 .2940000 .0040000 .0020000 .0771240 .7513970 .3930000 .0720000 .7366120 .0370000 CUSTOMER TRANSFER RATES .2841000 .4338920 .3707360 .3043390 .2795430 .0497330 .0443660 .2963730 .0365940 .2291130 .0029600 .0000000 .0000000 .0000000 .0000000 .0773800 .7538810 .0000000 .0757800 .7382100 .0000000

Al-Muzaini Exchange Co. Japanese Yen Indian Rupees Pakistani Rupees Srilankan Rupees Nepali Rupees Singapore Dollar Hongkong Dollar Bangladesh Taka Philippine Peso

ASIAN COUNTRIES 2.891 5.253 2.898 2.249 3.293 230.960 36.799 3.655 6.913

.2880000 .4470000 .3760000 .3170000 .2920000 .3020000 .0069000 .0035000 .0778990 .7589480 .4110000 .0770000 .7440150 .0440000 .2862000 .4370990 .3734770 .3065880 .2816100 .0501010 .0446940 .2985640 .0368650 .2308060 .0028810 .0052870 .0022880 .0029190 .0036810 .0779520 .7594530 .4048090 .0763400 .7436660 .0069870

Thai Baht Irani riyal - transfer Irani riyal - cash

Omani Riyal Qatari Riyal Saudi Riyal

9.939 0.271 0.273

ARAB COUNTRIES Egyptian Pound - Cash 40.900 Egyptian Pound - Transfer 40.827 Yemen Riyal/for 1000 1.333 Tunisian Dinar 178.840 Jordanian Dinar 403.620 Lebanese Lira/for 1000 1.917 Syrian Lier 3.105 Morocco Dirham 34.175 EUROPEAN & AMERICAN COUNTRIES US Dollar Transfer 285.700 Euro 372.550 Sterling Pound 436.410 Canadian dollar 279.000 Turkish lira 159.060 Swiss Franc 307.200 US Dollar Buying 284.500 GOLD 298.000 150.000 77.500

20 Gram 10 Gram 5 Gram

SELL DRAFT 298.30 282.78 304.27 374.77 285.30 439.39 2.94 3.675 5.248 2.252 3.292 2.904 77.74 759.65 40.79 406.44

Rate for Transfer US Dollar Canadian Dollar Sterling Pound Euro Swiss Frank Bahrain Dinar UAE Dirhams Qatari Riyals Saudi Riyals Jordanian Dinar Egyptian Pound Sri Lankan Rupees Indian Rupees Pakistani Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Pesso Cyprus pound Japanese Yen Thai Bhat Syrian Pound Nepalese Rupees Malaysian Ringgit

Selling Rate 285.650 281.385 437.355 371.980 302.460 756.265 77.750 78.410 76.135 402.670 40.779 2.255 5.262 2.899 3.661 6.914 700.715 3.870 09.985 4.065 3.370 93.485

Bahrain Exchange Company COUNTRY

UAE Exchange Centre WLL COUNTRY Australian Dollar Canadian Dollar Swiss Franc Euro US Dollar Sterling Pound Japanese Yen Bangladesh Taka Indian Rupee Sri Lankan Rupee Nepali Rupee Pakistani Rupee UAE Dirhams Bahraini Dinar Egyptian Pound Jordanian Dinar

743.000 78.500 76.500

Dollarco Exchange Co. Ltd

GCC COUNTRIES 76.217 78.532 742.370 759.130 77.826

Saudi Riyal Qatari Riyal Omani Riyal Bahraini Dinar UAE Dirham

742.51 78.78 76.21

SELL CASH 295.500 281.000 307.000 375.500 286.000 439.000 3.300 3.760 5.450 2.440 3.400 2.980 78.300 757.850 41.000 410.000

British Pound Czech Korune Danish Krone Euro Norwegian Krone Scottish Pound Swedish Krona Swiss Franc Australian Dollar New Zealand Dollar Uganda Shilling Canadian Dollar Colombian Peso US Dollars Bangladesh Taka Cape Vrde Escudo Chinese Yuan Eritrea-Nakfa

SELL CASH Europe 0.4286430 0.0061891 0.0457731 0.3664160 0.0443390 0.4270780 0.0390166 0.2977601 Australasia 0.2827578 0.2329940 0.0001155 America 0.2713797 0.0001488 0.2835500 Asia 0.0036164 0.0031697 0.0451116 0.0165133

SELLDRAFT 0.4376430 0.0181891 0.0507731 0.3739160 0.0495390 0.4345780 0.0440166 0.3047601 0.2947578 0.2429940 0.0001155 0.2803797 0.0001668 0.2857000 0.0036714 0.0033997 0.0501116 0.0196133

Guinea Franc Hg Kong Dollar Indian Rupee Indonesian Rupiah Jamaican Dollars Japanese Yen Kenyan Shilling Malaysian Ringgit Nepalese Rupee Pakistan Rupee Philippine Peso Sierra Leone Singapore Dollar Sri Lankan Rupee Thai Baht Bahraini Dinar Egyptian Pound Ethiopeanbirr Ghanaian Cedi Iranian Riyal Iraqi Dinar Jordanian Dinar Kuwaiti Dinar Lebanese Pound Moroccan Dirhams Nigerian Naira Omani Riyal Qatar Riyal Saudi Riyal Sudanese Pounds Syrian Pound Tunisian Dinar UAE Dirhams Yemeni Riyal

0.0000443 0.0342644 0.0051957 0.0000244 0.0028553 0.0027921 0.0033537 0.0891254 0.0031365 0.0028728 0.0064639 0.0000730 0.2261856 0.0022146 0.0095200 Arab 0.7513984 0.0388011 0.0129469 0.1487213 0.0000795 0.0001739 0.3973946 1.0000000 0.0001753 0.0219354 0.0012155 0.7310680 0.0778194 0.0756533 0.0480390 0.0031882 0.1775063 0.0763583 0.0012890

Al Mulla Exchange Currency US Dollar Euro Pound Sterling Canadian Dollar Japanese Yen Indian Rupee Egyptian Pound Sri Lankan Rupee Bangladesh Taka Philippines Peso Pakistan Rupee Bahraini Dinar UAE Dirham Saudi Riyal *Rates are subject to change

Transfer Rate (Per 1000) 285.300 373.700 437.400 280.150 2.905 5.250 40.810 2.250 3.655 6.915 2.898 759.700 77.750 76.250

0.0000503 0.0373644 0.0052597 0.0000295 0.0038553 0.0029721 0.0035837 0.0961254 0.0033365 0.0029128 0.0069339 0.0000760 0.2328566 0.0022566 0.0101200 0.7598984 0.0408311 0.0194469 0.1505113 0.0000800 0.0002339 0.4048946 1.0000000 0.0001953 0.0459354 0.0018505 0.7420680 0.0786024 O.0762933 0.0485890 0.0034082 0.1835063 0.0778083 0.0013890

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

BUSINESS

Travelers could crack open US budget door Solution to flight delays could create new worries

NICOSIA: People queue at an ATM outside a closed Laiki Bank branch in capital Nicosia. —AP

Economic crisis sets back peace in divided Cyprus NICOSIA: When the barriers carving Cyprus in half were finally breached 10 years ago this week, Turkish Cypriot Fethi Akinci forged what some might consider the unlikeliest of friendships with Yiannis Maratheftis, the Greek Cypriot he almost killed in battle with a gunshot to the head. The shooting took place on a July morning in 1974, as invading Turkish forces pushed forward in the wake a failed coup by supporters of uniting the island with Greece. The friendship took root once the two men, now in their 60s, met in 2009, an encounter made possible by the checkpoint openings. Akinci had discovered from a book Maratheftis wrote that the soldier he’d shot was alive, and sought out his onetime enemy. The story of Maratheftis and Akinci was one of the many signs of reconciliation that emerged after the barriers were opened, allowing crossings after three decades of complete separation. The number of crossings has now reached into the millions. But these flickers of hope for reunification are at risk of being snuffed out as the island confronts what could be its worst economic crisis, making prospects for reconciliation appear dimmer than ever. With its once robust banking sector decimated and unemployment soaring amid harsh EU imposed austerity, Greek Cypriots seem to have little appetite for any radical and potentially expensive change that would add to their overwhelming sense of uncertainty about their future. The island joined the European Union in 2004, but membership benefits only extend to residents in the south. The Turkish Cypriots, on the other hand, have had a close up look at the financial chaos that EU membership can bring, and may be in no hurry to join the club. “It worsened the prospect for settlement,” says Hubert Faustmann, political science professor at the University of Nicosia. “A solution is costly, and there is less money now or hardly any money if any money left to finance that.” There’s been no 10 anniversary com-

memoration this week. That early euphoria amid scenes of a crush people eager to cross over and see homes and properties that belonged to families for generations, then left hastily left behind, is now a faded memory. Turkish Cypriots were first to rebel in the early 2000s against their isolation, angry at seeing their future drying up amid a collapsing economy. That compelled Turkish Cypriot authorities to loosen restrictions on crossings and to open checkpoints, putting an end to the Turkish Cypriots’ nearly complete isolation on a sliver of territory recognized by no other country than Turkey. “The opening of the gates, had opened a big door for the Turkish Cypriots because we were in a sort of enclave” said Turkish Cypriot Hassan Cirakli, sitting with his former Greek Cypriot schoolmate and close friend, Andreas Paralikis, in the shadow of a 12 century cathedral converted into a mosque in the northern part of Nicosia. “We didn’t have any relations with the outside world.” But the lack of a deal after so many failed attempts has sapped all optimism that reunification is possible, says Ahmet Sozen, chair of the political science department at Eastern Mediterranean University in the north. Sozen said without real political progress, all the crossing points appeared to do was to bestow a kind of strange “normality” to the status quo. “Unfortunately the crossing openings failed to make a huge positive difference as to how people on both sides of the divided perceive each other,” says Sozen. “People in their subconscious have been reconciled with the idea that this is perhaps the best arrangement.” That pessimism doesn’t faze Maratheftis or Akinci. “Now we’re fighting for peace in the same trench,” said Akinci. Maratheftis still has the bullet fragments embedded in his skull but bears no grudges. These days, the two men recount their story to schoolchildren on both sides of the divide, part of a personal quest to erase the mistrust that the barriers sustained. —AP

CEO of Al Rayan Mohammed Al-Shuaibi

Al-Rayan decides on robust IT Infrastructure KUWAIT: The management of Al-Rayan Holding Company, the leading organization in the educational industry of Kuwait, has taken the big initiative to enhance the IT Infrastructure. Al-Rayan has decided to bank on IBM for its IT Infrastructure re-engineering project and have signed with United Business Group (UBG) locally. The solution is based on the latest and state-ofthe-art IBM Flex technology combining the industry leader VMware for server virtualization. The CEO of Al-Rayan, Mohammed Al-

Shuaibi has a very clear vision on the IT enhancement plans and decided rightly on the strategy of first building a robust infrastructure, a solid platform to support any necessary systems implementation in near future. Shuaibishowed keen interest & support in the change and said. The project is expected to be completed and be live by end of June 2013. United Business Group has deployed a team of well experienced professionals to steer the project to an emphatic success and ensure Al-Rayan realize their vision to the fullest.

WASHINGTON: Congress got rid of a headache when it rescued the flying public from flight delays caused by its budget cutting. But in the view of many US lawmakers, the pain is just about to begin. Members of Congress and groups representing people hit by acrossthe-board budget cuts, ranging from cancer patients to welfare recipients, say the quick action on air traffic control staffing underscored the importance of being visible to millions of Americans. “What are we going to do, every time there’s a fire we’re going to put it out by moving some funds around? That’s a shell game,” said Representative Gerald Connolly, a Democrat from northern Virginia. “I’m going to predict that there’s going to be more weeping and gnashing of teeth, as sequestration sets in and we’re going to continue to approach this on a piecemeal basis,” he said. Next in line for individual funding relief will be advocates for national parks, low-income housing, AIDS funding, meals on wheels and Community Development Block Grants, Connolly said, adding that budget cuts for these and other safety-net services will be felt severely by local communities. Representatives for some of these other programs said it was the television images of lines in airports and the interviews with angry passengers that led to action, combined with the lobbying power of the travel industry. “It means we worry about who’s going to scream the loudest now,” said Chris Hansen, president of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network, which has been lobbying against cuts in federal funding of medical research. A heavy dose of lobbying from the airline and travel industry preceded the legislation enacted Friday, which permitted the Federal Aviation Administration to move money to avoid the furloughs of air traffic controllers that were causing the delays. Sequestration - the $109 billion in automatic across-the-board budget cuts enacted by Congress

and signed by President Barack Obama - formally took effect in March and barring Congressional action to replace it may continue for a decade. Some programs won relief from Congress in March, notably the meat and poultry industry, which fought successfully to prevent furloughs of US Department of Agriculture meat inspectors. But because the furloughs in other programs, such as the FAA, were not immediately implemented, the

houses with bipartisan support and be signed into law by Obama. US Airways Chief Executive Doug Parker, who would head the world’s largest airline if his carrier’s merger with AMR Corp’s American Airlines is approved, said he spent the past week making calls to government officials in his airline’s hub markets to express concern about the furloughs. “What I know is we’re doing great disservice to the flying public and to the citizens of the United States and

impact was slow to build. The travel industry began to accelerate its lobbying effort after it learned early last week from the FAA that as many as 6,700 flights per day could be delayed, potentially reducing capacity at major airports by 30 to 40 percent. Nicholas Calio, president of Airlines for America, or A4A, the main airlines industry group, worked the phones throughout the week, said Jean Medina, senior vice president for communications at A4A. “He certainly was in very close contact with a lot of people to make sure they understood what needed to happen,” she said. Its first course of action was to ask the administration for a 30-day delay. When that was denied, the industry group began focusing on a legislative fix that would clear both

we need for this to get resolved,” Parker told Reuters from Arizona earlier this week. The non-profit US Travel Association said it mounted its own “sequester offensive” in response to the furloughs and began a consumer texting campaign that connected travelers who had been delayed at airports to members of Congress. The association also asked industry workers to contact their representatives in Congress to explain that the travel delays put their jobs at risk. “We were in frequent contact with Congress urging them to solve this problem as soon as possible,” Erik Hansen, director of domestic policy at the US Travel Association, said on Friday. “We were able to generate hundreds of calls and emails to Congress and we’re hoping that helped to move the ball forward,”

Austria aims to open up on bank secrecy within weeks VIENNA: Austria aims to agree within weeks to give other European Union countries access to foreigners’ bank account details, Chancellor Werner Faymann said yesterday, allowing the bloc to begin talks over bank secrecy with non-EU states such as Switzerland. Faymann said he hoped for a deal before a May 22 EU summit that will discuss ways to curb tax dodging that costs members about 1 trillion euros ($1.30 trillion) a year in lost income. EU leaders have pushed Austria for a deal before the meeting. “We want to achieve a result for an exchange of data in the interest of fighting fraud in Europe,” Faymann said in an interview aired by broadcaster ORF, playing down the potential impact of data swaps on Austria’s banking sector. “The biggest economic damage would be if we got the reputation of protecting frauds. Austrians don’t find this necessary and I have spoken with bank managers who also don’t find it necessary,” he said. Austria, the last EU holdout on bank secrecy, said on Friday it was ready for talks as long as banking secrecy for Austrians is preserved, and detailed its three main concerns. Vienna had been isolated on this after Luxembourg changed tack this month. Austrian banks at times use banking secrecy as a marketing tool, but foreign deposits do not play as much of a role as they do in major offshore centres such as Cyrpus and Luxembourg. EU citizens have about 35 billion euros ($46 billion) in Austrian deposits, a tenth of the total, while foreigners have 53 billion euros in banks in Austria, the central bank says. Austria now has banks withhold tax on EU citizens’ interest income and returns the money anonymously to home countries. After weeks of wrangling, Faymann’s

centre-left Social Democrats and their centre-right People’s Party coalition partners have laid out priorities for EU talks on an accord starting next week. Finance Minister Maria Fekter, who had taken the hardest line in defence of Austrian banking secrecy, said she supported the joint position, which cites three points of “decisive relevance” for Austria. Vienna wants negotiations to require an exchange of bank account data at least in line with Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) standards, reveal owners of trusts and mailbox companies, and take into account bilateral tax deals it already struck with Switzerland and Liechtenstein. Those accords preserve bank secrecy and are set to bring in more than 1 billion euros from mid-2013 from accounts Austrians hold across the borders. Faymann made a point of saying Austria’s concerns were just that, and not conditions for a deal. “We don’t need to blackmail anyone. We ourselves want the exchange of data to make it easier to fight fraud,” he said. “Our own banking secrecy is not affected. Prosecuting international fraud will be fully supported, and English trusts and the Channel Islands will also come into play.” Fekter has campaigned to have tax talks include not just bank accounts, but also trusts and other investment vehicles designed to cloak investors’ identities. She has urged Britain and the United States to crack down on money laundering and “tax havens” in their own backyards. A European Commission spokeswoman gave a cautious welcome to Austria’s new position, which it had not yet seen officially. “If Austria is willing to back the mandate to negotiate a stronger EU-Swiss agreement, then this would be very good news,” she said. —Reuters

Xi meets Hollande, eyes more balanced trade with France SHANGHAI: French President Francois Hollande wrapped up a two-day visit to China on Friday, confident that France could achieve more balanced trade with the world’s second largest economy. Hollande became the first Western leader to meet China’s new president Xi Jinping and picked up a deal potentially worth billions for 60 new Airbus aircraft. France runs a 26-billion-euro ($34 billion) trade deficit with China and Hollande said Beijing “responded perfectly to the requests that we made”. On the second and final day of his visit, his first to China, Hollande met Premier Li Keqiang. “China is not looking for a trade surplus but wants to import more French goods,” Li said, according to a source close to the delegations. China’s rapid development, far from scaring France, presented a “significant opportunity”, Hollande said, urging Beijing to ease market access. France accounts for just 1.3 percent of China’s foreign trade compared with around five percent for Germany but Hollande said the food industry and urban development could help diversify cooperation from its traditional aviation and nuclear sectors. Jean-Pierre Raffarin, a former prime minister travelling with Hollande, said the visit had been very useful and would

Hansen said. Airlines for America reported about $6.3 million in lobbying expenses in 2012 according to the Center for Responsive Politics; the US Travel Association spent about $1.7 million; US Airways and Delta about $2.8 million each. While other interest groups have a lobbying presence in the national capital, they are hard pressed to match the visibility of air travel. Compared to “longer lines at airports,” said Cynthia Pellegrini, a vice president at the March of Dimes, which raises funds to improve the health of mothers and babies, “you can’t see that a child’s belly is emptier because her family couldn’t get food assistance.” “We are not as well-heeled as the travel industry,” said Deborah Weinstein, executive director of the Coalition on Human Needs, an alliance of social welfare organizations. “But I think as more people learn of this appalling choice,” that Congress made on Friday, “they will get as mad as I am.” Senator Amy Klobuchar, a Democrat from Minnesota, home to a major Delta Air Lines hub in Minneapolis, was among the members backing an FAA budget fix on Thursday when the Senate passed it. She called it a “practical, pragmatic answer to an immediate problem,” but acknowledged that it does nothing to get Congress closer to fixing the problems caused by sequestration. More effects of the cuts, demonstrated dramatically to the public, could do that, she added. She may not have long to wait. Organizations that have been more quietly protesting the budget cuts were rethinking their strategy on Friday in the wake of Congress’ action. “It is inexplicable why proven and effective Meals on Wheels programs get overlooked from exemption from the sequester when both the business and social case exists,” said Ellie Hollander, President and CEO of Meals on Wheels Association of America. “I guess that’s because we need to be a different kind of squeaky wheel.” —Reuters

contribute to narrowing France’s trade deficit with China. On Thursday, the first day of Hollande’s visit, the two sides announced a lucrative deal for 60 Airbus planes. The deal, signed in the presence of Hollande and Xi, was part of the French leader’s attempt to press China to help reduce its trade surplus with France. China’s pact with Airbus could be worth at least $7.7 billion at list prices, although customers generally negotiate discounts from plane manufacturers. The French president later vowed to remove obstacles to Chinese investment in France as he vies to drum up anaemic rates of growth in the euro zone’s number-two economy. Hollande told a press conference on Thursday that during his talks with Chinese leaders he also raised the issue of Tibet and human rights, with all topics discussed in a “frank and respectful manner”. He said such discussions were not the only purpose of his trip, and that they wanted to talk about political partnership, the Chinese presence in Europe and economic growth. On Friday, Hollande highlighted the importance of cooperation between the two countries on a range of issues.”The world needs China and France to deepen regulations, strengthen certain procedures, govern the planet better and to

resolve certain conflicts or stave off threats,” Hollande told Li. “We are, like China, aware that we must fight against global warming.” A French source said that both countries’ finance ministers would begin to hold regular dialogue, which would provide a forum for discussing sensitive issues such as the view, shared by Paris, that China’s yuan is undervalued. Hollande had lunch with Xi on Friday with their respective partners, Valerie Trierweiler and Peng Liyuan, both women credited with bringing glamour to their career-politician other halves. Both Hollande and Trierweiler described the lunch as “friendly”. Twice divorced former journalist Trierweiler made waves in France by winning Hollande away from the mother of his four children while Peng, a popular soprano who carries the rank of general, was until recent years far better known than Xi. Speaking to students in Shanghai, Hollande said stronger ties between the European Union and China were essential to both sides. Europe is “the world’s top economic power. China’s top trade partner and the main destination for Asian exports,” Hollande said. “There will be no recovery in Europe without China, without Asia, and there will be no sustainable development in China without Europe,” he said. —AFP

Rupert Murdoch

Murdoch to get 15% pay hike NEW YORK: US media magnate Rupert Murdoch will get a 15 percent pay hike with the split up of News Corp into two publicly traded companies, according to a company filing published Friday. Murdoch will see his combined compensation from the two entities jump to $28.3 million in fiscal 2014, from $24.6 million this year, according to a News Corp filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission. The additional funds will be linked to company performance in the fiscal year ending June 30, the SEC filing said. The performance based increases “will further align Mr Murdoch’s compensation with the interests of stockholders,” the company said. News Corp expects to split into two companies by the end of June. Murdoch will be executive chairman of the new News Corp which will hold the company’s flagship newspaper, The Wall Street Journal, and other newspapers; book publishing, sports programming, and pay TV distribution in Australia. Murdoch will continue to be chairman and chief executive of the second entity, Twenty-First Century Fox, that will house the group’s cable and broadcast media as well as its TV and film production companies. As chairman of News Corp, Murdoch he will earn a base pay of $1 million and performance based bonuses of as much as $4 million in cash and stock. At Twenty First Century Fox, his base salary will be $7.1 million, with $16.2 in potential bonuses in cash and stock. The compensation package is “competitive and appropriate” given Murdoch’s role with two separate public companies, the News Corp filing said. —AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

BUSINESS

Kuwait real estate sales up 19% NBK ECONOMIC REPORT KUWAIT: Data for March show real estate sales increasing 19 percent year-on-year (y/y), to KD 293 million. The increase followed y/y drops in sales for the first 2 months of the year. Although the data can be volatile, we expect the underlying sales picture to remain firm ahead of the traditional summer slowdown, as the three major market segments continue to be driven by durable demand (to various degrees). Residential sales totaled KD 149 million in March, a mere 1 percent y/y increase. This came from a total of 490 transactions. Compared to March 2012, this translated to a 7 percent increase in

lion in sales in March, a 31 percent y/y increase. These sales are made up mostly of buildings, apartments, or plots of land, with the intention of renting out the endproduct. The sector is also seen as an alternative to investing in the Kuwait Stock Exchange. In the past few years, for example, interest in investment property has picked up as returns in the stock market have disappointed. Overall, we expect the investment sector to see a solid performance in 2013, as both robust demand and supply exist in the market. Nevertheless, we could see a one-off y/y drop this April, driven by a

the average transaction size. Recent events in the consumer financing area may translate to increased activity in residential real estate purchases in the nearto-mid term, though any potential increased appetite could also be faced with supply constraints. These recent events include the ceiling increase for housing loans provided by the Savings and Credit Bank (see April 10th issue), the establishment of the ‘family fund’ to help debtors with their pre-2008 loans, as well as a potential cut in interest rates on housing loans provided by conventional banks. The investment sector saw KD 122 mil-

basis effect, as April of last year had exceptionally strong sales. As for the commercial sector - the smallest of the three major sectors - it saw KD 22 million in sales, split over 12 transactions. The sector has been performing well in the past 2 quarters, which - at least partially - may be attributed to active participation in the market by the Kuwait Investment Authority (KIA). KIA, through funds managed by two local companies, has aimed to inject some liquidity into the commercial property market, though no official announcements about acquisitions have been made. The Savings and Credit Bank approved

545 new loans, worth a little more than KD 34 million. The biggest portion went to loans for new construction, which averaged in March a little under KD 69,000 per loan close to the soon-to-be-increased ceiling of KD 70,000. Additionally, disbursed loans totaled about KD 13 million. It is worth noting that the total value of approved loans has been on the rise in recent months, and in fact reached its highest in more than 4 years in March. In all likelihood, this is related to recent government disbursement of lands (for example in Jaber Al-Ahmad City, Sabah Al-Ahmad and Naseem area.)

