13th Jul 2013

IPT IO N SC R SU B

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

RAMADAN 4, 1434 AH

No: 15868

150 Fils

Emsak: Fajer: Dohr: Asr: Maghreb: Eshaa:

03:13 03:24 11:54 15:28 18:50 20:20

Morsi’s fall disconcerts Qatar, comforts Saudis Gulf fears Brotherhood would push radical agenda

Max 48º Min 32º

RIYADH: The $12 billion in aid Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait offered Egypt this week showed their delight at the army’s ousting of President Mohamed Morsi in a reversal for Islamists empowered by the Arab ferment of 2011. It also marked a recalibration of power among Gulf Arab states which, with the notable exception of Qatar, had viewed the Arab uprisings as catastrophic for regional stability and feared the Muslim Brotherhood would use its domination of Egypt to push a radical, Islamist agenda in their own backyard.

Qatar, however, saw support for the Muslim Brotherhood as a means to project its influence in the Middle East, and gave Egypt $7 billion in aid during the movement’s year in power. “I suspect the Qataris will draw back somewhat,” said Robert Jordan, a former US ambassador to Riyadh. “Their infatuation with the Muslim Brotherhood has probably been dampened. They’re likely to come around to a position closer to the Saudis.”

Continued on Page 14

BruisedEgyptian Islamists protest CAIRO: Islamist supporters of Egypt’s ousted president, Mohamed Morsi, protested in Cairo yesterday after a week of violence in which more than 90 people were killed in a bitterly divided nation.

More than a week after the army toppled Egypt’s first elected leader after a wave of demonstrations against him, Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood is trying to mobilize popular support for his reinstatement, which for now looks like a lost cause.

At a Cairo mosque where Morsi supporters have held vigil for more than two weeks, crowds swelled as people were bussed in from the provinces, where the Brotherhood has strongholds. The streets of Cairo were otherwise quiet yesterday, the weekly Muslim day of prayer, in the holy month of Ramadan. The youth-led Tamarud group, which brought millions of people to the streets to demand Morsi resign, has called for a Ramadan celebration in Tahrir Square, the cradle of the uprising that overthrew President Hosni Mubarak in 2011.Officials say Morsi is still being held at the Republican Guard compound in Cairo, where troops killed 53 Islamist protesters on Monday in violence that intensified anger his allies already felt at the military’s decision to oust him. Four members of the security forces were also killed in that confrontation, which the military blames on “terrorists”. Morsi’s supporters call it a massacre and say those who died were praying peacefully when troops opened fire.

Many of Egypt’s 84 million people have been shocked by the shootings, graphic images of which have appeared on state and private news channels and social media. The incident occurred just three days after 35 people were killed in clashes between pro- and anti-Morsi demonstrators across the country. “It’s a very hard time for Egyptians, to see footage of blood and violence during the holy month of Ramadan, and everyone I speak to says the same thing,” said Fateh Ali, a 54-year-old civil servant in Cairo.

The Brotherhood contends it is the victim of a military crackdown, evoking memories of its suppression under Mubarak. But many of its opponents blame Islamists for the violence, and some have little sympathy for the demonstrators who died, underlining how deep the fissures in Egyptian society are. The unrest has also raised fear over security in the lawless Sinai peninsula bordering Israel and the Palestinian Gaza Strip.

Continued on Page 14

JERUSALEM: Palestinian worshipers pray outside the Dome of the Rock at the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound in Jerusalem during the first Friday prayers of the Muslim holy fasting month of Ramadan yesterday. —AFP

Many casualties in French derailment

BRETIGNY-SUR-ORGE: A picture shows a derailed wagon on the site of a train accident in the railway station of Bretigny-sur-Orge yesterday near Paris. — AFP BRETIGNY-SUR-ORGE: At least seven people were dead and dozens injured yesterday after a speeding train split in two and derailed at a station in the southern suburbs of Paris, officials said. Interior Minister Manuel Valls gave the initial toll of seven dead and said there also were “dozens of injured” following the accident at the Bretigny-sur-Orge station involving a train heading from Paris to the west-central city of Limoges.

“At this stage there are seven people dead, several dozen wounded and some of them are serious,” Valls said.

The minister said that information on the number of dead and wounded was “constantly evolving” and that several train carriages were lying on their sides.

The Paris prefect’s office said a “red alert” plan had been activated at 5:23 pm following the accident. “The train arrived at the station at high speed. It split in two for an unknown reason. Part of the train continued to roll while the other was left on its side on the platform,” a police source said.

Continued on Page 14

local SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Fasting made simple for Diabetics during Ramadan Balanced diet, constant monitoring KUWAIT: Although strictly advised against fasting during Ramadan excess sugar level in the blood or hyperglycaemia, if not controlled by doctors, majority of Diabetic patients continue fasting during the can lead to organ damage.

Novartis is distributing patient education booklets and glucomeholy month, exposing themselves to high rate of acute complications like hypoglycaemia and dehydration. To help these patients Novartis ters through health clinics to raise awareness on the safety measures. has issued safety measures which will create awareness on the pre- The education booklet has been developed in consultation with medcautionary steps, balanced diet and constant monitoring of blood ical professionals. Here are some of Safety measures from the booklet: • Consult your doctor a few weeks before Ramadan to come up sugar level. “Fasting has very high chances of adversely affecting diabetic patients because long hours without food and drink can signifi- with an individualized management plan • Monitor your blood glucose level frequently, multiple times a cantly reduce the blood sugar levels leading to complications like unconsciousness, seizures, brain damage and very rarely death. day. If the glucose levels are noticed to be very low, break the fast Through a balanced diet plan and strict monitoring of blood suger immediately • It is very important to maintain constant body weight throughlevel these complications can be avoided,” says Dr. Rayaz A Malik, Professor of Medicine and Consultant Physician speaking at a recently out Ramadan and that can take place only through a balanced diet.

Tips for a balanced diet: held seminar on Diabetes and the fasting population in Ramadan.

1. Eat more vegetables and fruits; “The increased risk of hypoglycemia choose colored variety, non-starchy vegcaused by fasting can be severe and even life threatening for patients with type 2 More than 50 million Muslim etables such as spinach, carrots, broccoli or green kidney beans your meals. diabetes. Hence it is absolutely important 2. Choose the whole grain foods for patients to follow individualized man- patients with type 2 diabetes are agement plan in consultation with their estimated to fast during the instead of processed grains; choose the doctors.” Says Dr Monira Al-Arouj, month of Ramadan, putting them wheat macaroni or the brown rice instead of white rice.

Consultant Diabetologist and Assistant 3. Use the liquid oils in cooking Director of the Dasman Diabetes Institute. at increased risk of hypoglycemia During fasting, the circulating glucose 1,2. Patients are advised to instead of solid fats. Solid fats are high saturated. Remember that fats are high levels in the blood tend to fall due to decreased insulin secretion. For diabetic undergo medical assessment calories.

4. Choose the beef slices; to reduce patients, insulin secretion is severely before they begin fasting. the fat ratio you eat, remove the fat skin affected by the disease and prolonged of chicken or turkey. hours of fasting can lead to hypogly5. Choose products of non-fat milk such as non-fat milk, non-fat caemia, and dehydration. More than 50 million Muslim patients with type 2 diabetes fast during Ramadan every year, abstaining from yogurt, non-fat cheese.

6. Drink water or diet drinks free from calories, have a little normal food, water and the use of oral medications between dawn and sunset. Fasting can have important health consequences for type 2 dia- soda and fruit juices, sweetened tea and other drinks sweetened with betes patients, including up to a seven-fold increased risk of hypo- sugar.

7. In your meals, eat the dried kidney beans and lentil. Kidney glycemia (low blood sugar levels) that can result in difficulty in concentrating, coma, seizures and even death2, 3. During Ramadan, dia- beans and lentil contain high ratio of protein and low ratios of fats.

8. Stay away from snacks and high calorie sweets. Eat a little of betic patients are also exposed to different food options without knowledge of level of calories or sugar content. Due to prolonged food containing high fats and sweets such as chips, biscuit, cake and hours of fasting there is a tendency to overeat which can lead to ice cream.

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Ramadan Kareem

God’s Mercy to Mankind

By Hassan T. Bwambale

G

od is the Lord and the Cherisher of all the creatures. His mercy may imply pity, forbearance, (to purify or shape or forgive you), and forgiveness, etc. But there is a Mercy that goes before even the need arises, the Grace which is ever watchful, and flows from God - the most Gracious - to His creatures, protecting them from evil and calamities; preserving them, guiding them in the right path, and leading them to clearer light and higher life.

If our creator and cherisher is kind and merciful to us and guarantees forgiveness if we repent sincerely, why shouldn’t we be kind to our kith and kin and brothers in humanity. If we put this concept into consideration, then we will be able to eliminate all the present woes, wars, sufferings, hostilities, among others. Muslims tend to be kinder in Ramadan than other months. It is time they take the lessons from Ramadan and implement them even after the month of Ramadan. In Ramadan by depriving the body, we actually enrich the soul. That makes us better human beings and improves the way we deal with others. It is because of God’s infinite mercy that He is a friend of the friendliness and the help of the helpless. He hears and responds to all sincere prayers, and grants to us whatever is best for us even when we tend to be stubborn and obstinate; not as we see and fathom it according to our limited knowledge. In this world He grants protection and sustenance even to those who do not believe in Him. Revenge in Islam: Since the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) is our role model, it is conducive to quote some of the incidents in which he had the right to revenge but declined, seeking the infinite mercy of God Almighty.

During the battle of Uhud, the second decisive battle in Islam, Hind, the wife of Abu Sufyan, then amongst the staunchest enemies of Islam, hired a slave called Wahshi, to kill Hamza, Prophet Muhammad’s paternal uncle. Wahshi was famous for his shooting skills with his bow and arrows. After killing Hamza ranks of pagan warriors came and mutilated his corpse. Saddened and grieved by that barbaric act, Prophet Mohammed pledged to kill and mutilate 70 of the pagans in retaliation. God revealed the following verse: “... and if you catch them out, revenge no worse that they caught you out; but if you show patience, that is indeed the best (course) for those who are patient.” (16: 126) Those who have reached the highest spiritual standard do not take revenge, but rather seek common terms with those who wronged them. We must be careful of our own and other people’s lives. We must commit no violence. Our violence to our own brethren is particularly preposterous, seeing that God has loved and showered His mercies on all His creatures and us.

Even in the case of great crimes, if there is true repentance as tested by a changed life in conduct, God’s mercy is available, and it will transform the repentant’s nature from evil to good. (25:63-70) God’s mercy is in and for all things. All nature observes a common purpose, which is for the good of all creatures. Our faculties and understanding are all instances of His grace and mercy. Each unit or factor among His creatures benefits from the others and receives them as God’s mercy to them. His mercy is universal and all pervasive for those who believe in Him and also for those who don’t as He gives them a chance to believe in Him and thus repent before they die.

Question: Why did Allah send messengers? a. To guide mankind to the right path ( ) b. To fight against the devil ( ) c. To assert themselves as supernatural creatures (

)

Courtesy TIES Center, a leading non-political NGO promoting relations between Westerners and Muslims through dialogue, friendship and cultural exchange. For more information. www.tiescenter.net Please fill in the answer of today’s question on the coupon printed below.

JULY 13, 2013

LOCAL

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Major role for mass media in Kuwait election process Mediator between candidates, voters KUWAIT: Journalists and media men are exerting great efforts in preparation for the forthcoming parliamentary elections due on July 27, capitalizing on all available tools to cover the race. Since registration for candidacy began on June 27, the election watchdog has witnessed a remarkable media presence involving relevant arrangements, candidates and campaigns. Several journalists working with local newspapers stressed the significance of general elections as a professional experiment that would enrich their field experience.

Omar Al-Rashed, a journalist with Aljareeda daily, said all media representatives work actively in the election season, believing that social networking sites cannot wipe out the role of journalists, especially experienced ones.

The election season always has a quiet beginning, but it becomes very competitive by the end of the electoral process, Al-Rashed said.Abdulnaser AlAslami, a journalist with Alsiyasa daily, opined that there is nothing new for the election atmosphere, but there could be something different this time due to the holy month of Ramadan. Boshra Shaban, an editor with Al-Anbaa, said mass media play a main role in the electoral process, especially following the recent adoption of the election law which bans street pictures and signs.

Mass media act as a mediator between candidates and voters; being used by the former to promote their views and planks, she said. Mohamed Abdulhafeeth of Alnahar said mass media constitute a significant source of steering, guidance and education in societies. Journalists are required to do their jobs in line with international criteria and norms of professionalism, objectivity and neutrality, he added. Slogans of candidates running for the July 27 parliamentary polls differ from previous elections as they are of low-intensity in terms of political atmosphere in Kuwait coupled with a legally-approved voting system and how voters were digesting these mottoes. Slogan is an “artistic” style used by every candidate to influence the largest amount of voters as simple as possible, with emphasis on linking these slogans with everyday’s life. Some see the slogans used by candidates complimentary to campaigns while others consider them very important because they were linked to principles of democracy and competitiveness. Specialists in mass communications, sociology and political sciences said variation of slogans used by candidates are closely linked with political and electoral system, and how the voters were politically aware of the social surroundings accompanying the campaigning. This variation is also linked to candidates and their kills - culturally, socially and even financially - to persuade the voters to vote for them.

Mohammad Al-Baloushi, Mass Communications Professor at Kuwait University (KU), said slogans of candidates “are irrelevant to the demands and aspirations of voters because they are related to reality, and they are indeed different between past and present electoral campaigns.

“There supposed to be a link between the slogans and aspirations of candidates, but in reality there are many mottoes that don’t reflect the belief of the candidate but mere inaccurate hypotheses,” Al-Baloushi told KUNA. He said candidates were experiencing what he described as “media weakness” because of high weather temperature, the fact that elections would be held in Muslims’ fasting month of Ramadhan and that voters were politically aware of the current circumstances. Al-Baloushi said some candidates were careless to the mottoes because they were confident they have solid amount of voters thus believe slogans would not be crucial in their campaigns.

The constitutional court had last month annulled the parliament that was elected last December, and upheld the one-person, one-vote system.

The government then called for legislative elections on July 27.

Dr. Khudhor Al-Baroun, a teacher of Psychology at KU, said slogans during Ramadhan might be more objective, rational and calm.

Voters have adjusted themselves to the new voting system, noted AlBaroun, and Ramadhan would contribute to easing political tension and encourage candidates to call for national unity and the country’s stability.

Voters lean towards candidates who criticize negative aspects in the country, he said. However, some slogans “fail to influence voters because they depend on narrowly-minded individual interest.”

The fact that elections would be held in Ramadhan, noted Al-Baroun, mean the campaigning would focus on “good manners, forgiveness and fair competition. Political Sciences professor at KU Hamed Al-Abdullah said slogans in these elections would have low-intensity tone compared with previous elections because many people accepted the one-person, one-vote system “which was reflected in the campaigning of candidates.”

Speaking to KUNA, Al-Abdullah said candidates become aware now that voters “are in dire need of the voice of the mind in order to achieve their program on the ground.”

Voters, he added, “need a method that speaks to their mind in order to end the state of desperation they are feeling and thus head to polling stations on election day.” Al-Abdullah said voters were eager to know programs and slogans of new candidates, who needed new and attractive mottoes.

Some slogans are linked to reality while others are wrongly used to benefit from problems of voters, he said.

Yusuf Ghuloom, a professor of Sociology at KU, said that mottoes mirrored the political conditions in the country and how to address them.

Slogans of all candidates are “all excellent but the important thing is implementing them to benefit the society and the country ... thus the importance of electing the candidate who is capable of solving our problems and developing our society,” he said. — KUNA

Kuwait weather to reach 50 degrees C next week KUWAIT: The temperature in Kuwait mid next week is expected to reach around 50 degrees Celsius in most areas, head of the Kuwait Meteorological Center Mohammad Karam said over the weekend. Karam highlighted the regions of the “northern desert, northwestern, and residential areas” as the most likely to be affected by these sizzling

temperatures. As for the weekend, he said that extremely high temperatures will prevail. The extreme heat will lead to the fragmentation of desert soils, thus, coupled with northwestern wind activity, will increase the likelihood of a sandstorm today and tomorrow, particularly across desert and open areas. — KUNA

local SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

No intention to ban smart phone apps KUWAIT: The Kuwaiti government has no plans to ban or block any smart phone social networking applications, Minister of Communications and State Minister for Housing Affairs Salem Al-Utheina said Thursday. In statements on the sidelines of a meeting with senior ministry officials, Al-Utheina reiterated the ministry’s decisiveness of the issue.

Meanwhile, Al-Utheina unveiled a plan to receive bids from companies for a tender involving the issuance of privately-owned boat licenses.

With regard to the problems facing the finances of the Kuwait Airways deal to purchase a number of new aircraft, the minister said that the issue would be secured in a matter of weeks.— KUNA

Money, guns flowing to Syria’s rebel factions BEIRUT: Syrian rebels are getting weapons and cash from Gulf countries, including Kuwait, and their benefactors in the oil-rich state are sending the aid to the most militant and anti-West factions involved in the fight to topple Bashar Al-Assad.

The role of Saudi and Qatari governments and individuals in the funding and arming of Islamist fighters in Syria has been well known since the civil war began more than two years ago. But now, guns and money are flowing from private sources and Salafist-controlled NGOs based in Kuwait, and they are going to rebel factions aligned with Al Qaeda.

“We are collecting money to buy all these weapons, so that our brothers will be victorious,” hard-core Sunni Islamist Sheikh Shafi’ Al-Ajami announced on Kuwaiti television last month, listing the black-market prices of weapons, including heat-seeking missiles, anti-aircraft guns and rocket-propelled grenades.

Days later, Al-Ajami addressed a small throng outside the Lebanese Embassy in Kuwait and gleefully described slitting the throat of a Shiite Muslim in Syria.

“We slaughtered him with knives,” Al-Ajami said to shouts of “God is Great.” “We are collecting money to buy all these weapons, so that our brothers will be victorious.”

US and Western officials want aid flowing into Syria to be targeted to less extreme rebel groups. One concern is that hundreds of European fighters who have joined the most militant groups, which have links to Al Qaeda and other jihadist factions, will one day return home from Syria and carry out terrorist acts against the West. Among the groups receiving money from Kuwait is the Syrian Islamic Front, an alliance of eight jihadist groups, which while ready to conduct joint operations with Western-backed rebels, has refused to join the Free Syrian Army. SIF leader Hassan Aboud Abu Abdullah al-Hamawi has admitted publicly the alliance has received funding from the al-Ajami network of donors.

Al-Ajami, a member of the Kuwaiti parliament, isn’t alone in the Gulf country banging the drum for jihad and raising money for Syrian rebels and jihadists. The Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which started this week, is high season for fundraising and analysts expect that with Sunni-Shiite tensions now at their height across the Middle East-a result of what has become a sectarian conflict in Syria-Kuwait’s Sunni Muslims will rally to antiShiite Islamist appeals for donations.

Former members of the Kuwaiti parliament Falah Al Sawagh and Waleed Al Tabtabie also are highly visible fundraisers and frequent travelers to rebel-held areas in Syria, Turkey and Jordan to hand over cash to their favored groups, say analysts.

Although neither has adopted the fiery rhetoric of Al-Ajami, Al-Sawagh admitted recently that he places no constraints on how the recipients spend donations he gives and the funding can go to jihad. “They have absolute freedom to spend this money. If they can recruit mujahedeen for defending themselves and their sanctity with this money, then this is their choice,” he told the wire agency. The fundraising is open and, according to Norman Benotman, the president of the Quillam Foundation, a Londonbased think tank that monitors terrorism funding, Kuwait’s government doesn’t dare intervene.

“If they tried to launch a police or security crackdown there’d be a backlash,” Benotman said. “The tribes themselves organize the activity. Every day there’s fundraising; it is not an undercover or secretive pursuit. It is part of the social life of Kuwait now. The government would have to go after mosques, tribes, elders and Sheikhs. It would not be good for the Kuwaiti government. It is the last thing they need.”— Reuters

Duo in police custody for attempt to sell firearm Cash, jewellery stolen KUWAIT: Taima detectives arrested a citizen and a bedoon for offering to sell a firearm through the internet. A security source said that detectives learned about a person offering to sell a firearm through the internet. The seller was lured by detectives and was arrested with the firearm. He said that he volunteered to sell the weapon for his bedoon friend. The bedoon was arrested and he said he accidently found the weapon and does not know anything about it.

Abu Halifa theft A female citizen told Abu Halifa police that an unknown person broke into her bedroom and stole KD 700 and jewellery worth KD 2500. Investigations are under way.

Cigarette theft A Jordanian expat was detained by Salwa police as he attempted to steal five boxes of cigarettes from a famous store in the area. A security source said cameras detected the suspect hiding the boxes in his clothes, so security called police who found the cigarette on him. The source said the man was charged with attempted theft.

Currencies stolen Detectives in Adan are searching for

a thief who broke into a retired citizen’s car and stole a “basket of several currencies” worth KD 1,300. A security source said the citizen discovered the theft while his car was parked in front of his house, as the suspect stole KD 500, $500, SR 6000 and UAE dirhams 2000.

Detectives are investigating.

Woman harassed A man who harassed a woman, was not satisfied by damaging her car, but also made obscene gestures towards her. The Kuwaiti woman who was driving in Surra area was harassed by the man, but she did not pay any attention to him, so he hit her car on the back side and drove off while making an obsene gesture. The woman was able to note his car’s registration number and filed a complaint at nearby police station.

Detectives are investigating.

Physical assault A man physically assaulted a woman who refused to oblige to his sex request. A case was filed against him for harassing a woman and another one for physical assault. The woman was driving her car in Daeya when she was surprised by the man who was following her. He then forced her to stop. The woman shouted at him for his bad behavior, and she called police. The

man then beat her and escaped. Daeya police are investigating.

Driver held Policemen arrested a man who was driving aimlessly, and found him wanted to serve a two-year jail sentence. The policemen noticed the man changing lanes without any reason, so he was stopped and arrested.

Love duo held Policemen arrested an Egyptian woman and her compatriot as they were in a compromising situation. The two claimed they were engaged and about to get married. Meanwhile, a security source said pedestrians noticed the man and his girlfriend heavily engaged, so they called police who came and arrested the 31-year-old man and his companion. Investigations are under way.

Adan stabbing Detectives in Mubarak Al-Kabeer governorate arrested a young citizen for stabbing another in Adan area during a fight. A security source said the fight broke out between two young men and one stabbed the other with a screw driver before escaping on foot. Detectives arrested the man after a short while, and investigations are on going.

Argentina FM holds farewell event for Kuwait envoy KUWAIT: The Argentinian Foreign Ministry held a farewell ceremony at San Martin Palace in Buenos Aires for Kuwait Ambassador to Argentina Saud Abdulaziz Shamlan Al-Roumi, who completed six years in office.

The event gathered dozens of Argentinian senior officials including Deputy Foreign Minister Eduardo Zuain, Assistant Foreign Minister for International Affairs Maria del Carmen Squeff and Director of the Ministry’s North Africa and Middle East Department Hernan Bloret as well as heads of foreign diplomatic missions to the Latin American country, according to an embassy statement received here Thursday.

Addressing the gathering, Zuain appreciated Al-Roumi’s dedication and hard work for strengthening the friendly relations between the State of Kuwait and the Argentine Republic.

He granted Al-Roumi the Order of the Liberator General San Martin in recognition of his remarkable efforts to cementing bilateral ties and cooperation between the two countries in all fields in recent years.

The Argentinean official recalled that the official visit to Argentina in 2010 by His Highness the then Kuwaiti Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Al-Mohamed Al-Ahmad AlSabah and a large business delegation gave a strong momentum to these bilateral ties.

In return, Argentinean President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner visited Kuwait in 2011 and signed a range of

agreements on cooperation in the political, economic, commercial, technical, technological, scientific, cultural, health, environment and investment fields, he added.

On his part, Al-Roumi expressed gratitude to the Argentinean government and the Foreign Ministry for facilitating his mission and the Order of the Liberator

General San Martin, the highest decoration in Argentina.

He added that he had once had the honor of serving as dean of the Arab diplomatic corps in Argentina, a position that had given him the opportunity to cement ties between Argentina and the Arab world at large.—KUNA

LOCAL SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Expats fish at Muttrah Corniche, Muscat, Oman, Friday.

Asian expat laborers enjoy their Friday holiday at Ruwi Roundabout, Muscat on Friday, July 5, 2013. Oman has about 1,000,000 expats, mostly from India, Pakistan, the Philippines and Sri Lanka.

Expat life in Oman more casual, happier Citizenship, own plots, temples

By Sunil Cherian KUWAIT: Indian expat stories share the same scent whether they happen in Kuwait or Oman. But in Oman one might see more of an expat life brimming than in Kuwait - the whole of Muscat is a transfigured form of Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh. Omani expat life is more casual and should one say happier?

These are the 10 unforgettable scenes in Muscat 1. An Omani woman saying no when asked to pose for a photograph by an unknown Indian who says he’s a journalist.

2. Omani citizens enjoying south Indian delicacies at ‘continental’ restaurants.

3. Omani men washing their cars; walking on a downtown road under the July sun; fishing, farming and fruit-selling.

4. Omani women in colorful abayas at Qurum City Center, a shopping mall in Muscat.

5. Baloch people, Gujarati, Zanzibaris and even Keralites who have Omani citizenship.

6. Pakistanis who make the best of the Omani halwa. The tall, shalwar kameez-clad men also wait under a tree for their daily labor to be called by somebody.

7. Indian and Bangladeshi men who are seen fishing at Muttrah Corniche on Fridays using bread crumbs as baits.

8. Omani men who speak good friendly English and are gentle to give directions (but politely refusing to pose for photographs); shirtless boys near Shangri-La Barr Al-Jissah Resort & Spa asking for cigarettes or lighters or both.

9. Rocky mountains with amazing shapes on the scary road to Yiti; naturally decorated bus-waiting sheds on Madinat As Sultan Qaboos Road.

10. Gujaratis offering cow milk at Muttrah Shiv temple; devotees walking on bare feet on the temple premises.

The latest among the expat news in Oman is of press freedom. Oman public prosecution dismissed early this week a case of defamation against Keralite journalist Shinoj Shamsudheen who reported in Gulf Madhyamam daily 7 months ago about 4 Indian laborers deserted on the road after they were beaten up by their sponsor. A case of defamation was filed against the reporter but Oman public prosecution discharged the allegations upholding media responsibility and human rights.