EMC reports solid Q1 2013 financial results DUBAI: EMC Corporation (NYSE:EMC) yesterday reported first-quarter 2013 financial results that were highlighted by first-quarter records for consolidated revenue, non-GAAP net income, non-GAAP EPS and operating and free cash flow. First-quarter revenue was $5.39 billion, an increase of 6 percent compared with the yearago quarter. First-quarter GAAP net income attributable to EMC was $580 million and firstquarter GAAP earnings per weighted average diluted share were $0.26. Non-GAAP1 net income attributable to EMC was $850 million, an increase of 4 percent compared with the year-ago quarter. Non-GAAP1 earnings per weighted average diluted share were $0.39, an increase of 5 percent year over year. During the first quarter, EMC increased operating cash flow and free cash flow2 on a yearover-year basis to $1.71 billion and $1.44 billion, respectively. First-quarter GAAP and non-GAAP gross margins grew on a year-over-year basis, and the company ended the quarter with $12 billion in cash and investments. Joe Tucci, EMC Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, said, “EMC’s solid first-quarter financial results speak to the strength of our execution and the soundness of our strategy that offers customers greater efficiency, control, choice and agility. Our three federated businesses EMC Information Infrastructure, VMware and Pivotal - are squarely focused on areas of IT that are expected to experience high growth over the next decade: cloud computing, Big Data

and trusted IT. Each business is chartered to build its own technology and partner ecosystem necessary to succeed, while staying aligned to leverage one another’s strengths and to create value for our customers and shareholders. I am incredibly energized by the strength of our business model and the way we have positioned the company to lead this transformative era in information technology.” David Goulden, EMC President and Chief Operating Officer, said, “EMC’s focus on cloud computing, Big Data and trusted IT helped drive solid revenue, non-GAAP net income and nonGAAP EPS growth in the first quar ter. We believe EMC is extremely well-positioned to grow faster than the IT marketplace, produce leverage in the business and continue to innovate and evolve to capitalize on the opportunities ahead. Our first-quarter results are consistent with the full-year revenue and non-GAAP EPS outlook we provided in January, which remains unchanged. With continued steady execution, we expect that EMC will achieve our previously stated longer-term potential of more than $30 billion in revenue in 2016 with nonGAAP EPS growth outpacing revenue growth during this timeframe.” Q1 highlights First-quarter revenue from EMC’s Information Storage business grew 3 percent year over year. Highlights within this include: revenue from EMC’s High-end Storage business3 increased 10

HK’s pursuit of luxury defies Western gloom HONG KONG: A gold, diamond-encrusted iPhone gleams in the window at a shopping mall in Hong Kong, its $25,000 price tag a symbol of the city’s luxury excesses fuelled by cash-rich Chinese tourists and wealthy locals. The custom-built device boasts a rose gold chassis ringed with a combined 7.28 carats in diamonds that also spell out the number “5” on its back, loudly announcing that this is indeed an Apple iPhone 5 - albeit with a difference. Despite the gloom in the West and a slowing expansion of China’s economy, free-spending Chinese consumers and wealthy Hong Kong locals craving exclusivity have proven a blessing to retailers looking to buck global woes.

HONG KONG: Luxury condominiums in Hong Kong. From gadgets decked out in jewels to made-to-order men’s shoes and ladies leather handbags or Rolls Royce cars with monogrammed seats, Hong Kong continues to benefit from the influx of newly rich mainland Chinese searching for authentic goods and lower sales taxes. “They don’t care about the price,” said store manager Cytheia Lui, surrounded by gadgets ranging from shiny gold-plated iPad covers to multi-coloured laptops and headphones. “For them the attitude is: if you use an iPhone and I use an iPhone too, why should we have the same one?” Lui said that a mainland Chinese customer placed an HK$800,000 ($103,000) order for 70 custommade iPhones, which he planned to give

away as gifts. Global luxury brands continue to pin their hopes on China’s rising middle class as Europe slogs through its debt crisis, US growth remains weak and Japan’s economy fails to gain traction. Despite weaker-than-expected luxury goods demand in China last year as its new leadership vowed to crack down on corruption and official excess, China is still forecast to be the world’s biggest luxury goods market by 2020. Lower sales taxes and authentic products lure shoppers to Hong Kong’s luxury malls. In Hong Kong, brands such as Italian label Salvatore Ferragamo offer customers a choice of personalized handbags with up to 40 colors made from lizard, python or ostrich skin at premium prices. Swiss watchmaker Rolex offers bespoke dials. Although conspicuous consumption and big-spending tourist trips are welcomed by businesses, the influx of visitors from the mainland has not been welcomed by all in Hong Kong where locals complain about an extra strain on the crowded city’s public services. High-end shops and boutiques have been seen to help drive the sky-high rents that have forced decades-old shops and restaurants out of business, prompting warnings that the city is selling its identity. Yet the thirst for luxury remains unquenched. UK-based luxury craftsman Stuart Hughes, who recently designed the “world’s most expensive iPhone” valued at a whopping $15 million said more than two-thirds of his customers come from mainland China and Hong Kong. The work was commissioned by a Hong Kong businessman who asked Hughes to incorporate a 26-carat black diamond into the phone. “ The Chinese have got a lot of spending power in terms of buying for themselves or buying as a gift for people. “They want a nice, different phone. They want extra modifications to make it look unique,” said the 42-year-old designer. —AFP

percent year over year, and revenue from EMC’s Emerging Storage business4 increased 24 percent year over year. EMC’s RSA Information Security business increased revenue 12 percent year over year, and EMC’s Information Intelligence business returned to growth, increasing revenue 7 percent year over year. EMC’s VSPEX reference architecture solutions continued to gain momentum with rapid adoption and increasing popularity with customers and among partners who have sold just under 2,200 VSPEX solutions since their launch in April 2012. Demand for VCE’s Vblock systems also showed strong year-over-year growth in the first quarter. Finally, EMC continued to expand its Service Provider Program with first-quarter revenue from service provider partners up over 40 percent year over year. EMC’s consolidated first-quarter revenue from the United States increased 8 percent year over year to $2.8 billion, representing 53 percent of consolidated first-quarter revenue. Revenue from EMC’s business operations outside of the United States increased 4 percent year over year to $2.6 billion and represented 47 percent of consolidated first-quarter revenue. Within this, on a year over year basis, revenue from EMC’s Europe, Middle East and Africa region grew 1 percent, revenue from EMC’s Asia Pacific and Japan region increased 4 percent, and revenue from EMC’s Latin American region grew 27 percent. Revenue from EMC’s BRIC+13 markets increased 10 percent year over year.

Harvard debt luminaries say they don’t like austerity WASHINGTON: Two academics whose research became an intellectual touchstone for pro-austerity politicians want everyone to know they have been misunderstood. They actually don’t think harsh austerity is such a great idea for an ailing economy. In the political debate over debt since the financial crisis, no body of research has generated more howls of approval and disdain than that of Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff. The two Harvard economists have compiled centuries of data to show a strong correlation between heavy government indebtedness and weak economic growth. Critics, especially on the left, contend this doesn’t mean that debt causes growth to slow, but that perhaps weak growth makes governments borrow more. At the same time, conservative politicians around the world have said the academics’ findings back their own prescriptions to slash bloated deficits. The debate heated to a boil this month when a group of academics called attention to embarrassing errors in one of Reinhart and Rogoff’s papers, a paper that some conservatives have used as a foundation in proposals to massively cut back government spending. Critics claimed the spreadsheet coding errors, now acknowledged by Reinhart and Rogoff, to be a mortal blow against the intellectual argument for austerity. But in an opinion piece published in the New York Times on Friday, Reinhart and Rogoff said politicians and pundits were putting words in their mouths. “The politically charged discussion, especially sharp in the past week or so, has falsely equated our finding of a negative association between debt and growth with an unambiguous call for austerity,” the two Harvard researchers wrote. The errors found in Reinhart and Rogoff’s study undermined its gravest finding, that on average economic growth contracted when government debt exceeded 90 percent of gross domestic product. But even correcting for the spreadsheet errors and other alleged methodological missteps, the new study appeared to confirm the Harvard economists’ findings that heavily indebted countries do indeed grow more slowly. In an emotional argument, Reinhart and Rogoff on Friday said they had received threatening emails from people who blamed them for recent austerity measures embraced around the world, which have cost government workers their jobs and led to tax hikes. Indeed, the two said their message was merely that debt matters for countries’ long-term growth prospects, but that they never gave approval for the austerity-now campaign. —Reuters

Eberhard Kern, CEO of Mercedes-Benz India, poses in Mumbai.

Carmakers target India’s young, female and frugal MUMBAI: Luxury carmakers in India are moving downmarket and shifting production of smaller and cheaper cars to local plants to cut costs, broadening their target market to include India’s young, female and middleclass drivers to boost lacklustre performance. In an effort to raise stuttering sales that far lag emerging Asian rival China, the German big three of Mercedes-Benz, Audi AG and BMW AG want to win buyers outside the ultra-rich with locally-made hatchbacks and smaller cars. “This is a real year of offensive,” said Eberhard Kern, India managing director of Daimler AG’s Mercedes-Benz brand, for which sales dropped five percent during the nine months to December 2012. He expects the rollout of its hatchback A-Class and a diesel version of its B-class model to help spur double-digit sales growth this year. After two decades of economic boom, the sight of a sleek Lamborghini or polished Bentley outside Mumbai or Delhi’s flashiest hotels or most exclusive nightclubs is not uncommon. Yet annual sales of luxury cars stand at just over 20,000 vehicles, or about 1 percent of the total car market, compared with around 7 percent in China. Tapping into India’s love for compact vehicles - which account for around 75 percent of all car sales - is no guaranteed fix for the German firms, whose luxury hatchbacks will face competition from far cheaper mid-market offerings made by competitors including Toyota Motor Corp and Volkswagen AG in India’s highly cost-sensitive market. “What the (manufacturers) are trying to do is lower the prices and create a much more marketable population. That trend is going to continue,” said Abdul Majeed, automotive leader at PricewaterhouseCoopers India. “In India you have to demonstrate a value-formoney proposition ... but ‘How can I make sure that the BMW stands a class apart from the other products?’ will be the challenge for the (manufacturers),” Majeed told Reuters. Combined sales at BMW and Mercedes in India fell an annual 11 percent in the nine months to December 2012, according to the most recent data available from the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (SIAM), as India’s lowest economic growth in a decade brought years of rising demand to an end. Overall car sales fell for the first time in 10 years in 2012, and now to attract Indians who are affluent but lack the vast resources of the super-rich, Mercedes and its rivals are introducing lower-priced models, more of which than ever before will be built in India. Mercedes, which has built cars in India since 1995, is doubling assembly capacity at its plant in Pune in western India to 20,000 cars annually this year, and will bring its AClass small cars to the country in the next three months. It is also introducing guaranteed resale prices across its range, and adding cars like its GL-Class to its local plant this year. Kern said he does not think local assembly will put off buyers, “because the Mercedes-Benz quality everywhere in the

world is the same”. Mercedes will add more models to its local production line in 2014, Kern added. The range offered by Mercedes in India starts with the B-Class from around $40,000. The A-Class starts in Germany at around $27,000. No details of the Indian price of the A-Class were available. Audi, owned by Volkswagen, and BMW are following similar scripts. The UK-based luxury Jaguar Land Rover unit of India’s Tata Motors Ltd, which saw sales in India double last year, is even mulling full production, using Indian parts, in the country. In 2014, over 90 percent of the vehicles Audi sells in India will be made there, up from around 80 percent now, as it adds the Q3 compact SUV to its Indian assembly line where the A4, A6, Q5 and Q7 are already being built. “We will look at which of our global models will allow us in India an even higher and faster scaling up of our production capabilities,” Michael Perschke, managing director of Audi India, told Reuters. Cars built from imported kits, known as complete knock-down (CKD) production, avoid high import taxes on ready-to-drive models such as the top-end Audi R8 Spyder, which costs around $320,000 in India and will continue to be shipped in from overseas plants and sold alongside “Made in India” vehicles. No details of the cost of the upcoming Indian-made cars were available. In his February budget, India’s finance minister raised the import duty on luxury cars to 100 percent from 75 percent, making local production even more attractive. Yong and trendy None of the German luxury trio sold more than 7,500 cars in the nine months to December 2012, according to SIAM, during which Mercedes fell to third place behind BMW and Audi in a market it used to dominate. Stuttgart-based Mercedes-Benz, which entered India in 1994, expects total Indian luxury sales to rise to 280,000 annually by 2020, or 4 percent of the total forecast car market. The company believes it must break into new markets to secure that business. “There is a different growing segment below the 30 lakh (3 million rupees, or $55,500) threshold, where we are not in the game right now,” said Kern. “There the game starts for us in the next three months.” The A-Class will be India’s “first luxury hatchback” according to Kern, and will be launched alongside a diesel version of its BClass model, a fuel that powers 90 percent of the cars Mercedes now sells in India. Both those smaller models will be prime candidates for local assembly in 2014, further lowering their cost, while the company is also considering the CLA-Class compact for an Indian entry, Kern said. BMW, India’s biggest luxury carmaker by sales, began making its Mini small car in India last week, and will add the 1 series hatchback to its production line in the south Indian city of Chennai this year. —Reuters

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

BUSINESS

Central banks, economic data to steer investors WALL STREET WEEKLY OUTLOOK NEW YORK: With signs of a slower economy mounting, the near-term outlook for US stocks isn’t rosy, but investors may find comfort next week from the world’s major central banks. The Federal Reserve will meet on Tuesday and Wednesday, with the report of weaker-thanexpected, first-quarter growth could reinforce expectations the Fed will keep purchasing bonds at a pace of $85 billion a month. Low interest rates and ample liquidity provided by the Fed and other central banks have buoyed global equity markets because low borrowing costs for businesses and consumers lead to richer corporate profits. Major US stock indexes hit record highs earlier this month. “As long as it looks like central banks are on your side and on investors’ side as far as providing more liquidity, that’s going to help improve sentiment,” said Brian Jacobsen, chief portfolio strategist at Wells Fargo Funds Management in Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin. “I don’t think (Fed officials) have got enough data since the last meeting to really justify changing policy. I really don’t think they’re going to look at slowing the pace of purchases until probably September.” A strong commitment from the Fed to continue its stimulative policy, coupled with corporate earnings that have mostly exceeded lowered forecasts, could help Wall Street extend a rally despite signs that the US economic recovery is losing momentum. Even though the market ended flat on Friday, its performance for the week was positive. The Standard & Poor’s 500 rose 1.7 percent, the Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 1.1 percent and Nasdaq Composite Index rose 2.3 percent. The economy expanded at a 2.5 percent annual rate in the first quarter, the Commerce Department said on Friday, short of expectations of 3.0 percent and setting a cautious tone. A heavy slate of key economic indicators will be released next week, including personal income and spending, the Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing and services activity indexes, pending home sales, the Chicago purchasing managers’ index and consumer confidence from the Conference Board. The highlight of the week will come on Friday when the Labor Department releases its employment report for April. Economists polled by Reuters are looking for job growth of 150,000, up from 88,000 in March. The unemployment rate is likely to remain unchanged at 7.6 percent. “Today’s (GDP) data suggests maybe the momentum is much weaker that what was priced in,” said John Praveen, chief investment strategist at Prudential International Investments Advisers in Newark, New Jersey. “We have had a very strong rally, so people are looking for any trigger for profit-taking,” he said. Praveen said the market could see a 5 percent pullback in the months ahead should upcoming data prove weaker than expected. Stocks have had a wild run over the past week after hackers attacked the website of stock broker Charles Schwab Corp and a false report on the Associated Press’s Twitter account about explosions at the White House sent the market into a brief tailspin. On Thursday, a software glitch shut down the Chicago Board Options Exchange for half the day, preventing trading in options on two of the stock market’s most closely watched indexes and delivering the latest blow to confidence in the way US financial markets operate. The European Central Bank meets on Thursday and investors will watch to see if it delivers an interest-rate cut as the euro zone economy deteriorates further. Further monetary easing would encourage investors to buy riskier assets and boost stocks. “The market has been rallying on the fact the ECB might actually start to do something; if the US market reacts in the same way, that might get the market rallying,” said John Canally, investment strategist and economist for LPL Financial in Boston. With earnings reporting now half over, investors will look to see if companies can continue to exceed profit estimates despite lackluster revenue. According to Thomson Reuters data, of the 251 companies in the S&P 500 that have reported earnings for the first quarter, 68.5 percent have beaten analysts’ expectations, above the 63 percent average since 1994. However, only 42.3 percent have topped analysts’ revenue forecasts, well below the 62 percent average since 2002 and the 52 percent rate for the last four quarters. Analysts now see earnings growth of 3.8 percent this quarter, up from expectations of 1.5 percent on April 1. Next week Dow components reporting results will be Pfizer and Merck. Other companies scheduled to report include Loews Corp, Aetna Inc, Chesapeake Energy , Visa Inc, Viacom Inc and Kraft Foods Group Inc. David Joy, chief market strategist at Ameriprise Financial, based in Boston where he helps oversee about $700 billion in assets, said the lackluster figures suggest the second quarter may not be as robust as hoped. “Right now, markets are going through an adjustment process, trying to figure out just how robust the economy is here and overseas as well,” Joy said. “You have investors sort of biding their time. They are invested, but not with complete conviction.” — Reuters

Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive launches exclusive BMW promotion Teachers rewarded KUWAIT: In recognition of the important role that the education sector plays in the development of Kuwaiti society, Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive has relaunched its exclusive promotion for teachers on all new BMW models for the second consecutive year. Valid from last week (21st April), all Ministry of Education teachers purchasing a new BMW vehicle will receive free warranty for up to five years or 150,000 km (whichever comes first) and a four-year free servicing package, valid up to 84,000km. This offer will help put teachers’ minds at ease so they can enjoy hassle free ownership with their BMW vehicles from the moment they drive away from the showroom. In addition, the BMW Group importer is supporting the Ministry of Education in its objective to give all teachers access to the digital world either via internet or Smartphones by combining this offer with a one year free DSL subscription with Qualitynet and a brand new iPhone 5. “Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive recognises the role that teachers play in developing Kuwait’s future generation and as such believe that their contribution should be rewarded,” said Mr. Yousef Al Qatami, General Manager of Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive. “This exclusive promotion is our way of demonstrating our appreciation; by providing them with a high level ownership experience that exceeds their expectations and enhancing their daily lives with tools to excel in their role as educators.” The special promotion covers the full range of BMW vehicles, including BMW’s flagship 7 Series, BMW 5 Series and the BMW X5 and X6, as well as the world’s best selling premium car, the BMW 3 Series.

Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive recently announced a 56 percent increase in sales in the first three months of 2013; the company was the second best performing Middle East market after the UAE in terms of number of cars sold. Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive is the exclusive importer for BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce automobiles in Kuwait. One of the oldest premium car importers in the region, AA&SA began its relationship with the BMW Group in 1986 when it became their exclusive importer in Kuwait. Over the years the company has expanded its reach in the luxury market with the opening of a multi-million dol-

lar showroom in Shuwaikh adjacent to the Airport Road. The importership offers a full range of Customer Support Facilities including a state-of-the-art Workshop, Quick Service, Body Shop, Parts & Accessories, a BMW Premium Selection (BPS) used car division, Vehicle Financing and 24 hrs Road-side Assistance. Ali Alghanim & Sons Automotive has concluded a successful 2012 year as the third top performing market in the Middle East, with a 37 percent increase in BMW and MINI vehicle sales over 2011 - the highest growth witnessed by any BMW Group Middle East importer.

Samsung, Wahran Trading open new Samsung brand showroom in Kuwait Showroom boosts presence, better serve customers in Kuwait KUWAIT: Samsung Electronics Co Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, is further reinforcing its presence in the Kuwaiti market, in collaboration with Wahran Trading Company, with the opening ofa new Samsung Brand Showroom. The showroom brings an exciting range of Samsung smart products to the doorsteps of Kuwaiti residents, including smart phones, digital cameras and tablets. Located inAl Hamra Shopping Mall, Sharq area, Kuwait City, the new Samsung brand showroom was inaugurated by Kyung-SikKim, Ambassador of the Republic of Korea to Kuwait, Young Soo Kim, President of Samsung Gulf Electronics and Abdul Aziz Abu Shanab, representing Wahran Trading Company. The showroom provides easy access to a wide variety of Samsung smart products including its selection of innovative market leading smartphones, tablets and digital cam-

eras. Customers will get a chance to touch, feel and interact with the products at the new store and benefit from the one to one, personal service of trained sales consultants. “The opening of the new Samsung Brand Showroom will help us provide an interactive and unique shopping experience for all technology enthusiasts in Kuwait. This flagship store is in-line with our plans to strengthen our longstanding commitment in Kuwait and reinforce Samsung’s relationship with our consumers,” said Young Soo Kim, President of Samsung Gulf Electronics. The new store is one of the prestigious Samsung Brand showrooms in Kuwait and includes the latest products ranging from Smartphones, Tablets, and Smart Cameras. Additionally, Wahran Trading Company has provided a team of well-trained sales consultants on-site to assist customers and ensure that consumers are well informed on products and unique features.

“Our new Samsung brand showroom comes as a third addition to Wahran’s two previous showrooms in Kuwait, in Munira Complex, Assalimiyah and in Al-Radwan Complex, Salem Al Mubarak Street. We aim to further strengthen our customers’ confidence in the Samsung brand and also in Wahran Trading Company as an authorized distributor for Samsung products in Kuwait”, commented Abdul Aziz Abu Shanab, Wahran Trading Company representative. In line with its goals to satisfy customers and provide them with better service, Wahran Trading Company will soon be opening one of the largest customer service centers in Kuwait with the latest technology and equipment, so as to provide customers with the best and fastest maintenance and repair service for their mobile devices, digital cameras and all Samsung products Wahran sells in Kuwait.

Dollar falls against yen, bond yields decline NEW YORK: The US dollar tumbled against the yen on Friday after the Bank of Japan left its monetary policy unchanged, while benchmark U.S. bond yields fell, to near 4-1/2-month lows after the US economy grew less than expected in the first quarter. The disappointing growth rate spurred concerns about a tepid outlook for the United States which, along with recent concerns that China’s growth is slowing, also hit the price of oil. Brent crude fell to just above $103 a barrel after rising $3 in the past two sessions. China and the United States are the world’s two largest oil consumers. The BoJ held off from announcing new monetary policy on Friday, which was not unexpected, but board members suggested inflation may still fall short of the central bank’s target for some time. The outlook on inflation in the bank’s semi-annual economic report highlighted concerns that the BoJ has an unrealistic goal in its battle to end 15 years of deflation. The BoJ’s announcement in early April of plans for $1.4 trillion in new mone-

tary stimulus triggered a sharp selloff in the yen. However, traders said market expectations for ongoing weakness in the yen had come too far, too quickly. Recent lackluster US data has added to dollar selling, which accelerated on Friday. “The selling started to feed on itself, and everyone started to jump on the selling bandwagon,” said Charles StArnaud, foreign exchange strategist at Nomura Securities in New York. The dollar fell as low 97.54 yen and was down 1.2 percent at 98.02 in late New York trade. US gross domestic product expanded at a 2.5 percent annual rate in the first quarter. While that was a jump from the tepid growth seen in the final quarter of last year, it disappointed expectations for a 3 percent pace. The data and weakness on Wall Street lifted bond prices, with 30-year Treasuries up 28/32 at 105-07/32 to yield 2.862 percent. The benchmark 10 year note’s yield fell to 1.665 percent, just a shade higher than the low of 1.643 percent reached earlier in the week. “The thoughts about slower growth and disinflation have been

mostly priced at these levels,” said Mike Cullinane, head of Treasuries trading at D A Davidson in St Petersburg, Florida. “If we were to see another month of weak data, we could see yields grind lower.” The data could raise doubts about the ability of the economy to absorb government spending cuts and higher taxes and may fuel speculation of the possibility of more Federal Reserve measures to boost growth, or at least keep the Fed’s current stimulus plans in place. Wall Street ended little changed in light volume, with a slight loss on the S&P 500 ending a five-day winning streak for the index. “We traded off a decent amount after the GDP number but we didn’t break any technical levels or really didn’t get much momentum in the selloff past late morning,” said Paul Zemsky, head of asset allocation at ING Investment Management in New York. “I guess there was some bottom fishing. There was so much fear of poor earnings going into earnings season that this is still somewhat of a positive surprise.” A drop in Amazon.com weighed on the market after the Internet

retailer gave a disappointing outlook, sending its shares down more than 7 percent. The Dow Jones industrial average edged up 11.75 points, or 0.08 percent, to 14,712.55. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index slipped 2.92 points, or 0.18 percent, to 1,582.24. The Nasdaq Composite Index fell 10.72 points, or 0.33 percent, to 3,279.26. Investors in European equities also took a breather after five days of gains. Europe’s top shares on the FTS Euro first 300 closed down 0.4 percent, and world shares were off 0.2 percent. A growing belief that the European Central Bank will react to the recent deterioration in the euro zone’s economy by cutting interest rates next Thursday helped European stocks rise this week, pushed the euro to a three-week low and contributed to a fall in bond yields. A gloomy new set of surveys from the ECB further supported those rate cut calls, as they underscored the slowdown in lending and the difficulties companies in the bloc are facing to get credit. Brent fell 25 cents to $103.16 a barrel, while US crude settled down 64 cents at $93.00. — Reuters

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

BUSINESS

Oula achieves KD4.7m in operating profits for 2012 5% share dividend distributed at AGM

Yoichiro Kato new GM, Infiniti product development DUBAI: Infiniti Motor Company Ltd President, Johan de Nysschen, has appointed Yoichiro Kato (53) the company’s new General Manager, Product Development. Responsible for the development of Infiniti’s entire premium product portfolio, Kato is based at Infiniti’s global technical center in Atsugi, Japan. This appointment comes on the heels of multiple previous announcements pertaining to the buildup of the new Infiniti management team. “We are going to start a major product offensive in order to grow further within the premium segment and we are transforming the company to support our growth,” said de Nysschen. “I am very pleased that Yoichiro has joined the Infiniti team at this critical moment. With his experience, he will contribute significantly defining the Infiniti brand and delivering the products that Infiniti customers expect.” Kato is a seasoned Engineering leader with almost 30 years of global experience. He joined Nissan in 1984 as an engineer in the suspension division. During this time, he developed the world’s first multi-link suspension system which was featured on the Infiniti Q45 and numerous other products at the time. Kato also developed a unique multilink beam rear suspension. From 1996 to 2000, he gained experience from an international assignment to the company’s European technical center in Cranfield, UK. Upon his return to Japan, Kato held a number of engineering positions with increasing responsibility in the Chassis Engineering area. In 2010, he was appointed to lead this area as its General Manager. Kato is a Japanese national. He has a degree in Mechanical Engineering from Doshisha University in Japan. Infiniti, the premium automotive brand, reflects its brand promise “Inspired Performance” with a model lineup of saloons, coupÈs, SUVs and crossovers featuring exhilarating performance, emotive design and cutting edge technology. Infiniti continues to launch across the globe through a dedicated network of Infiniti Centres that share a commitment to exceptional hospitality throughout the entire period of ownership.