Expats bargaining with taxi drivers - a job reserved only for Omanis - is a common sight in Muscat and elsewhere. An Indian MBA holder sitting at the administrative manager’s chair and an Omani at a standing position because he is designated as a helper was also common, people say. “Up until

recently Omanis, Indians and the whites drew the same salary if their designations were the same. But now things are changing”, Saji Varghese, senior manager at Bahwan Properties told me last weekend. Many Omanis, Saji said, are also of the opinion that better salaries and stable jobs should be reserved for the citizens.

Maryam Altaei, an Omani woman stands out. An architect graduate on the lookout for a job, she is also a volunteer at iCare, a charity organization which is now busy in distributing drinking water to the workforce. “I’m trying to spend my time creatively”, said Maryam when I met her at Borders bookstore at Qurum City Center, Muscat. “No I’m not for skyscrapers”, she said when asked about the ‘poetry she wants to make in stones’. “I’m for creative designs within the limits the government prescribes”, Maryam said. (The ministry of town planning instructs limited storied and light colored buildings).

At least some expats feel that Omanis would turn against Indians after the tenure of the present sultan Sultan Qaboos bin Said. “The sultan had studied in India and he is favoring Indians which many citizens do not appreciate”, an expat said.

He quoted an incident some time ago where a branch of an Indian hypermarket chain was burned and looted in an uprising. “That’s not necessarily true”, another expat said when I clarified the favor story with him. “Some Indians from a strong

Maryam Altaei, an Omani woman

business community are behind bars now after they were caught changing the expiry dates of chocolates they sold. If the sultan was in favor of them we would have still munched the expired chocolates”, he said.

Joy C Raphael, an author of 2 books in English said food poisoning from restaurants is a common story. “I cook my own food because I don’t have a high opinion of the restaurants in the area where I’m staying”, Joy said. An investigative journalist, Joy is critical of the Keralite diaspora, the largest in Oman.

“Expats are not a strong force in this country. Many expats get more than they deserve. If they apply for the same job in India, they’ll be shown the door. Keralites are at each other’s throats.

For example, there are two Indian social clubs with a Malayalam wing and a Kerala wing. One owes allegiance to the Congress and the other to the Communists-Marxists”, Joy said.

Xavier Jacob Kavalam, managing editor and publisher at Re-Discover Kerala, a magazine in Malayalam and who runs Skyline Travels is happy with what Oman has been giving him and his family. “I’m indebted to Oman where I spent my good number of years and gained enormous experiences”, said Xavier who has the credit of publishing the first biography of HM Sultan Qaboos in Malayalam, in 2010 titled ‘Oman’s Own Golden Star’.

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Saudi princess freed on $5 million bail

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Indonesia inmates flee after jailbreak; 5 dead

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Suicides hit all-time high in Singapore

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TOUCHENG: Massive waves from the winds of approaching Typhoon Soulik break on the harbor in Toucheng, Taiwan yesterday. Taiwan is closing schools and deploying soldiers to help with evacuations as Typhoon Soulik threatens to bring strong winds and heavy rains to the island. — AP (See Page 11)

‘Dead’ man wins election in Mexico Prosecutors investigate whether Morales faked own death OAXACA: A man who was allegedly certified as dead almost three years ago has won a race for mayor in the southern state of Oaxaca. Leninguer Raymundo Carballido Morales won the election in

Lenin Carballido

the small town of San Agustin Amatengo by just 11 votes last Sunday as the candidate of a coalition of conservative and leftist parties. But now prosecutors are investigating whether Carballido Morales faked his own death in 2010 in order to escape arrest in connection with the gang rape of a woman in 2004.

A living and breathing Carballido Morales actually campaigned in the election, appearing in public events and giving interviews to reporters.

But two days before the vote, the local daily Tiempo de Oaxaca reported that the candidate’s lawyer had delivered a forged death certificate to authorities in 2010. The document, which was certified by a doctor, declared that Carballido Morales had died of “natural causes” following a diabetic coma, the newspaper said. Iliana Araceli Hernandez, a state prosecutor for crimes against women, said her office launched an investigation in the wake of the report “to determine if a crime was committed.”

Oaxaca’s civil registry director, Aide Reyes, acknowledged that a public servant signed the document and that her office opened an investigation.

The state head of the leftist Democratic Revolution Party (PRD), Rey Morales Sanchez, whose party was part of the candidate’s coalition said that if

the mayor-elect committed a crime, “he will have to be replaced” by his substitute. Carbadillo Morales proved once again he’s alive and well on the eve of the election, writing on his Facebook page that he

had gone to the prosecutor’s office “to ask for information related to the incidents linked to me, which are totally false.” “The proof,” he added, “is that there’s not even a formal complaint.” — AFP

Death toll from wave of Iraq violence rises to 51 BAGHDAD: The toll from a wave of attacks in Iraq mainly targeting security forces and Shiites rose yesterday to 51 killed, 26 of them police and soldiers, security officials and doctors said.

Thursday’s attacks came amid a surge in violence that has killed more than 2,500 people already this year, including upwards of 250 so far this month.

Analysts point to widespread discontent among Iraq’s minority Sunni community, and the Shiite authorities’ failure to address their grievances, as the main factors driving the increase in violence. In Thursday’s single deadliest incident, gunmen shot dead 11 police charged with protecting the country’s vital oil infrastructure and

three soldiers on the road between Haditha and Baiji, northwest of the Iraqi capital.

In another attack, a car bomb ripped through a funeral tent where family members of a Shiite man were receiving condolences in Muqdadiyah, northeast of Baghdad, and a suicide bomber detonated explosives when emergency personnel arrived. The blasts killed a total of 10 people and wounded 22. And a car bomb near a Shiite religious hall close to Dujail, north of Baghdad, killed nine people and wounded 21 more. Many people gather at places of worship at night during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which began earlier this week. —AFP

INTERNATIONAL SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Saudi princess freed on $5 million bail SANTA ANA: A Saudi princess charged with human trafficking was freed after posting $5 million bail, but authorities imposed strict travel requirements and GPS tracking to keep her in Southern California. Meshael Alayban, 42, who prosecutors said is one of the six wives of Saudi Prince Abdulrahman bin Nasser bin Abdulaziz Al Saud, was released Thursday after posting the hefty bail amount a day after her arrest.

Earlier in the day she had appeared in court wearing a dark blue jail jumpsuit to answer to one felony charge of human trafficking. She did not enter a plea. Her arraignment was postponed to July 29. Alayban was arrested after a Kenyan woman who worked for her as a maid alleged she was held against her will and forced to work. The maid led police to a condominium where Alayban’s family was staying, authorities said. Orange County District Attorney

Tony Rackauckas said after court Thursday that the woman was subjected to “forced labor,” and likened Alayban to a slave owner.

“It’s been 150 years since the Emancipation Proclamation, and slavery has been unlawful in the United States, and certainly in California, all this time, and it’s disappointing to see it in use here,” said Rackauckas, who had requested that Alayban’s bail be set at $20 million. Defense attorney Paul Meyer declined comment on the case but previously said it was just a dispute over domestic work hours. Alayban is forbidden to have contact with the alleged victim, cannot leave Orange County without permission from the court, and had to turn over her passport.

The Kenyan woman said her passport was taken from her when she left her country to work for Alayban, hoping to make enough money to cover her ailing

7-year-old daughter’s medical bills. The 30-year-old woman, whose name has not been released, alleges she was forced to work long hours and was paid only a fraction of what she was promised. Authorities said it wasn’t until she traveled with the Saudi family on their vacation to the United States that she was able to escape, flag down a bus, and call police, authorities said.

When police searched the condo, they found four other workers, from the Philippines. The women left voluntarily with officers and told them they were interested in being free, police said. No charges have been filed related to those women and police said there were no signs any of the workers had been physically abused.

The women’s passports had been held with the victim’s documents in a safe deposit box, Rackauckas said. The case is the first labor trafficking case

Hunt for Indonesia inmates after mass jailbreak, 5 dead 100 inmates, including militants flee MEDAN: Indonesian police yesterday hunted for around 100 inmates, including militants, who escaped from an overcrowded jail after setting the prison ablaze in riots that left five dead.

The inmates began rampaging through the jail in Medan city on Sumatra island on Thursday afternoon, setting fires and hurling bottles at guards in anger over power cuts and water shortages at the facility. The Tanjung Gusta jail was engulfed in towering flames and scores of firefighters battled through the night to douse them. Some 150 prisoners initially escaped and police and soldiers were on Friday still desperately hunting for around 100 after recapturing several dozen overnight.

Prisoners are often held in grim, overcrowded jails in Indonesia, and Tanjung Gusta is no exception as it currently holds well over double its official capacity of 1,054. The prisoners were still in control of the jail early Friday, casually chatting outside their cells while heavily armed security forces formed a cordon round the building, an AFP reporter at the scene said. They allowed in about two dozen soldiers but did not let police enter, the reporter said. “We don’t like police, they are inhumane, they frequently beat us,” one of the prisoners shouted, as another waved a charred gun and handcuffs at officers.

Heru Prakoso, North Sumatra province police spokesman, said that prisoners and a government official would hold talks later in the day in a bid to break the standoff. “Seven inmates will represent the prisoners and will negotiate later today with a senior official of the justice and human rights ministry,” he said. Five people-three prisoners and two prison staff-had been killed in the riots, he added. The two prison staff died trapped in their burning office, said Denny Indrayana, coordinating deputy minister for politics, legal and security. “They were collating prisoner data on remission, which was to be given on Independence Day, August 17,” he said.

About 1,000 police and soldiers were deployed to guard the facility and undertake a massive hunt around the area on Friday to try and find prisoners still on the loose. They included six people convicted of terrorism, said Prakoso. The prison had been holding a total of 11 terror convicts, he said. Some were jailed for their involvement in militant training at a camp in Aceh province where, police say, militants were planning Mumbai-style gun attacks on high-profile Indonesians.

The others were connected with a bank robbery to fund terror activities and the killings of police officers, police said.

Prakoso added that 55 escapees had so far been arrested after an all-night hunt in the area, including three convicted of terrorism. Ten civilian guards were briefly held hostage during the riots on Thursday but were released late in the evening, Prakoso said. The prison had been guarded by civilians and not police, he added. A spokesman for the justice and human rights ministry, Goncang Raharjo, told AFP that Tanjung Gusta

prosecuted in Orange County since voters approved a law last year to stiffen the penalties for the crime. If convicted, Alayban faces a maximum sentence of 12 years, which is double the sentence she could have received a year ago, Rackauckas said.

The Saudi royal family is extensive, with thousands of princes and princesses, including some who have run into trouble with the law. In 2002, Saudi princess Buniah Al-Saud, who was accused of pushing her maid down a flight of stairs, entered a no-contest plea in Florida and was fined $1,000. In 1995, another Saudi princess, Maha Al-Sudairi, allegedly beat a servant in front of sheriff’s deputies providing off-duty security.

No charges were ever filed. “These people have lots of money; they think they’re above the law,” said Ali AlAhmed, director of the Washington-based Institute for Gulf Affairs. — AP

News

in brief

World’s largest building opens in western China BEIJING: Move aside Dubai. China now has what is billed as the world’s largest building - a vast, wavy rectangular box of glass and steel that will house shops, offices and a faux ocean beach with a huge LED screen for video sunsets. The mammoth New Century Global Center that opened last month in the city of Chengdu has 1.7 million square meters (19 million square feet) of floor space, edging out the previous record-holder, the Dubai airport. The New Century project is a sign that China’s growth has spread from the country’s more prosperous eastern and southern regions to the west. Backed by local governments, the building will have offices, hotels, shops and the ocean park - all under one roof.

Japan heatwave kills 12 TOKYO: A severe heatwave that hit Japan a week ago has claimed at least a dozen lives, reports said yesterday. The mercury has topped 35 degrees Celsius in areas right across the country for several days, with no immediate end to the misery in sight, forecasters say. Thousands of people have been taken to hospital suffering from heatstroke or exhaustion, with at least 12 of them dying, Jiji Press and other media reported. Most of those affected are over 65, but there have also been groups of schoolchildren who were participating in school activities outside. One recent death was that of a 90-year-old man whose body was discovered by his son inside an apartment. The air conditioner was turned off, Jiji said. Yesterday, the day’s highest temperature was 38.3 degrees Celsius in Kawanehon town in Shizuoka prefecture. More than 40 other spots recorded highs of 35 degrees or more, Japan’s meteorological agency said.

MEDAN: Inmates look from inside a burnt down cell at Tanjung Gusta prison following a prison riot in Medan, North Sumatra, Indonesia yesterday. — AP was overcrowded. “The prison capacity is only 1,054 but it now holds about 2,600 convicts and suspects on trials,” he said. “Most prisons across the country have this problem.” The coordinating minister for politics, legal and security Djoko Suyanto said the riots were a call to action on the nationwide problem of overcrowded prisons. “We will (first) distribute prisoners at Tanjung Gusta to other nearby prisons,” he said. In February last year, dozens of inmates at the overcrowded Kerobokan prison on the resort island of Bali rioted and set parts of the facility on fire, sending outnumbered guards running. The riots ended days later when heavily armed police stormed the prison. — AFP

Italy police arrest 38 in mafia crackdown ROME: A major police operation in Italy yesterday led to the arrest of 38 people, including almost every member of a southern town council, for alleged mafia connections.

Police swooped on addresses across southern Italy as part of the latest crackdown on corruption in local authorities.

Among those held by police were several council members in the town of Scalea, including the mayor. Pasquale Basile, head of the town of 11,000 residents since 2010, is suspected of being an intermediary between two rival mafia clans and handing out contracts to mafia firms. Five out of six of the town’s councillors were also arrested, and the head of the local traffic police is being investigated for “criminal association”. There were also arrests in the cities of Bari, Matera, Salerno and Terni as part of the same inquiry, which targeted the network of the Valente-Summo clan of the ‘Ndrangheta mafia based in the Calabria region.

INTERNATIONAL SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

UK kicks off controversial talks on outsourcing weapons buying Around 20 companies linked to the deal LONDON: Britain has kicked off controversial talks to put its 159 billion pound ($238 billion) military equipment buying program in the hands of a private company, as it battles to clamp down on cost overruns and delays, industry sources said. About 20 firms have expressed an interest in a contract to run the Defense Equipment and Support (DE&S) unit, which accounted for almost half of the Ministry of Defense’s (MoD) 34.4 billion pound budget last year.

The government will now choose firms for formal discussions. Should it go ahead, Britain will be the first country to outsource its negotiations with weapons supplies such as BAE Systems and Finmeccanica, according to defense consultancy IHS Jane’s. Britain expects to spend 159 billion pounds on military equipment between 2012 and 2022.

Firms in the running for the contract include defense and engineering companies Bechtel, CH2M Hill and Balfour Beatty , as well as business consultants

PricewaterhouseCoopers and Deloitte, three sources said. US-listed Fluor, URS, KBR, and SAIC are also vying for the deal, two of the sources said.

Some of the British companies in the running include WS Atkins, Capita, PA Consulting, QinetiQ and Serco, the three sources added. The firms will now decide whether to form alliances, with some of the US groups expected to team up with British ones. In June, Defense Secretary Philip Hammond laid out the so-called government-owned, contractor-operated (GOCO) plan. “It’s a huge step for MoD outsourcing and has the potential to significantly change the procurement market for defense materiel in the UK,” one source close to the bid process said. The MoD declined to comment on the process.

CONCERNS The government intends to cut the list of bids down later this year, one source said,

and in 2014 will compare the best proposal with an alternative option known as ‘DE&S plus’, which it has not provided details on but has described as an “improvement of the status quo.” Britain is aiming to complete a reform within the next 18 months, Bernard Gray, the chief of defense materiel who spearheaded the GOCO idea, told political magazine Civil Service World this month.

While the defense industry has voiced support for the government’s move to reform the way it buys equipment, there are concerns over potential conflicts of interest as some bidders already hold contracts with both the DE&S and its top suppliers. There is also uncertainty over how the government and eventual winner will ensure commercial confidentiality.

“There could be circumstances where, certainly with the UK entities and occasionally some of the American ones, we might find that elsewhere in the world we’re competing against, or they’re in our supply chain, or

S Sudan gunmen battle rivals in war-torn Jonglei JUBA: Columns of heavily armed South Sudanese gunmen in a tribal militia are fighting their way towards a rival community in the eastern Jonglei state, a local official said yesterday. Lou Nuer and Dinka gunmen from northern Jonglei are reported to be marching south towards Pibor, an area of their rivals, the Murle. “We are worried that a lot of people will die, especially women and children,” said Pibor County Commissioner Joshua Konyi, speaking to AFP via a crackling satellite phone from the town.

He said civilians further out in the swampy bush were reporting that Murle civilians were fleeing ahead of rampaging gangs of Lou Nuer gunmen armed with semi-automatic rifles, machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades. “I’m worried because the Lou Nuer youth are there in huge numbers,” he said, adding that some reports estimated the militia force to number several thousand. The latest round of fierce fighting broke out a week ago in Pibor county in conflictwracked Jonglei, as government troops try clamp down on a rebellion as well as warring ethnic militia.

The United Nations peacekeeping mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) is “deeply concerned about reports of a major mobilization of armed youth (and) reported clashes,” it said in a statement late Thursday. The latest clashes follows bitter fighting in May, when soldiers and other gunmen looted UN and aid agency stores in Pibor, including a key hospital.

US State Department officials said Thursday they were “deeply disturbed by mounting reports of abuse of civilians, including targeted killings, rape, beatings, and the looting and destruction of homes and humanitarian facilities.”

PIBOR: Victims of ethnic violence in Jonglei, state, South Sudan, wait in line at the World Food Program distribution center in Pibor to receive emergency food rations. — AP South Sudan’s rebel-turned-official army has also been fighting in the region to crush a rebellion since April 2011 led

by David Yau Yau, who comes from the Murle people. Government officials in Lou Nuer areas in northern Jonglei denied young men had set off to fight, but past clashes have followed a similar pattern. In December 2011, some 8,000 Lou Nuer marched south killing and looting in what they said were reprisals for earlier attacks and cattle raids by Murle fighters.

The UN later estimated over 600 people were massacred, although local officials reported the figure to have been far higher. Rights groups accuse all sides of abusing and raping civilians. UN peacekeepers are based in Pibor and “are patrolling in the town”, but are not deployed in frontline areas, Konyi said.

UNMISS admitted they were “not in an immediate position” to confirm details about the clashes. Low level aerial patrols are limited after soldiers in December shot down a UN helicopter, claiming they thought it was from former civil war foes in Sudan, who Juba regularly accuse of arming rebels as a proxy force.

Ground patrols have also been scaled back after five UN peacekeepers and seven UN civilian workers were killed in an ambush in April near Pibor. Jonglei was one of the areas hardest hit in Sudan’s 1983-2005 north-south civil war, which ended in a peace deal that paved the way for the South’s full independence.

But the new nation is awash with guns, while communities that were once pitted against each other during Khartoum’s rule remain rivals. — AFP

they’re alliancing with us,” said one senior defense industry source. “Now if we’re going to share information with a commercial entity, we want to make sure that’s absolutely firewalled and any unauthorized disclosure is remediated at law.” QinetiQ, for instance, provides services to the MoD as well as technology and equipment to other defense contractors such as Lockheed Martin.

Atkins, whose overall work with DE&S is worth less than 1 percent of DE&S’ total annual spend, holds numerous defense equipment contracts with the MoD including for software testing for the Lynx Wildcat helicopter. Lawmakers will debate the issues at the second reading of the Defense Reform Bill in the House of Commons on Tuesday.

Alison Seabeck, who looks after defense equipment and procurement policy for the main opposition Labour Party, told Reuters she was “very open minded” about the proposals, but echoed industry concerns around intellectual property. — Reuters

Portuguese president Silva throws politics into disarray LISBON: Portugal’s president threw the bailed-out euro zone country into disarray on Thursday after rejecting a plan to heal a government rift, igniting what critics called a “time bomb” by calling for early elections next year. President Anibal Cavaco Silva proposed a cross-party agreement between the ruling coalition and opposition Socialists to guarantee wide support for austerity measures needed for Portugal to exit its bailout next year, followed by elections.

The surprise move came just when conservative Prime Minister Paolo Passos Coelho thought he had overcome a cabinet crisis by reaching a deal to keep his centre-right coalition together. The decision was a warning shot to all mainstream parties indicating the conservative president does not think any of them is capable of ruling effectively until the EUIMF bailout is due to expire in June 2014. “We are in a situation which demands that the political parties leave their comfort zone,” said Marina Costa Lobo, a political scientist at the University of Lisbon.

It was hard to predict how political leaders would cope with the president’s challenge until they held internal party meetings and consultations with the president, which started on Thursday. Cavaco Silva was Portugal’s longest-serving elected prime minister from 1985 to 1995 for the ruling centre-right Social Democrats and is seen by analysts as valuing political stability above all else. He has often said he does not want to use “the atomic bomb,” referring to snap elections.

Under Portugal’s constitution, the president has the power to dissolve parliament and call elections.

Cavaco Silva’s move drew sharp criticism in a country that has descended into its worst economic slump since the 1970s under the weight of austerity imposed by the bailout.

Portuguese markets fell in reaction to the president’s move.

Stocks declined 1.7 percent and 10-year bond yields climbed eight basis points to 6.97 percent. “The president of the republic decided to overcome the political stalemate between the parties in the ruling coalition by adding another problem to the one that already existed,” wrote daily Publico in an editorial. “He decided to take power.”

Such accusations are not made lightly in the country that had western Europe’s longest dictatorship under Antonio Salazar. The centre-left opposition Socialists, who lead opinion polls, face the toughest dilemma as they were in power when the country sought a bailout in 2011 and have demanded elections now. —Reuters

INTERNATIONAL SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

11 hostages in Philippine Muslim clan feud ZAMBOANGA, Philippines: Armed Muslim clans in the strife-torn southern Philippines are holding 11 people, including several children captive, as part of a decades-long feud, the military said yesterday.

The tit-for-tat kidnappings are part of a battle for land between two clans that began 30 years ago on Basilan, a small, remote island dominated by Islamic militants and separatist rebels, said Colonel Rodrigo Gregorio.

The feud has previously led to exchanges of gunfire and claimed about 20 lives from both sides, according to Gregorio, the regional military spokesman.

“Hopefully, there won’t be any violence. The two sides are still talking,” he said.

The latest hostilities began on Tuesday when three daughters of clan leader “Commander Hassan” were abducted by a rival family on Basilan, said Gregorio.

Hassan’s armed followers retaliated by abducting 12 members of the rival clan, including seven children on Thursday.

Gregorio said the local government and military were negotiating with both sides and had successfully obtained the release of four children.

The ages of the kidnapped children ranged from five months to 15 years, the military said. But it was not clear which of them were released.

They are still trying to get the two rivals to release the rest of the captives while preventing any new outbreak of fighting, Gregorio added.

Commander Hassan is a member of the Moro National Liberation Front, a former Muslim separatist rebel group, but the feud does not involve his organisation, the military said.

Muslim clans in the southern Philippines are well known for waging prolonged feuds, typically over land, political power or influence. They often use armed followers to attack each other.

Such feuds in the southern Philippines, which the country’s Muslim minority regard as their homeland, claimed more than 5,500 lives and displaced thousands between the 1930s to 2005, according to a study by the Asia Foundation. During such feuds, the government including the military, typically tries to negotiate for peace between rival sides rather than move to apprehend the contending parties. —AFP

Hundreds evacuated as typhoon nears Taiwan ‘Extreme torrential rain’ TAIPEI: Hundreds of villagers were evacuated and schools and businesses shut down in Taiwan yesterday as it prepared for the arrival of Typhoon Soulik, expected to pound the island with powerful winds and heavy rain over the weekend. Offices and schools closed in Taipei and eight other cities with residents advised to stay indoors as the typhoon churns towards the island. Packing winds of up to 209 km, Soulik is expected to make landfall on the north-east coast around 3am Saturday, the Central Weather Bureau said.

The bureau downgraded Soulik from a super typhoon to a moderate typhoon but warned residents across the island to prepare for “extreme torrential rain”-classified as 350mm (13 inches) within 24 hours-and rough seas.

More than 600 residents were evacuated from six low-lying aboriginal riverside villages outside the capital city on Friday morning. “I saw TV reporting that the typhoon may bring in up to one metre of rainfall. That would be terrible and reminded me of the painful memories last year,” Ginghong Izan, a male migrant from the Amei aboriginal tribe said, speaking outside his home in Hsichou village.

“My TV, computer, refrigerator and fur-

niture were all were flooded when (Typhoon) Saola hit in August. It cost me around Tw$200,000 ($6,670),” the 52-yearold said, adding that he started moving valuables to higher parts of his house two days ago. Saola left six dead, two missing and 16 wounded in Taiwan after taking 23 lives in the Philippines.

Others in the village were busy packing up their personal belongings to take with them and were reinforcing the roofs of the wooden homes they had to leave behind.

In Wuchieh, a township in the northeastern Yilan county-which is forecast to bear the brunt of Soulik-over 2,000 sandbags were snatched up by residents and two amphibious military vehicles deployed for rescue.

Waves as high as 1.5 metres were hitting the shore in Yilan on Friday afternoon as coastguards patrolled the beach to warn visitors to stay away while hundreds of fishing boats sought shelter.

“Many farmers have harvested rice, fruits and vegetables early as the typhoon is expected to impact our area,” said Huang Hai-tao, an official in Jiaosi, a popular tourist destination in Yilan.

“The typhoon has also caused some damage to tourism as more than 90 per-

cent bookings for this weekend have been cancelled.”

A coastal highway in Yilan where 20 Chinese tourists were killed by landslides caused by Typhoon Megi in 2010 was also closed.

More than 2,000 tourists had already been evacuated from the remote Green Island, south east of Taiwan, on Thursday.

In the capital Taipei, schools and businesses closed and in Songshan district one neighbourhood politician toured the streets in his car warning people over a loudspeaker to leave work and go home by 2pm local time.

Local television reported traffic gridlock in the capital as people left work early, desperate to get home.

The storm has disrupted travel to and from Taiwan with 65 flights cancelled according to the transport authorities.

President Ma Ying-jeou urged government units and the public “not to let their guards down” in a statement Friday, after inspecting the central government’s disaster response centre.

Measuring 280 kilometres across, Soulik was 360 kilometres east-southeast of Yilan at 0600 GMT, according to the weather bureau.— AFP

Cambodian rebel leader pardoned ahead of vote PHNOM PENH: Cambodia’s opposition leader in exile won a royal pardon yesterday, vowing to return to help his party fight strongman premier Hun Sen who is seeking to extend his nearly three decade grip on power.

Sam Rainsy, who lives in France, had faced 11 years in jail after he was convicted in absentia for charges that he contends were politically motivated, including publishing a false map of the border with Vietnam.

“All of his convictions are clear now. He is a free man, he is welcome back home and he can come back anytime,” cabinet spokesman Phay Siphan said.

Rainsy, who wrote to King Sihamoni in June requesting a pardon, told AFP on Friday that he would return “in the next few days” to campaign for his party, the Cambodia National Rescue Party (CNRP).

“It is a small victory for democracy that the leader of the opposition be allowed to be in the country during election campaigning and on election day,” he said by telephone from France. But “much more remains to be done,” he added.

The pardon was requested by Prime Minister Hun Sen “in the spirit of reconciliation”, a government official said on condition of anonymity, adding that Rainsy had “no right” to run as a candidate in the July 28 polls.

In his letter to the king requesting the pardon, Hun Sen said a pardon would allow elections “to be conducted according to democratic principles”.

Hun Sen, who has ruled Cambodia for 28 years, is widely expected to win a majority in the polls.

In May he said he would try to stay in power for another decade, until he is 74. He has previously vowed to hold office until he reaches 90.—AFP

BINZHOU: This picture taken on July 11, 2013 shows residents walking on a flooded street in Binzhou, east China’s Shandong province. Torrential rain and landslide in China have left more than 200 people dead or missing, with the country raising flood emergency response level as it embraces for an approaching typhoon, state media and the government said. — AFP

200 dead or missing in China rain, landslides BEIJING: Torrential rain and landslides in China have left more than 200 people dead or missing in recent days, state media and the government said as the country braced yesterday for an approaching typhoon.

Landslides and floods in Sichuan province in the southwest had killed 31 people by Thursday, according to data from the ministry of civil affairs, with

166 more missing. More than two million people had been affected in the region, it added.

Another 13 people had died, with four missing, since Sunday in Yan’an in the northwest, where local authorities warned of a high risk of flooding and landslides, the state-run Xinhua news agency said. Official figures also showed deaths in several other parts of the

country, from the central provinces of Henan and Hubei to the northern region of Ningxia. The government raised the flood alert status on the Yangtze river, warning of potential downpours and windstorms in the waterway’s middle and lower reaches Saturday as Typhoon Soulik moves towards the Chinese coast, reported news portal people.com.cn. —AFP

INTERNATIONAL SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Suicides hit all-time high in Singapore SINGAPORE: Suicides in Singapore hit an all-time high of 487 in 2012 as more young people bogged down by stress and relationship woes took their own lives, a charity group dealing with the problem said yesterday.

The tally, a 29 percent increase from the 2011 total, was boosted by an 80 percent rise in the 20-29 age bracket, the Samaritans of Singapore (SOS) said in a statement.

“Common problems presented by this group of people involved stressful life events, and interpersonal relationship issues,” said SOS, which aims to prevent suicides by providing emotional support through private counselling and a 24-hour telephone hotline.

“These include unemployment, stress with studies or work, financial worries, family life, and struggles with social interactions and feelings of loneliness.”

Christine Wong, executive director of SOS, said young people under stress “tend to hide their pain behind a facade, not knowing where, how or who they can approach for help”.

“People around them may not be aware of their distress and are hence unable to provide the support needed,” she said in the statement.

Wong added that the community should play an important role in “de-stigmatising” suicide by encouraging those under stress to talk about their struggles and suicidal feelings.

SOS received 39,994 calls on its telephone hotline in 2012, down from 40,025 in 2011.

Suicides cases have consistently hovered around two percent of total deaths in Singapore, an affluent city-state of 5.3 million residents known for its pressure-laden school system.

Despite a virtually full employment rate, Singapore also has a highly competitive work environment.

Suicide is an offence in the compact island-state, and anyone who survives an attempt faces a jail term of up to a year, a fine or both.

The World Health Organisation last year said one million people commit suicide every year worldwide, accounting for more deaths than wars and murders put together.

The number of suicide attempts is five times higher, it said, with five percent of the people in the world having tried to kill themselves at least once during their lifetime. —- AFP

Accused of rape, China general’s son plays victim BEIJING: Lawyers of a well-known Chinese general’s son accused of taking part in a gang rape are waging a rare, Western-style war of words against his critics in a reflection of the growing perception that public opinion counts.

The airing of accusations surrounding the high-profile criminal case via the Chinese Internet has been all the more unusual because the teenage defendant is a member of one of China’s wealthy and privileged families, who usually prefer to bury salacious scandals - if they can.

Li Tianyi, 17, the photogenic, baby-faced son of Li Shuangjiang, 72, a military singer who holds the rank of general, has become the newest target of popular anger over abuses of power by the country’s elite. “At the moment, public opinion is not on Li Tianyi and his family’s side,” said Zhan Jiang, a journalism professor at Beijing Foreign Studies University. “China’s public mood is this way when some wealthy or powerful people are involved and the opposing side is a weaker victim,” he said.

“It’s a protest against Chinese society’s lack of fairness,” Zhan added. Since news of his detention in the gang rape of a woman at a Beijing hotel emerged in February, pictures of him and his family have been splashed across Chinese media and websites. The case surfaced after the alleged victim told police that some men she had been drinking with at a bar took her to a hotel and took turns raping her.

This week, just days after state media reported that Li and four others have been charged with rape, Li’s attorney Chen Shu said in an interview with the official Legal Daily newspaper that his client would plead not guilty, a report that incited a storm of renewed criticism.

The lawyers also circulated a statement online pointing blame at the unnamed Beijing bar for allowing underage teenagers to consume alcohol. “This case happened after a minor and others who were in a bar late at night were persuaded by adult bartenders to drink large quantities of alcohol, and then checked into a hotel,” the statement said.—- AP

SEOUL: South Korean vehicles carrying their finished goods and materials arrive from South Korea and North Korea’s joint Kaesong Industrial Complex at the customs, immigration and quarantine office near the border village of Panmunjom, that has separated the two Koreas since the Korean War, in Paju, north of Seoul, yesterday.

North Korea on Thursday withdrew offers for talks with South Korea on reunions of separated families and resuming tours to a mountain resort, Seoul said. —AP

S Korea court orders US firms to pay up over Agent Orange SEOUL: South Korea’s highest court yesterday upheld a ruling ordering two US Agent Orange makers to compensate 39 Vietnam War veterans in one of the country’s most prominent lawsuits.

The Supreme Court recognised the epidemiological correlation between the toxic defoliant and skin diseases for the first time, saying the 39 victims should receive a total of 466 million won ($415,000) from Dow Chemical and Monsanto.

The veterans had complained that Agent Orange was responsible for their severe skin diseases.

Payment is now up to the US firms, but Dow Chemical said in a statement quoted

by Yonhap news agency that it disagrees with the Supreme Court’s decision as the verdict was not backed by clear evidence, citing US court rulings.

The South Korean court also reversed an appeals court verdict that the two firms should compensate thousands of other veterans who claimed to have similarly suffered from exposure to defoliants used during the Vietnam War. More than 16,000 veterans filed separate lawsuits in 1999 against the US firms, seeking about five trillion won ($4.4 billion) in damages, but a district court ruled against them. In 2006, an appeals court ordered the US firms to pay a total of 63 billion won ($61 million) in compensation to 6,795 veterans and their families.

But the Supreme Court, in its ruling on Friday, sent the case back to the appeals court for review. “There is no evidence their diseases were caused by their exposure to the defoliant sprayed during the Vietnam War,” it said in a statement.

South Korea sent some 300,000 troops to fight alongside the United States and southern Vietnamese forces during the war. US forces widely sprayed Agent Orange, which contained the lethal chemical dioxin, in Vietnam during the conflict to deprive enemy guerrillas of forest cover and destroy food crops.

Veterans in South Korea estimate the number of Korean victims of the chemicals at about 150,000. Many insisted they were suffering from various ailments associated with exposure to the powerful herbicide.

Vietnam says millions of its people have died or suffered from direct or second-generation disabilities as a result of the use of Agent Orange.

Washington has never accepted responsibility for the Vietnamese government’s claim. —AFP

Militants seek weeks-long halt to Thai violence Biggest test for peace talks KUALA LUMPUR: Muslim separatist negotiators will attempt to halt all violence in insurgency-plagued southern Thai provinces throughout the Islamic fasting month, a Malaysian official said yesterday.

The pledge by the National Revolution Front is the biggest test so far of whether peace talks that began this year with the Thai government might yield substantive results. More than 5,000 people have been killed in Buddhist-dominated Thailand’s southernmost, Muslim-majority provinces since an Islamic insurgency erupted in 2004.

Rebel officials will try to curb all armed attacks and bombings through Aug. 18 as part of “a common understanding to work toward achieving a violence-free Ramadan,” the Muslim holy month of fasting that began this week, said Ahmad Zamzamin Hashim, a Malaysian government representative facilitating the negotiations.

Ahmad Zamzamin said he was “optimistic” that the rebel representatives

involved in the talks can eliminate violence, despite concerns that the insurgency appears to be highly decentralized, with local units free to choose targets and campaigns.

If violence abates in the weeks ahead, “it is proof that we can say to the whole world: There is light at the end of the tunnel,” Ahmad Zamzamin told reporters in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s main city. “It is a steppingstone to whatever we want to achieve in the future.”

Thai authorities, meanwhile, “will refrain from any aggressive actions with regard to the security problems caused by the southern unrest,” said a statement issued by Ahmad Zamzamin’s office.

Even though the pledges were not part of a signed or legally binding document, “any party that breaches, disrupts or sabotages this understanding will be considered a non-peace-loving side,” Ahmad Zamzamin said.

Attacks have occurred almost daily in recent years, with the militants mainly tar-

geting security forces and teachers, who are perceived as representatives of the government of predominantly Buddhist Thailand.

Thai National Security Council Secretary-General Paradorn Pattanathabutr told reporters in Bangkok that if an attack occurs, both sides must help to verify the origin of the problem through a coordinating team.

“I believe the incidents will decrease from last year because (the National Revolution Front) has strongly confirmed that they can communicate to the operation-level members to tone down the attacks,” Paradorn said.

As a result of the peace talks, Thai authorities have agreed to reduce their raids in southern provinces, removed military operations personnel in some villages and replaced them with police officers and security volunteers to lighten the mood in the areas, Paradorn said. He insisted, however, that all safety measures remain tightened for civilians. —AP

INTERNATIONAL SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Swat girls throng to school as Malala addresses UN Global icon of child rights

AMRITSAR: Indian Muslim devotees pray during the second day of Ramadan at the Kharudin Mosque in Amritsar yesterday. Islam’s holy month of Ramadan is calculated on the sighting of the new moon and Muslims all over the world are supposed to fast from dawn to dusk during the month.— AFP

India’s telegram service goes dark after 163 years NEW DELHI: For 163 years, lives across the vast Indian nation have been upended by the knock of the khaki-clad postal worker armed with a telegram.

Families used them to announce births and deaths, the government used them to post job openings, young lovers sent them to tell their folks that they had eloped. No longer.

On Monday, the state-run telecommunications company will send its final telegram, closing down a service that fast became a relic in an age of email, reliable landlines and ubiquitous cellphones.

The fact that the telegram survived this long is a testament to how deeply woven it is into the fabric of Indian society. In much of the rest of the world, telegrams long ago were relegated to novelty services used by people who wanted to indulge in a bit of nostalgia.

Just 30 years ago the telegram was king in India. But the service has lost $250 million in just the last seven years as national cellphone subscriptions hit 867 million in April, more than double the number of just four years ago.

“Most people who come in now are those who want to send a telegram for an official reason,” said Lata Harit, a telegraph officer at Delhi’s historic Kashmere Gate Telegraph Office. “It’s no longer about a birth in the family or a death.

For that people rely on their telephones or cellphones.”

The nearly empty telegraph office was a far cry, she said, from the days when long lines of customers crowded in the British-colonial style building close to the teeming heart of old Delhi to send a telegram. From 10,000 telegrams a day, the office now sends about 100.

The government still uses telegrams to inform recipients of top civilian awards and for court notices. India’s armed forces recognize telegrams from troops extending their vacation or from soldiers’ families demanding their presence at home for a funeral. Lawyers still send telegrams to create an official record, for example, to prove to a judge that they had complained their client was subjected to police abuse.

When Harit joined the service more than three decades ago, she underwent six months of training at a school for telegraph operators. Telegrams were sent using the complex dots and dashes of Morse code that had to be decoded at their destination. “It required enormous concentration to decipher, but some of us were so good at our work, and so fast, that at the end of a day, we would feel exhilarated,” she said. “It made us feel proud.”

Other operators felt they were important messengers for crucial news. Baljit Singh, who became a telegraph operator in 1972 and will retire in a few months, recalled the frenetic rush following the 1984 assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and the days of political turmoil and street violence that followed.

“People came in droves to send telegrams. We worked round the clock. I don’t think we went home for days,” he recalled. Over the years, Morse code gave way to telex machines and teleprinters, and finally electronic printers and computers.—AP

MINGORA, Pakistan: When the Pakistani Taliban shot Malala Yousafzai in the head, their message to the world was simple: girls have no right to an education and their dreams of a better future should be crushed. The attack portrayed the world’s only Muslim nuclear power in an appalling light as Western leaders and celebrities fell over themselves to turn Malala into a global icon of child rights.

But as she gears up to address the UN General Assembly later yesterday — her 16th birthday-more girls than ever in Malala’s home, Pakistan’s northwestern Swat valley, are in school.

In the first six months of 2013, 102,374 girls registered at primary schools in Swatcompared to a total of 96,540 during all of last year, said Dilshad Bibi, Swat district education officer.

Educationalists say the influx has less to do with Malala’s fame and more to do with a growing confidence that far from being resurgent, Taliban influence is declining in Swat. “Many people think that Malala has nothing to do with the increase in girl students in schools,” said Erfaan Hussein Babak, head teacher of a private school in the town of Saidu Sharif.

“It is because of a general awareness among the masses that girls should also be educated,” he told AFP. “There are many other girls who worked for education and continued their studies under the Taliban. They think that Malala was wrongly promoted by the media and was falsely hyped,” he said.

Anwar Sultana, headmistress of Government Girls High School No. 1, the oldest in Mingora, the main town in Swat, agrees. “Many students were actually scared when the government named a college after Malala,” she said.

Last December, around 150 girls at another school protested against the renaming of their college after the injured schoolgirl, fearing it would make them a target for militants.

They tore up and stoned pictures of

Malala, since nominated for the Nobel Peace prize and now being privately educated in Britain, accusing her of abandoning Pakistan.

Sultana says more girls are going to school now not because of Malala, but because people feel increasingly liberated as more time passes since the Pakistan army quashed a 2007-9 Taliban insurgency in the valley.

“Whenever you suppress something, it

Saeeda Rahim, 13, is one of those girls.

The Taliban stopped her and thousands of other girls from going to school between 2007 and 2009. When the army offensive came in 2009, she and her family were forced to flee for their safety.

Displaced for three months, she spent much of the time in tears, her dreams of getting an education and becoming a doctor in tatters.

“Those days were the most difficult of

Malala Yousafzai appears with more freedom,” Sultana told AFP, sitting on a verandah as girls in long white shirts and baggy trousers poured out of congested classrooms.

“Now more and more girls are joining schools, which means the fear is over,” Sultana said. At Sultana’s school, there are no desks and chairs in the dark brown, grey and orange coloured classrooms.

Instead the girls sit on the floor to pack a maximum number into each room.

my life. I lost hope and courage. I had no energy to read. I thought I’d never be able to study again,” she said.

When her family returned home, her mother initially refused to let her go back to school, fearing that she could be attacked. Now, she is back at Government High School No 1. She covers her face with a white veil, wears the pink strip of a prefect-and says she takes inspiration from Malala.—AFP

Myanmar jails Buddhists over religious violence YANGON: Myanmar has sentenced more than 20 Buddhists to prison for their roles in religious riots in March, including a deadly attack on a Muslim boarding school, lawyers and police said Friday.

The convictions follow earlier concerns among rights groups that Muslims were bearing the brunt of the legal crackdown on suspects involved in the unrest which shook the central town of Meiktila.

The Buddhists were sentenced on Wednesday and Thursday on charges including murder, assault, theft, arson and inciting unrest, said a police official who did not want to be named.

According to state media, which did not specify the suspects’ religion, the sentences ranged from two years for minor offences such as theft to 10 years for murder, with some defendants handed several terms to be served separately.

Some of the charges related to the deaths of students at an Islamic school on the outskirts of Meiktila, according to Ba San, a lawyer who was at the court.

“We have to say that both Buddhists and Muslims have been sentenced if found guilty,” he told AFP. More than a dozen Muslims have been convicted in relation to the violence, with a number receiving life imprisonment for murder.

In May seven Muslims were sentenced to between two and 28 years for their parts in the killing of a Buddhist monk during the unrest, which was apparently triggered by a quarrel in a Muslim-owned gold shop.

Before the latest convictions, only two Buddhists were known to have been sentenced for serious offences during the riots, which drove thousands of Muslims from their homes.

Officially 44 people were killed in the

two days of bloodshed in Meiktila, although some fear the toll was much higher.

According to eyewitnesses interviewed by the rights group Physicians for Human Rights, a Buddhist mob hunted down and killed some 20 students and four teachers at the Islamic school.

Witnesses recounted seeing one pupil being decapitated and several being burned alive, according to a May report by the US-based group.

Attacks against Muslims-who make up an estimated four percent of Myanmar’s population-have exposed deep fractures in the Buddhist-majority nation and cast a shadow over its emergence from army rule.

Buddhist-Muslim clashes in the western state of Rakhine last year left about 200 people dead, mostly Rohingya Muslims who are denied citizenship by Myanmar.— AFP

INTERNATIONAL

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Bruised Egyptian...

Continued from Page 1 Militant groups in North Sinai have promised more attacks and urged Islamists to take up arms, while the army has vowed to step up operations in the region, which is near the Suez Canal, the busy waterway linking Asia and Europe. One Egyptian policeman was killed and another wounded early yesterday when militants fired rocket-propelled grenades at checkpoints in the Sinai town of El Arish. Egyptian state media said police arrested three Palestinian militants for attempted attacks in Sinai.

VIGIL, SONGS FOR THE DEAD Outside the Rabaa Adawiya mosque in northeastern Cairo, thousands of Brotherhood supporters gathered late on Thursday to mourn the dead in Monday’s violence, the deadliest since Mubarak was toppled, apart from a 2012 soccer stadium riot. Women wailed and men cried as they watched a large screen showing grim footage of hospital scenes immediately after the shooting, with corpses on the floor and medics struggling to cope with the number of bloodied casualties being carried in.

Hundreds of Egyptian flags fluttered. Songs of defiance were sung. Thousands of Islamists have camped out in searing heat, fasting in the daytime since Ramadan began on Wednesday. “This is a bloody military coup,” said Saad AlHusseini at the vigil. “This is the biggest crime I have witnessed in my country’s recent history. Never before has blood been so cheap.” The camp has become the de facto base of the Brotherhood, whose leaders live under the threat of detention after the public prosecutor ordered their arrests earlier in the week.

Judicial sources say Morsi is likely to be charged, possibly for corruption or links to violence. Prosecutors are also looking again at an old case from 2011 when Morsi and other Brotherhood leaders escaped from prison after being detained during anti-Mubarak protests. The detentions and threats of arrest have drawn concern from the United States, which has walked a semantic tightrope to avoid calling Morsi’s ouster a military coup.

US law bars aid to countries where a democratic government is removed in a coup. Washington, which gives Egypt’s military $1.3 billion in aid each year, has said it is too early to say whether Morsi’s removal by the army meets that description. The army has said it was enforcing the nation’s will meaning the huge crowds of people fed up with economic stagnation and suspicious of a Brotherhood power grab who took to the streets in late June to demand Morsi’s departure.

State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said on Wednesday Morsi’s government “wasn’t a democratic rule”.

Her words were warmly received by the interim government and swiftly denounced by the Brotherhood. On Thursday, Psaki expressed concern over the crackdown on Brotherhood leaders. “If politicized arrests and detentions continue, it is hard to see how Egypt will move beyond this crisis,” she said.

German’s foreign ministry demanded that Morsi be freed.

ALARM OVERSEAS Crucial to longer-term stability will be holding parliamentary and presidential elections, which the transitional authorities are hoping to achieve in a matter of months. Adli Mansour, the interim president named by the general who removed Morsi, has announced a temporary constitution, plans to amend it to satisfy parties’ demands and a fasterthan-expected schedule for parliamentary elections in about six months.

He has named liberal economist Hazem El-Beblawi as interim prime minister, and Beblawi said he had named leftist lawyer Ziad Bahaa El-Din as his deputy. Beblawi also said he would contact candidates for ministerial posts on Sunday and Monday, with a view to swearing in a cabinet next week.

Negotiations are difficult, with the authorities trying to attract support from groups that range from secularists to ultraorthodox Muslims, nearly all of whom expressed deep dissatisfaction with elements of the interim constitution.

Underlining the level of concern overseas at Egypt’s crisis, two US Navy ships patrolling in the Middle East moved closer to Egypt’s Red Sea coast in recent days, in what appeared to be a precautionary move following Morsi’s ouster on July 3.

The United States often sends Navy vessels close to countries in turmoil in case it needs to protect or evacuate US citizens or give humanitarian assistance. Rich Gulf states have thrown Egypt a $12 billion lifeline in financial aid, which should help it stave off economic collapse. More than two years of turmoil have scared away tourists and investors, shriveled hard currency reserves and threatened Cairo’s ability to import food and fuel. — Reuters

CAIRO: Supporters of Egypt’s ousted President Mohammed Morsi offer their Friday prayer in Nasr City, Cairo yesterday. — AP

Morsi’s fall disconcerts Qatar, comforts...

Continued from Page 1 Saudi Arabia in particular was alarmed by the popular unrest that toppled Egypt’s Hosni Mubarak and Tunisia’s Zein Al-Abidine Ben Ali, and rippled through Bahrain, Yemen and other countries.

But most Gulf rulers had fewer qualms about rebellions against Libya’s leader Muammar Gaddafi and Syria’s Bashar AlAssad, whose links with Shiite Iran and Lebanon’s Hezbollah movement had long antagonized US-backed Sunni Arab states.

Saudi Arabia and Qatar, which has challenged Riyadh’s traditional leadership in recent years, were broadly aligned on support for rebels in Syria and Libya, but they bitterly disagreed over their attitude to Islamist groups. Now that argument appears to be over - at least for now.

Doha insiders say it is too early to judge Qatar’s reaction to the crisis unfolding in Egypt, but they say the new emir may consider reducing his wealthy country’s support for the Muslim Brotherhood and playing a less prominent regional role. “They have admitted that there were some flaws in their Egypt strategy,” said a Doha-based source who has advised the Qatari government and who asked not to be named. “Their intervention was seen as overly reflexive support of the (Mursi) government without adequately taking into account the will of the people.

The way it was handled has caused them some problems, and they have acknowledged that,” he said. For Saudi Arabia, the Brotherhood’s fall was sweetened by the decisive intervention of an Egyptian military with ties to Gulf states that flourished under Mubarak. Army chief General Abdel Fatteh al-Sisi was once a military attache in Riyadh.

“He has long experience there and long ties to not only the Saudi military, but also the political leadership,” said Jordan.

Saudi Arabia and the UAE publicly insist they do not comment on other states’ inter-

nal affairs, but both rapidly broadcast congratulatory messages to Egypt’s new interim leader, tacitly signaling their hostility to the Muslim Brotherhood. “The problem with the Brotherhood is their ideology has no borders,” said Abdullah Al-Askar, chairman of the foreign affairs committee of Saudi Arabia’s Shoura Council, a body King Abdullah appointed to debate policy and advise the government. “They don’t believe in national identity, but they believe in the identity of the Islamic nation. They have their fingers in different states in the Gulf,” he said.

That concern was manifest in the trial in Abu Dhabi of 94 Emiratis accused of plotting to overthrow the government on behalf of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood. Their sentences were announced a day before the tanks rolled in Cairo last week. While Kuwait’s ruling family shares Saudi and UAE concerns about the Brotherhood, its stance is complicated by the presence of Islamists linked to the movement in its parliament. As a result it has been less vocal than other Gulf states in criticizing the Brotherhood after the Arab uprisings and has left fundraising for Syrian rebels largely to private citizens.

Like the Brotherhood, most Gulf states follow strict versions of Islam, but while the Islamist movement preaches political activism, Gulf clerics mostly espouse a doctrine of support for traditional rulers and oppose radical change. In Doha, the question now is how far the new emir, Sheikh Tamim bin Hamid al-Thani, might retreat from Qatar’s alliance of convenience with the Middle East’s sturdiest Islamist movement. Qatar’s support for the Brotherhood, including sheltering its sympathizers, arming its brigades in Syria and, some say, guiding the editorial policy of its Arabic-language Al Jazeera television station, has irritated Saudi Arabia and the UAE. “They (the Qataris) think soft power comes via the Brotherhood, via Al Jazeera

television but this is dangerous,” said the Saudi Shoura Council’s Askar, saying he was speaking for himself and not for the kingdom. He said the Qataris “use the Brotherhood for political reasons”, without belonging to the movement themselves.

There is no outward sign yet of Qatar changing its policy. Sheikh Youssef Al-Qaradawi, a prominent Doha-based Egyptian cleric and Brotherhood champion, has continued to lament last week’s army intervention in Cairo that was backed by popular protests.

And Al Jazeera’s coverage is still interpreted as pro-Morsi, prompting Egypt’s military to close its Cairo bureau, where some staff quit in protest at its perceived proBrotherhood line. “The Qataris are hedging their bets right now. They’re willing to engage with anyone who will come to the table. No one knows how this is going to play out. Right now, the best option for Qatar is to remain quiet,” said the Doha source.

It amounts to a weighty foreign policy challenge for the new emir, whose father stepped down unexpectedly this month.

“The abdication was miraculously welltimed. They changed the regime one week before Egypt hit the wall,” the Doha source said. “Now they have the opportunity to refashion the policy, and present the new emir as someone whose policies will be more aligned with the will of the Egyptian people.”

It is not clear how far the Brotherhood’s defeat in Egypt will energize Saudi Arabia and its Gulf allies in the region, although the election of a Saudi ally to head Syria’s opposition last week was seen as evidence of the shifting power balance. On Wednesday, UAE Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash wrote an opinion piece in Washington-based Foreign Policy magazine condemning political Islam and pledging support for Middle Eastern countries he described as moderate. — Reuters

Many casualties in French derailment Continued from Page 1 The cause of the accident was not immediately known “It was not a collision and it was not a problem with the speed,” a source with the SNCF national rail service said. The SNCF national rail authority says the train was carrying some 385 passengers when it derailed yesterday at 5:15 pm crashed into the station at Bretigny-sur-Orge, some 20 kilometers south of Paris. Passengers who spoke to French media from the scene said it was travelling unusually fast as it approached the station.