KUWAIT: Oula Fuel Marketing Company held its Ordinary General Assembly on April 25th of this year. The General Assembly took place at Kuwait Business Town Tower (KBT) and discussed the annual report for the financial year ending on 2012 in presence of Oula’s Chairman Abdul Hussein Al-Sultan and a number of the shareholders, auditors and representatives of the Ministry of Commerce. It was scheduled to hold the Extraordinary General Assembly at the same day but that was not possible due to the lack of quorum. During the Ordinary General Assembly; Oula’s Chairman pointed that the company achieved a net profit of about KD 3.85 million in 2012 (about Kuwaiti fils 11.29 per share). He added that the company achieved growth in its various indicators. Total fuel sale increased by about 3.9 percent, and operating profits reached about KD 4.7 million representing an increase of 11 percent as compared 2011. In addition, net non-operating income reached about KD345,000 in 2012 as compared to about KD55,000 in 2011. Nevertheless, provisions taken versus investment in an associate and a debtor for a total of about KD 963 thousand resulted in decreasing net income as compared to 2011, Mr. Sultan added that Oula reverted to the legal channels to preserve the rights of the shareholders. The company’s financial position improved during 2012; total assets reached about KD58.6 million as compared to KD55.4 million in 2011 (growth of 5.4 percent), meanwhile, its liabilities are limited to payments for KNPC. The shareholder equity reached about KD46.2 million (about KD0.133 per share), As a result, return on average equity (ROE) and return on average asset (ROA) reached 8.7 percent and 7.2 percent, respectively. The company’s board of directors recommends to the General Assembly the distribution of 5 percent share dividend (5 shares for each 100 shares) to shareholders registered as of the date of the general assembly. The chairman Abdul Hussein al-Sultan indicated that Oula is looking forward to construct and develop a number of stations in the upcoming period; he commented: “We are proud of the results achieved by the company during

2012 and we are aiming to offer more achievements and successes that shall enforce our leadership in the provision of distinctive services with positive imprint and impact in the local market. We were commitment in 2012 to develop and improve services at the stations in order to fit the expectations of our customers and meet their needs and provide quality service around the clock in order to maintain our exclusivity, uniqueness and distinction among others in the local fuel market”. He added: “We look forward to the results of 2013, which we are confident that it will be at the level of the expectations of our customers and our shareholders, especially that Oula intends to implement

Shuaiba is expected to operate during 2013. Furthermore, Oula exerted efforts to enhance the service level in stations by increasing the operating hours to 24 in most of them, linking the inventory control to the central depot and boosting safety measures. In addition, Oula introduced the “Oula payment cards” at the stations which will assist the clients in improving their control on expenses. The executive management restructured some departments, created new ones and recruited new talents which represent an ongoing process until Oula’s values and strategy are achieved and customer satisfaction is fulfilled. In addition, Oula is committed to

in transportation, logistics, security & safety and environment controls resulted in increasing operating cost. He also pointed to the cooperative with the regulatory authorities to help reduce the impact of these requirements on profits. He added that there are several scenarios diminish the effect on profitability and shareholder equity. The Ordinary General Assembly approved various items including clearing the activations of the board of directors, activities with related parties and endorsed the distribution of 5 percent share dividend to shareholders registered on the date of the General Assembly the latter is raised to the Extraordinary General Assembly proposal.

KUWAIT: Oula Chairman Abdul Hussein Al-Sultan addresses the AGM. several development projects in its stations”. The chairman had also pointed out to the achievements made during the year 2012 regarding the development of four stations and started operations in two of operating; namely Mubarak Al-Abdullah station and Kabad Station which are developed and equipped according to the latest technologies covering high standards in design, service, safety and security. The station of West

employ Kuwaiti talents, it is worthy to note that station managers are nationals, and the minimum national jobs required by the authorities is exceeded. The Chairman pointed to the adoption of a development plan for the upcoming two years, where services shall be added in three stations in 2013 and three others in 2014.This steps will diversity the sources of income. He also stated that the regulatory requirements

At the end of the assembly, Chairman Abdul Hussein Al-Sultan thanked the shareholders for their ongoing and consistent support to the company which complements its growth and success. He also extended his appreciation to the executive management and the staff working in the head office and the stations as well as the contractors and Oula customers for their support and belief.

Al Mazaya Holding Co appoints Ibrahim Al-Saqaabi as acting CEO

Pictured from left Rosen Fernandes (ACL Support), Paul Reynolds (Chief Operating Officer, Al-Sayer Group), NazeemUddin (Channel Manager, Middle East & Indian Subcontinent), Abdullah Malak (Product Manager, ACL) and Cajetan Barretto (General Manager, Dhow Information Systems)

Dhow Information Systems inks Channel partnership with ACL KUWAIT: Dhow Information Systems, a subsidiary of Al-Sayer group announced their channel partnership with ACL (www.acl.com). ACL delivers technology solutions that are transforming audit and risk management to give organizations unprecedented control over their business, by providing a combination of software and expert content that enables powerful internal controls to identify and mitigate risk, protect profits and accelerate performance. ACL provides a combination of software and expert content that enables powerful internal controls to identify and mitigate risk, protect profits

and accelerate performance. Dhow Information Systems has over 10 years of experience in the Kuwait market, providing highly customizable software and hardware solutions. During the launch ceremony, Paul Reynolds, Chief Operating Officer of the Al-Sayer Group reaffirmed his commitment to provide the highest quality of service to ACL customers in Kuwait. Nazeem Uddin, Channel Manager, Middle East & Indian Subcontinent at ACL, highlighted his company’s global presence as a leading provider of auditing and risk management solutions, and assured full backing for Dhow Information Systems.

KUWAIT: Al-Mazaya Holding Company the leading real estate company in the Gulf region, listed on the Kuwait and Dubai stock exchanges- is pleased to announce the appointment of Ibrahim Al-Saqaabi as acting CEO of the company. In this context, Rashid Al-Nafisi, chairman of the board, expressed his happiness that Al-Saqaabi has joined the team of Al-Mazaya. “On behalf of members of the board of Al Mazaya Holding Company and all of its employees, we are pleased to welcome Ibrahim Al-Saqaabi in the company, and we wish him all the best and success, and we are looking forward to a fruitful relationship”, he said, adding that Mr. Al-Saqaabi has “vast experience in the field of executive management”, which will be particularly useful in the position he is assigned to in Al-Mazaya Holding Company. Al-Saqaabiwas the General Manager of the KMC Group of Companies, owned by the Kuwait finance house which is considered one of the top Sharia-compliant companies in the Middle East, at which Al-Saqaabi managed the holding company - which consists of seven subsidiaries that provide different, variant and specialized real estate services development, including implementation and management of projects. Al-Saqaabi has extensive experience in corporate restructuring and the implementation of governance systems, which include companies’ operational systems, and the development of work plans and strategies to enhance the company’s market share. Al-Saqaabi holds an MBA from Kuwait Maastricht Business School, and a BS (Civil Eng) from George Washington University in the USA. In addition to that, he was a member of the boards in several

companies in different sections, mostly in real estate inside and outside Kuwait. For his part, Al-Saqaabi said: “I’m pleased to take on this new position in Al Mazaya company, which I consider a new challenge, looking forward to serve the company and those who made it, and I will do everything I can to achieve the company’s goals and the goals of the shareholders as well”. He added that joining Al Mazaya Holding Company came because of great faith in the company’s ability to prosper, and the potential of its management and employees to promote the company to the highest level as well as the stability of the company and its potential to acquire a substantial portion of large and distinguished real estate in addition to a basket of various investments.

Ibrahim Al-Saqaabi

CBK partners with Blends Restaurants KUWAIT: Commercial Bank of Kuwait yet again offers its customers a unique opportunity. The bank has partnered up with the unique brand of restaurants, Blends. From the period of April 15th to July 15th 2013 Premier Banking customers can exclusively enjoy a 15% discount at all Blends group of restaurants. Premier Banking customers at CBK enjoy a new dimension of personalized banking services. With a new world of products and services, Commercial Bank of Kuwait brings to its Premier Banking customers exclusive offers and benefits specially tailored to meet their expectations. Blends group of restaurants are include the popular “Casper and Gambini’s, Waterlemon Cafe, Zahr el Laymoun, the Spice Club, Cafe Blanc, Living Colors and Falafel Nadia. With prominent locations around Kuwait, and with such a large variety of cuisines customers will surely find what they’re looking for. CBK is proud to partner up with such an exceptional group of restaurants, and urges its customers to visit the restaurants and enjoy a memorable dining experience.

Wright: MPW continues to provide excellent service

Billy Wright

KUWAIT: Morphey Parsons Wright (MPW) are pleased to be coming back to the Real Estate and Investment Show this year to see all of their existing clients and all the UK property investors of Kuwait. The two directors Sam Morphey and Billy Wright will be attending the show this year. “It will be great to be back in Kuwait ” Morphey exclaimed “Each year we come to Kuwait, we are reminded of the hospitality of the Kuwaiti people - and it is always a thoroughly enjoyable visit”. MPW provide investors with a full lettings and management service, taking all the hassle away from the landlord and finding the best tenants for clients proper ties. For clients looking to rent their properties out it is an efficient service achieving the highest possible rents. For those not looking to rent their proper ty out, the Vacanc y

Management is a one stop shop for minimizing hassle and making your property safer. Billy Wright said “we have had a fantastic year with the vacancy management in particular, we have now started providing the service to clients at well known Kuwaiti bank in London who own properties in the UK and will look to build on this in the future.” MPW have had a very good year work ing alongside the Top Real Estate Group (TREG) in supplying many of their clients who have purchased some of the Barratt Homes properties in Milton Keynes with the Vacancy Management service, as well as some great quality furniture packs and home modifications. With a huge number of transactions set to complete this summer we would welcome all investors with any questions to come to the exhibition and talk to us. Due to such a high vol-

ume of clients and working with a number of families who are investing in Milton Keynes as well as London, MPW have used economies of scale to further drive down the cost of tertiary services to their clients. Meaning MPW clients not only receive the highest levels of customer service, but also great value. MPW continue to provide a level of service that is un matched by any local agent or competitor, having 24 hour access to members of staff on the phone or email, access to the office in Kuwait as well as London. Client satisfaction has never been higher and will continue as we take on more clients in 2013 and beyond. The Real Estate and Investment Exhibition will be held during 29th April 04th May 2013, in the Kuwait International Fairs Ground, Mishref - Hall 8.

Sam Morphey

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

technology

Smartphones dethrone feature phones in market SAN FRANCISCO: Industry tracker IDC yesterday reported that shipments of smartphones topped those of basic mobile phones for the first time ever in the first three months of this year. “Phone users want computers in their pockets,” said IDC senior research analyst Kevin Restivo. “The days where phones are used primarily to make phone calls and send text messages are quickly fading away.”

The rise of smartphones has put power in the hands of California-based Apple and South Korea’s Samsung, but Chinese companies such as ZTE and Huawei have muscled their way into the top-five sellers, according to IDC. “In addition to smartphones displacing feature phones, the other major trend in the industry is the emergence of Chinese companies among the leading smartphone vendors,” said IDC Mobile Phone team research manager

Ramon Llamas. “Chinese vendors, including Huawei and ZTE as well as Coolpad and Lenovo, have made significant strides to capture new users with their respective Android smartphones.” Google-back Android software for powering smartphones is available free to gadget makers while Apple keeps a tight grip on the iOS operating system for its iPhones. The global mobile phone market grew 41.6 percent, with the number of

handsets shipped climbing to 418.6 million as compared to 402.4 million in same period last year, IDC reported. The overall market, which includes basic phones that don’t serve as mini-computers linked to the internet, grew four percent to 418.6 million, according to IDC. Samsung remain the smartphone king, as shipments surged 60.7 percent to 70.7 million handsets in a showing that topped the combined total shipped by Apple, LG, Huawei, and ZTE,

which rounded out the top-five list in that order. Apple iPhone shipments hit a new high for the company in the first quarter, growing 6.6 percent to 37.4 million to claim 17.3 percent of the global market as compared with the 32.7 percent held by Samsung. LG saw smartphone shipments double to 10.3 million, while Huawei and ZTE shipped 9.9 million and 9.1 million respectively, according to IDC. —AFP

Shale Gas expected to fuel US manufacturing boom Impact of cheap natural gas

SALT LAKE CITY: Software engineer Mike Caldwell applies holograms to Bitcoins he is minting in his shop yesterday in Sandy, Utah. Bitcoin is an experimental digital currency used over the Internet that is gaining in popularity worldwide. —AFP

NEW YORK: People predicting a manufacturing renaissance in the United States usually imagine whirring robots or advanced factories turning out wind turbines and solar panels. The real American edge might be in something entirely more mundane: cheap starting materials for plastic bottles and plastic bags. The plummeting price of natural gas-which can be used to make a vast number of products, including tires, carpet, antifreeze, lubricants, cloth, and many types of plastic-is luring key industries to the United States. Just five years ago, natural-gas prices were so high that some chemical manufacturers were shutting down US operations. Now the ability to access natural gas trapped in shale rock formations, using technologies such as hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling, has lowered American prices to a fraction of those in other countries. Over the last 18 months, these low prices have prompted plans for the construction of new chemical plants to produce ethylene, ammonia for fertilizer, and diesel fuels. Dow Chemical, for example, plans to spend $4 billion to expand its US chemical production, including a new plant in Freeport, Texas, that’s due to open in 2017. The plant will make ethylene from the ethane found in many sources of natural gas. (The last such plant to be built in the United States was completed in 2001.) The impact of the resurgence is being felt most strongly in the $148 billion market for ethylene, the world’s highest-volume chemical and the

foundation for many other industries. It’s used to make bottles, toys, clothes, windows, pipes, carpet, tires, and many other products. Since ethylene is expensive to transport over long distances, a new ethylene plant is typically integrated with a facility to convert it into polyethylene for plastic bags or ethylene glycol for antifreeze. In the US, it costs $300 to make a ton of ethylene, down from $1,000 a few years ago, according to an analysis by PricewaterhouseCoopers published in October. It costs $1,717 to make it in Asia, where plants depend on high-priced oil instead of natural gas, and $455 per ton to make it in Saudi Arabia, using a combination of ethane and butane. (Ethylene plants are also being built in Qatar, which, like the US, has very cheap natural gas.) Over the last two years, manufacturers have announced plans to add 10 million metric tons of ethylene capacity in the United States by 2019. Those plans represent a 10 percent increase in global ethylene production and also account for close to half the industry’s planned expansions in all countries. The impact of cheap natural gas on manufacturing could extend beyond the production of various chemicals. Using natural gas as an energy source, rather than as a chemical feedstock, could significantly lower costs for manufacturers who use a great deal of energy, such as steel makers. (The steel industry is booming already for another natural-gas-related reason-it’s supplying gas producers with pipes.) What’s more, cheap natural

gas is prompting a shift away from petroleumbased fuels for trucking. Some companies are switching to trucks that burn natural gas directly. Eventually, even diesel trucks could be using fuel made from natural gas. The South African company Sasol plans to build a huge $14 billion plant in Louisiana partly to convert natural gas to diesel, potentially lowering fuel costs for conventional vehicles as well. Overall, cheaper chemicals, cheaper steel, and cheaper transportation could make the United States a far more attractive place for a wide range of industries. Still, Michael Levi, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, says energy doesn’t exceed 5 percent of costs in most industries-not enough to make gas prices decisive for most companies when they’re deciding where to build manufacturing plants. Levi thinks the biggest difference cheap energy might make is to give existing US factories a new reason not to close or move offshore. “Cheap natural gas might do more to keep existing manufacturing plants open than it will to get people to build new ones,” he says. Just how long US natural gas will stay relatively cheap is not clear. For capital investments to pay off, say analysts, oil prices need to stay high, and gas prices low, for many years to come. That means chemical makers could still shift their plans. For instance, Sasol will reassess the economics of its planned plant for converting natural gas into diesel in 2014, before it breaks ground. —AFP

Nest injects new technology into humble thermostat

BOSTON: In 2007, Tony Fadell believed he could see the future. He was an Apple executive who had created the iPod and was a leading figure on the team that had worked on the iPhone, which the company was about to launch. He knew people would soon form attachments to the Internet-connected computers they carried in their pockets, and he kept thinking about that as he started another major project: building an energy-efficient dream home near Lake Tahoe. “I said, ‘How do I design this home when the primary interface to my world is the thing in my pocket?’?” says Fadell. He baffled architects with demands that the home’s every feature, from the TV to the electricity supply, be ready for a world in which the Internet and mobile apps made many services more responsive. When it came to choosing a programmable thermostat for his expensive eco-friendly heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) system, Fadell blew a gasket: “They were 500 bucks a pop, and they were horrible and doing nothing and brain-dead. And I was like, ‘Wait a second, I’ll design my own.’?” Fadell, who soon left Apple at the age of 40, became convinced that his thermostat needed to be built like a smartphone and controlled from one. He wanted it to be smart enough to learn his routine and to program its own schedule accordingly, or to switch off automatically if he went out. A thermostat, he thought, could do that if it was really a small computer connected to the Internet. As he planned the features and design in his head, Fadell began to believe that his vision would appeal to other people too, even if their homes were more ordinary. With about 10 million thermostats sold in the United States every year, it could be a lucrative business. And because thermostats typically control half the energy used in US homes, a betterdesigned one could significantly reduce power consumption. He sought out Matt Rogers, a precocious 27-year-old who at the time led iPhone software development, and got him to leave Apple to cofound Nest. Fadell’s instincts turned out to be correct. Nest’s first model, a striking stainless-steel-ringed disc with a circular display, went on sale in October 2011 to widespread acclaim. The HVAC industry, a sector as unexciting as the thermostats it sold, was astonished by the fresh ideas behind the device, which learned from its owners’ behavior and could be controlled with a polished mobile app. The company released a second, more advanced thermostat in October 2012, and says sales of the two models have been brisk. The $250 product has kept owners from using 225

million kilowatt-hours of energy, the company estimates-saving around $29 million at average U.S. prices. This suggests that merely with elegant design and computing savvy, Nest might be having more impact than other Silicon Valley ventures trying to deliver on the promise of “clean tech.” Now the company is preparing to release another product. Details are scarce, but it seems that Fadell’s thermostat epiphany has launched a technological campaign that will make every part of your home more intelligent. Fadell has the energy and ready smile of a late-night talk show host, and a voice that is permanently loud. Rogers is quieter and more technically focused. The pair appear to be having enormous fun sweating the details of what is, at its core, just an on-off switch. They burst into a meeting room at Nest’s unremarkable offices in Palo Alto like two boys coming in from playing in the yard, breathless, in high spirits, and completing one another’s sentences.

Between them, they have had significant roles in creating two of the most iconic technology products of recent history, the iPod and iPhone-devices notable not only because they are useful and fashionable, but because they introduced genuinely new technological ideas. Rogers and Fadell have done the same at Nest, delivering a product that is both easier to use and more powerful than those that came before. That approach has helped them make the thermostat, historically a product bought and installed by contractors, into something people buy for themselves in the same stores where they get gadgets like phones and tablets. For half a century, the state of the art in home energy controls has been the programmable thermostat. The theory is that if people can schedule when their heating and cooling systems will kick in, they don’t have to waste energy by running the system at all times to be assured of comfortable temperatures when they wake up or return from work. But the HVAC

Nanostructures boost battery life fivefold STANFORD: Some of the most promising battery chemistries could store several times more energy than today’s lithium-ion batteries and cost much less. But these alternatives have had a fatal flaw. They can’t be recharged many times before they stop working, making them useless for applications such as electric cars. Now Stanford researchers have created novel nanostructures that greatly increase the number of times batteries with one of these chemistries can be recharged, even to levels high enough for many commercial applications. Whereas previous research reports have celebrated the ability to recharge a lithium-sulfur battery 150 times, the Stanford researchers recharged their battery 1,000 times and still retained 67 percent of its energy storage capacity. In some electric vehicles, that would be enough to last several years. Yi Cui, a professor of materials science and engineering at Stanford, says the nanomaterials can be made with simple methods that lend themselves to high-volume manufacturing. The nanostructures address two problems with previous lithiumsulfur batteries. When the batteries are discharged, sulfur combines with lithium to form lithium sulfide, and when they’re charged, sulfur forms again. But the reaction isn’t direct; intermediate compounds called polysulfides are formed. If these polysulfides migrate out of an electrode, the reactions aren’t completed, which limits the amount of energy the battery can store. Over several recharging cycles, these intermediate products accumulate, reducing battery capacity more. Several researchers have demonstrated that various nanostructures can help trap the polysulfides within an electrode, but these designs run up against a second problem with lithium-sulfur batteries. The sulfur swells and can damage the nanostructures, allowing the polysulfides to escape. The Stanford researchers made spherical nanoparticles of sulfur and coated them with a titanium-oxide shell that traps the polysulfides and keeps them from migrating out of an electrode. They then dissolved part of the sulfur, creating space inside the shell for the remaining sulfur to expand. Much more work remains, however. Electric car batteries would ideally retain 80 percent of their capacity for as many as 3,000 charging cycles. —MCT

industry has made programmable thermostats difficult to use, with unintuitive dials and sliders and cramped displays. Citing such “user interface issues,” the Environmental Protection Agency removed programmable thermostats from its Energy Star certification program in 2009. Studies showed that they didn’t reliably save energy; in fact, because many people end up switching their system on and off manually, programmable thermostats might cause most people to use more energy, says Kamin Whitehouse, a computer science professor at the University of Virginia. “People have a really hard time setting accurate schedules for their lives,” he says. When faced with a problem like this, many technologists would seek technical solutions. Fadell and Rogers thought instead about simplifying the device. “We started with the basic principle that 99.9 percent of the time, the only thing that you do is turn it up or down,” Fadell says. “So what’s the simplest form? A knob or a dial.” More complex functions, such as setting a schedule, could be executed more easily through a mobile app. That freed his designers from having to accommodate the many buttons that appear on other programmable thermostats. The Nest became nothing more than a compact stainless-steel cylinder that you can turn once it’s fixed to the wall. Fadell and Rogers have made sure that at every stage of installing and operating a Nest thermostat, you discover that potential problems have been solved for you. When you attach the device to a wall, there’s no need to drill holes or use plastic anchors to hold any screws. Nest’s engineers reviewed every screw on the market and then invented their own, with wide-spaced threads that can bite wood or powdery drywall without making it crumble. The device powers itself by leeching electricity from the control wires that connect it to your HVAC system, a feat that makes Rogers chuckle at his engineers’ audacity. Short- and longrange infrared sensors allow the device to light up when you approach and dim when you walk away-and to figure out that it was you, not the cat, who just went out, meaning it’s time to turn down the heat. Perhaps the biggest reminder of the thermostat’s intelligence comes a few days after installation, when you reach out to adjust the temperature and find that it has preÎmpted you by learning from your earlier changes. “Think of a normal thermostat. Everyone turns it up, turns it down, a couple of times a day-that’s a pattern we can infer from,” says Fadell. “Instead of changing it fifteen hundred times a year, do it 10 or 20 times and the Nest thermostat can learn from that.” —MCT

ATLANTA: The control tower stands in the background as a passenger paces while on the phone outside the international terminal at Hartsfield-Jackson airport yesterday in Atlanta. Congress easily approved legislation Friday ending furloughs of air traffic controllers that have delayed hundreds of flights daily, infuriating travelers and causing political headaches for lawmakers. —AP

IBM creates a new way to make faster, smaller transistors NEW YORK: Researchers at IBM have assembled 10,000 carbon nanotube transistors on a silicon chip. With silicon transistors approaching fundamental limits to continued miniaturization, the IBM work points toward a possible new way of continuing to produce smaller, faster, more efficient computers. Earlier work by IBM showed that nanotube transistors could run chips three times faster than silicon transistors while using only a third as much power. And at just two nanometers in diameter, the nanotubes—carbon molecules resembling rolled-up chicken wire—are so small that chip makers could theoretically cram far more transistors on a chip than is possible with silicon technology. But controlling the nanotubes’ placement in arrays numerous enough to be useful—ultimately, billions of transistors—is a major research challenge. At IBM’s T.J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York, researchers are etching tiny trenches on silicon and using a multistep process to precisely align semiconducting nanotubes in them. Then they add metal contacts to test the nanotubes’

performance. The company hopes that since the process uses a silicon substrate, it can eventually be inserted as a few extra steps within existing fabrication plants. In the samples the researchers have created so far, the nanotube transistors are about 150 nanometers apart. They’ll have to get closer if the new technology is to beat today’s silicon transistors and keep ahead of improved generations over the next decade. “We need to lay down a single layer of carbon nanotubes spaced a few nanometers apart,” says Supratik Guha, director of physical sciences at the lab. His group must also work out how to add individual electrical contacts, envisioned as atomic-scale vertical posts, to each of billions of transistors; right now the wafer acts as the gate switching the nanotubes on and off. And finally, they must find ways to generate ultrapure supplies of semiconducting carbon nanotubes so that few, if any, will fail or short out. While achieving all this is likely to take five to 10 years, Guha says, “nanotubes are an excellent candidate to keep the scaling of microelectronics technology going.” —MCT

AT&T lets people control homes using smartphones

SAN FRANCISCO: US telecom titan AT&T launched a service yesterday to use smartphones or tablets to activate home alarm systems and perform other duties like open doors for guests or adjust the temperature. A Digital Life home security and management system tailored for mobile Internet lifestyles was rolled out in an array of US cities for monthly subscription prices starting at $30 after installation charges. “People rely on their mobile devices more than ever, so Digital Life offers an easy and convenient way to secure their homes, protect their families and simplify their lives

from virtually anywhere,” AT&T senior vice president Kevin Petersen said in a statement. Applications tailored for personal computers as well as smartphones or tablets powered by Apple, Android or Windows mobile software let people remotely control cameras, door locks, lights, thermostats and appliances. Digital Life includes alarm systems and monitoring centers, according to AT&T. The service can be customized, and options include being able to view online feeds from cameras or remote-controlled door locks. —AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

H E A LT H & S C I E N C E

US senate bill targets large compounding pharmacies WASHINGTON: Large specialty pharmacies like the one that triggered a deadly meningitis outbreak last year would be subject to federal safety inspections and manufacturing standards under a new Senate proposal introduced Friday. The draft bill is the first Senate effort to address the recent outbreak tied to contaminated compounded drugs that sickened more than 700 Americans and killed more than 50 others. The wave of deadly fungal infections was identified in September and linked to a large Massachusetts compounding pharmacy, which regulators said was operating more like a manufacturer. The new proposal would subject such large compounding operations to direct federal oversight by the Food and Drug Administration, rather than the state pharmacy boards that have traditionally overseen them. Compounding pharmacies mix customized solutions, creams and other medications in formulas specified by a doctor’s prescription. Over the last two decades though, larger compounding

operations have emerged that produce medications in bulk and ship them across state lines. The New England Compounding Center, which triggered the meningitis outbreak, shipped more than 17,600 doses of its pain injection to 23 states. Last week, FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg said her agency was not aggressive enough in policing the company because of the conflicting patchwork of state and federal laws that govern pharmacies. The Senate bill is designed to clear up that ambiguity. “By clarifying FDA authority over high-risk compounding practices, this bill will enhance protections for patients taking compounded drugs and help prevent crises like last year’s tragic meningitis outbreak,” said Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, who chairs the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. The bill was drafted with support from Republicans on the committee, including Sens. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., and Pat Roberts, R-Kan. The bill identifies “compounding manufacturers”

as pharmacies that produce injectable drugs and ship them across state lines without patient-specific prescriptions from doctors. These operations will have to register with the FDA, report the drugs they make and meet standards similar to those required of drug manufacturers. Traditional compounding pharmacies, generally small operations that work with individual doctors, will continue to be regulated by state pharmacy boards. But the bill sets minimum standards for ingredients used by all compounding pharmacies. As the first bipartisan bill in Congress aimed at addressing last year’s outbreak, observers say the Senate legislation has the best chance of becoming law. Several Democrats in the House of Representatives have introduced similar measures, but Republicans who control that chamber have shown little interest in passing new compounding legislation. Previous congressional efforts to regulate the compounding pharmacies have been scuttled before, stretching back to the 1990s. In the last

attempt, senators including Roberts and Ted Kennedy, D-Mass, circulated a bill in 2007 that would have given the FDA more power to inspect compounders and set standards for sterile medications. But the legislation was abandoned after compounding pharmacists campaigned against it, visiting Capitol Hill and lobbying in Senate offices. The industry’s main trade group, the International Academy of Compounding Pharmacists, spent about $1 million lobbying Congress in the last decade, according to data from the Center for Responsive Politics. The group said in a statement Friday that new categories like “compounding manufacturer” create “more confusion and further blurs the jurisdictional authority of regulators.” “IACP reiterates its position that state boards of pharmacy are responsible for the licensing and oversight of compounding pharmacies and the FDA is responsible for overseeing and regulating pharmaceutical manufacturers,” the group said in an emailed statement. — AP

Latin America threatened by cancer epidemic: Study Healthcare access lagging, treatment costs rising

TAIPEI: Tourists wear masks at the Songshan Airport in Taipei yesterday. Taiwan confirmed its first case of a new deadly strain of bird flu. The Centers for Disease Control said Wednesday that a 53-year-old man became ill with fever after returning from a visit to the eastern Chinese province of Jiangsu on April 9. — AP

SAO PAULO: Latin America’s growing prosperity is fueling a cancer epidemic that threatens to overwhelm the region unless governments take urgent preventive action, a study published warned. A multinational team of researchers found the current state of cancer care and prevention in Latin America incompatible with the socioeconomic changes taking place in the region, where an increasingly urban populace faces mounting lifestyle-related cancer risks. Writing in The Lancet Oncology medical journal, researchers said Latin Americans are enjoying the benefits of growing economic prosperity but also are leading longer, more sedentary lives, accompanied by a rise in alcohol consumption, smoking and obesity. That is not only leading to an increase in cancer rates, which are expected to rise more than 33 percent in the region by 2020, but a disproportionately high number of cancer deaths.