Bretigny Mayor Bernard Decaux told newspaper Le Parisien that there was chaos at the station. “Everyone is running in every direction, there is panic,” he said. “It is an apocalyptic scene. We are trying to organize things.” Dozens of emergency and police vehicles had arrived at the scene, an AFP reporter said. The accident occurred as many in France were departing for the start of their summer holidays. A local lawmaker Michel Pouzol said: “Most of the people who suffered minor injuries have been taken care of. We are going to have to empty the carriages completely to see if there are victims or not,” said. — Agencies

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Japan buys Abu Dhabi crude from Sumitomo for reserves

17

S&P confirms Germany’s top-notch credit rating

Business

Olympus share sale fails zoom-lens test

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Brazil workers protest for better conditions

19 20

MUMBAI: An Indian man stands in a field as factory chimneys from an industrial area loom in the background in Mumbai. India’s industrial output shrank by a shock 1.6 percent in May from a year ago, official data showed yesterday, adding to mounting gloom for Asia’s third-largest economy. — AFP

India industrial output shrinks 1.6% Car sales slide, industry seeks revival package NEW DELHI: India’s industrial output shrank by a shock 1.6 percent in May from a year ago, official data showed yesterday, adding to mounting gloom about Asia’s third-largest economy. The contraction by India’s factories, mines and utilities was well below market expectations of a 1.5-percent production rise.

Manufacturing, which accounts for threequarters of the Index of Industrial Production, slumped by 2.0 percent in May from a year earlier.

“These figures tell you very clearly industrial recovery is not yet in sight-this is definitely a surprise on the downside,” D.K. Joshi, chief economist of India’s leading credit rating agency Crisil, told AFP. The figures marked more grim reading for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s Congress-led government which is desperately hoping for signs of a growth turnaround before fighting general elections due in the first half of 2014.

In another blow, April’s industrial output growth was cut to 1.8 percent growth from 2.8 percent reported earlier, the Central Statistical Office said. But despite the weak production, the central bank is ill-placed to cut interest rates to kickstart the economy, which is under the threat of a credit ratings downgrade, economists said.

The rupee is hovering near lifetime lows against the dollar and separate data Friday showed retail price inflation climbing to 10.13 percent in June from 9.65 percent in May. “For any policymaker, it is a very challenging time.

You have urgent situations over the rupee, inflation and now manufacturing,” Joshi said.

“There is no magic wand except that the government must start implementing some of the economic reforms it has been promising,” he said.

India’s economy has been struggling under the burden of high interest rates,

strong consumer inflation and weak domestic and foreign investment, as well as a string of corruption scandals. The scandals have stalled the government’s reform agenda after a blitz of liberalization initiatives last year. While the central bank has cut rates three times since the start of the year following an aggressive hiking spree, borrowing costs remain high.

The government has forecast the economy will grow by at least six percent in the financial year that began April 1, after expanding by five percent last year-its slowest pace in a decade. But private economists have been reducing their forecasts in the past few months with most seeing growth in the fiveto-six percent range. In one piece of positive news from yesterday’s string of downbeat data, June’s trade deficit from the previous month as gold imports slid in response to government duty hikes to curb consumer appetite for the metal.

The merchandise trade deficit narrowed to $12.2 billion in June from $20.1 billion in May, easing market worries about India’s gaping current account deficit-the broadest measure of trade. Oil imports also fell to $12.7 billion from $15 billion in May. Oil and gold are the biggest contributors to the current account deficit. But despite a sharply weaker currency, June exports fell 4.6 percent to $23.79 billion.

Underscoring weak consumer demand, car sales slid nine percent in June from a year earlier, marking an unprecedented eighth straight month of decline, other figures showed, and prompting industry calls for a government package to revive the oncebooming sector. “This is certainly the worst period I have seen in a long time,” RC Bhargava, chairman of Japanese-controlled Maruti Suzuki, the country’s largest carmaker, said in an interview published yesterday.

BUSINESS SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

China economic growth drop BEIJING: China’s economic growth dropped to 7.5 percent in the second quarter of this year, analysts predicted in an AFP survey ahead of fresh data Monday, projecting a further slowdown in the world’s second-largest economy. The median figure from a poll of 10 economists is a further deceleration from the already slower 7.7 percent recorded in the first three months, as concerns mount over the Asian powerhouse. “One point for sure is that the second-quarter growth will definitely be lower than the first,” said Yao Wei, economist at Societe Generale in Hong Kong, citing weakness in manufacturing as a result of poor domestic and foreign demand.

“Generally if manufacturing growth declines, macro-economic growth will slow down as well,” she said. China has also been buffeted recently by worries over its financial system, which suffered instability last month when the interest rates banks charge each other surged to record highs, reflecting Beijing’s reluctance to loosen monetary policy. The country’s new leaders so far seem to have taken a more laissez-faire approach to the slowing economy, a development that in years past would have been met with monetary easing and large-scale pump-priming.

They have proclaimed a long-term goal of rebalancing the economy, and since coming to power as Communist Party chief in November and then state president in March, Xi Jinping has placed less emphasis on the traditional growth drivers of exports

Japan buys Abu Dhabi crude from Sumitomo for reserves TOKYO: State-owned Japan Oil, Gas and Metals National Corp (JOGMEC) yesterday bought 1.89 million barrels of Abu Dhabi Upper Zakum crude from trading house Sumitomo Corp via tender for the government’s Strategic Petroleum Reserves, industry sources said yesterday. The purchase, confirmed later by a Sumitomo spokesman, marked the government’s first crude purchase since 2010 and comes as the government seeks to replace reserves of heavier crudes with lighter crudes to reflect the growing share of light crudes in Japan’s recent imports.

The purchase is partly to offset about 3.8 million barrels of heavy sour Khafji crude that the government sold from strategic reserves stored at Shirashima in April. Khafji crude is produced from the shared Neutral Zone between Saudi Arabia and Kuwait. The sales are not related to any emergency release coordinated by the International Energy Agency.

JOGMEC had been seeking Middle Eastern medium crude, with shipments to be delivered to the offshore Shirashima oil storage base in Fukuoka prefecture, southwestern Japan, between Oct 1 and Nov 20.

Sumitomo likely sold the United Arab Emirates crude at around $1.40-$1.50 a barrel premium to its official selling price (OSP) on a cost, insurance and freight (CIF) basis, traders said. Japan is set for more purchases for strategic stockpiles, in small increments, though no schedule has been set as buying large quantities in one tender could risk an adverse impact to domestic crude refining, a government source said.

The government has sold a total 8.2 million barrels (1.3 million kl) of crude from strategic reserves since last year. The trade ministry in April sold 630,000 barrels of Indonesia’s light sweet Attaka crude, as a direct-burning crude for power generation is difficult for domestic refiners to process. Last year the government also sold about 1.9 million barrels each of Khafji crude and sour Iraqi Basra Light crude from its strategic reserves. — Reuters

and investment, and more on consumer spending. “The new policymakers have focused more on reforms rather than shortterm stimulus since taking office, so in the short run the downward risk is increasing,” said Ma Xiaoping, a Beijing-based economist at British bank HSBC. “Reform measures are beneficial in the medium-to-long term, but they may not provide some stimulus in the short term,” she said.

Late last month, Xi was quoted promi-

nently in state media as saying officials can no longer expect kudos just for achieving growth targets. “We should never judge a cadre simply by the growth of gross domestic product,” Xi told a party meeting, the official Xinhua news agency reported.

Premier Li Keqiang, whose brief is the economy, emphasised Tuesday in comments posted on the government’s website the importance of pursuing reforms but also spoke of the importance of stabilizing

BEIJING: Pedestrians walk through an overpass in Beijing. China’s economic growth dropped to 7.5 percent in the second quarter of this year, analysts predicted in an AFP survey ahead of fresh GDP figures Monday, projecting a further slowdown for the world’s second-largest economy. — AFP

growth. The remarks prompted a stock market rise on Thursday on hopes they could signal the introduction of some stimulus measures.

The government has set a growth target for 2013 of 7.5 percent, the same as last year’s. Such objectives are usually made conservatively and thus usually exceeded.

Comments by Chinese Finance Minister Lou Jiwei, however, raised questions about whether that figure can be achieved this time. “Our expected GDP growth rate this year is seven percent,” Lou told reporters on the sidelines of an annual strategic and economic dialogue between China and the United States in Washington on Thursday.

“Of course, it won’t be a big problem for us if we achieve growth of seven percent or 6.5 percent.”

China’s economy grew 7.7 percent in the first quarter, a result that disappointed economists who had expected a more vigorous 2013 after last year’s 7.8 percent performance, the worst annual result in 13 years. Nomura International economist Zhang Zhiwei said Li’s comments “may indicate that he is feeling under more pressure as the economic data continue to weaken”. “Next week will be a testing time for the government in revealing just how much of a growth slowdown it is willing to tolerate,” Nomura economists said earlier.

The securities firm said last month it sees a “30 percent probability” China’s economic growth will fall below 7.0 percent in the second half of the year. — AFP

Thrift trumps Abenomics as shoppers stick to bargains Retailers aim to bump up unit sales TOKYO: Japanese apparel firm Fast Retailing Co Ltd has a problem: sales are surging, fullyear net profits are expected to rise nearly 28 percent but the customers thronging the stores of its popular Uniqlo brand are far too frugal for its liking. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe would also disapprove. Abe’s aggressive economic stimulus measures, aimed at lifting Japan out of two decades of deflation, hinge on a pick-up in consumer spending, but eight months after its launch, “Abenomics” has yet to convince many Japanese to part with their thrifty ways.

“Customers are clever - they want the more expensive items but they hang on to see if they get discounted,” Fast Retailing Chief Financial Officer Ken Okazaki said. “Shoppers are buying at the cheaper end of our product lines, so spending per customer has fallen,” he said after the company maintained its sales and operating profit forecasts for the year, knocking its shares 6 percent lower yesterday.

Abe’s policies have boosted Japan’s benchmark Nikkei average by two-thirds since midNovember, cheering stock market investors who used their new-found wealth to splurge on luxury goods such as handbags from LVMH-owned Louis Vuitton and jewelry from Tiffany & Co. But wages have yet to show any real gains and overall consumer sentiment remains lacklustre. Consumer confidence weakened in June for the first time in six months, government data shows, and total cash earnings for Japanese employees were flat in May and April from a year earlier.

Even the monthly pocket money Japanese wives traditionally give their husbands has

fallen 3.3 percent from a year ago to 38,457 yen ($390), or just half of its 1990 peak, the latest survey by Shinsei Bank Ltd shows.

“They keep saying the economy is getting better but so far I haven’t seen it reflected at all in my day-to-day life,” said Ayano Sakuma, 33, a housewife who was shopping in central Tokyo with her son. “I’ve heard that things are supposed to be getting more expensive but as far as I can see goods are still cheap.”

FALSE POSITIVES Abenomics has boosted revenues for luxury department store operators such as Takashimaya and Co Ltd and J Front Retailing Co Ltd, but even they admit there is little evidence of a pick-up across the board. “Luxury brands, watches and jewelry have seen double-digit sales growth and have pulled up overall department store revenues,” Shigeru Kimoto, managing director of corporate planning at Takashimaya told an earnings briefing last month. “But we can’t see any strength in other parts of the consumer sector.” Like Fast Retailing, the latest earnings reports by Japan’s biggest retailers have been riddled with healthy figures that suggest stronger demand but which actually show weak consumer sentiment and entrenched deflation.

Supermarket operator Aeon Co Ltd and convenience store owner Seven and I Holdings Co Ltd reported record high net profits in the March-May quarter, but growth was largely due to strong sales of their own-label goods which are often cheaper than branded items but carry larger margins. At 7-Eleven stores, the flagship chain of Seven & I, sales of its

own-label items rose 30 percent for the quarter. Spending per customer, however, dropped 0.6 percent for the month of May. To avoid losing customers, Aeon said it would accept smaller profit margins on its housebrands and absorb the higher costs a weaker yen is wreaking on imports such as bread and ham.

“We’ll try to avoid passing higher costs on to retail prices,” Aeon’s Senior Executive Vice President Yoshiki Mori told an earnings briefing this week. The company’s 9.8 percent profit increase was driven largely by its consumer credit operations and not its supermarkets. To boost the economy, the Bank of Japan has set a 2 percent inflation target to be reached within the next two years, but prices are still falling at a rate of 0.4 percent a year. Ironically, the prices of flat-screen TVs, long a symbol of Japan’s deflation, are bucking the downtrend.

Prices, however, are rising because manufacturers are willing to sell less to maintain their margins.

Flat-screen TV prices fell more than 40 percent from late 2010 to 2012 after manufacturers such as Sony Corp and Panasonic Corp offered huge discounts to staunch a slide in sales caused by the drying up of government incentives. Demand remains weak, and with sales volumes now at less than onetenth of their peak in November 2010, manufacturers have little to gain by cutting prices further. “We haven’t seen any effects from Abenomics yet,” said Hisashi Yamada, the executive in charge of corporate planning at Yamada Denki Co Ltd, Japan’s biggest electronics retailer. — Reuters

business SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Ford sees turnaround in Europe DETROIT: The steep contraction of Europe’s auto industry-which has trimmed sales, forcing carmakers to absorb punishing losses and slash production-appears to be reaching bottom, a key Ford executive said. Signs indicate the market for new vehicles in the euro zone has stopped shrinking, said Stephen Odell, executive vice president and president of Europe, Middle East and Africa, at a briefing at the automaker’s headquarters, “It’s beginning to show signs of stability,” Odell said, though he cautioned the turnaround was unlikely to be swift.

“The European market should start growing next year,” but growth will be slow and modest over the next several years, Odell added. He acknowledged Ford’s outlook is different than the one offered earlier this week by Nissan/Renault chair-

man Carlos Ghosn, who said he was not sure the European market had actually bottomed out. Odell said, while unemployment levels, at 12.2 percent, are “very bad,” even “unprecedented,” nevertheless, “most of the indices are pointing towards recovery.”

Vehicle sales in Europe are currently running at about 13.5 million units a year, well below the 18 million unit sales rate in 2007. The US automaker has also had to grapple with fierce competition, including extensive discounting and from German luxury makers crowding into market segments, such as midsized vehicles, in which it has traditionally done well. Ford’s European operations lost $462 million in the first quarter, which were offset by profits $2.4 billion in North America. “We still expect to be profitable

S&P upgrades Ireland outlook DUBLIN: Standard & Poor’s upgraded its outlook on Ireland’s credit rating yesterday, saying its debt may fall faster than expected, nurturing European Union hopes for at least one bailout success story. The upgrade to positive from stable on Ireland’s BBB-plus rating comes ahead of a planned year-end exit from its EU/IMF bailout, and backs its status as Europe’s strongest bailed out economy amid political turmoil in Portugal and Greece.

The upgrade will also fuel expectations that Moody’s, the only major rating agency that rates Irish sovereign debt as non-investment grade, could at least take the country off negative watch in the coming months. “The outlook revision reflects our view that Ireland’s general government debt burden is likely to decline more rapidly, as a percentage of GDP, than we had previously expected,” S&P said in a statement. “Ireland’s economic recovery is under way,” it said S&P said it saw a more than one-inthree probability it would raise Ireland’s credit rating during the next two years, citing expectations that national debt will fall from 122 percent of GDP in 2013 to 112 percent by 2016.

It also praised the “strong consensus” among the country’s largest political parties for fiscal consolidation and reform. “When you look at some of the cliff-hangers we have had in the rest of the periphery, Ireland has kept its head down and got on with it and I think that has been recognized,” said Philip O’Sullivan, chief economist at NCB Stockbrokers. “What S&P has done today illustrates the widening gap between the Moody’s stance and how many others on the market view the country. We see a Moody’s upgrade as a question of when, not if.”

GROWTH PROSPECTS Portugal’s president threw the bailed-out euro zone country into disarray on Thursday by rejecting plans to heal a government rift and calling for early elections next year. Fellow aid recipient Greece is in its sixth straight year of recession with unemployment at record highs, while its lenders extend financing in installments to keep pressure on the shaky coalition government for reforms. Data recently showed Ireland had unexpectedly tipped into recession for the first time in four years. But S&P said that while external demand remains weak, Ireland’s domestic economy is showing signs of stabilizing with unemployment declining and house prices showing signs of bottoming out. The country’s flexible, open economy and favorable demographics means it has the potential to grow by 2 percent per year, it said. Standard & Poor’s had the country on negative outlook until February, when Dublin struck a long-awaited deal with the European Central Bank allowing it to convert promissory notes into long-term bonds. That effectively gave Dublin far longer to repay debts it ran up as it rescued the Irish banking system.— Reuters

in Europe by the end of 2015,” Odell said.

The Ford executive declined to offer any guidance on the second quarter financial results, due out July 24. But he noted the company has now reached agreements with unions on closing two plants in Britain and one in Belgium. The three plants, which represent about 18 percent of Ford’s capacity in the Eurozone, are expected to shutter next year, he said. “We have no more capacity announcements to make,” Odell said, signaling the company will not be closing additional plants.

As part of the restructuring, by the end of 2014, Ford will build the next version of the Mondeo in Valencia, Spain, where it is also increasing production to meet the demand for the new Ford Kuga. Ford has reduced its inventories across Europe

even as it launched eight new vehicles in recent months, concentrated on retail sales and is now getting higher prices vehicles such as the Kuga, Odell said. He added that the company’s European operations have been able to expand the European product line by utilizing vehicles developed in other parts of the world. Meanwhile, Ford and its joint venture partners are in the midst of opening three new plants in Russia where the government has just boosted incentives for consumers to buy new, low-price vehicles-segments where Ford is relatively strong. In addition, demand for sport utility vehicles such as the Ford Explorer is robust in Russia. “These are segments where we have a lot of experience,” Odell noted, adding overall vehicles sales in Russia are staging a recovery.— AFP

S&P confirms Germany’s top-notch credit rating ECB in danger of overload FRANKFURT: Credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s affirmed yesterday the top-notch triple-A rating for German sovereign debt, saying Europe’s top economy could withstand any shocks from the euro-zone crisis. The ratings “reflect our view of (Germany’s) modern, highly diversified, competitive economy, and the government’s track record of prudent fiscal policies and expenditure discipline” S&P wrote in a statement.

“Furthermore, we believe the German economy has demonstrated its ability to absorb large economic and financial shocks.”

Germany is therefore one of a very select number of countries to enjoy the best possible credit ratings, alongside Finland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. S&P also affirmed its stable outlook for Germany’s rating, meaning no downgrade was expected. Germany has held up better to the crisis than all of its neighbors, thanks to deep restructuring and painful reforms undertaken a number of years ago.

But it has not escaped completely unscathed and growth ground to a halt at the end of last year and the average annual growth rate this year would be much slower than the 0.7 percent seen in 2012. Nevertheless, S&P said it was penciling in growth of 0.4 percent in 2013 and “steady, albeit very modest, growth over the medium term, averaging close to 1.0 percent in real gross domestic product per capita terms in 2013-2016.”

European Central Bank The European Central Bank risks being overloaded by its new and huge task of watching over banks, executive board member Peter Praet warned in a newspaper interview yesterday. “The euro-zone was set up with too few institutions actually capable of acting. We’re now paying

the price for that,” he said.”We’re being entrusted with more and more tasks,” Praet, who is the ECB’s chief economist, told the business daily Handelsblatt. “I wouldn’t call this a

minutes of its meetings, as the US Federal Reserve does.”The speculation in this respect reinforces my belief that, sooner or later, we should publish the minutes. We’re discussing this

THESSALONIKI: Employees of a shop install a poster yesterday announcing sales in Thessaloniki. — AFP politicization” of the central bank, “but a possible overburdening,” Praet said.

Ever since the start of the eurozone’s troubles, the ECB has been seen as the only institution capable of acting quickly enough to put out the crisis fires. From the second half of next year it will also take on the role of banking supervisor for the entire euro area. “It’s an immense challenge,” Praet said. The economist also said he was also in favour of a more open communication within the ECB, for example with the publication of the

issue intensively,” Praet said.

At the ECB’s policy-setting meeting last week, president Mario Draghi rang in what some observers saw as a “mini-revolution” by issuing so-called “forward guidance” by saying the bank’s interest rates were expected to remain at their current record-low levels of fall even further “for an extended period of time.” But on Thursday, the head of the German central bank or Bundesbank, Jens Weidmann, insisted that Draghi’s comments were “no historic turning point in monetary policy communication.”—Agencies

BUSINESS SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

India’s Infosys Q1 profit up, shares surge NEW DELHI: Indian IT outsourcing giant Infosys reported yesterday a nearly four percent rise in quarterly net profit and kept its market forecast intact, driving the firm’s shares up 15 percent. Infosys, whose earnings are seen as a sector bellwether, said net profit rose 3.7 percent to 23.74 billion rupees ($396 million) for the first quarter to June, from 22.89 billion rupees a year earlier-in line with market forecasts.

Despite “an uncertain macro environment, changing regulatory regime and a volatile currency environment, we have done well in the first quarter”, said Infosys chief executive S D Shibulal. Infosys, the country’s secondbiggest software services exporter, is “cautiously optimistic about (the) rest of the year,” Shibulal said.

The Nasdaq-listed firm’s earnings were driven by contract wins and foreign exchange gains, a company statement said. Shares climbed 15 percent to a high of 2,905.0 rupees in early trade on the earnings and an announcement that Infosys was sticking by its 6.0-10 percent revenue growth projection for the fiscal year to March 2014. By 0600 GMT the firm was trading at 2,820.75 rupees, still up 11.64 percent on the back of the results. “The earnings are positive as was the stable revenue outlook,” said Ankita Somani, analyst with Mumbai’s Angel Broking.

Infosys last month recalled company founder Narayana Murthy, who had retired two years ago at the age of 65, to serve as executive chairman in a bid to revive the company’s fortunes.

Murthy’s return comes at a time when the company has been struggling with weak earnings and falling market share to rivals such as Tata Consultancy Services and HCL. The Bangalore-based Infosys is seeking to reinvent itself with a strategic overhaul to focus on higher value software and consulting services instead of labor-intensive outsourcing services.

The company has seen a major reshuffle of its top management over the past two years, including the exit of several of its founders. Three decades ago, Murthy, who has an iconic stature in Indian business as a pioneer of the country’s flagship outsourcing industry, sat around a kitchen table with six others and created Infosys. Last month, Murthy told share-

Stocks head for best week in eight months Selloff in dollar eases, currencies steadier after wild ride LONDON: European shares rose yesterday and the dollar steadied in the wake of reassuring comments from the US Federal Reserve on its stimulus program, leaving world stocks on track for their best week in almost eight months.

Europe was drawing support from a record high close on Wall Street on Thursday, though investors in Asia turned cautious after China’s finance minister doused hopes of fresh stimulus after he said sub-7 percent growth was acceptable for Beijing.

The broad FTSEurofirst 300 index was up 0.3 by mid-morning as it eyed a fifth day of gains, while a steady close in Asia left MSCI’s world index, which tracks stocks in 45 countries, on track for its best week since November. This week’s rally in financial markets has spread across stocks and bonds to oil and metals and been driven by hints from the US Federal Reserve that it may not be as eager to phase out its support as markets had started to believe. “Markets have been reassured by the mention (by the Fed) of financial conditions and the weakness of inflation,” said Guy Foster, head of portfolio strategy at Brewin Dolphin.

“There remains little reason for the Fed to tighten policy although given their comments to date we assume a modest reduction in purchases in September,” he added. After a week of swings in the world’s big currencies, foreign exchange markets were trading in a calmer fashion, though positioning had started ahead of key Chinese growth data due next week. The dollar index, which tracks the greenback’s performance against a basket of major currencies, bounced off 2-1/2 week lows, having slumped more than 2 percent after Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke assured it would remain in support mode. That was the steepest fall in four years, normally seen only during financial crises. “This week was not pretty for some people. With dollar-longs removed, no one wants to take big new bets ahead of China,” said a foreign exchange market researcher at an

MANILA: Women work at a sweatshop sewing clothes under contract with local clothing manufacturers in Manila yesterday. Visiting World Bank vice president for East Asia and the Pacific Axel van Trotsenburg said the Philippine government needs to convert its recent high economic growth into more jobs for ordinary Filipinos so as to succeed in reducing widespread poverty. — AFP advisory firm in Tokyo who requested review to the end of August, which is anonymity. The euro slipped to $1.3037 clearly fuelling fears that Portugal doesn’t having jumped as far as $1.3208 on have the appetite for further fiscal conThursday though it was well off this solidation measures in place,” said Nick week’s trough of $1.2755. One of the Stamenkovic, a rate strategist at RIA ECB’s top policymakers, Peter Praet, Capital Markets. The rest of the bloc dragged on the currency after he said made gains, however, as the updraft of bank will keep interest rates at current the Fed’s soothing message this week levels or cut them even further, as long as was helped by an upgrade to Ireland’s inflation remains moderate. credit outlook by rating firm S&P. Commodity markets have enjoyed a parPORTUGAL STRIFE ticularly strong run this week as the talk Portuguese government bonds fell of ongoing central bank support has bolagain after Lisbon requested a delay to stered hopes of a pickup in global the next review of the country’s bailout growth. Gold along with other precious program due to its political crisis. metals eased after four days of gains but Tensions were reignited this week after was on track for its biggest weekly gain the country’s president threw out plans in nearly two years. Copper was cruising that looked to have patched up a govern- to its best week in two months as it ment rift and instead demanded some dipped back below $7,000 a ton. Brent kind of grand coalition. That would oil was steady at just under $108 a barrel include opposition Socialists, who are having hit a three-month high on distinctly cool on the government’s aus- Thursday as the prospect of more supply terity and have been calling for snap from non-OPEC producers and concerns elections. “Portugal is struggling as the about China’s demand growth capped government delays the next quarterly gains. —Reuters

holders after he was called back the task to rebuild a “desirable” Infosys could take at least 36 months and tough decisions would have to be taken which would result in “pain”.

Murthy called his “second innings” at the helm of the company something that he had not imagined in his “wildest dreams”.

The firm added 66 clients and a net 575 employees in the three months to June. Revenues for the quarter rose 17.2 percent to 112.67 billion rupees, said the company, whose results kicked off India’s quarterly earnings season. Many of India’s IT outsourcing firms have been going through a rough stretch and they say the outlook for the industry remains difficult due to uncertainty in its key US and European markets. — AFP

Malaysia Islamic finance overhaul boosts protection for depositors KUALA LUMPUR: New laws governing Malaysia’s Islamic finance sector will boost protection for depositors by making religious advisers legally accountable for financial products, and liable to steep fines and prison time for wrongdoing. The new rules also include a plan to require Islamic life insurers to separate the life arm from other parts of their business. The regulations also could spur takeovers in the Islamic insurance sector through capital-base provisions that encourage larger participants.

Malaysia’s new Islamic Financial Services Act (IFSA) gives regulators greater oversight as the country seeks to retain its position as the world’s second-largest Islamic Banking market, with 395 billion ringgit ($124 billion) in assets as of May. While there have been no major problems arising from lax standards, the new law - which went into effect last week - is seen as a broad way of enforcing closer adherence to sharia laws, where Malaysia is already a global leader.

One of the most important changes is to make sharia advisers legally liable for the financial products they approve, analysts and industry experts said. The Islamic scholars are hired by banks to assure that financial products abide by Islamic sharia standards. The rule-change would encourage advisers to conduct a closer inspection of the financial products they approve, holding them more accountable, said Mohamad Akram Laldin, executive director of the Malaysia-based International Sharia Research Academy for Islamic Finance.

“This is a step forward, everyone who is involved will know their duties and what is expected of them,” he said. Previous rules governing sharia compliance were just guidelines. The IFSA elevates them to statutory duties, a breach of which could expose licensed financial entities to punishment. Penalties will be more severe, a Malaysia-based lawyer told Reuters, with many offences carrying a possibility of up to eight years imprisonment and 25 million ringgit ($7.86 million) in fines.

Investors’ protection should also be boosted by another provision that requires banks to distinguish deposits made for savings from those made for investments. Banks will also need to guarantee the principal amount on savings deposits. The IFSA also gives Malaysia’s finance ministry more powers to further scrutinize financial holding companies and non-regulated entities if they pose a risk to financial stability. “From my view, it is quite comprehensive. The challenge is to ensure the enforcement, and to make people understand it,” Akram added. The IFSA may also reshape the takaful (Islamic insurance) sector by requiring the separation of life and general business lines, the latter covering property and automobiles. Under the new rules, firms with composite licenses that cover both sectors will have five years to separate the two. Malaysia had 12 direct takaful operators with a combined 19 billion ringgit in assets as of December 2012, central bank data showed. The majority of those assets - 85 percent - were in family insurance, up 13.3 percent from a year earlier. —Reuters

BUSINESS SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

G20 needs clear, predictable policies: Russia MOSCOW: The Group of 20 backs clear monetary policies, Russia said yesterday, reflecting the concerns of developing economies that a withdrawal of US monetary stimulus could cause market turmoil and capital flight.

Moscow hosts finance ministers and central bankers from the world’s top developed and developing markets next week amid nervousness over when Washington will wind down its program of so-called quantitative easing. “I think everyone will be against any sudden changes in currency exchange rates and monetary policies,” Finance Minister Anton Siluanov told Reuters in an interview.

Any tightening of monetary policy, such as the withdrawal of quantitative easing, “should be done in a predictable and consistent matter,” he added. “We (the G20) should not create reasons for instability,” Siluanov said.

“The policy of countries issuing reserve currencies should be predictable.” Russia, the first big emerging economy

to take the annual presidency of the G20, and other developing nations have grown anxious after Chairman Ben Bernanke first said in May the US Federal Reserve may scale back its massive asset purchases.

The rouble and Moscow stock indexes fell to one-year lows, while the Brazilian real and its stock market hit fouryear lows. In more dovish comments on Wednesday that are likely to ease those concerns going into the Moscow talks, Bernanke said a highly accommodative policy would be needed for the foreseeable future. “If the policy of quantitative easing in the United States is terminated, this can lead to excessive nervousness on the markets, especially in emerging markets; it can lead to an outflow of capital from these markets,” said Siluanov.

Siluanov welcomed the latest comments by Bernanke, who will not attend the Moscow talks, and said they had been well received by financial markets. The

Fed is spending $85 billion a month to buy bonds as it seeks to ease the cost of credit. “It is too early to be talking now about the end of the quantitative easing when the global economy is still in a recession trend,” said Siluanov, 50, who took over from Alexei Kudrin in 2011.

The meeting’s main task next week will be to prepare the agenda for a G20 leaders’ summit in St Petersburg on Sept 5-6.

The BRICS - Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa - will meet in Moscow to discuss preventive measures needed to stabilize their balance of payments in the event that a “taper” of the Fed’s stimulus causes sharp capital flight. There has been increased talk in recent weeks among the emerging markets caucus on devising a coordinated policy to limit the negative effects that a stronger US dollar could have on their commodity-driven economies. —Reuters

Olympus $1.2 bn share sale fails zoom-lens test HONG KONG: Without a zoom lens, it’s hard to see the logic in Olympus’ $1.2 billion share sale. Less than two years after a huge accounting fraud, the Japanese company is tapping capital markets. But the camera and medical equipment maker’s decision to sell shares only outside of Japan is a poor way to thank local shareholders who endured the dark days.

Besides Olympus’ finances were already on the right track.

Since ex-chief executive Michael Woodford first questioned Olympus’ accounting, the company has made remarkable progress. After a management overhaul, asset disposals, and a capital infusion from Sony, Olympus registered positive earnings in the full year that ended in March; its shares are one quarter above their pre-scandal level. The new cash will expand its fast-growing medical business and help pay down debt. Yet Olympus doesn’t have any urgent need for cash.

While its net debt is still high at around five times EBITDA for the year ending March 2013, according to Eikon, the amount due within a year was only equivalent to 60 percent of the company’s cash pile. That would leave almost $900 million that Olympus can draw on before it has to turn to shareholders. The share offer will take Olympus’ equity from 16 percent of its total assets to over 28 percent. But at the current rate, Olympus would have got there eventually anyway without selling new shares.

Then there’s the potential dilution. Japanese investors can’t buy the new shares locally - perhaps because Olympus senses foreign investors are keen to buy into Japan’s recovery. That may dilute their holdings by 8 percent, though the eventual effect will become clear when the price is set, sometime around July 18. Determined local institutions may be able to participate through offshore entities but non-financial and retail investors will find it hard to do so.

The people who will most welcome Olympus’ cash call are likely to be its lending banks. They also rank amongst its top shareholders - and the former executive of one big lender is chairman of the board. But given the lack of urgency, it’s hard to see other investors being as snap happy.

Japan’s Olympus Corp said on July 8 that it will raise up to 118 billion yen ($1.17 billion) in an offering of new shares.

Olympus will offer 32 million new shares and 4 million existing treasury shares. An additional 5 million shares may be sold in an overallotment. The number of shares outstanding as of July 11 was 306 million, according to Eikon data.

The stock will be priced as early as July 18. The estimated amount to be raised was calculated based on the closing price on July 4 of 3,120 yen a share, according to a filing to the ministry of finance. The shares will be offered and sold in offshore transactions to institutional buyers, mainly in the United States and Europe. On July 3, the Tokyo District Court found three former executives of Olympus guilty of covering up the firm’s massive investment losses and handed them suspended prison terms. Shares in Olympus are trading around one quarter above where they were in October 2011 before the financial scandal came to light. — Reuters

SICHUAN: People walk in the main hall of the New Century Global Center, the world’s largest single building, in the suburbs of Chengdu, in southwest China’s Sichuan province. The world’s largest building, in terms of floor space, has opened to the public in the booming Chinese city of Chengdu. — AP

US urges China to let currency rise further US, China agree to restart investment treaty talks WASHINGTON: US Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew yesterday called on China to let its currency appreciate but credited the growing Asian power with moving in the desired direction. Lew said he talked at length with Chinese officials about the rate of their yuan currency during the two-day Strategic and Economic Dialogue, the main annual meeting between the world’s two largest economies.

“We have acknowledged that there has been progress in closing the gap, but we’ve also made it clear that there’s still more progress that needs to be made in order to reach the point where there’s truly a market-determined interest rate,” Lew told reporters. Lew said he saw an “overlap of interests” between the two nations in reforming China’s exchange rate and opening up its billion-plus consumer market, as it would mean “more growth in China and more opportunity for US exports.”

“We are pushing hard for China to do things that China needs to do for itself,” he said. US manufacturers charge that China has kept the yuan artificially low as part of a deliberate strategy to flood the world with cheap exports, which have been a key driver of the billion-plus nation’s years of breakneck growth.

Four top US lawmakers across party lines, in a joint letter ahead of the talks, urged Lew to press China to move “more rapidly” towards what they considered an exchange rate set by market forces. But pressure has eased on China as the yuan has risen by more than 15 percent against the dollar in the past several years, largely in response to concerns in China over inflation. The Treasury Department, led until January by Lew’s predecessor Timothy Geithner, preferred quiet diplomacy on exchange rates and declined to declare China a currency manipulator, a designation that could trigger sanctions.

CHINA DROPS PRECONDITIONS The United States and China agreed on Thursday to restart stalled negotiations on an investment treaty, with Beijing dropping previous efforts to protect certain sectors of its economy from the start. The agreement to resume negotiations was welcomed by the US business community as a major advance during annual Strategic and Economic Dialogue talks in Washington, which have often produced few agreements of substance.

Top officials from both sides strived to project a friendly, businesslike tone as they tried to build what China calls a “new model of major country relations” between the world’s two biggest economies in the first year of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s mandate. But talks struck a sour note over China’s handling of former spy agency contractor Edward Snowden, who hid out in the Chinese territory of Hong Kong last month as he revealed a secret US surveillance program before fleeing to Russia.

Disputes over cyber security topped the agenda going into this year’s talks, which were launched in 2008 to manage a relationship that was growing more complex and tense with China’s emergence as major economic and military power. US Treasury Secretary Jack Lew hailed the investment treaty commitment as a sign of positive change in Beijing as China retools its economic growth model away from heavy investment and exports toward growth driven by consumption.

“China announced its intention to negotiate a high standard bilateral investment treaty with us that will include all stages of investment and all sectors - a significant breakthrough, and the first time China has agreed to do so with another country,” he said as the talks concluded. —Agencies

BUSINESS

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Brazil workers protest for better conditions SAO PAULO: Striking workers blocked highways and staged mainly peaceful marches across Brazil Thursday in a day of industrial action called by unions to demand better work conditions and tougher measures to contain rising inflation. The “National Day of Struggle” was called by the country’s top five labor federations during last month’s nationwide street protests for better public services and an end to endemic corruption.

Thursday’s protests drew only a fraction of the numbers seen during the huge rallies last month, which on one day alone drew more than a million people out onto the streets across the vast South American powerhouse. The unions are demanding better wages, shorter working hours, job security, improved public transport, steps to bring down inflation and more investment in public health and education. Demonstrators blocked around 40 highways in 18 of the country’s 26 states, as well as access to several ports, including Santos, Latin America’s biggest.

In Rio de Janeiro, demonstrators tried to break into a government building but were dispersed by elite military police using stun grenades and teargas.

Although the protests were largely peaceful during the day, after dark in Rio de Janeiro, black-clad, masked protesters threw Molotov cocktails and flares at police, who pushed them back with tear gas. The masked group sparked the clashes in a side street and then took refuge in a peaceful march in which union leaders

RIO DE JANEIRO: A riot police officer fires tear gas at violent demonstrators after clashes erupted following a march by Brazilian workers in Rio de Janeiro. — AFP called for calm and sang the national anthem.

Because of the violence, the march was dispersed before it reached its final destination, and at least 12 people, including two minors, were arrested. In the huge Sao Paulo metropolitan area, home to 20 million people, less violent clashes erupted when some 1,500 protesters burned tires to block a key highway. Police used tear gas and sound cannons to disperse them. Altogether some 4,000 people rallied in Sao Paulo. But buses, trains and the subway operated as on

Oil flat below $108 LONDON: Oil held steady below $108 a barrel yesterday, as concern about China’s demand outlook and the prospect of growing non-OPEC supply offset lower inventories in the United States and concern about possible disruption to flows due to strife in Egypt. Brent crude for August was 6 cents higher at $107.79 a barrel by 0857 GMT, after touching a low of $107.28. The contract was nearly flat for the week after pulling back from $108.93 on Thursday, the highest since April 3.

US crude was down 20 cents at $104.71, but still on track for a third weekly rise. It fell the most in nearly three weeks on Thursday after hitting a 16-month high at $107.45, as fears of a supply squeeze at the contract’s delivery point in Cushing, Oklahoma, eased. China’s finance minister signaled that Beijing may be willing to tolerate economic growth in the second half of the year significantly below 7 percent, marking the most sobering comment to date from a senior policymaker on the country’s slowdown.

That came after warnings from China earlier this week of a “grim” outlook for trade after a surprise fall in June exports, raising concerns that the world’s second biggest oil consumer would no longer be the buoyant force for oil it has been for the last decade. However improved sentiment on the outlook for the United States and lingering concern that violence in Egypt could disrupt supply through the Suez canal underpinned prices.

Brent remains close to a three-month peak reached the session before on political uncertainty in Egypt, falling US crude inventories and a weaker US dollar. Investors also netted profits on Thursday after a three-week rally pushed Brent and WTI crude futures to multi-month highs. US data on Wednesday showed the biggest two-week drop on record in crude stockpiles, while refinery production hit a five-year high. New York Harbor gasoline futures have topped $3 per gallon for the first time since March with the onset of the summer driving season.

“While overall fundamentals are still supportive, the market is taking a breather following the sharp increases earlier in the week,” Amrita Sen at Energy Aspects said. “Moreover the sharp rise in oil prices has started to dent refinery margins, both in Europe and in the US, capping any upside currently.” Also pressuring prices, non-OPEC supply is set to grow at the fastest pace in decades next year, the International Energy Agency (IEA) said on Thursday, and China’s weaker appetite for commodities continues to drag on prices. — Reuters

a normal day. Earlier in the day, marchers hoisting flags and banners blocked traffic on several thoroughfares, with an estimated 5,000 people thronging the central Avenida Paulista. “We want things to improve in the country. We are marching because health and education are in crisis in Brazil. There must be a change,” said Rosely Paschetti, a 49-year-old Sao Paulo municipal employee. “More taxes for the rich, fewer taxes for the poor,” read a huge banner.

Across the country, strikes and demonstrations affected major companies-

including General Motors, where a 24hour strike was in effect, and Embraer, Brazil’s top planemaker-as well as schools, ports and public transport. In some hospitals around the country, only emergency services were operating. Wednesday, Santos port activity was also disrupted for several hours when stevedores went on strike, complaining that Embraport, the largest Brazilian private multi-modal port terminal, is not hiring through the staterun labor management agency OGMO, which places union members in jobs.

The workers fear that bypassing OGMO will make it possible for private companies to recruit non-unionized workers who will accept lower wages. Top unions meanwhile appeared divided on whether to support President Dilma Rousseff, who last month vowed to hear “the voices of the street” and pledged to boost investments in public transport, health and education.

The country’s biggest labor federation, the Unified Workers’ Central, commonly known by the acronym CUT and founded in the 1980’s by ex-president Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva (2003-2010), backs Rousseff’s proposal for a popular plebiscite to usher in broad political reform. But the Forca Sindical union chided the government over rising inflation, which reached an annualized 6.7 percent in June, above the 6.5 percent upper limit of the government target. “Workers’ salaries are being eroded by rising inflation,” said its president, Paulo Pereira da Silva, in a statement. — AFP

Shanghai gold, silver volumes hit records Night trade booms on domestic investors’ demand SHANGHAI: Trading volumes for gold and silver on the Shanghai Futures Exchange (ShFE) have jumped to record highs a week after the bourse launched after-hours trading, driven by a surge in investment and hedging demand.

The ShFE, China’s biggest commodity exchange by contract value, launched night trading on July 5 to give investors a tool to manage risk during trading hours in London and New York.

The extended hours could give China a better hold in the global gold market and offer a taste of what lies ahead for contracts such as base metals, if the exchange sticks to plans to extend trading hours for other products. “The pricing power for main commodities is still decided by trading in overseas market, and any large price movement will not be favorable for domestic investors to control risks,” said Sun Yonggang, an analyst with Everbright Futures in Shanghai.

Weekly buy and sell trading volume for the most active gold contract more than doubled from a week ago, to 2.06 million lots by Friday, exchange data showed. Daily transactions for gold rose by nearly a quarter to a record of 595,642 lots on Thursday, versus an average of 483,529 lots in June, the data showed. Daily volume for the silver contract surged roughly six-fold from a week ago to 2.23 million lots on Thursday. “The night gold trade will help investors to adjust their positions immediately facing overseas market volatilities and the liquidity for gold night trade looks promising,” Sun said. Unlike other exchanges, Shanghai data is counted twice, with each side of a buy

and sell transaction tallied. Before after-hours trading was launched, investors in China, the world’s second-largest gold importer, were often exposed to global price fluctuations in the US and European markets.

The exchange also plans to expand trading hours for other contracts, chairman Yang Maijun said in a statement on July 5. Yang did not say what products were being considered, but one Hong-Kong based trader said any extension of trading hours could have a big impact on base metals.

“The silver and gold contracts have been going gangbusters. You could reflect on ... what that could mean for their base metals contracts, assuming they plan to start the night sessions,” he said. Extending trading hours into the European day would overlap

with the heaviest volume trading hours on the London Metal Exchange (LME), boosting the opportunity to trade price differentials, he said.

This could see ShFE volumes narrow the gap with the LME, he said. ShFE copper turnover in tons was just under a third of LME volumes last year. Gold slipped on Friday, but remained on track for its biggest weekly gain since October 2011, as fears of an early end to US monetary stimulus subsided and bullion recovered some of its appeal as a hedge against inflation. The ShFE’s extended hours run from 9:00 pm to 2:30 am local time. Each lot of gold is 1,000 grams and that of silver is 15 kilograms. In addition to gold and silver, also trades copper, aluminum, zinc, lead, natural rubber, fuel oil and steel. It is also preparing to launch crude oil futures. — Reuters

Shell shuts Nigerian pipeline due to leak LAGOS: Shell has shut a major pipeline in Nigeria for the second time in less than a month after locating another leak on the line repeatedly hit by oil thieves, the company said on Friday. The shutdown of the Trans Niger Pipeline will result in a cut of about 150,000 barrels of oil per day in Africa’s biggest oil producer. Nigeria’s total output has been at around two million barrels per day.

The joint venture Shell operates in Africa’s biggest oil producer on Thursday “shut in the 24-inch Trans Niger Pipeline

(TNP) as a result of a confirmed leak on this line at the Bomu-Bonny section at Owokiri,” it said, naming an area of southern Nigeria. “With the 28-inch TNP already shut in for removal of illegal oil theft connections, a total of about 150,000 barrels per day of oil have been deferred.”The British-Dutch company said details were unclear on the latest incident, “but the TNP has been variously targeted by crude oil thieves in recent months and shut down several times to enable the removal of theft points.”

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013 www.kuwaittimes.net

Tehran art auction lures spenders amid hard times Page 25

Thai Muslim women offer prayers at Pattani mosque during the month of Ramadan in Thailand‫؛‬s restive southern Pattani province yesterday. During the month devout Muslims must abstain from food, drink and sex from dawn until sunset, when they break the fast with a meal known as Iftar.— AFP

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

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ctress Leah Remini has severed ties with the Church of Scientology, a source with knowledge of her decision said on Thursday, making her one of the most high-profile members to quit. Remini, best known for her role as Carrie Heffernan in the CBS sitcom “King of Queens,” issued a statement following press reports that she had decided to leave the church. “I wish to share my sincere and heartfelt appreciation for the overwhelming positive response I have received from the media, my colleagues, and fans from around the world. I am truly grateful and thankful for all your support,” Remini said.

She did not address Scientology directly, but the source told Reuters that Remini’s statement was her confirmation that she had left the church. The New York Post broke the story early Thursday that Remini was leaving the Church of Scientology after “being subjected to years of ‘interrogations’ and ‘thought modification’ for questioning leader David Miscavige’s rule,” citing an unnamed source. Remini’s representatives would not comment on the New York Post article. Representatives for the Church of Scientology did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Leah Remini

and has attracted several Hollywood stars including Tom Cruise and John Travolta. The organization describes its practices as a religion and believes man is an immortal being whose experience extends beyond one lifetime.

But some observers - including media mogul Rupert Murdoch - liken it to a cult. Critics think the group coerces followers to think like they do, and they accuse Scientologists of harassing people who seek to quit. The church came under fresh scrutiny last year when actress Katie Holmes suddenly divorced Cruise, with whom she has one daughter. Although there was speculation that Holmes had rejected Scientology, neither she nor Cruise addressed a split over the faith.

In an April 2001 interview with CNN, Remini said she “finds solace in her steadfast practice of Scientology,” and jumped to the defense of the religion. “If somebody is going to get turned off about something because of what they read or heard, then that person’s not smart enough to even enter a church,” Remini said to CNN. Other notable former Scientology members include director Paul Haggis, who spoke out in detail about his experiences with the church in a New Yorker article in February 2011. — Reuters

Scientology and celebrities The actress, 43, has spoken publicly in the past about being a member of the Church of Scientology, which was founded in 1954 by science fiction writer L. Ron Hubbard

“P

acific Rim” has sudden momentum and reigning champ “Despicable Me 2” has the family crowd locked up - but “Grown Ups 2” could just as easily beat both in a weekend that’s shaping up to be the closest box office race of summer. All are projected to wind up at $40 million or above for the three days, analysts say - though the volume of social buzz for “Pacific Rim” has been foretelling an opening that could creep up to $50 million, according to social media-based estimates.

That Guillermo del Toro’s monster epic in even the No. 1 discussion represents an impressive turnaround - just a week ago it was tracking at below $30 million. “Buzz has been good for the last four months, which is disappointing because they haven’t managed to translate that to the mainstream,” Kristen Longfield, a social-media analyst at Cimarron, told TheWrap. The problem is that much of that buzz is coming from fanboys and there are only so many of those to go around. “‘Pacific Rim’ has been strong in social, and it’s gotten stronger,” said Ben Carlson, of the social-media analytics firm Fizziology. “But it’s a very concentrated group of fanboys who are talking very loudly.” The lack of A-list stars and extremely highconcept had to present marketing challenges for Warner Bros, but it seems to be connecting now. Online ticket broker Fandango reported Thursday morning that it was accounting for 60 percent of presales.

Some analysts believe that the early numbers were skewed because the film’s core demographic targets - young boys and devoted Del Toro followers - are tough to track and will turn out in force. The studio is also hoping for a boost from the Mexican director’s Hispanic fans. But word-of-mouth could make or break the PG-13-rated film this weekend, and the signs are positive. It had a 76 percent positive rating on Rotten Tomatoes on Thursday.

“I think it’s going to pop,” said BoxOffice.com editor-in-chief Phil Contrino. “If it connects with the late Thursday-Friday night crowds, and I think it will, then look for it to take off on Saturday.”

Warner Bros is counting on a big international performance from “Pacific Rim,” which should get a boost from Del Toro’s significant international following. The studio is releasing it in 38 foreign markets this weekend, including the UK, Russia, Mexico, South Korea and Australia. France and Germany will come next week, followed by China on July 31.

This film image released by Warner Bros. Pictures shows Charlie Hunnam as Raleigh Becket, left, and Rinko Kikuchi as Mako Mori in a scene from ‘Pacific Rim.’ — AP Contrino said he’s giving “Grown Ups 2” a slight edge in the domestic race. It will be in 3,491 theaters this weekend, with “Pacific Rim” in more than 3,300. “But I wouldn’t be surprised by any of the top three films taking the weekend,” he said. “Grown Ups 2” looks like the perfect spot for Adam Sandler to get his boxoffice groove back. He voiced Dracula in Sony’s surprising animated hit “Hotel Transylvania,” but his last two live-action efforts “Jack and Jill” and “That’s My Boy” - have disappointed. The latter film was R-rated and a bid by Sandler to broaden his youthful base, but it came up short.

Reteaming with Kevin James, Chris Rock and David Space (Rob Schneider is sitting this one out) in the PG-13-rated sequel should turn that around. “Grown Ups 2,” which has an $80 million production budget, has been tracking in line with the original, which

opened to $40 million in June 2010 and went on to make $270 million globally.

Director Dennis Dugan is back, as is Fred Wolf, who co-wrote the screenplay with Sandler and Tim Herlihy. Salma Hayak and Maya Rudolph co-star. Universal and Illumination Entertainment’s “Despicable Me 2” has played strongly all week, and the animated family has now rung up more than $175 million domestically and $326 million globally, after last weekend’s $83 million debut. — Reuters

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

File photo shows Tyler the Creator posing backstage with the award for best new artist backstage at the MTV Video Music Awards in Los Angeles.

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ince it began, rap has found ways to offend. Whether for political content, sexual imagery, misogyny, violence or coarse humor, rappers have found themselves having to defend their words on a regular basis, no matter how innocuous - or extreme. Those defenses have typically been defiant. So it was a bit startling when both Lil Wayne and Rick Ross - under intense fire over rhymes deemed offensive gave mea culpas for their words amid threats of boycotts and a loss of major endorsements.

Their contrition, and the success of their detractors in getting them dropped by major corporations, raises the question: Could the close attention paid to lyrics today - mainly because of the digital age and social media - find some rappers toning down their words, or compromising artistry, to satisfy others?

Ebro Darden, the program director of New York’s Hot 97 radio station, thinks rappers may become more mindful, but isn’t convinced this is a tipping point in the genre. “I think they’ll be more cautious about the disrespect they show toward a specific situation,” he said. “I think hiphop is a culture of people speaking what they feel and see. ... I think it does get out of balance sometimes and I think that’s the main issue people have with hip-hop.” Others see Lil Wayne and Ross’ situations as blips that won’t shake up how rap stars approach their music.

“Folks in hip-hop are going to use freedom of expression,” said Cori Murray, the entertainment director at Essence. “I don’t see them self-editing themselves.” There are still plenty of examples of vulgarities dominating in rap, including pop hits

File photo shows Rick Ross performing at the BET Hip-Hop Honors at Boisfeuillet Jones Atlanta Civic Center, in Atlanta.

such as Kendrick Lamar’s “(Expletive), Don’t Kill My Vibe” and A$AP Rocky’s “(Expletive) Problems.” The use of gay slurs has been toned down, though rappers like Tyler, the Creator still say them regularly. But even for a genre known for using outrageous words to convey a message, some thought Lil Wayne went too far. On a remix of rapper-producer Future’s song, “Karate Chop,” Lil Wayne compared a sex act to the beating that killed 14-year-old Emmett Till in Mississippi. PepsiCo cut ties with Lil Wayne in May; it was the same week the company pulled an online Mountain Dew ad - developed by Tyler, the Creator - that was criticized for portraying racial stereotypes and making light of violence toward women.