“If corrective action is not taken this problem will become magnitudes of order bigger than it is today, it will create massive human suffering and it will threaten the economies of the region,” Paul Goss, a professor at Harvard Medical School who led the study, said at an event in Sao Paulo on Friday. While Latin Americans contract cancer at lower rates than residents of the United States, they are nearly twice as likely to die from it, the study said. Much of that has to do with the way cancer is treated in Latin America. More than half of those in the region have little or no health insurance and relatively few public health efforts are focused on preventive medicine. That means most patients seek treatment when they are at advanced stages of the disease and often too sick to be saved. That type of care is not only ineffective but often very expensive, draining already scarce resources from public coffers, the study found. The study recommended Latin American

nations make major changes to their healthcare policies, such as dedicating more funds to public health, widening healthcare access so cancer patients can be treated earlier and developing better national cancer plans. It also envisions shifting funds away from costly end-stage cancer treatment toward palliative care. While researchers speaking at Friday’s event acknowledged the difficulty of enacting such reforms quickly, they called on governments to start with short-term solutions, such as raising taxes on tobacco and providing families with cleanerburning wood stoves. The total cost of cancer to Latin American countries currently is about $4 billion per year and stands to grow precipitously, according to the study. “If we don’t put these things on the agenda now, we won’t be prepared to deal with this in 10 or 15 years,” said Carlos Barrios, a professor at Brazil’s Pontificia Universidade Catolica do Rio Grande do Sul. “(At that point) the costs will be likely be exorbitant.” — Reuters

Use of herbicide Roundup linked to health problems NEW YORK: Heavy use of the world’s most popular herbicide, Roundup, could be linked to a range of health problems and diseases, including Parkinson’s, infertility and cancers, according to a new study. The peer-reviewed report, published last week in the scientific journal Entropy, said evidence indicates that residues of “glyphosate,” the chief ingredient in Roundup weed killer, which is sprayed over millions of acres of crops, has been found in food. Those residues enhance the damaging effects of other food-borne chemical residues and toxins in the environment to disrupt normal body functions and induce disease, according to the report, authored by Stephanie Seneff, a research scientist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Anthony Samsel, a retired science consultant from Arthur D. Little, Inc. Samsel is a former private environmental government contractor as well as a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists. “Negative

impact on the body is insidious and manifests slowly over time as inflammation damages cellular systems throughout the body,” the study says. We “have hit upon something very important that needs to be taken seriously and further investigated,” Seneff said. Environmentalists, consumer groups and plant scientists from several countries have warned that heavy use of glyphosate is causing problems for plants, people and animals. The EPA is conducting a standard registration review of glyphosate and has set a deadline of 2015 for determining if glyphosate use should be limited. The study is among many comments submitted to the agency. Monsanto is the developer of both Roundup herbicide and a suite of crops that are genetically altered to withstand being sprayed with the Roundup weed killer. These biotech crops, including corn, soybeans, canola and sugarbeets, are planted on millions of acres in the United States annually.

Farmers like them because they can spray Roundup weed killer directly on the crops to kill weeds in the fields without harming the crops. Roundup is also popularly used on lawns, gardens and golf courses. Monsanto and other leading industry experts have said for years that glyphosate is proven safe, and has a less damaging impact on the environment than other commonly used chemicals. Jerry Steiner, Monsanto’s executive vice president of sustainability, reiterated that in a recent interview when questioned about the study. “We are very confident in the long track record that glyphosate has. It has been very, very extensively studied,” he said. Of the more than two dozen top herbicides on the market, glyphosate is the most popular. In 2007, as much as 185 million pounds of glyphosate was used by US farmers, double the amount used six years ago, according to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) data. — AP

BUENOS AIRES: Picture released by Noticias Argentinas showing the Metropolitan Police standing guard after clashing with staff of the Borda neuropsychiatric hospital in Buenos Aires. Confrontation erupted after workers started demolishing a rehabilitation workshop at the mental health center for men, in which premises the city government plans to build a civic centre. — AFP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

W H AT ’ S O N

More winners at Al-Mulla Exchange’s weekly Remit Tronics promotion

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hat’s more fun than clicking a beautiful picture? Sharing it with others! Let other people see the way you see Kuwait - through your lens. Friday Times will feature snapshots of Kuwait through Instagram feeds. If you want to share your Instagram photos, email us at instagram@kuwaittimes.net

Announcements NAFO ‘Samanwayam’ he 10th anniversary of NAFO Kuwait will be celebrated on May 10 at the American International School Auditorium from 6pm onwards. Indian Ambassador Satish C Mehta will inaugurate the event. Former Indian Ambassador to the US and the United Nations T P Sreenivasan and NSS Director Board Member Pandalam Sivankutty will be guests of honor. NAFO will also present an eclectic dance drama ‘Krishna’ which is conceived and choreographed by Padmashri Shobana. She will be accompanied by a 15-member troupe from Kalarpana Chennai and supported by Oscar winner Rasool Pookkutty. It has voice-overs in English by film personalities such as Irrfan Khan, Konkonasen, Shabaana Azmi, John Abraham, Prakash Raj, Stephen Devassy and P Rajeevan.

Konkani musical show nited Friends Club - Kuwait presents Kuwait Trio’s Konkani Songit Sanz (a Konkani musical evening) with fun filled comedy and songs, starring: Gracy Rodrigues, Clemmie Pereira, Irene Vaz, Lucy Aranha, Espy Crasto, Bab. Agnel, Katty de Navelim, Salu Faleiro, Gasper Crasto, Braz de Parra, Anthony D’Silva, Agnelo Fernandes, Seby & Seby, Zeferino Mendes, Lopes Bros., Comedian Nelson, Laurente Pereira & Cajetan de Sanvordem-Michael D’Silva-Mario de Majorda (Kuwait Trio). The show will be held on Friday, 10th May 2013 at 4 pm at the Indian Community School (Senior), Salmiya, Kuwait. Music will be provided by Maestro Shahu.

KALA-Balakalamela registeration alakalamela-2013, the art and cultural competition for Indian students in Kuwait, organized yearly by KALA-Kuwait is scheduled to be conducted on 3 May 2013 at Indian Public school, Salmiya. The completions are open for Indian students from Class 1 to 12 categorized as Sub Juniors (Class 1-4), Juniors (Class 5-8) and Seniors (9-12). The completions will be held for Bharathanatyam, Mohiniyattam, Folk Dance, Group Dance, Light Music, Classical Music, Fancy Dress, Elocution (English & Malayalam), Essay (English & Malayalam), Recitation (English & Malayalam) in 6 different stages in the venue. The registrations can be done through schools or directly through KALA web site ‘www.kalaonweb.com’ or directly handed over to any of the nearest KALA-units, or to sent to our e-mail ‘kalabalakalamela@gmail.com’ on or before 20 April 2013.

l-Mulla International Exchange, the premier exchange company in Kuwait, announced the names of 14 more lucky winners in their 9th and 10th ‘Remit Tronics’ mega promotion draw respectively. The draws were held on 16th April at their Hawally-3 branch, and on April 23 at their Mahaboula-1 branch. The three-month long promotion that began in February and will run until 6 May, 2013, picks 14 winners at the end of each week from all transactions done at any branch of Al-Mulla Exchange during the previous seven days. The big winners of the latest draws

were MD Haresh and Huzefa Batariya Zulfikar Ali who won KD 400 each for their transaction with Al Mulla International Exchange. The list of the other winners and the prizes they won are as follows: Antonio C Sabu Ad Jr, Muhammad Vembanattu Aliyar, Aluganti Vishnu Vardhan, Lineesh K Narayana, Joseph Thomas Thomas, Abdullah Mohammed Alsaraheen, Kashaf Mahmuod Khadm Hussin, Sami Ossama Siddiqe, each of whom won a Samsung Tab 2. Zawar Hussain Fateh Muhammed, Mohammad Anwar Amereshen, Ankit Joshi, Sreejit Viyyam, Goma Muhammad

Goma Muhammad, Nargarajan Murugesan, Abdullah Salim Ahmad, Haji Abdul Sattar, K Ramesh Kumar, Naresh Kumar, who each received a Samsung Duo mobile each. Vengala Murali Prasad, Kunju Mohamed, Nurul Amin Abdul Kadir Rawoot, H M S Jayathilak, Azad Mohammed Ahmed Mhd, Shajan Devasi, Lakshamma Kuncham and Dufail Sadhri who each took home a Samsung 32” LCD television With more than 155 electronic items to be won and one more week to go, customers could send their remittances from any Al-Mulla Exchange branch and

win fabulous prizes, including cash prize of KD 400, Samsung Tabs, Samsung LCD televisions and Samsung mobile phones. Now customers have yet another reason to remit their money through AlMulla Exchange which offers, free insurance and loyalty points on every transaction, as well as SMS confirmation on delivery of remittances. Besides making money transfer a quick, safe and relaxed experience for customers, Kuwait’s premier exchange also offers the facility to send money from the comfort of one’s home or office through their online service.

Zesty, fresh and delicious soups and salads at Zafran

IMAX

IMAX film program st

Effective from 31 March 2013 ** 9:30am Showtime Available for Groups Tornado Alley 3D10:30am, 6:30pm, 9:30pm To The Arctic 3D 11:30am, 8:30pm Flight of Butterflies 3D 12:30pm, 5:30pm

afran, the contemporary Indian restaurant by Foodmark, invites guests to try out a good range of fresh, zesty and delicious salads and soups with the ongoing “Soup and Salad” promotion available for a limited period till the end May. Zafran’s master chefs; Chef Mohit Dhingra and brand Chef Gaurav Singh have concocted a delicious range of menu offering which includes five soups with a combination of vegetarian, non-vegetarian and seafood soup and a selection of salads extremely nourishing for the body. Meticulously created with healthy ingredients, the menu comprises of “Dal Shorbha” a simple and a very popular one in GCC countries to the rich innovative “Broccoli and Almond Soup”, customized to delight guests of all nationalities. The non vegetarian soup eaters can be delighted by the “Chicken and Mushroom Soup”, which is wholesome or even try an alternative, the light and simple Chicken Shorbha just to tease their palate. The seafood eaters have not been left behind as they can indulge in the aromatic Seafood Shorbha. Lastly the all time favorite “Tamater and Dhaniya” ka Shorbha definitely features on the menu. The menu also offers four salads ranging from a “Tossed Green Salad” spiked with sumac powder. The

“Chicken Tikka” salad tickles your bud with the crunchy rocca leaves tossed in a balsamic honey dressing and a crunch of fresh pomegranate grains. For a wholesome meal one can choose the “Murg Malai Salad” which is very close to the Indian style Cesar salad. The most interesting of all salads is the “Water Melon and Feta Salad” on a bed of fresh rocca leaves which is filled with nutritional ingredients and is very healthy. Sajan Alex, Country Operations Manager, Foodmark Kuwait, said: “We devel-

oped the Soup and Salad promotion in response to our customers wanting more choices, and new flavors .We welcome our patrons as well as residents who are yet to discover our food to enjoy our gastronomic delights.” Zafran, located in Salmiya (Salem Al-Mubarak Street), is known for its vibrant and modern setting, and is a warm and welcoming retreat for friends and family who wish to relax and enjoy good high quality food at pursefriendly prices.

Born to be Wild 3D7:30pm

AUK holds 9th Annual Career Fair

Monday: ** 9:30am Showtime Available for Groups Flight of Butterflies 3D 10:30am, 8:30pm Tornado Alley 3D11:30am, 5:30pm, 7:30pm To The Arctic 3D 12:30pm, 9:30pm Born to be Wild 3D6:30pm Tuesday: ** 9:30am Showtime Available for Groups Tornado Alley 3D10:30am, 6:30pm, 8:30pm Flight of Butterflies 3D 11:30am, 9:30pm To The Arctic 3D 12:30pm, 7:30pm Born to be Wild 3D5:30pm Wednesday: ** 9:30am Showtime Available for Groups To The Arctic 3D 10:30am Tornado Alley 3D11:30am, 6:30pm, 9:30pm Flight of Butterflies 3D 12:30pm, 7:30pm Journey to Mecca 5:30pm Born to be Wild 3D 8:30pm

Write to us Send to What’s On upcoming events, birthdays or celebrations by email: local@kuwaittimes.net Fax: 24835619 / 20

Dr Nizar Hamzeh, AUK Provost and Interim President cuts the ribbon.

ach year, a wide variety employers visit the American University of Kuwait to share information about their organizations, and to discuss future employment opportunities with AUK students. On April 23, it was time to kick-off the recruitment season with the AUK 9th Annual Career Fair. Held in the AUK Auditorium, the Career Fair brought together 28 reputable local and multinational companies from all around Kuwait to meet and speak with AUK students about potential career opportunities. Organized by the AUK Career Services and Wellness Center (CSW), the fair was the biggest yet, and provided students with a valuable chance to make contacts with companies, and market themselves to prospective employers. During the opening ceremony, AUK Provost and Interim President, Dr Nizar Hamzeh, cut the ribbon marking the offi-

Jason Sullivan, Assistant Director, Career Services and Wellness Center

cial inauguration of the fair. He gave an opening speech where he welcomed all participants and stressed that, “This event is an important opportunity to form potential partnerships. It helps students advance their careers as professional leaders in their communities.” Hamzeh emphasized that recruitment is a two-way process in which students seek to make themselves attractive to employers through their skills and get recruited. “It can be life-changing for potential students,” he added. This event, exclusively for AUK students and graduates, was sponsored by the platinum sponsors Al-Ahli Bank of Kuwait (ABK) and Gulf Bank; the gold sponsors KIPCO Asset management, 4fest and 4films Printing Group, and Ahli United Bank; and the silver sponsors Al-Homaizi Ltd., IKEA, Hyundai Green Industries (HGI), United Real Estate Company, Al-Ghanim

Abir Itani, AUK Career and Personal Counselor at the Career Services and Wellness Center.

Industries, and Commercial Bank of Kuwait. Abir Itani, AUK Career and Personal Counselor at the Career Services Center said, “The fair is a very important chance to prepare students for potential employment. We have many representatives from AUK as well.” During the event, students had an opportunity to investigate their career paths and directly gain advice on their resumes from professionals and various corporate representatives, some of whom are AUK graduates. Speaking as an AUK graduate and representative of Al-Ahli bank, Mariam Bin Nakhi said she is proud of AUK students, and that the institute opens broad opportunities for its students. The fair proved to be very successful. It is a great platform for students to maximize their chances of finding the right

career placement for them, while also making a connection with their possible future employers. AUK equips students with the necessary skills needed to prepare them for a successful future. The Career Services and Wellness Center (CSW) aims to promote wellness education, serve as a resource for students, staff and faculty, and provide counseling for students and alumni. Counseling follows American Counseling Association (ACA) standards which require confidentiality between client and counselor. Career services provide career counseling, professional trainings, and job readiness. Personal counseling addresses a wide range of academic, personal and social concerns. Disability services offer reasonable accommodations and assistance for students. The CSW is committed to help students learn, think and become.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

W H AT ’ S O N BTB proud to introduce ‘Free Summer Checkup’ campaign

umper-to-Bumper (BTB) is proud to introduce its ‘Free Summer Checkup’ campaign starting Wednesday, April 24, 2013 until Sunday June 30, 2013 for the 3rd year. Regardless of the make or model of your car, Bumper-to-Bumper will provide you with a complimentary checkup which includes AC systems, engine cooling systems, tires, and brakes. In addition, customers will receive a KD 5 voucher for every KD 50 spent for any required services. Bumper-to-Bumper branches are conveniently located in Shuwaikh, Sharq, Al-Rai, Jahra and Fahaheel. Bumper-to-Bumper caters its services to all car makes through its highly trained and skilled team, advanced facilities and the highest standards of practices that mirror the company’s commitment to delivering complete customer satisfaction. The company’s services include quick service and lubes, body shop, accessories, car wash and detailing, tire garage and diesel services. The company furthers its commitment

to providing its customers with rewarding experiences through special promotions and specials. Stop by at one of Bumper-toBumper’s convenient locations, with no appointment and get your ‘Free Summer Checkup’ today.

Embassy

Sebamed goes Instagram

e are glad to inform you that we have launched our site on instagram. Follow us on @sebamedkuwait and (hashtag) #sebamedkuwait. We plan to launch a contest about the daily life with sebamed involving all family members, so follow us for more details, for the weekly contest and prizes. See page 7 For Details On Sebamed Contest.. Be Ready.. Join Us.. All Are Welcome.

Fawzia Sultan International School clean-up

Information EMBASSY OF AUSTRALIA The Australian Embassy Kuwait does not have a visa or immigration department. All processing of visas and immigration matters in conducted by The Australian Consulate-General in Dubai. Email: info.ausdxb@vfshelpline.com (VFS) immigration.dubai@dfat.gov.au (Visa Office); Tel: +971 4 355 1958 (VFS) - +971 4 508 7200 (Visa Office); Fax: +971 4 355 0708 (Visa Office). In Kuwait applications can be lodged at the Australian Visa Application Centre 4B 1st Floor, Al-Banwan Building Al-Qibla Area, Ali Al-Salem Street, opposite the Central Bank of Kuwait, Kuwait City, Kuwait. Working hours and days: 09:30 - 17:30; Sunday - Thursday. Or visit their website www.vfs-au-gcc-com for more information. Kuwait citizens can apply for tourist visas on-line at www.immi.gov.au/e visa/e676.htm. nnnnnnn

EMBASSY OF CANADA The Embassy of Canada in Kuwait does not have a visa or immigration department. All processing of visa and immigration matters including enquiries is conducted by the Canadian Embassy in Abu Dhabi, UAE. Individuals who are interested in working, studying, visiting or immigrating to Canada should contact the Canadian Embassy in Abu Dhabi, website: www.UAE.gc.ca or www.goingtocanada.gc.ca, E-mail: abdbi-imenquiry@international.gc.ca. The Embassy of Canada is located at Villa 24, Al-Mutawakei St, Block 4 in Da’aiyah. Please visit our website at www.Kuwait.gc.ca. The Embassy of Canada is open from 07:30 to 15:30 Sunday through Thursday. The reception is open from 07:30 to 12:30. Consular services for Canadian citizens are provided from 09:00 until 12:00, Sunday through Wednesday. nnnnnnn

awzia Sultan International School (FSIS) organized a beach clean-up last week at Shuwaikh port as part of the school’s Earth Day celebrations. Over 95 enthusiastic students and teachers headed to Shuwaikh Port last Wednesday on a beach clean-up trip organized by the school. The volunteers who contributed in the activity showed motivation and dedication to keeping their environment clean and

preserving the port that is a wildlife refuge for a many migrating birds. “Pollution in all its forms is a very important issue andwe needto continuously educate our future generations about it so they can make a difference starting today. Our students are very aware of the importance of a clean and well preserved environment. The students chose to go on this trip because they care about their country, the people who live in it, and its wild life” said

High School Science Teacher, Ron Brooke. FSIS celebrated Earth Day during a week filled with activities toincrease awareness on preserving a clean environment for both students and faculty. “Students at Fawzia Sultan International School are very aware of their environment, and this annual environmental celebration is something they look forward to every year. Our commitment to raise awareness

on preserving the environment is derived from our student’s enthusiasm “said FSIS Director, Tania Callaway. Students were also exposed to the wildlife in Shuwaikh Port, and were presented with facts of migratory birds’ activities in Kuwait.Founded in 1993, Fawzia Sultan International School is a non-profit American educational institute that serves students with learning disabilities and helps prepare them to lead successful lives as global citizens.

GUST hosts forum on youth, sports and nation

country’s youth is its foundation and its future. The Kuwait Sports and Social Committee in collaboration with the student Sport Club at the Gulf University for Science and Technology helda forum on Thursday April18under the auspices of Dr Adel AlFalah, Undersecretary of Awqaf and Islamic Affairs with the slogan “The importance of youth on the nation”. The forum was an open meeting with six experienced speakers in the field of sports from different countries, including Saudi Arabia, Tunis, Sudan, and Qatar. The ceremony was attended byprofessional athletes, Sulaiman AlJbailan, Khodhar Abu Al-Raish, Mohammad Abduljwad, Nawwaf Al-

Temyat, Essam Al-Shawwaly, and Swar Al-Thahb. The speakers discussed and explained the huge role of youth in the renaissance of their countries. According to Sulaiman Al-Jbailan, “Young people are the future of the nations. The culture of the country depends on its youth”. The Gulf University for Science and Technology, which hosted the event through one of its student clubs, is the first private university in Kuwait which began operation in 2002. It is based on an American-style model of higher education and aims to serve the increasing educational demands of Kuwait and the Gulf region. It currently hosts approximately 3,000 full-time students.

KDNA holds family picnic

ozhikode District NRI Association (KDNA) organized one day picnic as a connotation of its members and family to the landscape Area at Kabd on April 19, 2013. Picnic is an occasion to flee from the habitual hassle everyone endures in their routine life. The morning session was on track by a breakfast followed with an inaugural speech by the president of KDNA Zubair MM and the picnic general convener Illyas Thottattil narrated about the well being of the picnic. The general secretary of KDNA Suresh Mathur recounted few words on the association activities and Advisory Board members Krishnan Kadalundi and Basheer Batha spoke during the inaugural function. Picnic encompassed lots of entertainments including sports, games, vivid competitions, musical orchestra, swimming, bingo and various other activities to the members and family to rejoice in a leisurely atmosphere.

Picnic came to an end with the musical extravaganza led by the Association Arts & Cultural Secretary Rafi Kallai and Joint Secretary Abdurahiman Naduvannur. Rafi Kozhikode, Kabeer, Dr Divya Deepak, Shana Hakkim, Dhanya Padmanabhan enthralled the audience. During the concluding stages of the programs prizes and gifts were presented to the winners sponsored by the Malabar Gold & Diamond and I Black Electronics. Calicut Landmark Builders are the main sponsors of the association. Picnic joint conveners Suhesh Kumar and Abdurahiman Naduvannur, Ubaid Chakitakandy,Raveendran Mukkum, Premraj Koroth, Shijith Kumar Chirakkal, Karunakaran, Sajeevan Kunnimal, RN Shoukath, Hakeem Villyapalli, Praju TM, Mohanraj Areekad, Area/unit office bearers, Central executive members coordinated and controlled the picnic. Picnic ended with vote of thanks by Association Treasurer Santosh Punathil.