Steve Stoute, the former record label boss and advertising executive who has worked with Jay-Z and Mary J. Blige, believes Lil Wayne and Ross did no harm - and nothing they haven’t done before. “Lil Wayne’s fans know he wasn’t being disrespectful ... he was trying to make a point, which in hip-hop you will sometimes go as ridiculous as he went to make a point,” said Stoute, who added that the rappers shouldn’t alter their lyrics. “I think Lil Wayne and Rick Ross and every other artist should do exactly what they’ve always done to become the special thing that they are.” Ross rapped about giving a woman the drug MDMA, known as Molly, and having his way with her in Rocko’s song “U.O.E.N.O.” Reebok ended its relationship with Ross in April after the women’s group UltraViolet held several protests, including one outside a Reebok

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File photo shows Justin Bieber performs at the MGM Grand Garden Arena in Las Vegas. — AP

File photo shows Lil Wayne performs at the iHeart Radio Music Festival at the MGM Grand Arena in Las Vegas.

—AP photos

File photo shows LL Cool J arrives at the 55th annual Grammy Awards, in Los Angeles. store in New York City. The sneaker brand said it was not happy with how 37-year-old Ross handled the situation (Ross apologized for his lyrics twice before he was dropped, but only acknowledged the seriousness of his words after Reebok let him go). “I bet you (Ross) wasn’t thinking that was going to happen when he was writing that lyric,” John Legend said of the backlash the burly rapper received, with whom he has collab-

ustin Bieber apologized by phone to Bill Clinton, the former president’s office said Thursday, for cursing Clinton and spraying his photo with cleaning fluid in a New York City restaurant kitchen earlier this year. The pop star also had repercussions from a tour stop in Chicago earlier this week when city officials said Bieber was listed as an underage guest on a citation that police issued to a nightclub. Clinton’s office said Thursday the pop star called and “he apologized and offered to help the Clinton Foundation.” Clinton’s office declined to provide any other details.

A video released Wednesday by TMZ.com shows the 19-yearold Bieber urinating in a mop bucket as he and others race through the restaurant kitchen. Before exiting, Bieber sprays the Clinton photo and drops the F-bomb in reference to the former president. Bieber tweeted to his more than 41 million followers Wednesday night, thanking Clinton “for taking the time to talk.”

Bieber tweeted: “Your words meant alot. #greatguy.” Separately, Chicago Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection

orated three times. “Now people will think twice about stepping in that territory and making light of it ... and if that’s the effect of people protesting then maybe that’s a good effect.”

Lyrics from rap icons like Tupac Shakur and the Notorious B.I.G. were sometimes raw and vulgar, but they didn’t have contracts with major companies like rappers do today. Hip-hop performers have become the faces for many top brands: Nicki Minaj has a contract with PepsiCo; Snoop Dogg has had endorsements with Hot Pockets and Monster Energy; and Jay-Z, rap’s ultimate businessman, has had a plethora of partnerships, including Duracell, Reebok and recently Samsung to debut his album, “Magna Carta Holy Grail,” released this week.

“When these companies go into business with artists, they know what they’re getting into.

It’s not a surprise what kind of record Lil Wayne makes. He’s Lil Wayne,” said Rick Rubin, who has worked with the Beastie Boys, Public Enemy, Run D.M.C. and dozens of other rock and rap icons. “There’s a reason they want to be associated with him: because of the kind of records he makes.” Stoute echoed that. “(Pepsi) went in business and (Wayne) was already locked up in jail for having a gun, but now they’re going to get rid of him because of the Emmett Till line?”

Stoute said. — AP

spokeswoman Jennifer Lipford confirmed Thursday that the 19year-old Bieber was listed as an underage guest on a citation of Bodi nightclub. Police cited the club early Wednesday for admitting and knowingly having an underage person in the establishment, she said.

Bieber performed in a concert at Chicago’s United Center on Tuesday evening. The next step is for the citation to go to an administrative hearing. The club faces a fine of up to $1,000. A date hasn’t been set. Bodi issued a statement saying Bieber made a brief appearance to support a friend who is a DJ and was performing at the nightclub. The club said Bieber was not served alcohol. “Neither Justin nor anyone affiliated with Bodi broke any laws,” the statement said. “We believe this matter amounts to a simple misunderstanding with local police officers.”—AP

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

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fter chasing festival-goers through the cobbled streets of Pamplona, a huge black fighting bull now hangs from one leg, blood gushing out of its throat. The half-tonne beast is being drained of blood in the patio of the bullring where it was slain by a matador following the morning chase. Like all the bulls killed in the San Fermin festival in this northern Spanish city, it will soon head to a slaughterhouse to be prepared and then sold in butcher shops.

“It’s very common here in Pamplona for a housewife to buy 10 kilos, 15 kilos and freeze it to eat at Christmas or on special occasions,” says one local butcher, Patxi Jimenez Arellano, 44. A former sociologist, he now stands behind the counter in the butcher’s shop founded by his father in the historic heart of Pamplona.

“People experience the bull during the whole process. They look at it in the holding pen, watch it in the bull run and in the ring, and finally they eat it. It’s like closing a circle,” he says.

The most popular dish is a stew made with the choicest bits of meat from the bull, but all parts of it are eaten. The feet are cooked with peppers, the tail is chopped up and stewed with tomatoes, onions and carrots-and the testicles are breaded and fried to make a dish called “criadillas”. It is not just the taste that locals love-many believe eating bull will give them the strength of

one, said Julio Flames, the chef and owner of La Nuez, considered one of the best restaurants in Pamplona. “I don’t believe in that kind of thing. But like all things in life, if you believe something gives you strength, maybe it does,” said the 33-year-old Venezuelan, who keeps his skateboard in his kitchen.

“There is a lot of romanticism, people love to think they are eating the bull that was killed by a matador,” added Flames, who likes to listen to heavy metal bands like Black Sabbath while he cooks. The bulls used to be dismembered at the bullring after they were killed in a bullfight and the animals’ testicles cooked on the spot. But health regulations introduced in 2002 due to the outbreak of mad cow disease put an end to the tradition. The bulls must now be taken to a slaughterhouse within an hour of being killed in the ring.

Before the animal is hauled away, a butcher drains it of its blood. A team of three mules decorated with colored ribbons and bells drag the dead bull by the horns from the arena to the patio, where a forklift hoists it in the air by one of its hind legs. A butcher wearing dark blue pants and a red shirt to hide the blood stains then repeatedly jabs a 20-centimetre (8-inch) knife into the bull’s throat, causing several litres of blood to pour out into a plastic container. Another man hoses the cement floor of the patio to

wash away any blood that oozes out from the wounds suffered by the animal in the bullring.

When the bull arrives at the slaughterhouse, three young men dressed in white immediately set to work with knives and electric saws to skin it, chop off its legs and head and remove its innards.

The team took just under half an hour on Wednesday to skin and dismember a 550-kilo bull called Jocundo that was killed in the ring by top matador Julian Lopez Escobar, also known as “El Juli”.

The bull’s carcass will hang in a freezer at the slaughterhouse for a few days while health inspections are carried out, before it is chopped into smaller bits and sold. The 48 bulls used in the eight bull runs of the annual San Fermin fiesta which wraps up on Sunday will produce around 14,000 kilos of meat products. “That is enough bull for all the butcher shops in Pamplona,” said Arellano. He says the meat should be frozen to tenderize it. “It is like game meat, it is very strong. It is great with red wine-with chocolate even,” he added. — AFP

Goldfish swim in a cross over fish tanks as part of art exhibition ‘Art Aquarium’ during a press preview in Tokyo yesterday. The exhibition, designed by aquarist Hidetomo Kimura, will begin from July 13 through September 23. — AFP

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Iranian art collector Ali Bakhtiari speaks about an artwork at his house in Tehran.

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ome arrived in Porsches or BMWs, which were whisked away by valet parking attendants. The hotel lobby was awash with the celebrated and powerful including A-list actors, well-known artists and captains of commerce. For one glimmering moment late last month, the Iranian capital was the talk of the world’s art market after 80 works sold for $2 million, astonishing a country whose economy is battered by Western sanctions but still has pockets of wealth looking for investment havens for their money. This is the other side to Tehran - hidden by walls surrounding elite enclaves or in highrise towers with doormen - that has more in common with well-heeled spots in Manhattan or London.

Many in the gilded set of Tehran come from old merchant families. Others made it big in newer ventures: the export trade with the Gulf or the city’s still-hot real estate market, where prime residential property prices in the overcrowded capital can reach Tokyo-level rates of $10,000 per square meter, or $929 per square foot. Signs of wealth still appear in Tehran even as sanctions bite deeper over the country’s nuclear program. Car dealers get orders - even at inflated price tags because of import complications - for a $300,000 Mercedes Benz or BMWs at $200,000 each. Ice cream flaked with edible gold dust was a signature dish at the rotating restaurant atop Tehran’s 435-meter (1,427-foot) Milad Tower.

Officials chagrined by the extravagance banned the dessert in 2011, as tightening sanctions have led to shortages of medicine and protests over the soaring price of chicken. Iran’s stumbling economy has become such a political issue that it dominated debates before June’s presidential election. The winner, Hasan Rouhani, has pledged to try to reverse painful inflation now running at about 30 percent and work to ease sanctions. The art auction - Tehran’s second such event in the past year - offered a rare window into the investment strategies of the city’s rich, whose route to acquire assets overseas has been complicated by sanctions that bumped Iran from main international banking networks. Now some of Iran’s wealth increasingly appears drawn to the rising profile and prices of Iranian art in galleries from Dubai to Los Angeles.

In April, the painting “The Secret Garden” by Iranian artist Farhad Moshiri brought the highest price at a Christie’s auction in Dubai at $987,750. “They have learned that artworks have business and investment aspects while also having a high cultural and social prestige,” said Saeed Leilaz, a prominent economic analyst in Tehran. Iran’s ruling clerics - who once even banned music in the years after the 1979 Islamic Revolution - now encourage Iran’s vast artistic community that includes such luminaries as Oscar-winning director Asghar Farhadi. But there are limits. Strict bans are in place on anything that hints too strongly of political dissent or criticism of the theocracy.

Other artists have faced prosecution for alleged support of opposition movements. This month Iranian director Jafar

Two Iranian women look at paintings in an art gallery in Tehran, Iran.

Panahi appeared via Skype at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival in the Czech Republic after the screening of his film, “Closed Curtain,” which he made in defiance of censors while under house arrest. Authorities imposed a 20-year filmmaking ban on Panahi in 2010 after his conviction on charges of “making propaganda” against Iran’s ruling system. The works on the auction block at Tehran’s high-end Azadi Hotel - the former Hyatt near the infamous Evin Prison - played it safe, however.

The collection, such as the 1970 painting “The Body of Trees,” avoided any political overtones.

That piece, by the late painter and poet Sohrab Sepeheri, brought the highest price of the auction, about $220,000. The buyer, the private Pasargad Bank, already has bought more than 140 artworks in recent years as part of plans for a museum. A photo entitled “Weeping Cow,” by the internationally renowned film director Abbas Kiarostami, fetched $22,000 when the gavel came down. It was wielded by celebrity auctioneer Reza Kianian, a veteran film and television actor who has won the Iranian equivalent of an Academy Award.

“I did not expect that all works could be sold,” Kianian said.

“The excitement was very high, and that pushed me to raise the offers.” A photo by Jamshid Bayrami on the hajj, or Islamic

pilgrimage to Saudi Arabia, was sold for about $6,000.Bayrami’s works have been sold previously at Sotheby’s auctions in London and Qatar. “Many know that investment cannot be limited to real estate, gold and carpets,” the photographer said. “It also shows the strength of Iranian art lovers and artists.”The manager of the auction, Ali Reza Samei Azar, said he had hoped to top last year’s auction that brought in $1.3 million, but the sinking economy initially made him think they “were dreaming.” “We rarely see the sale of 100 percent of artworks in international auctions,” Samei Azar gushed after the 3 1/2-hour event on June 28. “Iranian society has shown that art can be an investment.” He described many of the buyers as “young and Western educated.” “It was exciting,” Samei Azar said. “One-third of buyers were new buyers. It shows the growth potential for Iran’s art market.”— AP

In this picture taken on Monday, July 1, 2013, Iranians visit an art gallery with paintings in Tehran, Iran. — AP

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Couples dress up to perform a danzon, a slow-moving dance from Cuba, in Ciudadela Park in Mexico City, Mexico. — MCT photos

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A Mexican couple dances to the danzon.

A Mexican couple dances to the danzon.

A Mexican couple dances to the danzon.

Couples perform a danzon.

very Saturday of the year, hundreds of couples converge on a shady park in this capital to embrace one another in the slowmoving, genteel dance known as the danzon. Many of the men appear transported from the 1930s and 1940s in zoot suits with loose-fitting jackets and high-waist tapered pants. Fedoras, graced with a lone feather, top off the retro look. The women balance on high heels, waving fans to shoo away the heat.

Danzon lives on in corners of Mexico even though it has virtually died out in Cuba, where it evolved in the 19th century from dances and rhythms originating in Europe and Africa centuries earlier. It is a precise, elegant dance, with the men leading in a three-step movement, dipping and swirling their partners in delicate but restrained style. “It is a dance in which the partners touch each other in a discreet way,” said Jose Luis Ceron Mireles, a sociologist and expert on danzon (pronounced dahn-SONE). “They don’t look at each other directly. They glance at each other out of the corners of their eyes.

That’s where the sensuality lies.” To this day in public parks in Veracruz, Merida and Mexico City, as well as ballrooms in other cities, fans of the dance turn out by the hundreds while bands known as danzoneras, replete with marimbas, trumpets, drums and percussive instruments made from gourds and known as guiros, coax the music forth. “See that guy with the hat with the feather in it? They are called pachucos. They dress like they are from the 1940s,” said Vicente Carranza Navarro as he took a break in Mexico City’s Balderas Avenue Park, where danzon is played every Saturday.

Pachuco is an old school Mexican slang term referring to a style of dress developed in northern Mexico and in El Paso, Texas, more than

six decades ago. A basic staple is the fedora with the lone feather. “I have been doing danzon for 45 years,” said Carranza, 63, who wore a blue guayabera, the loose-fitting square-tailed shirt commonly worn in the Caribbean and along Mexico’s Gulf Coast.

The park was filled with people in their 60s and 70s or older but a smattering of young people, and even children, mixed in.”My mom would come here and bring me along, so I started to learn,” said Carla Bocanegra, a 23-year-old whose partner wore an elegant white striped suit and a panama hat. “I come all Saturdays, every last one.”

Danzon developed in Cuba in the mid-1800s with roots in the English line dance known as contradance and the French square dancelike quadrille, two styles that arrived in Cuba from British invaders and French colonists fleeing the Haitian Revolution. The dance forms blended with African rhythms to make a fusion of African and European movement.

With its far-flung rhythms merged into a quintessentially Creole form, the danzon allowed people of all races and social strata to intermingle. Itinerant Cuban theater and music companies arriving in the Mexican port of Veracruz and the Yucatan city of Merida brought danzon with them.

“They’d play in the parks and on the wharves,” Ceron said.

“People danced in the open air.” As the decades passed, other dance forms evolved in Cuba, like the mambo, cha-cha-cha and salsa.

Danzon took root and grew in Mexico.

“The triumph of danzon has come outside its country of origin. It’s only in Mexico where the danzon carries on,” Ceron said. “I went to Cuba two years ago, and it is no longer there. Danzon is dying out.

They only dance salsa,” Carranza said. In an essay on the musical form, Ceron wrote that the elegant swing dance “has the particular characteristic that ... after each refrain, the woman fans her face and the man wipes the sweat from his brow, wooing each other as they do so.” In the early years, the dance had a whiff of iniquity, made stronger by a historical incident on Nov 18, 1901, during the rule of dictator Porfirio Diaz. That night, police raided a house in which they found 41 men, 19 of them dressed as women. The raid is said to have occurred just as a danzon was being played.

A rumor at the time said Diaz’s son-in-law was among the upperclass men present at the dance. To this day, “41” remains a symbol in Mexico of taboo. Some high-rises don’t have a floor 41, and it’s rare to find a house along a street numbered 41.

By the 1920s, after Mexico’s revolution, times had changed, and ballroom salons opened in the capital, bringing a true explosion of danzon, especially in the city’s premier venue, Salon Mexico, where throngs lined up to enter its multiple ballrooms. Cuban and Mexican musicians filled the dance halls. Benjamin Muratalla, deputy director of the Fonoteca, a national archive of popular music and street sounds in Mexico, said the danzon incorporates many elements of African culture along with its European roots. “Danzon has a big dose of black cultures its sensuality, its elegance, that snappy tropical rhythm all come from there,” Muratalla said.—MCT

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

The Little Free Library box instructs passers by to take a book, leave a book in Nevada City, California.

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he docents of the diminutive Golden Drift Museum in the Placer County, Calif, hamlet of Dutch Flat are proud of their collection of historical artifacts and photos. So imagine their surprise when an out-of-town couple arrived to get a photograph of themselves next to the book-lending kiosk out front. A lot of people have taken notice of Little Free Libraries. Since 2009, the movement has grown from a one-box memorial that a Wisconsin man built for his bookloving mother to an international movement with more than 8,000 locations.

There are no memberships, identification cards or late fees. A small structure is set up, usually looking like a dollsize house on a post. A sign on the house asked visitors to “take a book, leave a book.” Little Free Library sites have been set up in various Sacramento region communities.

Statewide there are more than 150.

The Dutch Flat Little Free Library was set up about a year ago, but it wasn’t until recently that Placer County officials and literacy advocates celebrated the installation the county’s first. Supported by volunteers and Placer County’s Literacy Support Council, the county now has five locations.

“We just saw this Little Free Library as a way to get out into the community,” said Miriam Chipp, president of the council.

She said the project, spearheaded by former board member David McAfee, is in keeping with their mission to expand adult literacy.

“It makes reading available. It makes books available,” Chipp said. Alta resident Heidi Johnson serves as the steward for the Little Free Library. The other Placer County Little Free Library boxes are within buildings chosen to reach audiences that might need reading help. In many ways, the Dutch Flat location is the most in tune with the Little Free Library movement. Most are installed and artfully decorated by residents hoping to make a small difference in their communities. Each site has a steward to occasionally check in on the box.

“These aren’t just about books; they are about community,” said Rick Brooks, who founded the project along with fellow Wisconsin resident Todd Bol, who built the first library to

This box in Dutch Flat, California, is one of several supported by Placer County’s Literary Support Council.

honor his mother. Brooks said he was surprised at how fast it has caught on. He said the boxes create a sense of community in the neighborhoods where they’re located and in the broader community, with people traveling miles to visit locations.

Little Free Library, through its website (littlefreelibrary.org), enrolls new stewards, sells various-style boxes and maintains a worldwide map of each site, including GPS coordinates. The movement runs counter to the

A Little Free Library box is shown outside of Grass Valley. — MCT photos

steady rise in electronic book usage. About 23 percent of Americans age 16 and over used an e-book in 2012, up from 16 percent in 2011, according to Pew Research data.

Meanwhile the percentage of people who read printed books dropped from 72 percent to 67 percent during the same time period.

“I think people are feeling nostalgic for books because of all the digital stuff,” said Molly Fisk, a Nevada City resident who placed a Little Free Library outside her home. She said people like to pass along good books, event if it’s indirectly.

“There is a long history of people saying, ‘Here is a good book, read it,’” Fish said. Joaquin Feliciano is the steward of two Little Free Libraries in Davis, one outside his home and one at the Davis Food Co-op.

Feliciano figured he’d kill three birds with one stone: build community, use up some extra lumber and expose himself to new books. “Part of my motivation also came from a simmering frustration over the Davis branch of the Yolo County public library having to cut back on its open hours due to budget cuts,” Feliciano said.

Within the first 24 hours he had his first donation of books and it hasn’t let up. “During the warm months, I enjoy sitting quietly on my front porch in the evenings and seeing who all comes up to check out the offerings,” Feliciano said. “It’s a little like Christmas whenever you stop by. You just don’t know what’s going to be there. And once you’ve donated, it can be kind of fun to see if your own book is still there.” — MCT

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Perfumed oil created by Jennifer Nicholson are displayed.

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esigner, retailer and Hollywood royalty Jennifer Nicholson, who once headlined Los Angeles Fashion Week and showed her collections in New York, has returned to fashion after a nearly fiveyear hiatus. Her new venture is Pearl Drop, a Venice, Calif, boutique with a “boho goddess festival vibe,” opened just in time to dress customers for this month’s Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, one of Nicholson’s favorite springtime excursions. Located on Lincoln Boulevard in the up-and-coming retail area known as the Linc that’s become an alternative to crowded Abbot Kinney, Pearl Drop showcases mostly California-based labels, plus pieces that Nicholson has designed herself under the Pearl Drop label. “The LA fashion scene has changed so much in the past 10 years,” says Nicholson, 49. “There are so many more designers making things here. And fashion in LA is really respected. Designers like Rodarte’s Kate and Laura Mulleavy have really upped the ante. When I was starting out, I did sales through Showroom Seven in New York. Now, they have an office in LA Downtown is revived. It’s really happening, which is why it’s possible now to open a store featuring designers who are primarily from here.”

Pearl Drop is a play on Pearl, which was the name of Nicholson’s Santa Monica, Calif, store that closed in 2005. Her old store was very “girly debutante on acid,” she says, as was her collection back then. “I loved that, but I didn’t really dress that way. This is the way I dress,” she says of the haute hippie Pearl Drop, which is located near several of her favorite Venice haunts, including General Store and Moon Juice.

Antique silver Native American jewelry is displayed.

The interior is eclectic and light-filled, with baroque-looking antiques culled from Nicholson’s Malibu beach house. She describes the look as one part “underwater beachy, mermaid grotto” (a glass side table with pink seahorses for a base; a sea foam green velvet, scallop shell-shaped couch with carved wood mermaids for legs; and a glass pirate ship chandelier) and one part “glorified yoga shop,” with mystic crystals, feathers and framed butterfly displays.

Nicholson, who is the daughter of Jack Nicholson and his first wife, Sandra Knight, recently took up Kundalini yoga after a bad breakup

Jewelry displayed on the pages of an open book at Jennifer Nicholson’s new boutique, Pearl Drop, in Venice, California. — MCT photos

and plans to offer libations from Moon Juice and workshops with her yoga teacher in the store’s outdoor courtyard space. “So you never want to leave,” she says. She even created a leather turban for her collection inspired by the traditional clothing she wears during her practice.

On the racks and shelves are Gregory Parkinson caftans made of over-dyed Indian fabric GoldDust one-of-a-kind floaty print dresses ,Goddis fringed cardigans and ponchos; Alex & Lee artisanal crystal collage necklaces , Heyoka fringed leather bags and neck pieces and Calleen Cordero sandals. Mixed in are vintage pieces, including a fringed suede wrap skirt, embroidered denim jacket and beaded moccasins. Carried over from Nicholson’s old store, a wood and glass display with a sign overhead that says “Beauty Bar” showcases an expansive selection of jewelry, including shell rings, clear bracelets with dried flowers encased inside, serpent rings by Jessica Seaton, and vintage silver and turquoise Native American pieces. There are also beauty products, including body oils, bath salts and lip balms, from Rodin, Sweet Sisters and Persephone.

Nicholson’s own designs are also featured, including brightly colored leather biker jackets with zipper pulls molded into the shape of shark’s teeth, and high-waist leather pants with lacing at the ankles. “I love vintage leather pants from the 1970s, but when you put them on, you’re so stiff, you can’t walk. Now there are all these amazing stretch leathers to work with,” she says.

Nicholson has made caftans and kimonos in prints created with LA artist Alia Penner. One print is a collage of jewels, along with the Pearl Drop logo. Another, which is used as a lining in the leather jackets, mixes naked 1970s pinups with images of seashells.

“I’m just doing pieces I want to do, not whole categories, so I can go at my own pace,” says Nicholson, who made her first foray into fashion in 2002, launching her line after a short-lived acting career. Back then, she took inspiration from the 1950s, with short, ruffle-back skirts and waitress shirts with the names of her dogs embroidered on the fronts.

Saks Fifth Avenue and Henri Bendel picked up a few pieces from the line, and there was an editorial in Italian Vogue.

Her campy, fun fashion shows were a mainstay at Los Angeles Fashion Week for a few years, but when she started showing in New York, she wasn’t able to break through to the next level. The grind of the fashion system was getting to her, too, she says, especially the constant travel for runway shows and sales. So she took a break to raise her kids Sean is 17 and Duke is 13. About two years ago, Nicholson started designing again, working on leather pieces and selling them at Roseark. She missed the creative process, but also “interacting with customers and making people happy,” she says. “And I felt like there was a niche to fill in this area higher-end beach vibe.”—MCT

Clu tops and Goddis knits and necklace by Alex & Lee are displayed.

Kimonos designed by Jennifer Nicholson.

Vintage clothing mixes with new designs at Jennifer Nicholson’s new boutique.

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Mimi Fery poses for a photograph Tuesday, July 9, 2013, in New York.— AP photos

This undated photo provided by her family on July 9, 2013 shows Sidonie Fery in New York.

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dozen years ago, a 10-year-old girl wrote a message on a scrap of paper, placed it in a ginger-ale bottle and launched it into the waters off Long Island. Now, that bottle has been discovered amid a beach strewn with debris from Superstorm Sandy.

The girl who cast that bottle into the bay is dead, but her message has been passed along to her grieving mother.

“I was just sobbing when I heard they had found it,” Mimi Fery said of the workers in the Long Island village of Patchogue, who not only found the message in the bottle, but called the woman and arranged for its ultimate return. “These are very, very kind people.”

This weekend, Fery will return to the seaside village about 95 kilometres east of Manhattan where she will again thank the workers and attend a ceremony where a small plaque will be dedicated as a remembrance to Sidonie Fery, village officials said. The 18-year-old died in a 2010 fall from a cliff in Switzerland.

A bottle containing a message by Sidonie Fery is shown Tuesday, July 9, 2013, in New York.

Fery described her only child as a creative youngster, who was always writing poetry. She knew instantly when told what the message contained that it had been written by Sidonie because it was a quote from Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure, the girl’s favourite film. Fery also takes a second meaning from the message, one not to worry about Sidonie, who died after falling off a cliff with another student while attending boarding school.

“Be excellent to yourself, dude,” Fery said, quoting the message.

“It makes so much sense.” Described as a “very artistic and vivacious young woman,” Fery said Sidonie always had an independent streak; she travelled by herself to visit relatives in Iran every summer beginning when she was about seven years old, her mother said.

Born on Sept 11, 1991, the little girl was often teased and harassed after the terror attacks on her 10th birthday by people who didn’t understand her Persian heritage, her mother said. “She had to

deal with a lot of things,” Fery said. “But she stood her ground.” The bottle only travelled a mile or two westward from where it was likely deposited to the location where parks workers found it just before Thanksgiving last year. It was intermingled with broken docks, boating gear and a spectrum of sea trash. Because the note included Fery’s New York City phone number, the worthless piece of trash is now a priceless memento.—AP

Marlo Miyashiro has helped some 1,400 craftspeople find a market via the website Etsy Rain. — MCT photos

Marlo Miyashiro, who makes sterling-silver jewelry, has used the online platform of Etsy to expand her business and unite other artists.

would wear for my own wedding,” Brooks said. The NordstromEtsy deal is part of a national trend, says Paco Underhill, author of “What Women Want: The Global Marketplace Turns Female Friendly.” He said there’s a “sea of sameness” in the items national chains stock. He said with Etsy, consumers are finding unique products.

The receiver of any gift from the site will look at their gift and connect with it more simply because they know someone made that item by hand, Underhill said. For artists like Miyashiro and Brooks, the online platform propels them beyond a crafts fair and helps them navigate the e-commerce-sales channel. Etsy charges sellers 20 cents to list an item for up to for four months and collects a 3.5 percent transaction fee on each sale.

Dayna Isom, a public relations specialist for Etsy, said in an email the decline in availability of full-time jobs means the economy is moving in the direction of independent and nontraditional work. She said 77 percent of Etsy shop owners are women. “The barriers to turn an idea into a product, and market it to a global

audience, have decreased dramatically,” Isom said.

With lower barriers comes a new set of challenges. Miyashiro is one of the founding members and current organizer of Etsy Rain, a community of more than 1,400 artists in Washington state’s Puget Sound region who own independent shops on Etsy.

The group started with just 11 people in 2007 but slowly developed into “this great excuse to get out of their studios and meet,” said Miyashiro. Its goal is to bring Etsy sellers together and to support people looking to start their own shop. “You have to know what your personal brand is,” she said. “The more authentic that brand is, the more likely you are going to find people who will resonate with that message. It’s not an easy thing to do.”— MCT

M

arlo Miyashiro starts with a sheet of sterling silver. She then uses wires, pliers, a jeweler saw and small torch to transform the sheet into sterling-silver charms and etch comic-book phrases like “Kapow!” or “Zing!” on them. Or she engraves on silver promise rings “I love you.” The Seattle jewelry maker started selling her art 20 years ago at craft fairs and eventually in more than 200 stores. Now she displays photos of each of her creations with a catchy description like “Do you have a special saying between the two of you?” and “Maybe you just want to make them laugh?” on Etsy.com, an online site where people sell handmade crafts and jewelry.

“Technology moves so fast that having a place like Etsy was a welcome find,” said Miyashiro, who has shipped 431 orders from her Etsy store I Make Cute Stuff since 2007. Etsy started eight years ago in Brooklyn, NY It now has more than 900,000 active shops and more than 25 million members. Last year those sellers generated $895 million, a 70 percent increase from $525.6 million in sales in 2011.

Traditional retailers have caught on. Seattle retailer Nordstrom launched in June its second collaboration with the e-commerce site called “Etsy and Nordstrom Present: Weddings.” The 80-piece collection, available in select stores and online, features handcrafted work of five Etsy artists, including one from Seattle.

Andrea Wasserman, national bridal director for Nordstrom, said the Seattle retailer was attracted to Etsy because that’s where “people go to find art accessories that really come with a story.”

“We want those pieces to be part of what we have to offer in the Nordstrom wedding suites,” Wasserman said. Seattle artist Erin Brooks said she read Nordstrom’s message 10 times because she was in such disbelief that they selected her items. Her “Marguerite” Bridal Sash comes with a price tag of $398.

Brooks said she started her store Serephine three years ago to sell vintage-inspired bridal sashes and hair pieces. She said she remembers buying a headpiece for her own wedding from a vendor in Australia but was disappointed she could see dried hot glue on it. After making her cousin a headpiece and a few more, she decided to launch her site full time.

“I try to make things that will stand the test of time and that I

TECHNOLOGY

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Norway mulls broadband coverage in the Arctic TAVANGER: Norway may provide high-speed Internet in one of the few places on Earth where it’s not available: The Arctic.

The Norwegian Space Center has teamed up with Telenor Satellite Broadcasting to assess the feasibility of a new satellite system covering northern areas outside the reach of current geostationary communications satellites.

Space center director Bo Andersen on Thursday told The Associated Press the system could be in place in the early 2020s if it gets the necessary funding from private and public sources. The estimated cost is 2 billion-4 billion kroner ($330 million-$650 million).

Demand for high-speed Internet in the Arctic is expected to grow as shipping, fishing and oil companies move north amid warming temperatures and melting ice. Last year, summer sea ice cover in the Arctic fell to the lowest extent on record. Geostationary satellites, which are in orbit over the equator, provide coverage up to 75 degrees north, Andersen said. But above that latitude, the signals become too weak, and the only option is another satellite network that can only handle voice and limited data service.

“We see very clearly that there is an increasing need for broadband in the high Arctic,” Andersen said. Ola Anders Skauby, a spokesman for Norwegian energy company Statoil, said “new satellite solutions would be beneficial” as the offshore industry moves north in search of oil and gas. “Our plans for the Arctic depend on a number of issues: safe operations, logistics, weather conditions and more,” he said. “Broadband coverage is part of this picture and for operations in some regions further north than where current operations are taking place development of new solutions for high-capacity broadband ... will be needed.” Canada’s space agency has been studying a similar system. Spokeswoman Melanie Beauchesne said the agency has completed feasibility studies but is still talking with potential public and private partners in Canada and abroad “to determine their level of interest and potential collaboration scenario to bring about the future realization of this mission.”— AP

GREENLAND: In this file photo, an iceberg floats in the sea near Qeqertarsuaq, Disko Island. Norway is looking into providing high-speed Internet in one of the few places on Earth where itís not available. — AP

EU raids telecoms firms BRUSSELS: The European Union said Thursday that its inspectors raided the offices of several telecommunications companies this week to see if they had abused their dominant position in the global market for Internet traffic.

The European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, said the probe is centered on Internet connectivity - how providers use wholesale services to connect their customers with websites.

Germany’s Deutsche Telekom and France’s Orange were among the targeted companies and both said that earlier investigations by national authorities had already come up emptyhanded.

Such raids are an initial step in investigations to see if abuse effectively takes place and the Commission insisted it did not mean any of the companies raided were guilty of anti-competitive behavior. The European Commission has wide ranging authority in such probes and its fines can sometimes reach in the hundreds of millions of euros (dollars).—AP

SAN FRANCISCO: Microsoft store employee Judy Thao gives a search demonstration on a Fujitsu tablet at a Microsoft event in San Francisco. — AP

Microsoft reboots with sweeping reorganization SAN FRANCISCO: Microsoft Corp. has decided its entire business needs a new operating system. CEO Steve Ballmer is restructuring the company to cope with a quickening pace of technological change that has left the world’s largest software maker a step behind its two biggest rivals, Apple and Google.

In an effort to catch up, Microsoft is dismantling a management structure that separated the company into sometimes disjointed divisions and hatching a more cohesive product line-up. The new set up revolves around software, devices and services connecting those devices to applications stored in remote data centers - a concept that has become known as “cloud computing.”

The move comes amid a lukewarm response to the latest version of Microsoft’s flagship Windows operating system and a steady decline in demand for personal computers as people increasingly rely on more convenient smartphones and tablets.

If things pan out the way Ballmer envisions, the shake-up announced Thursday will foster more rapid innovation and sharpen the company’s focus on countering the threat posed by mobile devices running on software made by Apple and Google while laptop and desktop computers powered by Windows lose their luster. He is hoping a more closely-knit organization making the software and services that run smartphones, tablets, the Xbox video game console and, yes, PCs will re-establish Microsoft’s reputation as “a company that helps people get stuff done.” “We are ready to take Microsoft in bold new directions,” Ballmer told analysts and reporters during a conference call. Ballmer, 57, can’t afford to lose his way now. If he does, Microsoft could be even further eclipsed by its rivals. That, in turn, could disillusion investors already exasperated with the lackluster performance of Microsoft’s stock since Ballmer succeeded his close friend, company co-founder Bill Gates, as CEO 13 years ago.

During Ballmer’s reign, Microsoft’s stock has slipped by nearly 40 percent even as the company’s annual revenue has roughly quadrupled from $20 billion to nearly $80 billion. The bellwether Standard & Poor’s 500 has climbed by 14 percent during the same time while Apple’s stock price is nearly 17 times higher. By the time Google went public, Ballmer had already been Microsoft’s CEO for four years. Since then, Google’s stock has risen tenfold. Both Apple and Google now boast higher total market values than Microsoft.

Microsoft’s stock gained 99 cents Thursday to close at $35.69. The shares have surged 24 percent in the past three months, partly because the company’s revenue is holding up better than many analysts expected, despite five consecutive quarters of declining PC sales.

Some recent buyers of Microsoft’s stock had been betting the company would do something even more dramatic, such as spinning off a division or shedding its unprofitable Internet search engine, Bing, said BGC Financial analyst Colin Gillis. Neither of those appears likely, now that Ballmer has reshuffled the business.

Gillis views the changes as Ballmer’s tacit acknowledgement that Microsoft had become bogged down in bureaucracy and secondguessing - and an admission that there was too much internal strife as

various factions formed to protect their turf. “We have to make the right decisions more quickly,” Ballmer said. The company’s motto now: “One Microsoft all the time.” Ballmer appears to have the right idea, although it would have looked even smarter had he done it shortly after it became clear that Apple’s 2010 release of the iPad was reshaping the tech market, said Gartner Inc. analyst David Cearley.

“They are really reorganizing for the market reality that has been in place for the last three years,” Cearley said. “It would have been nice if it was done earlier, but it’s not too little too late yet. The real key is execution. All these changes make sense and I can see a path forward, but that path forward is a really rocky one.”

Most of Microsoft’s key executives will remain in positions of power at the Redmond, Wash., company although with new roles and more defined responsibilities. The company’s new divisions include engineering, marketing and business development.

Ballmer said no layoffs are planned, although analysts believe the overhaul will open the door for cost-cutting opportunities as Microsoft pulls together its disparate parts.

Terry Myerson, who had been overseeing Windows Phone, will lead Microsoft’s operating systems and engineering group, namely Windows. Qi Lu, who had been overseeing Bing, will head applications and services. Microsoft named veteran executive Julie LarsonGreen head of its devices and studios engineering group, which will be in charge of hardware development, games, music and entertainment. She had been promoted in November to lead all Windows software and hardware engineering after Steven Sinofsky, the president of its Windows and Windows Live operations, left the company shortly after the launch of Windows 8.

Tony Bates, who joined Microsoft in 2011 when the company bought video calling service Skype for $8.5 billion, will take on a key networking role as he works with the company’s key business partners and preaches about the virtues of Microsoft’s products and services.

Some of what Microsoft is doing mirrors changes that Apple and Google already have executed. For instance, Apple put its iOS software for iPhones and iPads along with its operating system for its Mac computer under one executive, Craig Federighi, in a shake-up last year. And Google’s Android software for mobile devices and Chrome software for laptops were aligned under the management of the same executive, Sundar Pichai, for the first time during the spring.

Now, Microsoft hopes to mimic the success of its rivals in a world that increasingly revolves around mobile devices and Internet services. Gartner estimates nearly 867 million devices running on Android software will be shipped worldwide this year, up from 505 million last year. Worldwide shipments of Windows-powered devices are expected to total nearly 340 million this year, down from 346 million last year, Gartner forecasts. But those Windows machines are primarily PCs, not smartphones or tablets. Apple will ship about 296 million iOS and Mac devices this year, up from 213 million last year, Gartner predicted.—AP

TECHNOLOGY

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Nokia phone’s camera in bid to regain share NEW YORK: One-time cellphone powerhouse Nokia Corp. is hoping to lure people back from iPhones and Android phones with a powerful smartphone camera that tops many point-andshoot imaging devices. The new Nokia Lumia 1020 phone is packed with innovations designed to provide sharp images, even in low light. With the phone’s 41-megapixel sensor and image-stabilizing technology, both rare in smartphones, you’re less likely to get blurry shots at night or indoors. You can also zoom in to an image and pick up details that even the naked eye will miss.

Although more expensive cameras with superior lenses can take better images, those cameras aren’t always with you. Nokia said the Lumia 1020 gives people the ability to take good pictures with a device they always carry.

Nokia said its new flagship phone will change how people take pictures, and marketing executive Chris Weber boasted that it will make pointand-shoot cameras obsolete.

NEW YORK: Nokia CEO Stephen Elop shows his company’s Nokia Lumia 1020.

The Nokia Lumia 1020, with a 41-megapixel camera, records more detail than other camera phones and even tops point-andshoot cameras. — AP But whether a good camera is enough to lure customers remains to be seen. AT&T will offer the Lumia 1020 in the U.S. for $300 with a twoyear service agreement. That’s $100 or $200 higher than what phones typically sell for. Nokia is counting on customers willing to pay more for a phone that does more. The phone runs Microsoft’s Windows Phone system, which is far behind the iPhone and Android devices in usage. Although Nokia, AT&T Inc. and Microsoft Corp. are planning a large marketing push in the U.S., no amount of marketing can overcome the fact that the Windows system still doesn’t have as many apps from outside parties as the iPhone and Android devices.

Tony Cripps, principal device analyst at the research firm Ovum, said Nokia “may still have work to do to convince prospective buyers to sacrifice favorite apps for superior imaging.” He said that leading rival devices such as Apple’s iPhone 5 and Samsung’s Galaxy S4 “effectively sell themselves, (but) the case for selecting the Lumia 1020 is less clear cut.” The Lumia 1020 will be available in the U.S. on July 26, with advance orders to begin July 16. Nokia said the phone will expand to China and Europe by September.

Other markets are planned later.

Nokia reigned as the leading phone maker for 14 years, until early last year when Samsung Electronics Co. took the top spot. Among smartphones, the lucrative business for phone makers, Nokia doesn’t even rank in research firm IDC’s top 5. In recent years, the Finnish company has been losing share to high-end devices such as the iPhone and various Android phones as well as cheaper devices from Asian manufacturers such as ZTE. Nokia has partnered with Microsoft and its Windows system in hopes of recapturing market share, but none of the new Windows phones have been hits. Weber said he believes the new camera will get people looking at Nokia and Windows phones again. The camera’s 41megapixel resolution is far higher than the iPhone 5’s 8 megapixels and the Galaxy S4’s 13 megapixels. Even point-and-shoot cameras and more expensive ones with interchangeable lenses often don’t go as high as the Lumia 1020.

More pixels mean more sensors for capturing the light that forms an image.

But the number of megapixels is just part of the story. Camera sensors have a certain amount of sensitivity known as ISO. The higher the number, the better the shot in low light. The Lumia 1020 can be set as high as ISO 3200, which is higher than the typical camera phone. The camera also comes with image-stabilization technology to compensate for shaky hands. Most phones don’t have that, meaning shutters can’t be open as long without images starting to blur.

A longer open shutter means more light can come in, allowing for decent shots in low light.

The Lumia 1020 won’t replace digital cameras with interchangeable lenses, known as DSLRs, even if its megapixel resolution is higher.

For one thing, the Lumia 1020 lacks a real zoom lens; the zoom it offers is essentially blowing up the image. By contrast, DSLRs with a telephoto lens can let you take close-up shots from afar.

The Lumia 1020 also lacks a setting for aperture, or how wide the lens is opened to let in light.

Changing the aperture can affect how much of your image is in focus.

To make photos on the Lumia 1020 easier to share, the camera actually records two versions of each image. The first is in full resolution, which you can use to zoom in or crop, or download to a computer to make large prints. A smaller version, equivalent to 5 megapixels, is also produced. That’s the one you can use to post on Facebook or Instagram without eating too much of your cellular data plan. The US version syncs with Microsoft’s SkyDrive and AT&T’s Locker storage services. Otherwise, the 32 gigabytes of storage on the device will fill up in no time.

The Lumia 1020 isn’t Nokia’s first 41megapixel phone. Its 808 PureView phone last year had the feature, too. But that phone lacks the image-stabilization technology introduced later in the year with the Lumia 920. The new phone combines the two in a shell that is made to resemble a camera. It comes in yellow, white or black. Nokia is also selling a Camera Grip attachment for $79, offering extended battery life and a case that makes you feel as if you’re holding a regular point-and-shoot camera. With the Grip, you’ll also be able to attach the phone to a tripod.

The phone’s display measures 4.5 inches diagonally, which is larger than the iPhone’s, but smaller than those on leading Android phones.

At 332 pixels per inch, the display resolution is comparable to the iPhone 5, but lags those of several Android phones. — AP

CALIFORNIA: In this Friday, June 7, 2013 file photo, a sign displays the Apple logo outside of the company’s headquarters in Cupertino, Calif. A federal judge ruled Wednesday, July 10, 2013 that Apple Inc. broke antitrust laws and conspired with publishers to raise electronic book prices, citing ‘compelling evidence’ from the words of the late Steve Jobs. — AP

Apple case cracks open e-books and all digital goods pricing WASHINGTON: A ruling by an American judge that Apple illegally conspired to fix ebook prices could boost competition in the market for all kinds of digital goods, including music and movies, analysts say.

Wednesday’s decision by a federal judge also may allow online retail giant Amazon to cement its dominance, though pricing models are still evolving.

“The consumer is the huge winner,” said David Balto, a Washington antitrust lawyer and former policy director for the Federal Trade Commission.

“Apple’s policies clearly increased prices, and if permitted Apple would have used this formula to raise prices in numerous markets.

This is a landmark decision that demonstrates the value of strong antitrust enforcement.”

US District Judge Denise Cote’s ruling followed a three-week trial in New York in June.

She concluded that Apple was liable for “facilitating and encouraging” a collective effort by five publishers to end price competition for ebooks. She has ordered a new hearing to determine damages. David Crane, a University of Michigan specialist in antitrust law, said Apple would now be heavily impeded from influencing the pricing of content.

“Whether it’s music or movies or newspapers or whatever it is, basically Apple wants to be heavily involved in reformulating the business model of how pricing is set and who decides on release dates and so forth,” Crane said. “This kind of precedent says ‘Apple: be very careful with anything other than having one-on-one negotiations with content providers.’”

The Justice Department has said it will seek interim relief and a court-ordered independent monitoring trustee. A group of 33 states are seeking unspecified damages against Apple. A class-action suit against the technology giant could also be bolstered by

judge Cote’s ruling. Apple has said it will appeal and “continue to fight against these false accusations.” Some analysts noted that the court decision could help Amazon assert its dominance in electronic books, and that the online retailer has moved to the “agency” model which Apple helped impose.

“Everybody is on agency now,” said Roger Kay, analyst at Endpoint Technology Associates. Before Apple came on the scene, Amazon used a “wholesale” model and sold e-books at the cut-rate price of $9.99 for most titles. “Amazon was taking profit out for everyone else is well,” Kay said. “Now it’s busted open. But Amazon also benefits from higher prices.”

Amazon is believed to control around twothirds of US e-book sales-down from 90 percent a few years ago-while Apple’s share is said to be around 20 percent.

E-book sales have been cooling after a few years of sizzling growth. A survey by the Association of American Publishers said 2012 growth in such sales was 41 percent-an impressive figure but below the red-hot pace of recent years including 2011, when e-book sales doubled.

Michael Weinberg, vice president at the digital advocacy group Public Knowledge, said the marketplace is still sorting out the model for e-books and other content.

He hopes the case will raise awareness that the e-book market is being constrained by digital “locks,” sometimes called digital rights management, which keep electronic content tied to one device. “If you have all these files on your Kindle, and can move them to other devices, that would help the market grow,” he said.

“While no one would argue that major publishers have fully come to terms with this lesson it is encouraging that they are at least aware enough of it to discuss it.”— AFP

TV listings SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

14:10 15:05 16:00 16:55 17:50 18:45 19:40 20:35 21:30 21:55 22:25 22:50 23:20 23:45 00:40 01:35

14:20 14:45 15:10 16:00 16:55 17:45 18:35 19:00 19:30 20:20 21:10 21:35 22:00 22:50 23:40 00:05 00:30 01:00 01:50

James May’s Man Lab James May’s Man Lab James May’s Man Lab You Have Been Warned Overhaulin’ 2012 Gold Divers Alaska: The Last Frontier Sons Of Guns How It’s Made How It’s Made How It’s Made How It’s Made How It’s Made Gang Wars Kidnap And Rescue Ultimate Cops

The Gadget Show How Tech Works What’s That About?

X-Machines Scrapheap Challenge Moon Machines Bigger, Better, Faster, Stronger Bigger, Better, Faster, Stronger What’s That About?

Human Body: Ultimate Machine The Gadget Show How Tech Works What’s That About?

Human Body: Ultimate Machine The Gadget Show How Tech Works Weird Connections Unchained Reaction Unchained Reaction

04:30 Leno 05:30 06:00 06:30 07:00 08:00 08:30 09:00 09:30 10:00 10:30 11:00 Leno 12:00 12:30 13:00 13:30 14:00 14:30 15:00 15:30 16:00 16:30 17:00 18:00 18:30 19:00 19:30 20:00 Leno 21:00 21:30 22:00 23:30 00:30 01:00 01:30

The Tonight Show With Jay Friends Hope & Faith Arrested Development Late Night With Jimmy Fallon Brothers Friends How I Met Your Mother Go On 2 Broke Girls Arrested Development The Tonight Show With Jay Hope & Faith Brothers Friends Arrested Development How I Met Your Mother 2 Broke Girls Go On The Daily Show The Colbert Report Hope & Faith Late Night With Jimmy Fallon Wilfred Happy Endings Hot In Cleveland 2 Broke Girls The Tonight Show With Jay The Daily Show The Colbert Report Saturday Night Live Syndicated Late Night With Jimmy Fallon The Daily Show The Colbert Report Saturday Night Live Syndicated

13:00 13:30 14:00 15:00 16:00 On 17:00 18:05 19:00 20:00 22:30 00:00 01:00

Coach Trip Come Dine With Me Ireland The Hungry Sailors The Jonathan Ross Show Paul McCartney & Wings: Band

05:15 05:35 06:00 06:25 06:35 06:45 07:10 07:35 07:55 08:20 08:45 09:05 09:30 09:55 10:15

Brandy & Mr Whiskers Brandy & Mr Whiskers Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Jake & The Neverland Pirates Jake & The Neverland Pirates A.N.T. Farm A.N.T. Farm Jessie That’s So Raven That’s So Raven Good Luck Charlie Shake It Up Jessie Austin And Ally A.N.T. Farm

Celebrity Fit Club USA The Chase May The Best House Win Come Dine With Me Ireland Popstar To Operastar Marco’s Kitchen Burnout Celebrity Fit Club USA

10:40 11:05 12:35 13:00 13:25 13:45 14:10 14:35 15:00 15:25 15:50 16:10 16:35 17:00 18:20 18:30 18:55 19:20 19:40 20:05 20:30 20:50 21:15 21:40 22:00 22:25

Good Luck Charlie Monsters Inc. Good Luck Charlie Shake It Up Jessie A.N.T Farm A.N.T. Farm A.N.T. Farm Austin And Ally Shake It Up Jessie Jessie A.N.T Farm Cheetah Girls: One World Prankstars That’s So Raven Jessie A.N.T Farm A.N.T. Farm A.N.T Farm Austin And Ally Austin And Ally That’s So Raven Good Luck Charlie Shake It Up A.N.T Farm

14:05 What Would Ryan Lochte Do? 14:30 What Would Ryan Lochte Do? 15:00 Keeping Up With The Kardashians 16:00 Keeping Up With The Kardashians 17:00 Married To Jonas

01:30 Private Crimes 02:00 Gangs Of Britain With Gary & Martin Kemp 03:00 Haunted Encounters: Face To Face 04:00 Jack The Ripper 05:00 Crime Stories 06:00 The FBI Files 07:00 Psychic Detectives 07:30 Psychic Detectives 08:00 Psychic Detectives 08:30 Psychic Detectives 09:00 Curious & Unusual Deaths 09:30 Private Crimes 10:00 Vanished With Beth Holloway 11:00 Vanished With Beth Holloway 12:00 Vanished With Beth Holloway 13:00 Vanished With Beth Holloway 14:00 Curious & Unusual Deaths 14:30 Private Crimes 15:00 Beyond Scared Straight 16:00 Beyond Scared Straight 17:00 Beyond Scared Straight 18:00 Beyond Scared Straight 19:00 The FBI Files 20:00 Snapped: Women Who Kill 20:30 Snapped 21:00 Cold Case Files 22:00 My Ghost Story 23:00 Mobsters

14:00 15:00 16:00 17:00 18:00 19:00 20:00 21:00 22:00 23:00 00:00 01:00 02:00

C.S.I. Miami Glee Smallville The Ellen DeGeneres Show C.S.I. Miami Body Of Proof C.S.I. New York White Collar Top Gear (US) Smallville Glee White Collar Top Gear (US)

03:00 How I Met Your Mother 03:30 How I Met Your Mother 04:00 Brothers

MISSION IMPOSSIBLE GHOST PROTOCOL ON OSN MOVIES HD

17:30 18:00 19:00 20:00 20:30 21:00 21:30 22:30 23:30 00:00 00:55 01:25

Married To Jonas E! News THS What Would Ryan Lochte Do? What Would Ryan Lochte Do? Chasing The Saturdays Fashion Police E! News Chelsea Lately Dirty Soap Style Star Too Young To Kill

03:15 Coastal Kitchen 03:40 Cash In The Attic 04:30 Bargain Hunt 05:15 Daily Cooks Challenge 05:45 How Not To Decorate 06:30 Coastal Kitchen 07:00 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent 07:55 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent 08:50 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent 09:40 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent 10:30 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent 11:20 Cash In The Attic 12:15 Come Dine With Me 13:05 The Good Cook 13:35 Planet Cake 14:00 Tareq Taylor’s Nordic Cookery 14:25 Hairy Bikers’ Bake-ation 15:15 Bargain Hunt 16:00 Antiques Roadshow 16:55 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition 18:20 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition 19:00 Celebrity MasterChef 19:55 Vacation Vacation Vacation 20:20 Come Dine With Me 21:15 Antiques Roadshow 22:15 Bargain Hunt 23:00 Extreme Makeover: Home Edition 23:45 Superhomes 00:35 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent 01:25 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent 02:20 Phil Spencer - Secret Agent