EMBASSY OF CYPRUS In its capacity as EU Local Presidency in the State of Kuwait, the Embassy of the Republic of Cyprus, on behalf of the Member States of the EU and associated States participating in the Schengen cooperation, would like to announce that as from 2nd October 2012 all Schengen States’ Consulates in Kuwait will use the Visa Information System (VIS). The VIS is a central database for the exchange of data on shortstay (up to three months) visas between Schengen States. The main objectives of the VIS are to facilitate visa application procedures and checks at external border as well as to enhance security. The VIS will contain all the Schengen visa applications lodged by an applicant over five years and the decisions taken by any Schengen State’s consulate. This will allow applicants to establish more easily the lawful use of previous visas and their bona fide status. For the purpose of the VIS, applicants will be required to provide their biometric data (fingerprints and digital photos) when applying for a Schengen visa. It is a simple and discreet procedure that only takes a few minutes. Biometric data, along with the data provided in the Schengen visa application form, will be recorded in the VIS central database. Therefore, as from 2nd October 2012, first-time applicants will have to appear in person when lodging the application, in order to provide their fingerprints. For subsequent applications within 5 years the fingerprints can be copied from the previous application file in the VIS. The Cypriot Presidency would like to assure the people of Kuwait and all its permanent citizens that the Member States and associated States participating in the Schengen cooperation, have taken all necessary technical measures to facilitate the rapid examination and the efficient processing of visa applications and to ensure a quick and discreet procedure for the implementation of the new VIS. nnnnnnn

EMBASSY OF AUSTRALIA The Embassy will reopen on Sunday 28 April 2013. nnnnnnn

EMBASSY OF VATICAN The Apostolic Nunciature (Embassy of the Holy See, Vatican in Kuwait presents its compliments to Kuwait Times Newspaper, and has the honor to inform the same that the Apostolic Nunciature has moved to a new location in Kuwait City. Please find below the new address: Yarmouk, Block 1, Street 2, Villa No: 1. P.O.Box 29724, Safat 13158, Kuwait. Tel: 965 25337767, Fax: 965 25342066. Email: nuntiuskuwait@gmail.com nnnnnnn

EMBASSY GREECE The Embassy of Greece in Kuwait has the pleasure to announce that visa applications must be submitted to Schengen Visa Application Centre (VFS office) located at 12th floor, Al-Naser Tower, Fahad Al-Salem Street, Al-Qibla area, Kuwait City, (Parking at Souk Watia). For information please call 22281046 from 08:30 to 17:00 (Sunday to Thursday). Working hours: Submission from 08:30 to 15:30. Passport collection from 16:00 to 17:00. For visa applications please visit the following website www.mfa.gr/kuwait. nnnnnnn

EMBASSY OF ALBANIA The Embassy of the Republic of Albania to the State of Kuwait would like to inform that on 03.04.2013, the new Albanian Ambassador, Kujtim Morina presented credential letters to His Highness, the Amir of the State of Kuwait, Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber AlSabah. The address of the embassy is the same: Al - Zahra, Block 8, Street 802, Villa 169, Kuwait,P.O.BOX 3090, Safat 13131. The ebassy offers consular services as well. Working hours are from 9:00 to 14:00, Sunday through Thursday.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

TV PROGRAMS

00:45 Up Close And Dangerous 01:10 Up Close And Dangerous 01:35 Untamed & Uncut 02:25 Wild Hawaii 03:15 Wildest Islands 04:05 Wild France 04:55 Call Of The Wildman 05:20 Orangutan Island 05:45 RSPCA: On The Frontline 06:10 RSPCA: On The Frontline 06:35 Wildlife SOS 07:00 The Really Wild Show 07:25 Groomer Has It 08:15 Dogs 101 09:10 Weird Creatures With Nick Baker 10:05 Wild Hawaii 11:00 Animal Cops Houston 11:55 Call Of The Wildman 12:20 Wildlife SOS 12:50 Safari Vet School 13:15 Safari Vet School 13:45 Animal Precinct 14:40 Wild Hawaii 15:30 Orangutan Island 16:00 The Really Wild Show 16:30 Dogs 101 17:25 Animal Planet’s Most Outrageous 18:20 Project Puppy 18:45 Project Puppy 19:15 Monkey Life 19:40 Rescue Vet 20:10 Call Of The Wildman 20:35 Orangutan Island 21:05 Wild Appalachia 22:00 Into The Pride 22:55 Untamed China With Nigel Marven 23:50 Animal Cops Phoenix

00:40 Come Dine With Me 01:30 Masterchef: The Professionals 02:15 Gok’s Fashion Fix 03:05 Coastal Kitchen 03:30 Cash In The Attic 04:10 Bargain Hunt 04:55 Britain’s Dream Homes 05:45 Gok’s Fashion Fix 06:35 New Scandinavian Cooking 07:00 Baking Mad With Eric Lanlard 07:25 The Good Cook 07:55 Baking Made Easy 08:20 Homes Under The Hammer 09:10 Bargain Hunt 09:55 Antiques Roadshow 10:50 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition 11:30 Masterchef: The Professionals 12:15 Come Dine With Me 13:05 Baking Mad With Eric Lanlard 13:30 New Scandinavian Cooking 13:55 Cash In The Attic 14:40 Bargain Hunt 15:25 Antiques Roadshow 16:15 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition 17:00 Homes Under The Hammer 17:55 Baking Mad With Eric Lanlard 18:20 The Roux Legacy 18:55 Baking Made Easy 19:20 New Scandinavian Cooking 19:45 Come Dine With Me 20:35 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition 21:20 Antiques Roadshow 22:15 Bargain Hunt 23:00 Homes Under The Hammer 23:55 Cash In The Attic

00:00 00:30 01:00 01:30 01:45 02:00 02:30 02:45 03:00 03:30 03:45 04:00 04:30

BBC World News America BBC World News America Newsday Asia Business Report Sport Today Newsday Asia Business Report Sport Today Newsday Asia Business Report Sport Today BBC World News Asia Business Report

04:45 Sport Today 05:00 BBC World News 05:30 Asia Business Report 05:45 Sport Today 06:00 BBC World News 06:30 Hardtalk 07:00 BBC World News 07:30 World Business Report 07:45 BBC World News 08:00 BBC World News 08:30 World Business Report 08:45 BBC World News 09:00 BBC World News 09:30 World Business Report 09:45 BBC World News 10:00 BBC World News 10:30 World Business Report 10:45 BBC World News 11:00 BBC World News 11:30 Hardtalk 12:00 BBC World News 12:30 World Business Report 12:45 Sport Today 13:00 BBC World News 13:30 BBC World News 14:00 GMT With George Alagiah 14:30 GMT With George Alagiah 15:00 BBC World News 15:30 World Business Report 15:45 Sport Today 16:00 Impact With Mishal Husain 16:30 Impact With Mishal Husain 17:00 Impact With Mishal Husain 17:30 Hardtalk 18:00 Global With John Sopel 18:30 Global With John Sopel 19:00 Global With John Sopel 19:30 World Business Report 19:45 Sport Today 20:00 BBC World News 20:30 BBC Focus On Africa 21:00 World News Today With Zeinab Badawi 21:30 World News Today With Zeinab Badawi 22:00 World News Today With Zeinab Badawi 22:30 World Business Report 22:45 Sport Today 23:00 Business Edition With Tanya Beckett 23:30 Hardtalk

00:45 01:35 02:00 02:25 02:50 03:00 03:30 03:55 04:20 04:45 05:00 05:25 05:45 06:00 06:25 06:50 07:15 07:40 08:05 08:30 08:55 09:45 10:10 10:35 11:00 11:25 11:50 12:40 13:00 13:25 13:50 14:20 14:45 15:10 15:35 16:00 16:25 16:50 17:15 17:40 18:05 18:30 18:55 19:20 19:45 20:10

Wacky Races Duck Dodgers Duck Dodgers Dastardly And Muttley Dastardly And Muttley Dexter’s Laboratory Wacky Races Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries Tom & Jerry The Garfield Show Bananas In Pyjamas Gerald McBoing Boing Jelly Jamm Ha Ha Hairies Bananas In Pyjamas Lazytown Krypto: The Super Dog Baby Looney Tunes Gerald McBoing Boing Cartoonito Tales Lazy Town Baby Looney Tunes Krypto: The Super Dog Cartoonito Tales Jelly Jamm Gerald McBoing Boing Lazy Town Jelly Jamm Tom & Jerry Kids A Pup Named Scooby-Doo Moomins Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries Tiny Toon Adventures The 13 Ghosts Of Scooby-Doo Taz-Mania Tom & Jerry Tales Moomins The Garfield Show The Looney Tunes Show Tiny Toon Adventures Taz-Mania Sylvester & Tweety Mysteries The 13 Ghosts Of Scooby-Doo Pink Panther And Pals The Looney Tunes Show Taz-Mania

20:35 21:00 21:25 21:50

Puppy In My Pocket What’s New Scooby-Doo? Looney Tunes Dexter’s Laboratory

00:30 Grim Adventures Of... 01:20 Johnny Test 02:10 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 02:35 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 03:00 The Amazing World Of Gumball 03:25 Regular Show 03:50 Ben 10: Omniverse 04:15 Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated 04:40 Powerpuff Girls 05:05 Evil Con Carne 05:30 Cow & Chicken 06:00 Casper’s Scare School 06:30 Angelo Rules 07:00 Ben 10 Omniverse 07:25 The Amazing World Of Gumball 07:45 Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated 08:10 Evil Con Carne 08:55 Adventure Time 09:45 Regular Show 10:35 Angelo Rules 11:25 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 11:50 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 12:15 Hero 108 12:40 Hero 108 13:05 Mucha Lucha ! 13:30 Angelo Rules 14:20 Evil Con Carne 15:10 Ben 10 15:35 Ben 10 16:00 Johnny Test 16:35 Scooby Doo! Mystery Incorporated 17:00 Ben 10: Omniverse 17:25 Dreamworks Dragons Riders Of Berk 17:50 The Amazing World Of Gumball 18:15 Adventure Time 18:40 Regular Show 19:05 Total Drama World Tour 19:30 Total Drama World Tour 19:55 Starwars: The Clone Wars 20:20 Ben 10: Omniverse 20:45 Hero 108 21:10 Young Justice 21:35 Green Lantern: The Animated Series 22:00 Ben 10 22:25 Ben 10 22:50 Mucha Lucha ! 23:15 Mucha Lucha ! 23:40 Powerpuff Girls

00:00 00:30 01:00 02:00 02:30 03:00 04:00 05:00 06:00 07:00 07:30 08:00 09:00 10:00 10:30 11:00 12:00 12:30 12:45 13:00 13:30 14:00 15:00 16:00 17:00 18:00 18:45 19:00 19:30 19:45 20:00 21:00 21:45

Amanpour World Sport Piers Morgan Tonight World Report World Sport Anderson Cooper 360 Piers Morgan Tonight Quest Means Business The Situation Room World Sport Talk Asia World Report World Report World Sport Sanjay Gupta MD World Business Today World One Winning Post The Gateway Amanpour CNN Newscenter Piers Morgan Tonight News Stream World Business Today International Desk Global Exchange CNN Marketplace Middle East CNN Football Club Winning Post The Gateway International Desk Quest Means Business CNN Marketplace Europe

EXORCISMUS ON OSN ACTION HD

22:00 Amanpour 22:30 CNN Newscenter 23:00 Connect The World With Becky Anderson

00:15 You Have Been Warned 01:10 Magic Of Science 01:35 Magic Of Science 02:05 Mythbusters 03:00 Mythbusters 03:55 Border Security 04:20 Auction Hunters 04:50 Baggage Battles 05:15 How Do They Do It? 05:40 How It’s Made 06:05 Sons Of Guns 07:00 Mythbusters 07:50 Futurecar 08:45 American Chopper: Senior vs Junior:... 09:40 Border Security 10:05 Auction Hunters 10:30 Baggage Battles 10:55 How Do They Do It? 11:25 How It’s Made 11:50 You Have Been Warned 12:45 Magic Of Science 13:15 Magic Of Science 13:40 Mythbusters 14:35 Border Security 15:05 Auction Hunters 15:30 Baggage Battles 16:00 Fast N’ Loud 16:55 Flying Wild Alaska 17:50 Mythbusters 18:45 Sons Of Guns 19:40 How Do They Do It? 20:05 How It’s Made 20:35 Auction Hunters 21:00 Baggage Battles 21:30 Sons Of Guns 22:25 Mobster Confessions 22:50 Mobster Confessions 23:20 Hellriders

00:05 The Tech Show 00:30 Weird Connections 01:00 NASA’s Greatest Missions 01:50 Weird Or What? 02:45 Space Pioneer 03:35 NASA’s Greatest Missions 04:25 Kings Of Construction 05:15 Gadget Show - World Tour 05:40 The Tech Show 06:05 The World’s Strangest UFO Stories 07:00 Food Factory 07:25 Food Factory 07:50 Curiosity 08:40 Gadget Show - World Tour 09:05 The Tech Show 09:30 Smash Lab 10:25 Nextworld 11:15 Kings Of Construction 12:05 Moon Machines 13:00 Curiosity 13:50 Weird Connections 14:20 Gadget Show - World Tour 14:45 The Tech Show 15:10 Food Factory 15:35 Food Factory 16:00 Smash Lab 16:55 Sci-Fi Saved My Life 17:45 Kings Of Construction 18:35 The World’s Strangest UFO Stories 19:30 Food Factory 19:55 Food Factory 20:20 Curiosity 21:10 Gadget Show - World Tour 21:35 The Tech Show 22:00 Food Factory 22:25 Food Factory 22:50 The Science Of Fear And Lust 23:40 Gadget Show - World Tour

00:10 00:35 01:00 01:25 01:50 02:15 02:40 03:05 03:30 03:55 04:20 04:45 05:10 05:35 06:00 06:25 06:40 07:05 07:30 07:55 08:20 08:45 09:10 09:35 10:00 10:25 10:50 11:15 11:40 12:05 12:30 12:55 13:20 13:45 14:10 14:35 15:00 15:25 15:50 16:15 16:40 17:00 17:30 17:50 17:55 18:20 18:40 18:45 19:10 19:35 20:00 20:25 20:50 21:15 21:40 22:05 22:30 22:55 23:20 23:45

Hannah Montana Brandy & Mr Whiskers Brandy & Mr Whiskers Replacements Replacements Emperor’s New School Emperor’s New School Brandy & Mr Whiskers Brandy & Mr Whiskers Replacements Replacements Emperor’s New School Emperor’s New School Brandy & Mr Whiskers Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Doc McStuffins Hannah Montana Hannah Montana A.N.T Farm Jessie Jessie Good Luck Charlie Good Luck Charlie Austin And Ally Austin And Ally Shake It Up Shake It Up Suite Life On Deck Suite Life On Deck Hannah Montana Wizards Of Waverly Place Wizards Of Waverly Place Jessie A.N.T. Farm A.N.T. Farm Hannah Montana Hannah Montana Good Luck Charlie Jessie Shake It Up A.N.T. Farm Austin And Ally Suite Life On Deck Minnie And You Suite Life On Deck Wizards Of Waverly Place Minnie And You That’s So Raven Cory In The House Good Luck Charlie Jessie Wizards Of Waverly Place Wizards Of Waverly Place Phil Of The Future Hannah Montana Jonas Los Angeles Sonny With A Chance Wizards Of Waverly Place Wizards Of Waverly Place Hannah Montana

00:00 00:55 01:25 03:15

Scouted Style Star E! Investigates Style Star

03:40 04:10 05:05 06:00 07:50 08:20 09:15 09:45 10:15 11:10 12:05 13:05 14:05 York 15:00 15:30 16:30 17:00 17:30 18:00 19:00 20:00 21:00 21:30 22:30 23:30

Extreme Close-Up THS THS THS Style Star E! News Ice Loves Coco Ice Loves Coco E!es E!es E! News Opening Act Kourtney & Kim Take New Style Star THS Extreme Close-Up Married To Jonas Married To Jonas E! News THS Giuliana & Bill Chasing The Saturdays Fashion Police E! News Chelsea Lately

00:05 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 00:30 Outrageous Food 00:55 Unwrapped 01:20 Unwrapped 01:45 Charly’s Cake Angels 02:10 Charly’s Cake Angels 02:35 Unique Sweets 03:00 Unique Sweets 03:25 Unique Eats 03:50 Andy Bates Street Feasts 04:15 Andy Bates American Street Feasts 04:40 Chopped 05:30 Iron Chef America 06:10 Food Network Challenge 07:00 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 07:25 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 07:50 Unique Eats 08:15 Andy Bates Street Feasts 08:40 Andy Bates American Street Feasts 09:05 Barefoot Contessa - Back To Basics 09:30 The Next Iron Chef 10:20 Extra Virgin 10:45 Extra Virgin 11:10 Everyday Italian 11:35 Unwrapped 12:00 Staten Island Cakes 12:50 Have Cake, Will Travel 13:15 Barefoot Contessa 13:40 Barefoot Contessa 14:05 Extra Virgin 14:30 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 14:55 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 15:20 Guy’s Big Bite 15:45 Chopped 16:35 Barefoot Contessa - Back To Basics 17:00 Barefoot Contessa - Back To Basics 17:25 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 17:50 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 18:15 Symon’s Suppers 18:40 Guy’s Big Bite 19:05 Tyler’s Ultimate 19:30 Chopped 20:20 Chopped 21:10 Iron Chef America 22:00 Food Network Challenge 22:50 Unique Eats 23:15 Unique Eats 23:40 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives

00:30 01:20 02:05 02:55 03:45 04:30 05:20 06:10 07:00 07:50 08:15 08:40 09:05 09:30 10:20 11:10 12:00 12:50 13:15 13:40 14:30 15:20 15:45 16:10 17:00 17:50 18:40 19:30 20:20 21:10 22:00 22:50 23:40

Dr G: Medical Examiner A Haunting Nightmare Next Door Nightmare Next Door I Almost Got Away With It Dr G: Medical Examiner A Haunting FBI Case Files Mystery Diagnosis Street Patrol Street Patrol Real Emergency Calls Who On Earth Did I Marry? On The Case With Paula Zahn Murder Shift Disappeared Mystery Diagnosis Street Patrol Street Patrol Forensic Detectives On The Case With Paula Zahn Real Emergency Calls Who On Earth Did I Marry? Disappeared Murder Shift Forensic Detectives On The Case With Paula Zahn Disappeared Nightmare Next Door Couples Who Kill On The Case With Paula Zahn Killer Kids I Almost Got Away With It

00:15 00:45 01:40 10 02:05 11 02:35 03:00 03:30 03:55 04:25 05:20 06:15 06:40 07:10 07:35 08:05 09:00 10 09:25 11 09:55 10:20 10:50 11:15 11:45 12:40 Water 13:35 14:00 14:30 14:55 15:25 16:20 12 16:45 13

Peru Savate Keeping Up With The Joneses

VIOLET & DAISY ON OSN CINEMA 17:15 Ep 1 17:40 Ep 2 18:10 Ep 3 18:35 Danger Beach, 5 19:05 Cambodia 20:00 Italy 20:30 Las Vegas 21:00 The Spice Road 21:30 Thailand - Bangkok 22:00 Russia: Comrades Capitals 22:55 Porto,Portugal 23:20 Dolce Vita 23:50 Pesce

And

00:00 Exorcismus-18 02:00 Mad Max-18 04:00 The Man Inside-PG15 06:00 True Justice: Dead Drop-PG15 07:45 True Justice: Vengeance Is Mine-PG15 09:30 Burden Of Evil-PG15 11:15 The Speed Of Thought-PG15 13:00 True Justice: Vengeance Is Mine-PG15 15:00 Hide And Seek-PG15 17:00 The Speed Of Thought-PG15 19:00 The Godfather III-18 22:00 The Keeper-18 23:45 The Ward-18

01:00 33 Postcards-PG15 03:00 The National Tree-PG15 05:00 The Dragon Chronicles: Fire & Ice-PG15 07:00 Call Of The Wild-PG15 09:00 33 Postcards-PG15 11:00 Ike: Countdown To D-DayPG15 13:00 An Invisible Sign Of My OwnPG15 15:00 Blackthorn-PG15 17:00 A Fall From Grace-PG15 19:00 The Descendants-PG15 21:00 Killer Elite-18 23:00 Violet & Daisy-PG15

03:30 04:30 Leno 07:00 09:30 10:00 11:00 Leno 14:00 14:30 15:00 17:00 18:00 18:30 19:00 19:30 20:00 20:30 23:30

Happy Endings The Tonight Show With Jay Late Night With Jimmy Fallon The Neighbors The Office The Tonight Show With Jay Happy Endings The Office The Neighbors Late Night With Jimmy Fallon Hot In Cleveland 1600 Penn Two And A Half Men The Office Whitney The Cleveland Show Whitney

Keeping Up With The Joneses Ep 7 Ep 8 Ep 9 Danger Beach, 4 Laos Ep 3 Belize Germany - Berlin Czech Republic Peru Savate Keeping Up With The Joneses Keeping Up With The Joneses Ep 7 Ep 8 Ep 9 Danger Beach, 4 Laos Papua New Guinea: Fire And The Spice Road Thailand - Bangkok Italy Las Vegas Muay Thai Keeping Up With The Joneses Keeping Up With The Joneses

19:00 Necessary Roughness 21:00 Grimm 22:00 Scandal

00:00 01:00 02:00 03:00 04:00 05:00 06:00 07:00 07:30 08:00 09:00 10:00 11:00 12:00 12:30 13:00 14:00 15:00 16:00 16:30 17:00 18:00 19:00 20:00 22:00 23:00

Supernatural The Client List Castle Greek Bones Castle Supernatural Emmerdale Coronation Street The Closer Bones Castle Touch Emmerdale Coronation Street The Ellen DeGeneres Show The Closer Supernatural Emmerdale Coronation Street The Ellen DeGeneres Show The Closer Switched At Birth American Idol Downton Abbey Greek

00:30 Moon 03:30 06:00 08:00 Life 10:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 19:45 21:45

Transformers: Dark Of The X-Men: First Class Interview With A Hitman True Justice: One Shot, One Go Fast The New Daughter Go Fast Do No Harm The New Daughter Covert One: The Hades Factor

00:15 Take Me Home Tonight-18 02:00 A Little Help-18 04:00 While You Were SleepingPG15 06:00 The Winning Season-PG15 08:00 Police Academy 7: Mission To Moscow-PG15 10:00 The Search For Santa Paws-PG 12:00 While You Were SleepingPG15 14:00 Gabe The Cupid Dog-PG15 16:00 The Search For Santa Paws-PG 18:00 A Heartbeat Away-PG15 20:00 Stripes-18 22:00 Take Me Home Tonight-18

01:00 Mad Bastards-PG15 03:00 The Weather Man-18 04:45 Bruc-PG15 06:15 George Harrison: Living In The Material World-PG15 09:45 Offline-PG15 11:30 Love Takes Wing-PG15 13:15 Restless-PG15 15:00 Offline-PG15 17:00 The Evening Star-PG15 19:15 The Roommate-PG15 21:00 Any Given Sunday-18 23:30 Fear-18

01:00 03:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 11:15 13:00 15:00 16:45 19:00 21:00 23:00

Bloodworth-18 The Artist-PG Alpha And Omega-PG Monte Carlo-PG15 Moneyball-PG15 The Artist-PG Johnny English Reborn-PG15 127 Hours-PG15 Moneyball-PG15 Mary & Martha-PG15 Wrath Of The Titans-PG15 21 Jump Street-18

01:00 Toyz Goin’ Wild 02:45 Arthur’s Missing Pal 04:30 Twigson 06:00 Ploddy Police Car 08:00 Olentzero And The Magic Log 10:00 Treasure Buddies 11:45 Ploddy Police Car 13:00 The Ugly Duckling Goes On Holiday 14:30 Kung Fu Panda 2 16:15 Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax 18:00 Treasure Buddies 20:00 Mandie And The Secret Tunnel 22:00 The Ugly Duckling Goes On Holiday 23:30 Dr. Seuss’ The Lorax

00:00 MSNBC Hardball With Chris Matthews 01:00 MSNBC Politicsnation 02:00 Live NBC Nightly News 02:30 ABC World News With Diane Sawyer 03:00 MSNBC The Ed Show 04:00 MSNBC The Rachel Maddow Show 05:00 MSNBC The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell 06:00 NBC Nightly News 06:30 ABC World News With Diane Sawyer 07:00 Live NBC Nightly News 07:39 ABC Nightline 08:06 Live MSNBC The Rachel

Maddow Show 09:00 MSNBC The Last Word With Lawrence O’Donnell 10:00 ABC World News Now 10:30 Live ABC World News Now 11:00 NBC Early Today 11:30 ABC America This Morning 12:00 ABC America This Morning 12:30 Live ABC America This Morning 13:00 Live ABC America This Morning 13:30 MSNBC First Look 14:00 Live NBC Today Show 17:57 Live MSNBC Hardball With Chris Matthews 18:38 Live MSNBC The Ed Show 19:19 Live MSNBC The Rachel Maddow Show 20:00 MSNBC Andrea Mitchell Reports 21:00 MSNBC Newsnation 22:00 MSNBC The Cycle 23:00 MSNBC Martin Bashir

01:00 Inside The PGA Tour 01:30 PGA European Tour Weekly 02:00 Trans World Sport 03:00 International Rugby League 05:00 Rugby League Challenge Cup 06:30 ICC Cricket 360 07:00 PGA European Tour Weekly 07:30 Live PGA European Tour 11:30 PGA European Tour Highlights 12:30 PGA European Tour Highlights 13:30 Trans World Sport 14:30 Futbol Mundial 15:00 Live Snooker 19:00 NRL Premiership 21:00 Live Snooker

01:30 02:00 06:00 07:00 08:00 08:30 09:00 11:00 12:00 14:00 14:30 15:30 16:30 17:00 19:00 20:00 21:00 21:30 22:00

NRL Full Time Snooker World Championship Trans World Sport Super Rugby Futbol Mundial NRL Full Time Live NRL Premiership Trans World Sport Live NRL Premiership NRL Full Time Super Rugby AFL Premiership Highlights Futbol Mundial NRL Premiership WWE NXT UFC Countdown European Tour Weekly Inside The PGA Tour Live PGA Tour

01:00 World Cup Of Pool 02:00 Golfing World 03:00 AFL Premiership 05:30 ICC Cricket 360 06:00 Golfing World 07:00 Golfing World 08:00 Snooker World Championship 12:00 World Pool Masters 13:00 World Cup Of Pool 14:00 Total Rugby 14:30 Ladies European Tour Highlights 15:30 European Tour Weekly 16:00 PGA European Tour 20:30 Futbol Mundial 21:00 Live Premier League Darts

00:00 UFC Countdown 01:00 NHL 03:00 Ping Pong World Championships 04:00 US Bass Fishing 05:00 NHL 07:00 WWE SmackDown 09:00 Ping Pong World Championships 10:00 US Bass Fishing 11:00 NHL 13:00 WWE Vintage Collection 14:00 WWE Bottom Line 15:00 UAE National Race Day Series 16:00 Advanture Challenge 17:00 Triahlon UK 18:00 Prizefighter 21:00 UFC Countdown 22:00 UFC Prelims

Classifieds SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

Kuwait

SHARQIA-1 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) SHADOW (DIG) (TELUGU) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO FRI NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) SHARQIA-2 TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) THE HOST (DIG) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) SHARQIA-3 Seats-225 THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) FIRE WITH FIRE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) FIRE WITH FIRE (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) MUHALAB-1 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) SHADOW (DIG) (TELUGU) FRI THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO FRI NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) MUHALAB-2 THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) FIRE WITH FIRE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) MUHALAB-3 TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) THE HOST (DIG) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D)

NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) 1:30 PM 3:30 PM 5:15 PM 5:30 PM 8:15 PM 10:00 PM 12:05 AM

FANAR-3 THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) THE HOST (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) THE HOST (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG)

2:30 PM 5:00 PM 7:30 PM 10:00 PM 12:30 AM

2:00 PM 4:00 PM 6:00 PM 8:00 PM 10:30 PM 12:30 AM

1:45 PM 3:30 PM 5:15 PM 7:00 PM 9:00 PM 10:45 PM 12:30 AM

12:45 PM 3:15 PM 5:15 PM 7:45 PM 9:45 PM 12:15 AM

MARINA-2 FIRE WITH FIRE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) FIRE WITH FIRE (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) FIRE WITH FIRE (DIG)

12:30 PM 2:45 PM 5:15 PM 7:45 PM 9:45 PM 12:15 AM

5:00 PM 7:15 PM 9:00 PM 10:45 PM

12:45 PM 3:15 PM 5:45 PM 7:45 PM 10:15 PM

1:30 PM 3:30 PM 5:30 PM 8:00 PM 10:00 PM

FANAR-1 OBLIVION (DIG) 1:45 PM OBLIVION (DIG) 4:15 PM IT TAKES A MAN AND A WOMAN (DIG) (FILIPINO)6:45 PM OBLIVION (DIG) 9:15 PM OBLIVION (DIG) 11:45 PM NO SUN+ TUE+WED FANAR-2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG)

12:15 AM

MARINA-1 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2

12:30 PM 2:30 PM 4:15 PM

1:15 PM 3:00 PM 4:45 PM 6:45 PM 8:30 PM 10:30 PM

ACCOMMODATION

KNCC PROGRAMME FROM THURSDAY TO WEDNESDAY (25/04/2013 TO 01/05/2013)

MARINA-3 TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) EMPEROR (DIG) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) AVENUES-1 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 THE HOST (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 THE HOST (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 AVENUES-2 THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) THE COMPANY YOU KEEP (DIG) NO SUN+ TUE+WED

2:00 PM 4:15 PM 6:15 PM 8:15 PM 10:30 PM 12:45 AM

1:15 PM 3:30 PM 6:00 PM 8:30 PM 10:45 PM 1:15 AM

2:30 PM 5:00 PM 7:30 PM 10:00 PM 12:30 AM

AVENUES-3 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG)

2:15 PM 4:15 PM 6:15 PM 8:15 PM 10:15 PM 12:15 AM

360ยบ- 1 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG)

1:15 PM 3:15 PM 5:15 PM 7:15 PM 9:15 PM 11:15 PM 1:15 AM

360ยบ- 2 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2

2:15 PM 4:30 PM 6:45 PM 9:00 PM 11:30 PM

360ยบ- 3 EMPEROR (DIG) EMPEROR (DIG) EMPEROR (DIG) EMPEROR (DIG) EMPEROR (DIG) EMPEROR (DIG)

1:45 PM 4:00 PM 6:15 PM 8:30 PM 10:45 PM 1:00 AM

Sharing accommodation available for decent bachelor or family non smoking, Amman street, one big room, opposite to Al Rashed Hospital. Contact: 66232356. (C 4395) 28-4-2013 For ladies or bachelor Filipino only near big Jamiya Farwaniya. Available on April 25, 2013. Contact: 66158188. 25-4-2013

FOR SALE AL-KOUT.1 TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) FIRE WITH FIRE (DIG) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) AL-KOUT.2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG)

12:45 PM 2:45 PM 4:45 PM 6:45 PM 8:45 PM 10:45 PM 12:45 AM

1:00 PM 2:45 PM 4:45 PM 6:30 PM 8:30 PM 10:15 PM 12:05 AM

AL-KOUT.3 OBLIVION (DIG) 2:00 PM OBLIVION (DIG) 4:30 PM OBLIVION (DIG) 7:00 PM IT TAKES A MAN AND A WOMAN (DIG) (FILIPINO)9:30 PM OBLIVION (DIG) 12:15 AM BAIRAQ-1 TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) TAD, THE LOST EXPLORER (DIG-3D) THE CROODS (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D) SPIDERS (DIG-3D)

1:30 PM 3:30 PM 5:30 PM 7:30 PM 9:30 PM 11:30 PM

BAIRAQ-2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) THE HAUNTING IN CONNECTICUT 2 NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO TELL MOTEL (DIG) NO SUN+ TUE+WED

12:30 PM 2:15 PM 4:30 PM 6:15 PM 8:30 PM 10:15 PM 12:05 AM

BAIRAQ-3 OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) EMPEROR (DIG) OBLIVION (DIG) NO SUN+ TUE+WED

2:00 PM 4:45 PM 7:15 PM 10:00 PM 12:15 AM

Nissan Pathfinder 2005, color: pearl white, engine gear and body in very good condition. Price KD 2,425, negotiable. Please call 99683415. (C 4393) Nissan Infiniti G37, 2009 model, 6 cylinder, automatic, 6 CD changer, mobile connectivity, rear view camera, sunroof, send color, GPS, excellent condition, 60,000 kms. KD 7,000. Contact: 99742340. (C 4394) Audi A6 (S-Line) V6 model 2007 0 3.2 engine, black color, beige leather inside full options + nav, mileage km 64,000 with accurate

service history by dealer. Price KD 6,000. Call 99283882. (C 4397) Mercedes SL 500 convertible (year 2004) blue sky color - beige leather inside, low mileage km 48,000 include 18 inch AMG wheels + rear wing, like new, price KD 9,000 (firm). Call 90080013. (C 4396) 28-4-2013 Delivery van box, Nissan Frezer 2004, Mazda 2005. Ph: 66052331. (C 4391) Chevrolet Lumina 5 model 2008, 43,000 km, excellent condition, one owner, original paint, full options, price KD 3,100, negotiable. Contact: 66416391. (C 4392) 27-4-2013 SITUATION VACANT Required for a Kuwaiti family a female cook, salary KD 100. Contact: 99304076. (C 4388) Required driver for a Kuwaiti family, 3 years experience, salary KD 100. Contact: 99304076. (C 4389) MATRIMONIAL Marthomite MCA Boy 28/179, employed as Web

No: 15792

DIAL 161 FOR AIRPORT INFORMATIO

Airlines BBC QTR JZR JZR RJA THY ETH GFA UAE ETD FDB MSR QTR KAC DHX CLX THY FDB KAC JZR BAW KAC KAC FDB KAC KAC KAC UAE ABY QTR FDB IRA ETD IRC GFA MEA JZR JZR KAC UAE MSR THY KAC KAC FDB MSR IRC SVA KNE RJA

Arrival Flights on Sunday 28/4/2013 Flt Route 43 DHAKA 148 DOHA 267 BEIRUT 539 CAIRO 642 AMMAN 764 SABIHA 620 ADDIS ABABA 211 BAHRAIN 853 DUBAI 305 ABU DHABI 67 DUBAI 612 CAIRO 138 DOHA 544 CAIRO 170 BAHRAIN 870 LUXEMBOURG 770 ISTANBUL 69 DUBAI 412 MANILA 555 ALEXANDRIA 157 LONDON 206 ISLAMABAD 382 DELHI 53 DUBAI 302 MUMBAI 332 TRIVANDRUM 352 COCHIN 855 DUBAI 125 SHARJAH 132 DOHA 55 DUBAI 603 SHIRAZ 301 ABU DHABI 6666 AHWAZ 213 BAHRAIN 404 BEIRUT 165 DUBAI 561 SOHAG 284 DHAKA 871 DUBAI 610 CAIRO 766 ISTANBUL 742 DAMMAM 774 RIYADH 57 DUBAI 575 CAIRO 6507 SHIRAZ 500 JEDDAH 472 JEDDAH 640 AMMAN

Time 0:05 0:15 0:20 0:40 1:10 1:40 1:45 1:55 2:25 2:30 3:10 3:15 3:30 4:10 4:20 4:20 4:35 5:50 6:15 6:20 6:30 7:25 7:30 7:45 7:50 7:55 8:05 8:25 8:50 9:00 9:15 9:20 9:30 10:10 10:40 10:55 11:35 12:00 12:05 12:45 13:00 13:10 13:30 13:45 13:50 14:15 14:25 14:30 14:35 15:55

QTR JZR ETD SYR UAE ABY SVA GFA UAL JZR JZR KAC KAC QTR KAC KAC FDB GFA KAC AXB KAC MSR JAI KAC AFG OMA FDB ABY JZR MEA KAC KAC KLM ALK UAE KAC ETD QTR QTR GFA DHX QTR FDB AIC JZR UAL JZR JZR DLH JAI PIA THY

134 787 303 341 857 127 510 215 982 177 777 502 542 144 786 166 63 219 618 393 674 606 572 102 415 647 61 129 481 402 562 514 417 229 859 172 307 136 6130 217 372 146 59 981 239 981 185 135 636 574 205 772

DOHA RIYADH ABU DHABI DAMASCUS DUBAI SHARJAH RIYADH BAHRAIN WASHINGTON DC DULLES DUBAI JEDDAH BEIRUT CAIRO DOHA JEDDAH PARIS DUBAI BAHRAIN DOHA KOZHIKODE DUBAI LUXOR MUMBAI NEW YORK KABUL MUSCAT DUBAI SHARJAH SABIHA BEIRUT AMMAN TEHRAN AMSTERDAM COLOMBO DUBAI FRANKFURT ABU DHABI DOHA DOHA BAHRAIN BAHRAIN DOHA DUBAI CHENNAI AMMAN BAHRAIN DUBAI BAHRAIN FRANKFURT MUMBAI LAHORE ISTANBUL

16:15 16:15 16:35 16:45 16:55 17:10 17:20 17:20 17:25 17:30 17:50 18:00 18:15 18:25 18:30 18:40 18:55 19:05 19:10 19:15 19:25 19:30 19:35 19:35 19:45 20:00 20:00 20:05 20:10 20:15 20:45 20:50 21:05 21:10 21:15 21:15 21:30 21:35 21:45 21:45 22:00 22:00 22:20 22:25 22:30 22:40 22:40 23:00 23:10 23:20 23:40 23:45

Airlines AIC AXB JAI UAL DLH BBC THY THY ETH UAE FDB MSR ETD QTR QTR JZR CLX FDB RJA GFA THY JZR BAW FDB KAC ABY UAE FDB KAC QTR ETD KAC IRA KAC IRC GFA KAC MEA KAC JZR JZR KAC JZR KAC JZR MSR THY UAE FDB

Departure Flights on Sunday 28/4/2013 Flt Route 976 GOA 490 MANGALORE 573 MUMBAI 981 WASHINGTON DC DULLES 637 FRANKFURT 44 CHITTAGONG 773 ISTANBUL 765 ISTANBUL 621 ADDIS ABABA 854 DUBAI 68 DUBAI 613 CAIRO 306 ABU DHABI 139 DOHA 149 DOHA 560 SOHAG 792 HONG KONG 70 DUBAI 643 AMMAN 212 BAHRAIN 771 ISTANBUL 164 DUBAI 156 LONDON 54 DUBAI 171 FRANKFURT 126 SHARJAH 856 DUBAI 56 DUBAI 117 NEW YORK 133 DOHA 302 ABU DHABI 773 RIYADH 602 SHIRAZ 741 DAMMAM 6667 AHWAZ 214 BAHRAIN 541 CAIRO 405 BEIRUT 501 BEIRUT 776 JEDDAH 480 ISTANBUL 103 LONDON 786 RIYADH 785 JEDDAH 176 DUBAI 611 CAIRO 767 ISTANBUL 872 DUBAI 58 DUBAI

Time 0:05 0:15 0:20 0:25 0:30 1:30 2:20 2:40 2:45 3:45 3:50 4:15 4:20 4:25 5:15 5:35 5:50 6:30 6:35 7:00 7:10 7:25 8:25 8:25 8:55 9:30 9:50 9:55 10:00 10:00 10:15 10:20 10:20 10:30 11:10 11:25 11:30 11:55 12:00 12:25 12:30 12:30 12:50 13:00 13:20 14:00 14:10 14:15 14:30

Directorate General of Civil Aviation Home Page (www.kuwait-airport.com.kw)

MSR KAC IRC KAC KNE KAC SVA KAC RJA JZR QTR ETD JZR SYR ABY UAE SVA GFA JZR JZR UAL QTR FDB GFA JZR AXB MSR JAI FDB ABY AFG OMA MEA DHX KLM ETD ALK UAE KAC QTR KAC GFA DHX FDB KAC QTR KAC QTR KAC KAC KAC

576 673 6508 561 473 617 503 513 641 238 135 304 538 342 128 858 511 216 184 266 982 145 64 220 134 394 619 571 62 120 415 648 403 171 417 308 230 860 343 137 301 218 373 60 205 147 351 6131 411 283 415

SHARM EL SHEI DUBAI SHIRAZ AMMAN JEDDAH DOHA MADINAH TEHRAN AMMAN AMMAN DOHA ABU DHABI CAIRO LATAKIA SHARJAH DUBAI RIYADH BAHRAIN DUBAI BEIRUT BAHRAIN DOHA DUBAI BAHRAIN BAHRAIN KOZHIKODE ALEXANDRIA MUMBAI DUBAI SHARJAH JEDDAH MUSCAT BEIRUT BAHRAIN DAMMAM ABU DHABI COLOMBO DUBAI CHENNAI DOHA MUMBAI BAHRAIN BAHRAIN DUBAI ISLAMABAD DOHA KOCHI DOHA BANGKOK DHAKA KUALA LUMPUR

s ta rs CROSSWORD 173

STAR TRACK Aries (March 21-April 19) ARIES You just may have to give a friend a second chance, even though the greater part of your being says it’s time to move on. You do however, owe it to yourself and them to make certain that you’re not over-reacting. After all, its always a good idea to give a decent person a second chance. Feelings of relaxation, receptivity and passivity are likely and you tend to avoid stressful confrontations or situations that demand too much of you. Goals and desires that normally seem so important to you just don’t matter quite as much now. It’s just a lazy kind of mood and it never hurt anyone to take the time out to contemplate their belly button for a day or two.

Taurus (April 20-May 20) There is an opulence in good taste that surpasses grandeur, and the key to satisfaction is not how much you have but what you do with it. Taking just what you need to feed your desires makes for a gentle spiral of growth and gratification. By making it just so, the afterglow of contentment lingers on. This is a favorable time to take a short vacation or pleasure trip, even if it’s only in your mind as a fantasy. You could read a book or see a movie. Positive connections are made with others, and you may meet a new romantic partner, perhaps even share the fantasy of the day. You may also want to call or email someone you love, simply to cheer them up or tell them you love them.

Gemini (May 21-June 20)

ACROSS 1. Nonresinous wood of a fir tree. 4. Accumulated on a surface of a solid. 12. Thickening of tissue in the motor tracts of the lateral columns and anterior horns of the spinal cord. 15. A sweetened beverage of diluted fruit juice. 16. Of a vivid red to reddish-orange color. 17. (British) A waterproof raincoat made of rubberized fabric. 18. Someone who listens attentively. 20. Being one hundred more than three hundred. 21. Shrubby plant with aromatic grayishgreen leaves used as a cooking herb. 23. Herb of the Pacific islands grown throughout the tropics for its edible root and in temperate areas as an ornamental for its large glossy leaves. 24. Advanced in years. 26. Dried out by heat or excessive exposure to sunlight. 27. A small constellation in the polar region of the southern hemisphere near the Southern Cross and Chamaeleon. 29. An island of central Hawaii. 32. A heavy precious metallic element. 34. A physician who is not a specialist but treats all illnesses. 35. Goddess of the dead and queen of the underworld. 36. God of love and erotic desire. 40. So extremely old as seeming to belong to an earlier period. 43. A spy who makes uninvited inquiries into the private affairs of others. 44. United States painter (born in England) of portraits and historical scenes (1783-1872). 45. A Chadic language spoken in northern Nigeria and closely related to Hausa. 47. 4-wheeled motor vehicle. 48. A metric unit of length equal to one hundredth of a meter. 50. An emotional response that has been acquired by conditioning. 52. The basic unit of money in Romania. 53. Showing the wearing effects of overwork or care or suffering. 56. Line of descent traced through the maternal side of the family. 58. (Babylonian) The sky god. 59. A hospital unit staffed and equipped to provide intensive care. 61. Not easy. 62. Squash bugs. 65. A plain plinth that supports a wall. 69. The capital of Bahrain. 71. (archaic) Exalted emotionally especially with pride. 75. Someone who works (or provides workers) during a strike. 77. The basic unit of money in Western Samoa. 78. An international organization of European countries formed after World War II to reduce trade barriers and increase cooperation among its members. 82. Top part of an apron. 83. Electronic equipment that provides visual images of varying electrical quantities. 84. Elder brother of Krishna. 85. A plant hormone promoting elongation of stems and roots. DOWN 1. King of Saudi Arabia since 1982 (born in 1922). 2. The content of cognition. 3. A domain in which something is dominant. 4. (informal) Of the highest quality.

5. English theoretical physicist who applied relativity theory to quantum mechanics and predicted the existence of antimatter and the positron (1902-1984). 6. A silvery malleable metallic element that resists corrosion. 7. Belonging to some prior time. 8. Twist or braid together, interlace. 9. A small pellet fired from an air rifle or BB gun. 10. The sense organ for hearing and equilibrium. 11. Any of numerous low-growing cushionforming plants of the genus Draba having rosette-forming leaves and terminal racemes of small flowers with scapose or leafy stems. 12. In a murderous frenzy as if possessed by a demon. 13. A narrow way or road. 14. Any of a number of fishes of the family Carangidae. 19. Large hawk of the northern hemisphere that feeds chiefly on small rodents and is beneficial to farmers. 22. South American plant cultivated for its large fragrant trumpet-shaped flowers. 25. A rare silvery (usually trivalent) metallic element. 28. Castrate, used with animals. 30. A region of northeastern France famous for its wines. 31. Norwegian explorer of the Arctic and director of the League of Nations relief program for refugees of World War I (1861-1930). 33. Elected Vice President in Roosevelt's 4th term. 37. A region in southeastern Italy on the Adriatic. 38. A streak of light in the sky at night that results when a meteoroid hits the earth's atmosphere and air friction causes the meteoroid to melt or vaporize or explode. 39. In the area or vicinity. 41. Being ten more than one hundred forty. 42. The opening into the stomach and that part of the stomach connected to the esophagus. 46. A soft gray ductile metallic element used in alloys. 49. A colorless and odorless inert gas. 51. An intensely radioactive metallic element that occurs in minute amounts in uranium ores. 54. Wild llama. 55. (Old Testament) In Judeo-Christian mythology. 57. The act of taking something from someone unlawfully. 60. Someone who lends money at excessive rates of interest. 63. Tag the base runner to get him out. 64. Minute floating marine tunicate having a transparent body with an opening at each end. 66. A drama set to music. 67. An assertion of a right (as to money or property). 68. Being one more than fifty. 70. Type genus of the Aceraceae. 72. A sock with a separation for the big toe. 73. English essayist (1775-1834). 74. A Chadic language spoken south of Lake Chad. 76. A constellation in the southern hemisphere near Telescopium and Norma. 79. A metallic element having four allotropic forms. 80. A silvery ductile metallic element found primarily in bauxite. 81. A soft silvery metallic element of the alkali earth group.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

Feelings and desires may feel like you are on a wild ride, and trying to find balance may be a challenge. Today’s beginnings may mature into tomorrow’s turmoil’s, so don’t fly off the handle and don’t jump into something you’re not sure of. Let the energy settle until tomorrow, then decide on it. The emotions you are looking for will work themselves out in its own time, just hang in there. Subtle feelings and intangible intuition allow an increasing buildup of emotional communication. Take things slow and easy is really the best way to handle things as there’s no hurry to get to the end of the game when you are just starting out.

Cancer (June 21-July 22) A possible day of raised tensions at home as energies run high and elbow room seems harder to come by. It’s a good time to start new homerelated projects as a way to utilize the extra energy in a constructive manner. The only thing you’ll not want to do today is lazy, the energy is too intense to just sit around and watch the TV. The normal joys of a partnership may appear to have become a bit old and worn out, so it’s probably time to work to some aspects to bring back the shine. In some ways you may be asking not for more than what you want, but what you don’t want at all, beware of mixed messages you send out. Be willing to spend some time working on your relationships, keeping what really works and let go of what doesn’t.

Leo (July 23-August 22) Your mind is not as alert as it should be, nor are you thinking in logical terms. Give careful consideration to what you say or put in writing. Faulty judgment can place you under heavy burdens or obligations, so it is best to sign nothing of importance during these few days. Friendships and love relationships are the energy for today, as you are openly affectionate, warm, and also quite responsive to loving gestures from others. It’s not enough for you to simply feel loving toward another right now, you really want to express it and show it physically. An opportunity for a new romance or friendship is likely to surface now and work out quite nicely for you.

Virgo (August 23-September 22) A problem you had worried about is actually going to turn out much better than you thought and in a far shorter time than you had anticipated. On the social front news of an engagement or marriage will bring some joy to your peer group. You may be highly attracted to someone new, simply because of the novelty and possibilities for adventure. Also, your friends or love partner may behave in unexpected ways which may throw you off emotionally. Being flexible and open minded in your relationships is called for now.

Word Search

Libra (September 23-October 22) Your imagination is invigorated, and you need activities and entertainments that are colorful, out the ordinary, and definitely not routine. Being more eclectic and outspoken on all issues is likely. Light and pleasant interactions characterize the day. You gain what you want through diplomacy or charm, of which you have an abundance of both. Enlisting the support of your lover or partner, rather than by being forceful and pushy will get you a lot farther today. You are willing to make concessions in order to maintain harmony in your relationships.

Scorpio (October 23-November 21) You may be less rigid in your attitudes to others now. Various stereotypes or prejudices that you have are chipped away during this time period. You are likely to have interactions with people of various political persuasions, religious faiths, or life styles that show you that your rigid categories and classifications are not always appropriate. The emotional mood is strong and upbeat for a change today. Any plans started today regarding relationships will be firm and supportive and continue to evolve that way. Feelings of friendship and love are high and it’s easy to see the good side of anyone, just keep in mind there may be other sides that you haven’t seen yet.

Sagittarius (November 22-December 21) Like minds and hearts gravitate toward you — together you could rule the world, or ought to. Use this smooth energy to make big strides, conquer new ground so you’ll be in ever better position when the situation is less ideal. Make time to explore your inner self. Your spirits are high at this time, and you feel optimistic, self-confident, generous, and just outright happy. You greet life with a fresh attitude, and it is easy for your to forget the mistakes of the past and envision bright new adventures for growth and fulfillment.

Capricorn (December 22-January 19) Ask and you just might get it, so if you want it, go for it. Part of it is about intuitively knowing just what to ask for, what’s really available, and who’s in the mood for giving. Go with your feelings and you’ll be surprised at what’s at your command. It’s a definite day for manifesting what you need and want. Unexpected twists and turns are likely to challenge your personal relationships at this time. Challenges and unwanted surprises may come at you from new sources. Be wary of new people entering your social circle.

Aquarius (January 20- February 18) You are able to share ideals and spiritual concerns with others in a very satisfying way at this time. If there is someone that you feel does not understand “where you are coming from”, you may find that you are now able to effectively communicate whatever lofty, idealistic, or abstract ideas that are important to you. Anything you try to formalize today won’t stay that way, so it’s a better day for imagination than trying to pin anyone down for an answer. Fantasy is favored as this keeps you able to both dream and manifest what you want without being rejected today. Keep in mind that today is only a 24 hour period, and tomorrow will be here soon enough.

Pisces (February 19-March 20) It is easy for you to talk about your feelings now, and also to listen sensitively to not only what others are saying but also what they are feeling. This is an excellent time to discuss your feelings and clear the air on any grievances you may be holding on to from the past. Chasing after a fantasy may give you cause to complain, as getting whom you want at the desired where and when just leads to one complication after another. You may have to settle for second best or some sort of compromise, unless you’re willing to wait and do without and see if it all comes together later.

Yesterday’s Solution

Daily SuDoku

Yesterday’s Solution

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

i n f o r m at i o n For labor-related inquiries and complaints: Call MSAL hotline 128 GOVERNORATE Sabah Hospital

24812000

Amiri Hospital

22450005

Maternity Hospital

24843100

Mubarak Al-Kabir Hospital

25312700

Chest Hospital

24849400

Farwaniya Hospital

24892010

Adan Hospital

23940620

Ibn Sina Hospital

24840300

Al-Razi Hospital

24846000

Physiotherapy Hospital

24874330/9

PHARMACY

ADDRESS

PHONE

Ahmadi

Sama Safwan Abu Halaifa Danat Al-Sultan

Fahaeel Makka St Abu Halaifa-Coastal Rd Mahboula Block 1, Coastal Rd

23915883 23715414 23726558

Jahra

Modern Jahra Madina Munawara

Jahra-Block 3 Lot 1 Jahra-Block 92

24575518 24566622

Capital

Ahlam Khaldiya Coop

Fahad Al-Salem St Khaldiya Coop

22436184 24833967

Farwaniya

New Shifa Ferdous Coop Modern Safwan

Farwaniya Block 40 Ferdous Coop Old Kheitan Block 11

24734000 24881201 24726638

Tariq Hana Ikhlas Hawally & Rawdha Ghadeer Kindy Ibn Al-Nafis Mishrif Coop Salwa Coop

Salmiya-Hamad Mubarak St Salmiya-Amman St Hawally-Beirut St Hawally & Rawdha Coop Jabriya-Block 1A Jabriya-Block 3B Salmiya-Hamad Mubarak St Mishrif Coop Salwa Coop

25726265 25647075 22625999 22564549 25340559 25326554 25721264 25380581 25628241

Hawally

Al-Madeena

22418714

Al-Shuhada

22545171

Al-Shuwaikh

24810598

Al-Nuzha

22545171

Sabhan

24742838

Al-Helaly

22434853

Al-Faiha

22545051

Al-Farwaniya

24711433

Al-Sulaibikhat

24316983

Al-Fahaheel

23927002

Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh

24316983

Ahmadi

23980088

Al-Mangaf

23711183

Al-Shuaiba

23262845

Kaizen center

25716707

Rawda

22517733

Adaliya

22517144

Al-Jahra

25610011

Khaldiya

24848075

Al-Salmiya

25616368

Kaifan

24849807

Shamiya

24848913

Shuwaikh

24814507

Abdullah Salem

22549134

Nuzha

22526804

Industrial Shuwaikh

24814764

Qadsiya

22515088

Dasmah

22532265

Bneid Al-Gar

22531908

Shaab

22518752

Qibla

22459381

Ayoun Al-Qibla

22451082

Mirqab

22456536

Sharq

22465401

Salmiya

25746401

Jabriya

25316254

Maidan Hawally

25623444

Bayan

25388462

Mishref

25381200

W Hawally

22630786

Sabah

24810221

Jahra

24770319

New Jahra

24575755

West Jahra

24772608

South Jahra

24775066

North Jahra

24775992

North Jleeb

24311795

Ardhiya

24884079

Firdous

24892674

Omariya

24719048

N Khaitan

24710044

Fintas

23900322

INTERNATIONAL CALLS

PRIVATE CLINICS Ophthalmologists Dr. Abidallah Al-Mansoor 25622444 Dr. Samy Al-Rabeea 25752222 Dr. Masoma Habeeb 25321171 Dr. Mubarak Al-Ajmy 25739999 Dr. Mohsen Abel 25757700 Dr Adnan Hasan Alwayl 25732223 Dr. Abdallah Al-Baghly 25732223 Ear, Nose & Throat (ENT) Dr. Ahmed Fouad Mouner 24555050 Ext 510 Dr. Abdallah Al-Ali 25644660 Dr. Abd Al-Hameed Al-Taweel 25646478 Dr. Sanad Al-Fathalah 25311996 Dr. Mohammad Al-Daaory 25731988 Dr. Ismail Al-Fodary 22620166 Dr. Mahmoud Al-Booz 25651426 General Practitioners Dr. Mohamme Y Majidi 24555050 Ext 123 Dr. Yousef Al-Omar 24719312 Dr. Tarek Al-Mikhazeem 23926920 Dr. Kathem Maarafi 25730465 Dr. Abdallah Ahmad Eyadah 25655528 Dr. Nabeel Al-Ayoobi 24577781 Dr. Dina Abidallah Al-Refae 25333501 Urologists Dr. Ali Naser Al-Serfy 22641534 Dr. Fawzi Taher Abul 22639955 Dr. Khaleel Abidallah Al-Awadi 22616660 Dr. Adel Al-Hunayan FRCS (C) 25313120 Dr. Leons Joseph 66703427 Psychologists /Psychotherapists

Paediatricians

Plastic Surgeons Dr. Mohammad Al-Khalaf

22547272

Dr. Khaled Hamadi

Dr. Abdal-Redha Lari

22617700

Dr. Abd Al-Aziz Al-Rashed

Dr. Abdel Quttainah

25625030/60

Family Doctor Dr Divya Damodar

23729596/23729581

Psychiatrists Dr. Esam Al-Ansari

22635047

Dr Eisa M. Al-Balhan

22613623/0

Gynaecologists & Obstetricians DrAdrian arbe

23729596/23729581

Dr. Verginia s.Marin

2572-6666 ext 8321

Endocrinologist

25665898 25340300

Dr. Zahra Qabazard

25710444

Dr. Sohail Qamar

22621099

Dr. Snaa Maaroof

25713514

Dr. Pradip Gujare

23713100

Dr. Zacharias Mathew

24334282

(1) Ear, Nose and Throat (2) Plastic Surgeon Dr. Abdul Mohsin Jafar, FRCS (Canada)

25655535

Dentists

Dr. Fozeya Ali Al-Qatan

22655539

Dr. Majeda Khalefa Aliytami

25343406

Dr. Shamah Al-Matar

22641071/2

Dr. Ahmad Al-Khooly

25739272

Dr. Anesah Al-Rasheed

22562226

22618787

Dr. Abidallah Al-Amer

22561444

Dr. Faysal Al-Fozan

22619557

Dr. Abdallateef Al-Katrash

22525888

Dr. Abidallah Al-Duweisan

25653755

Dr. Bader Al-Ansari

25620111

General Surgeons Dr. Amer Zawaz Al-Amer

22610044

Dr. Mohammad Yousef Basher

25327148

Internists, Chest & Heart Dr. Adnan Ebil Dr. Latefa Al-Duweisan

22666300 25728004

Dr. Nadem Al-Ghabra

25355515

Dr. Mobarak Aldoub

24726446

Dr Nasser Behbehani

25654300/3

Soor Center Tel: 2290-1677 Fax: 2290 1688

Neurologists

22639939

Dr. Mousa Khadada

info@soorcenter.com www.soorcenter.com

3729596/3729581

Dr. Sohal Najem Al-Shemeri

25633324

Dr. Jasem Mola Hassan

25345875

Gastrologists Dr. Sami Aman

22636464

Dr. Mohammad Al-Shamaly

25322030

Dr. Foad Abidallah Al-Ali

22633135

Kaizen center 25716707

25339330

Dr. Ahmad Al-Ansari 25658888 Dr. Kamal Al-Shomr 25329924 Physiotherapists & VD Dr. Deyaa Shehab

25722291

Dr. Musaed Faraj Khamees

22666288

Rheumatologists: Dr. Adel Al-Awadi

Dr Anil Thomas

Dr. Salem soso

Dr. Abd Al-Naser Al-Othman

25330060

Dr. Khaled Al-Jarallah

25722290

Internist, Chest & Heart DR.Mohammes Akkad

24555050 Ext 210

Dr. Mohammad Zubaid MB, ChB, FRCPC, PACC Assistant Professor Of Medicine Head, Division of Cardiology Mubarak Al-Kabeer Hospital Consultant Cardiologist Dr. Farida Al-Habib MD, PH.D, FACC Inaya German Medical Center Te: 2575077 Fax: 25723123

2611555-2622555

William Schuilenberg, RPC 2290-1677 Zaina Al Zabin, M.Sc. 2290-1677

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

Iran 0098 Iraq 00964 Ireland 00353 Italy 0039 Ivory Coast 00225 Jamaica 001876 Japan 0081 Jordan 00962 Kazakhstan 007 Kenya 00254 Kiribati 00686 Kuwait 00965 Kyrgyzstan 00996 Laos 00856 Latvia 00371 Lebanon 00961 Liberia 00231 Libya 00218 Lithuania 00370 Luxembourg 00352 Macau 00853 Macedonia 00389 Madagascar 00261 Majorca 0034 Malawi 00265 Malaysia 0060 Maldives 00960 Mali 00223 Malta 00356 Marshall Islands 00692 Martinique 00596 Mauritania 00222 Mauritius 00230 Mayotte 00269 Mexico 0052 Micronesia 00691 Moldova 00373 Monaco 00377 Mongolia 00976 Montserrat 001664 Morocco 00212 Mozambique 00258 Myanmar (Burma) 0095 Namibia 00264 Nepal 00977 Netherlands (Holland) 0031 Netherlands Antilles 00599 New Caledonia 00687 New Zealand 0064 Nicaragua 00505 Nigar 00227 Nigeria 00234 Niue 00683 Norfolk Island 00672 Northern Ireland (UK) 0044 North Korea 00850 Norway 0047 Oman 00968 Pakistan 0092 Palau 00680 Panama 00507 Papua New Guinea 00675 Paraguay 00595 Peru 0051 Philippines 0063 Poland 0048 Portugal 00351 Puerto Rico 001787 Qatar 00974 Romania 0040 Russian Federation 007 Rwanda 00250 Saint Helena 00290 Saint Kitts 001869 Saint Lucia 001758 Saint Pierre 00508 Saint Vincent 001784 Samoa US 00684 Samoa West 00685 San Marino 00378 Sao Tone 00239 Saudi Arabia 00966 Scotland (UK) 0044 Senegal 00221 Seychelles 00284 Sierra Leone 00232 Singapore 0065 Slovakia 00421 Slovenia 00386 Solomon Islands 00677

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

LIFESTYLE G o s s i p

Rihanna planning big ‘surprise’ for Chris Brown’s birthday

he ‘Diamonds’ singer wants to prove her love for the ‘Yeah 3x’ hitmaker and plans to go all out to help him celebrate turning 24 on May 5. Speaking about her plans, a source said: “It’s a surprise. All I can say is she’s got a few things up her sleeve. She wants Chris to know how much she loves him and wants him and honestly, she just wants to be with him and let him know she’s got his back.” However, Rihanna’s plans may not come to fruition as she has a gig scheduled in Brooklyn on Chris’ birthday and doesn’t want to force him to fly into New York to be with her. The source added to HollywoodLife.com: “Chris treated her and surprised her with his presence when she turned 25, she wants to be with him badly when he turns 24. “She’s not going to flat out ask him to be with her - not on his birthday because she feels that’s his day - but in her heart she wants him with her.”

Vince Vaughn’s wife is pregnant

he ‘Old School’ actor and Kyla Weber - who tied the knot three years ago - are already parents to two-year-old daughter Locklyn and are set to welcome a new arrival on August 5. Speaking to chat show host Ellen DeGeneres, Vince, 43, said: “This is the first time I’ve said anything. We’re very excited.” After Locklyn was born, Vince revealed parenthood had given him “a different purpose”. He said: “I feel so grateful. You know, my wife’s so great. But I gotta tell you. Just the minute they come out, so beautiful and just so sweet - I was just so glad that everyone was healthy. “I’ll tell you. When Kyla and I had the first paediatrician appointment, we gotta get the car seat and put it in the back of the car. Kyla buckled up and I got in the car. And I was like, ‘We’re a family.’ We’re going to an appointment as a family. It’s just a great feeling.” However, he admitted becoming a dad had also left him worrying about everything. He explained: “My thing is getting ahead of myself and worrying about stuff. She’s only three weeks old, right?! People are like, ‘Where is she going to college?’I didn’t even know she wanted to go to college!”

‘Two And A Half Men’ renewed for 11th season

oth Ashton Kutcher and Jon Cryer will return for the new series but Angus T. Jones, who plays Jake Harper, will not be a regular, although it is possible he will make guest appearances, according to Deadline. A tweet on the CBS Twitter feed read: “#TwoAndAHalfMen renewed for 2013-2014 season! (sic).” Ashton and Jon were shocked last year when Angus launched a tirade against the sitcom calling it “filth” in a video with his church pastor and while Jon was surprised, he felt living through former co-star Charlie Sheen’s falling out with creator Chuck Lorre left him better prepared for it than Ashton. Jon previously said: “It is surreal to be part of several Internet s**t storms. When the latest one happened Ashton came up to me and he looked like he had seen a ghost and he was like, ‘Did you hear about Angus?’ and I was like, ‘He is ok?’ He said, ‘Sort of,’ and he showed me the video. And as I said having become a veteran of the internet s**t storm afterward I just looked at Ashton and said, ‘Well do you think he still wants to go in on the crew gift?’ It’s just been one after the other. “My life has taken a lot of strange turns. Mostly I’m just glad everybody is still alive.” While some people have claimed the show is cursed, Jon doesn’t agree. He explained: “It is crazy. I have no explanation for it. You could say the show is cursed except the show has been cursed with being monumentally successful so it’s hard to call that a curse. Angus’ one was so minor because I wasn’t actually worried that any actual harm would come to him and he’s already been back to work several times.”

Celine Dion’s son loves wearing high heels

he 45-year-old singer has Rene-Charles, 12 and twins Nelson and Eddy, two, with husband Rene Angelil and Celine revealed Nelson is obsessed with walking in her stilettos. She told chat show host Katie Couric: “One of my sons, Nelson, is two-and-ahalf, and he walks better in heels than me! “I don’t know how he does it, but I’m not the only one in the family who loves shoes.” Celine claims to have over 3,000 pairs of shoes, explaining: “I stopped counting, because I’m not good at math.” The ‘My Heart Will Go On’ hitmaker also revealed she will buy footwear she likes even if they are not the right size. She said: “I go to the store, and I’m like, ‘I really like those ones,’ and they’re like, ‘What size?’ And I’m like, ‘Oh no, you don’t understand. I want them, so what size do you have? I’ll make it work, baby. I’ll make it work!’ From five to 10, it works!”

Eva Longoria battled eating

Cory Monteith leaves rehab

he 32-year-old actor - who checked in to a treatment facility for substance addiction earlier this month - has now completed his stay and jetted off on holiday with his girlfriend Lea Michele. A witness who spotted them at LAX told E! News: “Both Lea and Cory seemed very happy, smiling the entire time. “When security asked Cory how he was doing, he said good. They were friendly to those around them and appeared in great moods and excited to get out of town.” Lea, 26, has been credited with encouraging Cory to check into rehab before his addictions got out of hand. A source previously said: “She encouraged him to get help, she supports him completely. “Though this was mostly Cory’s decision, Lea agrees it’s for the best. She’s a great influence on him. All his friends can see Cory is incredibly happy with her.” Cory - who has been clean since going to rehab at the age of 19 - was reportedly led astray by his Hollywood friends and started drinking and taking drugs at parties at his Hollywood Hills home. The source added: “He drinks hard and then he can’t say no to other things. The house party scene in Los Angeles is dangerous for him. He thought he could dive in and then drop it but he got hooked on stuff again.

disorder after marriage breakdown

he former ‘Desperate Housewives’ actress was “depressed” when she split from basketball player Tony Parker in November 2010 after three years, yet she was amazed her diminishing figure saw her attract a lot of compliments. Speaking on ‘The Dr. Oz Show’, she said: “I was not eating. I was depressed. I was sad. My diet was coffee. “[But this was] the time I got the most compliments, because I was so skinny. “People kept saying, ‘You look amazing. Divorce agrees with you.’ “And I was like, ‘I don’t feel good. I have no energy.’ I didn’t know I was depressed. I mean, I knew it was a sad moment in my life, but I wouldn’t categorise myself as depressed.” Eva, 38, eventually saw a doctor who ran blood tests and warned she was “just depleted of every vitamin,” her liver was overacting and she had an iron deficiency. She said: “There were all these things [that] were physically wrong with my body, so I had to saturate with vitamins and kind of get back on track. “For about three months, I did a really strict no sugar diet, and I had more energy than I’ve ever had. My palate was different. Things tasted better.” —Bangshowbiz

Robert Pattinson struggled while filming in Australia

he 26-year-old actor lived in the country earlier this year while he filmed the movie ‘Rover’ and co-star Guy Pearce has revealed Robert initially didn’t enjoy his time in the country. He told HollywoodLife: “Well, he struggled with the flies and the heat. “I didn’t man him up, but the others manned him up. “He had a nice time. He had a pretty good time, I’d say.” Director David Michod previously spoken about Robert’s difficulties adjusting to Australia. He said: “He’s very smart. It’s been one of the beaut experiences [for him] ... to roam around and breathe fresh air, but the flies are driving him crazy.” However, Robert is said to have used his time in Australia to contemplate the future of his relationship with Kristen following her fling with married director Rupert Sanders last year. A source said: “Kristen is confident that her relationship with Rob is stronger than ever and has no problem whatsoever with Rob wanting to take things slow. They have been together pretty much non-stop since he’s been back. The first person he wanted to see and spend time with is Kristen, and of course (their dogs) Bear and Bernie.”

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

LIFESTYLE F e a t u r e s

Doors drummer protects Jim Morrison legacy in book

ormer Doors drummer John Densmore keeps the spirit of Jim Morrison alive in his new book, “The Doors Unhinged: Jim Morrison’s Legacy Goes on Trial.” The 68-year drummer is no stranger to chronicling his former band. He wrote The New York Times best-seller, “Riders on the Storm” in 1991. The new book defends Morrison’s stand against commercializing the band’s music catalog. Keyboard player Ray Manzarek and guitarist Robbie Krieger considered selling the rights to a Doors song for a television commercial. Densmore wouldn’t go along with it. He won a lawsuit that says his former bandmates must agree unanimously to any use of the Doors name. Densmore sees himself as the keeper of Morrison’s legacy and feels the singer would never sell the rights to his songs for commercial use. Morrison died in 1971 as a member of the infamous “27” club. Recording artists that passed away at that age include Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Kurt Cobain, and most recently,

Amy Winehouse. And while the band had a relatively short career, their fallen lead singer continues to live on in the memory of fans. Recently, Densmore talked about Morrison’s intentions, struggles, and gift to the music world. He also spoke the singer’s 1969 obscenity arrest in Miami. In 2010, 41 years after the incident, Florida Gov. Charlie Crist granted Morrison a posthumous pardon. AP: You’ve already written about the Doors, so what are you trying to tell people in this new book? Densmore: Jim had an uncompromising spirit that he cared about the catalog. ‘Come on Buick, light my fire’ was something he said he would not do, and would smash a car on television to make my point. It’s something I cannot forget. I’m pleased that he instilled in me that money is important, but not the most important... The book starts out with Jim screaming ‘You guys want to change the meaning of “Light My Fire,” you’re crazy.’

And he didn’t write that song, primarily. He wrote: Our love become a funeral pyre. He added that one line that was missing. So he cared about the whole

body of work. AP: Did you see Jim Morrison spiraling out of control? Densmore: Jim succumbed to alcoholism, the legal drug, which at the time we didn’t have substance abuse clinics and we didn’t know he had a disease, you know? I’m wondering if today like Eminem who is this angry, creative guy can put out an album called ‘Recovery’ maybe Jim could have done the same. AP: The band wasn’t on the same destructive path as Jim, so were you guys concerned? Densmore: That was my cross to bear. I mean I found my path in music and I was being creative and was in a band with a self-destructive kamikaze Dionysus drunk and it was hard but I couldn’t give it up because I knew that it was magic and I knew there was a big elephant in the room and I lobbied for about a year to get off the road, because in a studio you can stop. In front of 10,000 people you can’t.

AP: There was controversy when you performed, most notably the Miami arrest. Densmore: Jim did not expose himself at Miami, OK? He was drunk that night and very political and it was a mess musically but it was theatrical. At the time the country was polarized into for and against the Vietnam War... I think they wanted to get those grubby rock n’ rollers. Those anti-establishment kids. AP: What was special about seeing The Doors perform live? Densmore: It was dynamic. If you get real dramatic and fortissimo and loud, then soft... We’d play ‘Light My Fire,’ and everybody would be dancing. Then we’d play ‘The End,’ and everybody would file out, quietly. AP: What are you most proud of? Densmore: I’m very proud that we broke the three-minute barrier with ‘Light My Fire,’ and ‘The End.’ ‘When the Music’s Over’ is one of my ultimate favorites. —AP

Espadrilles: Go-to shoe on fair-weather days I

f you’re craving a little more summer in your springtime wardrobe and you’re hesitant to break out the white pants (it’s OK, but that’s another conversation), try espadrilles. The rope-soled shoes have long been a staple of the fair-weather seasons, no matter if there’s a chill in the air or the sidewalks are steaming. It’s all good as long as the sun is shining.

“The espadrille for spring is like the riding boot in the fall,” says Elisa Miller, creative director of the beachy brand Calypso St. Barth. “It’s a rite of the season.” Style options have increased exponentially as designers take liberties with the definition - and have gotten a little smarter about their construction. Flat versions, wedge versions, sandals, slides and gladiator lace-up styles are some of the choices of a shoe with humble roots that was made fashionable in France and Spain in the mid-20th century. “I’d call anything with the jute sole an espadrille,” says Miller. “You could have any fabric for the top - canvas, leather - it could be plastic, but you have to have the jute. That’s what defines it.” Luckily for wearers, especially those who have been caught in the rain, many espadrilles now have a bottom layer of rubber, too. But such practicality likely isn’t driving the renewed interest. Alexis Bryan Morgan, executive fashiondirector at Lucky magazine, traces this “huge espadrille moment” to last year’s Valentino spring runway. Seeing lacy black espadrilles paired with a long lace dress left editors swooning, she said. “It was styled so elegantly that suddenly this disposable go-to shoe was also chic and elegant. This brought it to a whole new level.” You can’t really say they’re a “trend” because they’re pretty much an annual tradition, says Tracey Lomrantz Lester, women’s editorial director at Gilt, but she agrees this season marks a rebirth. They elevate an outfit without ever looking “too done,” she says. And, they’re fun, says Tana Ward, senior vice president and chief merchandising officer for American Eagle. They can bring graphic prints and bright colors to an outfit without a major commitment, she says. Lucky’s Morgan sees them as a

more fashionable alternative to flipflops. They can go to the beach or to dinner, prices tend to be affordable or at least less expensive when you are talking Valentino - and the nautical vibe keeps things relaxed and summery. As a vacation shoe, it’s ideal, she adds. “You’re probably already wearing them so you don’t have to pack any shoes.” Espadrilles are instantly transporting, agrees Lester. To her, they evoke Brigitte Bardot on the French Riviera, an inspiring image even if you’re headed to the office or running errands, she says. Just throw on a striped bateau-neck top and white jeans - and voila! Lester says a white sundress also works, while Morgan suggests a long maxi or a simple black dress. She’s worn espadrilles with black satin pants and jeans rolled to a capri length. Calypso’s Miller says a white linen shirt with jeans and silver espadrilles are a favorite look of hers, but they offer a lot of flexibility, complementing shorts, skirts and pants with all sorts of hemlines and silhouettes. That helps them live through other fads and fashions. For them to last that long, though, Miller suggests using fabric or leather protector on the uppers, and glue on the rubber bottom if it starts to separate from the jute. Still, Morgan likes to refresh her closet with a new pair. “So they’re not hearty shoes, but that’s part of the appeal. They’re casual, they’re go-to, they’re beachy. There’s a huge variety, but the message is the same: It’s time to relax and be in the sun.”

Will.i.am

Will.i.am rebuts accusations of song theft W

ill.i.am says he’s been unfairly accused of stealing a song from a Russian dance producer for use on his new album. The producer-rapper-singer has acknowledged reaching out to trance producer Arty after hearing his 2011 song with London’s Mat Zo, “Rebound.” Will.i.am recorded a new version with Chris Brown titled, “Let’s Go,” which has been met with criticism online from Arty’s fans. He said he emailed Arty, who initially responded positively to an invitation to collaborate. But in recent weeks, the Russian DJ and producer told fans on his Facebook page that there was no final deal between their respective labels and “the matter is under review by our legal teams.” Will.i.am credits Arty, whose real name is Artem Stoliarov, as a writer on the song in the liner notes for his album “(hash)willpower,” released this week. He blamed the slow legal clearance process and said he didn’t know Arty had worked with another producer on the track. Will.i.am said his legal team was also at work on the issue. “You can’t steal if you credited somebody,” will.i.am told The Associated Press in an interview this week. “He and I communicated. ... It’s not my fault he didn’t tell me about the other guy. So who is to blame? I didn’t know.” A message sent to Arty’s label,

Anjunabeats, was not returned Friday. Will.i.am, whose real name is William Adams, noted that his album includes collaborations with more well-known electronic dance music producers including Afrojack, Steve Angello and Sebastian Ingrosso. “I respect that world and in a way helped cross it over for it to be played on radio,” he said. “So it’s just - it’s just - it’s kind of wack the way this situation has turned out because it’s undermined in a way - not really, it hasn’t - but it’s undermined my contributions to that world and my respect to that world. Because the way they’re painting it is not the way it is.” Will.i.am, whose group the Black Eyed Peas went on hiatus two years ago, said he faced similar issues with slow legal clearances when Estelle and Kanye West released “American Boy” using the beat from his 2007 song “Impatient.”“I don’t mind because I like the song and I’m excited about the collaboration with Kanye and Estelle. And then the paperwork happens after it’s out,” he said. “That happens a bunch of times where legal takes so long. The creative is instantaneous. You want things to come out.” —AP

OSN partners with ABS-CBN to bring Filipino TV entertainment to the region

SN, the leading pay-TV network in the Middle East and North Africa, has partnered with ABS-CBN, the largest Filipino TV network in the world, to bring viewers in the region the very best Filipino TV entertainment from May 1, 2013. OSN will offer its Filipino viewers four new ABS-CBN channels featuring premium content across a variety of genres so there’s something for everyone. Channels include TFC (The Filipino Channel), the network’s flagship entertainment channel and the No. 1 Filipino TV channel in the world; Bro, a dedicated sports and entertainment channel; Cinema One Global, featuring the biggest and latest movies from top studios; and ANC (ABS-CBN News Channel), a 24-hour news channel broadcasting talk shows and documentaries from the Philippines and the world. David Butorac, CEO of OSN said: “Our part-

David Butorac, CEO, OSN nership with ABS-CBN, the largest provider of entertainment to Filipinos globally, is a clear demonstration of our network’s strength in reaching out to the widest cross-section of the region’s Filipino community. Both OSN and

ABS-CBN focus on quality content and the addition of four new world-class channels complements our existing Filipino channel line-up further strengthening OSN’s choice and variety proposition for the segment.” The four channels have an enviable reputation of broadcasting several award-winning television shows in the Philippines and beyond, and are extremely popular among the 3 million-strong Filipinos in the MENA region. The addition of these channels will significantly boost the choice of premium Filipino entertainment on OSN, which already offers a bouquet of over 40 channels through its Pinoy packages. The four ABS-CBN TV channels come at no extra cost to existing OSN subscribers. “We are delighted to offer through OSN our four channels to cater to the diverse viewing preferences of Filipinos in the Middle East. With this partnership with OSN, the leading main-

stream pay-TV network in the Middle East and North Africa, ABS-CBN through TFC fortifies its already strong presence in the region built over the past 15 years through its own direct-tohome platform and its carriage partnerships with the major cable operators,” said ABS-CBN Middle East Managing Director Edgardo Garcia. “We appreciate OSN’s recognition of ABSCBN’s leadership in Filipino programming and its strong affinity with various Filipino communities in the region. Such confidence only encourages us to strive even harder to meet and satisfy our viewers’ passion for high quality content for which ABS-CBN is known for.” TFC, ABS-CBN’s flagship entertainment channel is packed with drama, comedy and more. Reality show enthusiasts can cheer their compatriots on the top-rated Pilipinas Got Talent, The Voice, and Minute to Win It, while series fans can revel in their choice of the most-

Edgardo Garcia, MD, ABS-CBN Middle East watched shows including Maalaala mo Kaya, Be Careful with My Heart and Apoy Sa Dagat. Viewers can also enjoy TV Patrol, the network’s flagship news programme and the No 1

prime time news cast in the Philippines; Umagang Kay Ganda, the No 1 early morning news-variety-talk show in the Philippines; Kris TV, a lifestyle show hosted by Kris Aquino - the Philippine President’s sister; comedian Vice Ganda’s rip-roaring variety game show It’s Showtime; the longest running musical show ASAP; plus many more. Only on Bro, the dedicated sports and entertainment channel, viewers can enjoy Trip Na Trip, the part-travel, part-reality show; UAAP, the premier collegiate basketball tournament; and PreLikula, a showcase of popular action themed Filipino movies, among other popular choices. Cinema One Global has the largest roster of blockbuster Filipino movies from the Top 3 production companies - Star Cinema, Regal Entertainment, and Viva Films - all exclusive to the channel. These films are telecast within six months of its theatrical release.

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

lifestyle

Lynne Saltzman de Berger, proprietor of Flory Saltzman Molas in Panama City, displays a bedspread made from molas.

rom the traditional blouses worn by Guna Indian women to evening gowns, wall hangings and even oven mitts, mola designs are everywhere in Panama. Formed by stacking layers of vividly hued cloth together and then snipping away a part of each layer to form a design, the textiles are traditionally made by Guna women from the San Blas Islands to form the front and back panels of their blouses. But now you’ll find these sculptures in cloth hawked on street corners in tourist areas and sewn into everything from bedspreads and pillow cases to purses and yarmulkes. Miss Panama 2011 even wore a molainspired skirt when she competed in the Miss Universe pageant. “This is a living art and a dying art at the same time,” said Lynne Saltzman de Berger, proprietor of Flory Saltzman Molas, a Panama City shop started by her mother Flory, 86. Tucked away in every corner and stacked to the ceiling are more than a million molas that the elder Saltzman began collecting and selling in the early 1960s. The Guna refer to the San Blas archipelago as Guna Yala. Both the indigenous people and the place used to be known as Kuna, but the switch was made a few years ago at the insistence of the Guna people - they said the letter K did not exist in their language. In the early days, the Guna women remained on the islands, just off the northeastern coast of Panama. The men did the selling, arriving at the shop between 7 am and 9 am, when Flory Saltzman did her buying. The Guna are becoming more assimilated as they move to the mainland. Mola sellers are often women these days, Saltzman said. About 15,000 Guna create molas, Saltzman said. “Everyone makes them. Not everyone is an artist.” To make the huge quantity of molas the store has accumulated over the years more marketable, Saltzman has them fashioned into everything from beach bags to glasses holders and T-shirts. Other than requesting some white-on-white molas to match the color scheme of her mother’s home, Saltzman and her mother have eschewed interfering with the traditional designs and colors of the Gunas’ confections. They don’t request designer color schemes or soothing floral designs that are more compatible

This mola featuring a fox displays many intricate details from the criss-cross stitchery to rick-rack appliques. — MCT photos

with home decor. Though plenty of tourist molas in au courant colors are sold all over Panama, most of the textiles in the Saltzman shop are in the traditional mola colors of black, burgundy, red, and orange. Helene Breebaart, a Panama City fashion designer and artist, isn’t such a purist - but she keeps the mola tradition alive in her own way. She uses traditional molas as her inspiration but creates the designs herself. “I like to maintain their traditions but I’m not going to steal their designs,” Breebaart said. “We are creative here.” Breebaart, who is French, came to Panama to help launch the Christian Dior line in the Americas and wound up marrying her boss. The couple, who both had their pilot licenses, often took trips to the San Blas Islands on the weekends. “One day I was looking at these beautiful girls with their molas and said, ‘I’m going to make my own mola designs,’” said Breebaart, who studied art in France and lived in a household where there was a full-time dressmaker on staff. Her first design was a pineapple motif that that was appliqued on a simple shift. That was 1978. The pineapple became the logo for her business, and she hasn’t looked back since. Beauty queens, socialites and even Rosalynn Carter are clients. She also fulfills one-of-a-kind design requests. “A Greek ship builder commissioned a pillow for a wedding performed at Versailles and requested a design with the gardens of Versailles in mola form,” she said. “I use the fabric like painting.” The second floor of her colonial-style home in the Obarrio section has been turned into a workshop, with women from the San Blas Islands as well as other provinces executing molas from Breebaart’s designs in a large room that she refers to as the Guna Yala. In other rooms, seamstresses fashion the molas into the bodices of high-fashion gowns or use the decorative panels in everything from sundresses to pant suits. Her bestseller is a two-tone jacket made from denim or raw silk that is entirely covered with mola motifs. Making such a jacket, she said, takes six weeks. “Our production is very limited because everything is handmade,” Breebaart said. As far as color schemes go, “black

and white is the most popular now,” she said. Despite the current pervasiveness of molas in Panama, making them is a relatively recent phenomenon. In his book, “Magnificent Molas: The Art of the Kuna Indians,” French ethnologist Michel Perrin said Scottish surgeon Lionel Wafer met the people of the San Blas Archipelago as early as 1681 and noted the women’s “passion for graphic arts.” But their geometric designs of birds, beasts and other nature motifs were painted on their bodies, not cut from cloth. The textile designs didn’t appear until the second half of the 19th century and were “an art of reaction, a hybrid art stemming from contact and conflict with whites,” Perrin writes. The designs moved to clothing because of the influence of Western clothing “they wanted to imitate or were obliged to wear.” “I want people to treat molas as art, not as a handicraft,” Saltzman said as she plopped a pile of molas on the floor - the best vantage point for viewing the overall designs - and began pointing out what transforms a mola into art. “Art you look at from a distance,” said Saltzman as she pointed out a particularly well-executed design of two turtles - one said, another happy - on an orange background. “You see this design comes alive.” One of the older molas in Saltzman’s stock says simply “Revolucion 1925,” commemorating a Guna uprising against Panamanian authorities whom they accused of repressing their traditions and forcing them to adopt Hispanic culture. The Guna briefly seceded from Panama, and their homeland is now recognized as an autonomous territory. And after the December 1989 US invasion of Panama, when tensions between Washington and its former ally, Panama’s de facto leader Gen Manuel Noriega, reached a boiling point, motifs from Operation Justice Cause crept into the molas. Around the same time, molas also were being crafted that depicted the reporters who covered the invasion - and their computers. In her store, Saltzman displays folkloric masks, tagua seed carvings, baskets, Embera bead work and wood sculptures made by other indigenous groups, but the molas are front and center. They range from simple pan-

This file photo shows (from left) Milly Shapiro, Sophia Gennusa, Oona Laurence and Bailey Ryon, the four actresses who share the starring role in “Matilda the Musical” on Broadway, outside the Shubert Theatre in New York.— AP

he members of the Tony Award nominations committee better look out: They’ve snubbed four girls who play a tough little telekinetic heroine on Broadway. Administrators for the awards met Friday for the fourth and final time to determine the eligibility of certain shows and ruled that the quartet of actresses who rotate as the lead in “Matilda” are not eligible in the category of Best Performance by an Actress in a Musical category. The group did rule that the four - Sophia Gennusa, 9; Oona Laurence, Bailey Ryon and Milly Shapiro, all 10 - will receive Tony Honors for Excellence in the Theatre, a non-competitive commendation. “The Tony Awards Administration Committee wishes to recognize their outstanding performances this season,” the committee said in a statement. A publicist for the Tonys did not immediately return a request for clarification. It remains to be seen if the girls will perform on the June 9 telecast. The use of four rotating Matildas in New York echoes the way it was done in Britain, to huge success. All four actresses in London were jointly declared best actress at the Olivier Awards, the most prestigious honor in British theater.

The move by the Tonys seems strange since the three boys rotating the lead of “Billy Elliot the Musical” - David Alvarez, Trent Kowalik and Kiril Kulish - all took home a joint best actor Tony in 2006. The producers of the show were diplomatic in their response: “The ‘Matilda’ producers appreciate the decision of the Tony Administration committee and The Tony Honors.” The four girls - one from New York City, two from the surrounding region and one from Pennsylvania - are each making their Broadway debuts. Reviews for the show have been excellent, with raves for each of the Matildas. The show “Matilda,” which opened April 11 at Shubert Theatre, is a witty musical adaptation of the beloved novel by Roald Dahl and is true to his bleak vision of childhood as a savage battleground. The 2 1/2-hour musical tells the story of a precocious and slightly telekinetic Matilda Wormwood, an English girl who loves to read despite the disdain of her sleazy parents. She is befriended by a kindly teacher but opposed by the fearsome school headmistress. — AP

els that sell for 50 cents to $3.50 that appeal to the backpacking crowd to museum-quality molas that sell for $100 or more. A king-size bedspread sells for $450 to $472. “I call find beauty in everything - even the 50-cent ones,” Saltzman said. “My idea is to share them. Now the art of the mola is much more appreciated than it used to be.” — MCT

Designer Helene Breebaart sits in her living room with Guna sewers who make the mola fabrics she uses in her high-fashion designs.

embers of the Cajun band T’Monde are young, but they like their music old. The band of 20-somethings opened the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival Friday with century-old, fiddle-heavy Cajun tunes. “Je vais faire accoire, que tu m’aimes toujours,” sang Drew Simon (pronounced SEE-mon), while playing the accordion to lyrics from an old Cajun song that loosely translated means “I’m going to make believe that you still love me.” T’Monde (pronounced TEE-mone), in Cajun French can mean “little world” or “little people.” The group based in Lafayette, La., opened one of the festival’s 12 stages Friday as music fans carrying folding chairs and umbrellas filed through the gates of the Fair Grounds horse racing track. Jazz Fest spans two weekends. It continues through Sunday and then resumes May 2-5. Couples danced in the grass as T’Monde played on the Fais Do-Do (FAY-doh-doh) stage, where Cajun and zydeco music would be performed throughout the festival. Simon, who at 29 is the eldest of the T’Monde trio, said he studied old recordings of Cajun music dating back to the early 1900s. The music was common at Cajun parties known as a “fais do do,” where couples would two-step to music played with just a handful of

Singer Emeli Sande performs at the Live From T5 concert series, on Friday, April 26, 2013 in New York. — AP

A Guna worker at Helene Breebaart’s design studio in Panama City stitches a flower.

instruments, usually a fiddle or guitar and an accordion. Jazz Fest producer Quint Davis said Cajun and zydeco music are as important to the festival as jazz. “There are certain aspects of culture that only exist here,” Davis said. “We’re the birthright of jazz, everybody knows that, second-line music, the Mardi Gras Indians go along with that. The other wonderful culture in southwest Louisiana is the French-speaking people that are Cajun and zydeco in terms of music.” Davis said about 25 Cajun bands and 25 zydeco bands will perform at this year’s festival. “The younger generations are really keen on the music and keeping it alive, so there’s traditional Cajun music, which is dance hall music, and then there’s zydeco, which is like French rock ‘n’ roll,” Davis said. Corey Ledet (pronounced LUH-day), another opening day act, said he can’t remember a time when zydeco music wasn’t a part of his life.—AP

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

lifestyle

This theater image shows Patina Miller during a performance of “Pippin,” at Broadway’s Music Box Theatre in New York.

he last show to open this season on Broadway comes with plenty of bang, lots of flips and real value for money: A ticket buys you not just a musical but also a trip to the circus. The American Repertory Theatre’s thrilling revival of that cultishly cute “Pippin” opened Thursday at the Music Box Theatre as a hybrid that surely will keep everyone thoroughly entertained. Director Diane Paulus hasn’t just slapped some fresh paint on this beloved tale of self-discovery, she’s rebuilt it, apparently inspired by the opening number’s line “we’ve got magic to do.” The musical, with songs by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Roger O. Hirson, is framed by a group of traveling players who tell the story of a young man named Pippin, the ninth-century emperor Charlemagne’s firstborn, who is looking for his place in the world. It wowed Broadway in the 1970s with Bob Fosse directing and Ben Vereen starring. Paulus has transformed the players into a troupe of circus performers, and it’s a stroke of genius. It allows for a Big Top theme - think fire jugglers, teeterboards, knife throwing and contortionists but also teases out the wandering nature of the mysterious players and zooms up the physicality of the story. The Montreal-based Les 7 Doigts de la Main, a group known for mixing high-risk acrobatics, music and dance with the thrill of street performance, has been handed the circus duties. In retrospect, it’s as natural a collaboration as peanut butter and jelly. Paulus, who has already thrilled with remakes of “Hair” and “Porgy and Bess,” scores again, making two very different companies work coherently. She’s also managed to tease out the connection between the intricate dance style of the late Fosse - Chet Walker choreographs this in the master’s style - with the equally meticulous needs of acrobatics. Both require tiny, precise movement. The cast members are amazing and clearly have all been to the gym. No sooner have you

realized that one actor is busy stealing the show than another steps up to blow you away. Patina Miller, last on Broadway as the heroine of “Sister Act,” steps into the Vereen role of Leading Player. Miller looks as if she just walked off the set of “Tomb Raider” - she’s a triumphantly muscular, lithe creature with a hat and cane. Miller has got a manic grin on her face, sings with power and has a menacing air. She proves perfectly suited to Fosse’s complicated footwork and, unlike Vereen, does tricks on a trapeze while singing. Terrence Mann plays Pippin’s manic father, and his real-life wife, Charlotte d’Amboise, plays his stage wife. This role gives d’Amboise the unusual vampy sexy role, which she nails with a hoot, and her husband gets to ride a unicycle and throw knives at her. (This must lead to some interesting conversations at home.) Andrea Martin plays Pippin’s grandmother and sings the music hall favorite “No Time at All,” but the 66year-old will be more remembered for doing jaw-dropping stunts that would make someone a fraction of her age blanch. She milks it all night, of course. But she deserves it. Two up-and-comers play the central lovers Rachel Bay Jones has great comedic chops but also adds a wistful tenderness to the part, and Matthew James Thomas, a one-time Peter Parker in “Spider-Man: urn Off the Dark,” announces himself as a new Broadway leading man. He’s got the looks, the lungs and the abs, all of which the audience gets to enjoy multiple times. Unfortunately for Thomas, his cool six-pack pales in comparison to the circus performers. Some of the women look as though they could arm-wrestle him into submission in seconds; one of the circus guys looks like He-Man. They run around - and swing around - Scott Pask’s big top set, which has two poles and plenty of flaps for the hectic “Spamalot”-type action. One negative is that Dominique Lemieux’s costumes look a little muddled from far away, lack-

This image shows Andrea Martin (left) and Matthew James Thomas during a performance of “Pippin,” at Broadway’s Music Box Theatre in New York.

ing some pop. Even if you don’t want to hear one more rendition of “Corner of the Sky” or “Spread a Little Sunshine,” the Gypsy Snider-led acrobats will thrill you. One suspends himself horizontally from a pole, another balances on a tower of

The genius of Paulus, though, is to know when to stop. For the penultimate tune, “Love Song,” only Pippin and his gal are on stage, a welcome show of quiet restraint that makes it a sweet moment. She knows when to pack up the circus tent. So when the cast sings, by way of

cans, still others bounce on six big yoga balls and one contorts herself into a human belt slung around another performer. A body-less head talks as part of a simple but funny theater trick, and a guy jumps through a hoop balanced on a girl’s nose - an extremely non-simple trick.

invitation in the opening number, “Join us, come and waste an hour or two,” it’s highly recommended you do so. Little can get the blood going this way. — AP

Ss13’ woman collection Spring is the season when the good weather begins. Dark and dull colours leave us, giving way to light and intense ones. Elements of nature become the collection protagonist, creating a symbiosis between our garments and their surrounding environment. From earth and cocoa tones to stone and shafed of grey with blue, red, pink, and sea green for a touch of colour. A classic renewed by materials, where quality garments become important through fabrics or accessories, the garments design and pattern. Linen coexists with silks and technical fabrics, providing quality, comfort and above all femininity to our women at this time of the year. Accessories in first quality vegetable leathers help give that extra special touch. Ss13’ man collection Sophistication, quality, and traditions are adjectives which describe this season spring-summer collection. Nature returns as an essential source of inspiration. Neutral tones are still in, giving way to a very enriching tandem of colours such as grey with pink, green with mauve together with navy blue, creating an exquisite collection. Noble materials such as cashmere, cotton or linen, cotton-cashmere fine gauge or new fantasies bring a breath of fresh air to the knit fabric family. Outerwear with renewed colours and materials with a very clean finish, such as the nylon/linen reversible parka. Fresh functional shirts, pique over garments in very summery tones, giving an informal but at the same time casual look. Sartorial trousers, with new fabric structures and offering a wide range of colour. Kids collection Watch, listen, feel... Intellectual futures with an adventurous spirit impose a new avant-garde or street style with knitted fabrics, denim or linen. A simple colour palette: beige, white, blue and some touches of water green; the scarce variety of patterns - plain, stripes, and checks - and the lightness of the patterns are reasons enough to take over the wardrobe of younger children. Comfortable garments and versatile accessories, which adapt to the favourite activities for a special weekend.

This theater image released by Boneau/BryanBrown shows the cast during a performance of “Pippin,” at Broadway’s Music Box Theatre in New York. — AP photos

Doors drummer protects Jim Morrison legacy in book

SUNDAY, APRIL 28, 2013

In this undated photo, Tammy Wynette (left) sings with George Jones in Nashville.

In this undated photo, Country singer George Jones is shown performing with his guitar.

ful, tender and tragic. His hits included the sentimental “Who’s Gonna Fill Their Shoes,” the foot-tapping “The Race is On,” the footstomping “I Don’t Need Your Rockin’ Chair,” the melancholy “She Thinks I Still Care,” the rockin’ “White Lightning,” and the barfly lament “Still Doing Time.” Jones also recorded several duets with Tammy Wynette, his wife for six years, including “Golden Ring,” “Near You,” “Southern California” and “We’re Gonna Hold On.” He also sang with such peers as Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard and with Costello and other rock performers. But his signature song was “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” a weeper among weepers about a man who carries his love for a woman to his grave. The 1980 ballad, which Jones was sure would never be a hit, often appears on surveys as the most popular country song of all time and won the Country Music Association’s song of the year award an unprecedented two years in a row. Jones won Grammy awards in 1981 for “He Stopped Loving Her Today” and in 1999 for “Choices.” He was elected to the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1992 and in 2008 was among the artists honored in Washington at the Kennedy Center. He was in the midst of a yearlong farewell tour when he passed away. He was scheduled to complete the tour in November with an allstar packed tribute in Nashville. Stars lined up to sign on to the show, many remembering kindnesses over the years. Kenny Chesney thinks Jones may have one of the greatest voices in not just country history, but music history. But he remembers Jones for more than the voice. He was picked for a tour with Jones and Wynette early in his career and cherishes the memory of being invited to fly home on Jones’ private jet after one of the concerts. “I remember sitting there on that jet, thinking, ‘This can’t be happening,’ because he was George Jones, and I was some kid from nowhere,” Chesney said in an email. “I’m sure he knew, but he was generous to kids chasing the dream, and I never forgot it.” Jones was born Sept. 12, 1931, in a log house near the east Texas town of Saratoga, the youngest of eight children. He sang in church and at age 11 began performing for tips on the streets of Beaumont, Texas. His first outing was such a success that listeners tossed him coins, placed a cup by his side and filled it with money. Jones estimated he made more than $24 for his two-hour performance, enough to feed his family for a week, but he used up the cash at a local arcade. “That was my first time to earn money for singing and my first time to blow it afterward,” he recalled in “I Lived to Tell it All,” a painfully self-critical memoir published in 1996. “It started what almost became a lifetime trend.” The family lived in a government-subsidized housing project, and his father, a laborer, was an alcoholic who would rouse the children

hen it comes to country music, George Jones was The Voice. Other great singers have come and gone, but this fact remained inviolate until Jones passed away Friday at 81 in a Nashville hospital after a year of ill health. “Today someone else has become the greatest living singer of traditional country music, but there will never be another George Jones,” said Bobby Braddock, the Country Music Hall of Fame songwriter who provided Jones with 29 songs over the decades. “No one in country music has influenced so many other artists.” He did it with that voice. Rich and deep, strong enough to crack like a whip, but supple enough to bring tears. It was so powerful, it made Jones the first thoroughly modern country superstar, complete with the substance abuse problems and rich-and-famous celebrity lifestyle that included mansions, multiple divorces and - to hear one fellow performer tell it - fistfuls of cocaine.

songs in five separate decades, 1950s to 1990s. And its qualities were admired by more than just his fellow country artists but by Frank Sinatra, Pete Townshend, Elvis Costello, James Taylor and countless others. “If we all could sound like we wanted to, we’d all sound like George Jones,” Waylon Jennings once sang. Word of his death spread Friday morning as his peers paid tribute. Merle Haggard put it best, perhaps: “The world has lost the greatest country singer of all time. Amen.” “The greatest voice to ever grace country music will never die,” Garth Brooks said. “Jones has a place in every heart that ever loved any kind of music.” And Dolly Parton added, “My heart is absolutely broken. George Jones was my all time favorite singer and one of my favorite people in the world.” In Jones’ case, that’s not hyperbole. In a career that lasted more than 50 years, “Possum” evolved from young honky-tonker

In this file photo, Country music legend George Jones waves to the crowd during his 75th birthday celebration at the Grand Ole Opry House in Nashville, Tenn. He was a beloved and at times a notorious figure in Nashville and his problems were just as legendary as his songs. But when you dropped the needle on one of his records, all that stuff went away. And you were left with The Voice. “He just knows how to pull every drop of emotion out of it of the songs if it’s an emotional song or if it’s a fun song he knows how to make that work,” Alan Jackson said in a 2011 interview. “It’s rare. He was a big fan of Hank Williams Sr. like me. He tried to sing like Hank in the early days. I’ve heard early cuts. And the difference is Hank was a singer and he was a great writer, but he didn’t have that natural voice like George. Not many people do. That just sets him apart from everybody.” That voice helped Jones achieve No. 1

to elder statesman as he recorded more than 150 albums and became the champion and symbol of traditional country music, a welllined link to his hero, Williams. Jones survived long battles with alcoholism and drug addiction, brawls, accidents and close encounters with death, including bypass surgery and a tour bus crash that he only avoided by deciding at the last moment to take a plane. His failure to appear for concerts left him with the nickname “No Show Jones,” and he later recorded a song by that name and often opened his shows by singing it. His wild life was revealed in song and in his handsome, troubled face, with its dark, deep-set eyes and dimpled chin. In song, like life, he was rowdy and regret-

In this file photo, Garth Brooks (left) and George Jones (center) perform their duet “Beer Run” at the Country Music Association Awards show in Nashville, Tenn.

from bed in the middle of the night to sing for him. His father also noted that young George liked music and bought him a Gene Autry guitar, with a horse and lariat on the front that Jones practiced on obsessively. He got his start on radio with husband and wife team Eddie & Pearl in the late 1940s. Hank Williams once dropped by the studio to promote a new record, and Jones was invited to back him on guitar. When it came time to play, he froze. “Hank had ‘Wedding Bells’ out at the time,” Jones recalled in a 2003 Associated Press interview. “He started singing it, and I never hit the first note the whole song. I just stared.” After the first of his four marriages failed, he enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1951 and served three years. He cut his first record when he got out, an original fittingly called “No Money in This Deal.” He had his first hit with “Why Baby Why” in 1955, and by the early ‘60s Jones was one of country music’s top stars. “I sing top songs that fit the hardworking, everyday loving person. That’s what country music is about,” Jones said in a 1991 AP interview. “My fans and real true country music fans know I’m not a phony. I just sing it the way it is and put feeling in it if I can and try to live the song.” Jones was married to Wynette, his third wife, from 1969 to 1975. (Wynette died in 1998.) Their relationship played out in Nashville like a country song, with hard drinking, fights and reconciliations. Jones’ weary knowledge of domestic warfare was immortalized in such classics as “The Battle,” set to the martial beat of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” After one argument, Jones drove off on a riding mower in search of a drink because Wynette had taken his car keys to keep him from carousing. Years earlier, married to his second wife, he had also sped off on a mower in search of a drink. Jones referred to his mowing days in the 1996 release, “Honky Tonk Song,” and poked fun at himself in a Big & Rich video that featured him pulling up to a party aboard a mower. His drug and alcohol abuse grew worse in the late ‘70s, and Jones had to file for bankruptcy in 1978. A manager had started him on cocaine, hoping to counteract his boozy, lethargic performances, and Jones was eventually arrested in Jackson, Miss., in 1983 on cocaine possession charges. He agreed to perform a benefit concert and was sentenced to six months probation. In his memoir, “Satan is Real,” Charlie Louvin recounts being offered a fistful of cocaine by Jones backstage at a concert. “In the 1970s, I was drunk the majority of the time,” Jones wrote in his memoir. “If you saw me sober, chances are you saw me asleep.” In 1980, a 3-minute song changed his life. His longtime producer, Billy Sherrill, recommended he record “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” a ballad by Braddock and Curly

In this file photo, Country music veteran George Jones bends an ear toward 14year-old newcomer LeAnn Rimes during the opening segment of the TNNMusic City News Country Awards show in Nashville, Tenn.

In this file photo, George Jones accepts his 1985 award at the Country Music Association (CMA) awards show in Nashville, Tenn.

Putnam. The song took more than a year to record, partly because Jones couldn’t master the melody, which he confused with Kris Kristofferson’s “Help Me Make it Through the Night,” and partly because he was too drunk to recite a brief, spoken interlude (“She came to see him one last time/And we all wondered if she would/And it kept running through my mind/This time he’s over her for good.”)

In this file photo, Country music legend George Jones accepts his Country Music Hall of Fame award from Randy Travis (left) during the Country Music Association Awards show, Nashville, Tenn. “Pretty simple, eh?” Jones wrote in his memoir. “I couldn’t get it. I had been able to sing while drunk all of my life. I’d fooled millions of people. But I could never speak without slurring when drunk. What we needed to complete that song was the narration, but Billy could never catch me sober enough to record four simple spoken lines.” Jones was convinced the song was too “morbid” to catch on. But “He Stopped Loving Her Today,” featuring a string section that hummed, then soared, became an instant standard and virtually canonized him. His concert fee jumped from $2,500 a show to $25,000. “There is a God,” he recalled. — AP

In this file photo, Country singer George Jones, winner of top male vocalist award at the Academy of Country Music Awards, poses with his daughter Georgette, in Los Angeles, Calif. — AP photos