03:00 Food Wars 03:25 Food Wars 03:50 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 04:15 Unique Eats 04:40 Chopped 05:30 Iron Chef America 06:10 Food Network Challenge 07:00 Healthy Appetite With Ellie Krieger 07:25 Healthy Appetite With Ellie Krieger 07:50 Healthy Appetite With Ellie Krieger 08:15 Healthy Appetite With Ellie Krieger 08:40 Cooking For Real 09:05 Cooking For Real 09:30 Cooking For Real 09:55 Cooking For Real 10:20 Tyler’s Ultimate 10:45 Tyler’s Ultimate 11:10 Tyler’s Ultimate 11:35 Tyler’s Ultimate 12:00 Staten Island Cakes 12:50 Barefoot Contessa 13:15 Barefoot Contessa 13:40 Barefoot Contessa 14:05 Unique Sweets 14:30 Unique Sweets 14:55 Unique Sweets 15:20 Unique Sweets 15:45 Charly’s Cake Angels 16:10 Charly’s Cake Angels 16:35 Reza’s African Kitchen 17:00 Reza’s African Kitchen 17:25 Ultimate Recipe Showdown 18:15 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 18:40 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 19:05 Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives 19:30 Chopped 20:20 Chopped 21:10 Amazing Wedding Cakes 22:00 Food Wars

22:25 22:50 23:15 23:40 00:05 00:30 00:55 01:20 01:45

Food Wars Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives Unwrapped Food Wars

03:15 The Way-PG15 05:30 A Fall From Grace-PG15 07:00 The Lucky One-PG15 09:00 Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol-PG15 11:15 Joyful Noise-PG15 13:15 A Mother’s Choice-PG15 15:15 Into The Wind-PG15 16:30 Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol-PG15 19:00 What’s Your Number?-PG15 21:00 Waiting For Forever-PG15 23:00 21 Jump Street-18 01:00 Playdate-PG15

07:00 Sammy’s Adventure: The Secret Passage-FAM 09:00 Underground: The Julian Assange Story-PG15 10:45 The Way-PG15 13:00 Arrietty-FAM 14:45 I’ve Loved You So Long-PG15 16:45 Neverland-PG15 19:30 Now Is Good-PG15 21:30 Albert Nobbs-18 23:30 Cleanskin-18 01:30 Neverland-PG15

04:00 A Monster In Paris-PG 06:00 Frankenweenie-PG 08:00 Batman: The Dark Knight Returns Part One-PG15 10:00 Do No Harm-PG15 12:00 Frankenweenie-PG 14:00 American Girl: McKenna Shoots For The Stars-PG 16:00 Batman: The Dark Knight Returns Part One-PG15 17:45 The Amazing Spider-Man-PG15 20:00 Dark Shadows-PG15 22:00 Prometheus-PG15 00:15 Do No Harm-PG15 02:00 The Amazing Spider-Man-PG15

04:15 06:00 PG15 08:00 10:00 12:15 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00 00:15 02:00

Warbirds-PG15 Charlie’s Angels: Full ThrottleVengeance-PG15 Constantine-PG15 Go Fast-PG15 Vengeance-PG15 Boiler Room-PG15 Go Fast-PG15 Amphibious-18 End Of Days-18 Disturbing Behavior-18 Amphibious-18

08:00 Monte Carlo-PG15 10:00 Love Birds-PG15 12:00 Ernest Goes To Jail-PG 14:00 The Tooth Fairy 2-PG 16:00 Love Birds-PG15 18:00 The Year Dolly Parton Was My Mom-PG 20:00 Bridesmaids-18 22:15 The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard-18 00:00 Friends With Benefits-18 02:00 Bridesmaids-18

10:45 World Trade Center-PG15 13:00 The First Grader-PG15

TV listings SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013 14:45 War Horse-PG15 17:15 The Vow-PG15 19:00 Dying Young-PG15 21:00 Ironclad-18 23:00 The Most Fun You Can Have Dying-PG15 01:00 Kathmandu Lullaby-PG15

12:30 15:30 16:00 16:30 19:30 20:00 21:30 22:00

Live AFL Premiership Inside The PGA Tour ICC Cricket 360 Live Cricket Friends Life T20 Inside The PGA Tour Live PGA Tour Inside The PGA Tour Live PGA Tour

12:00 13:00 14:00 16:30 17:15 20:00 21:00 23:00

05:30 Inside The PGA Tour 06:00 Trans World Sport 07:00 Live AFL Premiership 10:00 Futbol Mundial 10:30 Trans World Sport 11:30 ICC Cricket 360 12:00 Live British & Irish Lions Tour of Australia 15:30 Futbol Mundial 16:00 Live Super Rugby 18:00 Live Super Rugby 20:00 Live Super Rugby 22:00 ICC Cricket 360 22:30 Cricket Friends Life T20

00:00 00:30 01:00 04:00 06:00 07:00 10:00 10:30 12:30 14:30 15:00 19:00 22:30

Total Rugby ICC Cricket 360 Cricket Friends Life T20 Super Rugby Golfing World Cricket Friends Life T20 NRL Full Time Live NRL Premiership Live NRL Premiership PGA European Tour Weekly Live PGA European Tour British & Irish Lions Tour Super Rugby

01:00 03:00 04:00 06:00 06:30 07:00 10:30

00:00 01:00 04:00 05:00 07:00 09:00 10:00 11:00

Porsche GT 3 Cup Prizefighter Mass Participation NHL WWE Smackdown WWE Bottom Line WWE Vintage Collection UAE National Race Day Series

00:00 Wild Carpathia 01:00 Off Limits 02:00 Departures 03:00 Globe Trekker 04:00 Inside Luxury Travel - Varun Sharma 05:00 Bizarre Foods America 06:00 Eden Eats 07:00 Globe Trekker 08:00 Off Limits 10:00 Bert The Conqueror 12:00 Ultimate Braai Master 13:00 Ultimate Braai Master 14:00 International House Hunters 15:30 Essential 16:00 Hotel Impossible 18:00 Ultimate Braai Master 20:00 Reza, Spice Prince Of India 20:30 Jonathan Phang’s Caribbean Cookbook 21:00 World’s Greatest Motorcycle Rides 22:00 Luxury Trains 23:00 Inside Luxury Travel - Varun Sharma

WWE SmackDown WWE Bottom Line Super League ICC Cricket 360 Futbol Mundial PGA Tour Live Super Rugby

Porsche GT 3 Cup Mass Participation Live ITU World Triathlon Series Mobil 1 The Grid Live ITU World Triathlon Series WWE Bottom Line WWE Smackdown UFC Countdown

Cera, hippies, hallucinogenic cactus make for a groovy trip

M

ovies don’t get more alternative than this. “Crystal Fairy” is drugfueled road movie that, like both kinds of trips, has its highs, lows and mundane moments. That one ends up enjoying the journey is both a credit to terrific performances by stars Michael Cera and Gabby Hoffman and Chilean director-screenwriter Sebastian Silva’s careful and yet freehanded guidance.

(Silva’s previous movies include “The Maid” and “Old Cats.)

Cera plays Jamie, a self-involved, inconsiderate, twentysomething American spending time in Chile hanging out and sampling local narcotics. At a party one night, he meets a fellow Yank, a hippie chick, to use dated parlance, who calls herself Crystal Fairy (Hoffman).

He spontaneously invites her to come along on a road trip that he and three Chilean friends, who are brothers, are embarking upon the next morning. (The brothers are played by Juan AndrÈs Silva, JosÈ Miguel Silva and Augustin Silva, who are the real-life brothers of the director.) When Crystal Fairy actually shows up the next day for the trip, Jamie is horrified.

The quintet begin their journey, the purpose of which is to find a San Pedro cactus, boil it down and drink its hallucinogenic-causing juice while camping on a beach. There are really three trips going on in this film: the road trip, the drug trip and the transformative journey that the characters, primarily Jamie and

THE WAY ON OSN CINEMA

Crystal Fairy, make. He finally becomes a better person, and she is able to speak out loud a long held secret.

“Crystal Fairy” is a small movie - but beautifully shot, much of it with a handheld camera - that conveys a sense of place and intimacy. Most of the dialogue was improvised, based upon an outline that Silva provided - the film is loosely based on a trip he himself took a dozen years ago - but it rarely feels excessive or self-indulgent.

Cera is amusing and, in the end, moving as a dislikable guy who eventually begins to understand that other people possess feelings, too. As for Hoffman, who back in 1989 played Kevin Costner’s young daughter in “Field of Dreams” and worked steadily as a child star for the next 10 years before taking a partial break from acting, she’s a wonder.

Portraying Crystal Fairy, she gives a deeply committed performance as a free spirit who, whether clothed or nude Hoffman spends a big chunk of the movie wearing naught but sneakers - is always emotionally naked. — AP

WHAT’S ON SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Announcements Indian Embassy sets up helpline he Indian Embassy in Kuwait has set up helpline in order to assist Indian expatriates in registering any complaint regarding the government’s ongoing campaign to stamp out illegal residents from the country. The embassy said in press release yesterday that it amended its previous statement and stated if there is any complaint, the same could be conveyed at the following (as amended): Operations Department, Ministry of Interior, Kuwait. Fax: 22435580, Tel: 24768146/25200334. It said the embassy has been in regular contact with local authorities regarding the ongoing checking of expatriates.

The embassy has also conveyed to them the concerns, fears and apprehensions of the community in this regard. The authorities in Kuwait have conveyed that strict instructions have been issued to ensure that there is no harassment or improper treatment of expatriates by those undertaking checking. “The embassy would like to request Indian expatriates to ensure that they abide by all local laws, rules and regulations regarding residency, traffic and other matters,” the release read. It would be prudent to always carry the Civil ID and other relevant documents such as driving license, etc. In case an Indian expatriate encounters any improper treatment during checking, it may be conveyed immediately with full details and contact particulars to the embassy at the following phone number 67623639. These contact details are exclusively for the above-mentioned purpose only.

T

Issue of online visa by Indian embassy oreigners requiring visas for India need to apply it online from 16th June 2013. Applicants may log on to the Public portal at www.indianvisaonline.gov.in. After successful online submission, the hard copy, so generated, has to be signed by the applicant and submitted with supporting documents in accordance with the type of visa along with the applicable fee in cash at any of the two outsource centres at Sharq or Fahaheel. It is essential that applicants fill in their personal details as exactly available in their passports. Mismatch of any of the personal details would lead to non-acceptance of the application. Fees once paid are non-refundable. All children would have to obtain separate visa on their respective passports.

F

NBK Summer Internship Program students visit Al-Othman Museum

N

ational Bank of Kuwait (NBK) organized a field trip to the students of the Summer Internship Program to AlOthman Museum, after concluding their training session. Students were taken on a tour of the Museum and learned more about the history of Kuwait and how things were decades ago. The tour was both interesting and educational at the same time.

The NBK Summer Internship Program is designed for students as an extension of NBK’s education outreach efforts. The 5-hour daily sessions of two-week internship featured a mixture of theoretical and practical training dedicated to providing the interns with invaluable knowledge on a variety of sub-

jects such as team work, creative thinking, means of self expression and modern banking work procedure, in addition to helping interns to have greater exposure to daily banking work procedures.

The program demonstrates NBK’s long-standing social involvement as well as its national commitment towards providing the young generations with the appropriate opportunities to experience firsthand how the actual professional banking issues and transaction are handled and processed.

NBK regularly organizes and designs events and packages for the youth of the country to familiarize them with the world of banking and make them responsible citizens.

A message from the Kuwait University College of Architecture Department of Communication Design & Interiors About the Department The Communication Design and Interiors Department is part of the newly founded College of Architecture. We offer two distinct degrees, Bachelor of Science in Visual Communication and Bachelor of Science in Interior Architecture.

Our Visual Communication program focuses on critical cultural analysis leading to creative design syntheses. The Interior Architecture program centers on ethical, social and visual tools in the enhancement of the intact environment. The faculty at the Communication Design and Interiors department are all affiliated with world renowned institutions and involved in advanced research and practices.

Departmentís Vision The Communication Design and Interiors faculty aspire to educate students to become leaders, independent thinkers, and creative designers. Our goal is to provide design students an approach to innovation that is powerful, effective, and accessible, that can be integrated into all aspects of business and culture.

Departmentís Mission The Communication Design and Interiors department aims to offer intellectually challenging programs in a friendly educational environ-

ment. We equip our students with the right intermingle of knowledge and skills needed for a successful career in professional design practices. We aspire to advance local and international design cultures.

Visual Communication Design Program - Life After Graduation Visual Communication designers produce through industrial resources and, she/he will find career opportunities in both the government and the private sectors in Kuwait. Kuwait Ministries hire Visual Communication designers for jobs involving designs for information, education, persuasion, administration, design production, and design consultancy. Jobs in the private sector are offered through in-house designs for businesses, organizations, agencies, hospitals, banks, and, service productions. Just as important, Visual Communication designers can also be entrepreneurs and freelancers.

Interior Architecture Program Life After Graduation Interior Architects will find career opportunities in both governmental and private sectors.

Kuwait Ministries hire interior architects for jobs involving design consultancy, contracting, construction, and maintenance. Jobs in the private sector are offered by architectural and interior design consulting firms, design agencies, construction companies, hospitality and service

industries, and real-estate companies. In addition, Interior Architects can also be entrepreneurs and freelancers.

College Requirements 1. Admission limited to high school graduates with scientific majors or the equivalent.

2. Minimum grade point average of 80% 3. Total admission score is calculated based on the following:

a. 70% from high school GPA b. 15% from math placement test c. 15% from English placement test 4. 6% of the number of admissions in the college is set for non-Kuwaitis.

5. The number of seats admitted to the Department of Communication Design & Interiors will be no more than 50 seats for the year 2013/2014.

6. Admissions are limited to females until further notice on the departmentís new location.

7. Admissions are permitted annually in the Fall Semester.

Department Requirements 1. Minimum of 80% in the English placement test.

2. Minimum of 75% in the Math placement test.

3. Pass the following course in the foundation year with at least a B-: * Introduction to Design Studio (1600/100) * Introduction to Design Theory & Criticism (1600/101) * Representation Studio I (1600/102) 4. Pass physics course (101) 5. Major sheet applies on transfer students.

6. A minimum of a 3.33 grade point average.

For more information visit: http://www.coa.ku.edu.kw/vci Tel: +965 24983103 | Fax: +965 24983163

WHAT’S ON SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

What to do in Kuwait this summer?

Visit the Sadu House Al-Sadu Society is dedicated to preserving, documenting and promoting the rich and diverse textile heritage of the Kuwaiti Bedouin, from the nomadic weaving of the desert to the urban weaving of the town. Sadu is a traditional Bedouin art that involves weaving geometric designs on dyed and colored wool that is spun by hand to create magnificent carpets, rugs, and Bedouin tent screens. Inside the Sadu House, visitors have the opportunity to see Bedouin women weaving. Sadu House is located near the National Museum.

It is considered to be the center of Bedouin art aiming at presenting Kuwait’s roots and protecting Bedouin crafts from eradication.

Address: Arabian Gulf Street, Next to the National Museum of Kuwait, Kuwait City Opening Hours: Saturdays to Thursdays: Mornings from 08 am to 1 pm. Evenings from 4 pm to 8 pm.

Contact: 22432395 E-mail: info@alsadu.org.kw Website: www.alsadu.org.kw View Boushahri Gallery The Boushahri Art Gallery was established in 1982 by Jawad Boushahri, the Chairman of the Boushahri group who is also an acclaimed Kuwaiti sculptor. It is one of the oldest private art galleries in the Middle East. This long established gallery showcases contemporary regional work. In order to create an awareness toward art in Kuwait as a community service, the Boushahri Art Gallery educates, supports and sponsors local and international artists, displaying their paintings, potteries, ceramic portraitures, designs, photographers, sculptures and much more. To encourage the Art lovers and educate society, Boushahri Art Gallery offers many courses, seminars and lectures about Art. Address: Salmiya, Baghdad St., Building Number: 36, in front of Al- Laheeb Mosque Opening Hours: 10 am to 1 pm and 5 pm to 9 pm. The museum is closed on Friday and Thursday afternoons.

Contact: 25621119/99770607 Website: www.boushahrigroup.com/client/PhotoandArt.aspx Take a break at Al-Khiran Resort The Al-Khiran resort is a relaxing “get-away” from the mayhem of stressful city life. The resort provides a soothing tranquil environment that includes beautiful green lawns, wide, well-defined roads, ample parking spaces, and clean well-maintained beaches. It has many chalets that are beautifully furnished and air-conditioned. The resort also offers a variety of other facilities such as football and basketball courts, luxurious restaurants, yacht clubs, an amusement park for children, electronic computer arcade and the ‘Duza’ ballroom. The resort also provides variety in food as it includes a fastfood counter, and a counter that offers seafood, Italian and oriental food.

Address: Gulf Street, Al-Khiran district Contact: 23951122 E-mail: mailbox@khiranresort.com Website: www.khiranresort.com Stop at the Tareq Rajab Museum The Tareq Rajab Museum houses an anthology of over thirty thousand items collected over the last fifty years, of which approximately ten thousand are on permanent display. Tareq Sayed Rajab was the first Kuwaiti to be sent abroad to study art and archaeology and his collection includes Islamic arts, ceramic, gold and silver jewelry, English manuscripts, metal and glass works, old English costumes, and musical instruments. His personal collection includes over thirty thousand Islamic treasures that were gathered over the years. The Museum is divided into two parts: in Area A, calligraphy, manuscripts, ceramics, metalwork, glass, jade, wood and stone carvings are exhibited. Area B contains objects such as costumes, textiles, jewellery and musical instruments produced in the Islamic world.

Address: Jabriya, near the intersection of the Fifth Ring Motorway and the Abdulaziz Bin Abdilrahman al-Saud Expressway (Fahaheel Expressway); Street 5; Block12; House 16 Opening Hours: Weekdays from 9 am to 12 pm; Evenings: From 4 pm to 7 pm; Fridays: From 9 am to 12 pm.

Contact: 25317358/25354916 Website: www.trmkt.com The Scientific Center, Kuwait The Scientific Center is designed to reflect the Islamic arts and culture. It has three main fascinating attractions: Aquarium, Discovery Place and IMAX Cinema. The Aquarium presents an ecosystem of desert, sea, and coastal edge. Visitors of the Aquarium explore the lives of beings and animals in their environments. When entering the Discovery Place, visitors gain scientific experience

charity activities worldwide. The gallery offers varieties of art including paintings, frames, handcrafts, art materials and antiques.

Address: Block 6, Street 5, Villa 40, Mishref, Kuwait Contact: 22435101, 22426240 E-mail: info@ghadirgallerykuwait.com Website: www.ghadirgallerykuwait.com

through educational games. Highly specialized trainers are assigned to guide visitors through hand-on playful training. On entering the IMAX Cinema, one can watch 3D movies played on the giant screen.

Visitors can enjoy watching educational and documentary presentations and get engaged into a highly imaginative experience.

Address: The Scientific Center, Gulf Road Contact: 1848888 E-mail: info@tsck.org.kw Website: www.tsck.org.kw Visit Dar Al-Funoon gallery Dar Al-Funoon, which was established in 1993, focuses on contemporary Arab art as well as Arabic calligraphy. Exhibitions are held monthly from October to May, and a special silk exhibition of arts and crafts is held in December. Between temporary exhibitions, items from the private collection are on display, which can be bought. The gallery is located between the Sheraton Hotel and the Arabian Gulf Street. The area itself is interesting thanks to its old Kuwaiti-style houses and a large courtyard which includes a number of excellent restaurants.

Address: Behbehani compound, Salhiya, House No. 28, AlWatiah, Kuwait City Opening Hours: Sundays to Thursdays: 10 am to 1 pm Evenings: 4 pm to 8 pm Contact: 22433138 E-mail: info@daralfunoon-kw.com Website: www.daralfunoon-kw.com Bayt - Lothan Bayt Lothan is dedicated to the promotion of arts and crafts and is host to various exhibitions and displays throughout the year. It covers an area of 4,000 square meters on the Arabian Gulf Street and caters to all tastes and themes, including sculpture, ceramic arts, jewelry and photography, as well as contemporary art and calligraphy. Watch out in the local press for details of current and forthcoming exhibitions or seminars. There is also a small coffee shop for basic refreshments and for theatre lovers they also hold drama classes throughout the year.

Address: Gulf Street, beside Marina Mall, in front of Corniche Hotel Contact: 25755866 / 25727388 E-Mail: info@baytlothan.org Opening Hours: Sundays to Thursdays: 9 am to 1 pm; Evenings: 5 pm to 9 pm Website: http://www.baytlothan.org

Visit Ghadir Gallery, Kuwait The Al-Ghadir Gallery Kuwait is dedicated to promote the Kuwaiti formative artist and writer Thuraya Al-Baqsami and successfully accomplished 120 national and international solo art exhibitions, literary and poetry readings and musical events. It also participates in

Take the kids to Al-Shaab Leisure Park Al-Sha’ab Leisure Park is located on the southern coast of Kuwait City. It combines more than 70 special rides on the level of the Middle East. It also provides integrated services, including restaurants, a mall, and rides and games that meet the interests of all age groups. The park also offers indoor games as well as outdoor sports like bungee jumping, pony rides and ice-skating. Families can also access facilities such as the movies and the delicious meals at the restaurants. At Al-Sha’ab Leisure Park, all these facilities are maintained according to international standards.

Address: Baghdad Street, Block 11, Salmiya Opening Hours: All days from 5 pm to 1 am (Summer) and 10 am - 12 Midnight on weekends.

Contact: 25613777 E-mail: shaabpark_fb@uetc.com.kw Website: www.shaabpark.com Kuwait National Museum The Kuwait National Museum hosts a range of items such as fossils, bones, Islamic artifacts, and pottery tools that reflect the culture, history and heritage of the Kuwaiti society and the Islamic world.

The relics on display presents Kuwait’s ancient past, the development of the Islamic nations and the impact of the discovery of oil.

Part of the Dar-Al-Athar-Al-Islamiyah collection is also on display, and a replica of the Muhallab II that graces the entrance has also recently been restored as a reminder of Kuwait’s seafaring past.

There is also a modern Planetarium, built by Carl Zeiss which is a pleasant educational experience for both adults and children. The three major attractions in the museum are the heritage museum, the planetarium and the wooden ship.

Address: Behind Sadu House, Arabian Gulf Street Contact No.: 22451195 Opening Hours: 8:30am to 12:30pm and 4:30pm to 8:30pm (Summers); and 8 am to 4 pm (Winters). The Museum is closed on Sundays, Friday mornings and Saturday afternoons.

Stop to view AL M. Gallery AL M. Gallery is a contemporary fine art gallery located in the heart of Kuwait City in Salhia Complex. Gallery organizes exhibitions of Kuwaiti, Middle Eastern and International artists.

Address: Salhia Complex, Gate 4, Mezzanine 2, Place 16.

Opening Hours: Sundays to Thursdays 10 am to 3 pm and Evenings: 5 pm to 9 pm Contact No.: 22996447 E-mail: info@al-m-gallery.com Website: www.al-m-gallery.com Go to Kuwait Zoo Since its establishment years ago, the Kuwait Zoo is an entertaining place to visit and a ‘fun’ place to be with family. It includes many species of animals and a train that goes around the entire zoo. The zoo also offers camel and horse rides. The zoo suffered extensive damages during the 1990 Iraqi Invasion. Nevertheless, most of the maintenance work has been finished, and the zoo reopened after the modification and renovation work was completed. Part of these renovations in early 1993 included the addition of new animals.

Address: Airport Road, Omariya, off the fifth ring road, (Route 55), Farwaniya Opening Hours: Mondays to Saturdays: 8 am to 12pm and Evenings: 4pm to 8pm E-mail: zoo.kuwait@gmail.com Website: www.raisaquaculture.net/drupal-5.7 Skate at the Ice Skating Rink The Ice Skating Rink in Kuwait is a major landmark and a great sport facility and is the first of its kind in the Gulf region and the middle East. The rink consists of two main rinks - the first is an Olympic rink that is bigger and can accommodate around 1600 viewers and also provides shoe-changing rooms, a skating equipment store and a first-aid facility. The second is a smaller rink accommodating nearly 600 visitors. Both arenas have a cafeteria serving light snacks and drinks. The rink occasionally organizes different music festivals, kids’ shows and award ceremonies. The rink offers viewers a great chance to get a glimpse of an Olympic-sized rink.

Address: Al - Soor Street, First Ring Road, Shamiya, near Discovery Mall Opening Hours: 8:30 am to 10 pm Contact No.: 22411151 / 22411152

HEALTH

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Study: Brainpower in the very old may be improving NEW YORK: If you’re lucky enough to live into your 90s, how well will your brain hold up? You may have an edge over people who got there ahead of you, a new study hints. Researchers found that on tests of mental abilities, a group of 95-year-old Danes scored better than a group of Danes born 10 years earlier, who had been tested when they were about the same age. In a standard simple test, for example, 23 percent of them scored in the highest category, compared to 13 percent of the earlier-born group. Out of the 30 questions and tasks, members of the later-born group averaged two more correct responses than the earlier-born group did. The results were released Wednesday by the journal Lancet. Why the better mental performance? It wasn’t just better education, but beyond that the researchers could only guess at things like more intellectual stimulation and better diets earlier in life.

More people are living to such old ages. The US census counted 425,000 Americans age 95 and older in 2010, a 26 percent increase over the total in 2000. The mental testing compared 1,814 elderly Danes examined in 1998 to the later-born group of 1,247 Danes tested in 2010. The researchers also found that later-born Danes were better able to carry out basic living tasks like getting out of bed or a chair. So they were function-

ing better overall, the study concluded.

Lead author Dr. Kaare Christensen, head of the Danish Aging Research Center at the University of Southern Denmark in Odense, said he imagines that in the future, Danes who live into their 90s will continue to be better off than their predecessors. He was cautious about applying the results to the United States, although he said the availability of education in the U.S. after World War II would be a plus.

Dr James Pacala, associate head of the department of family medicine and community health at the University of Minnesota Medical School, who didn’t participate in the study, said he suspects the same trends are present in the United States.

He also said the findings fit with previous work that shows people are functioning better at given ages than they used to.

But Pacala, who heads the board of the American Geriatrics Society, noted that even in the better-functioning group of Danes, at least 40 percent and probably more had dementia. Denise Park, an expert in mental function and aging at the University of Texas in Dallas, called the mental test results provocative but said it’s not clear why the differences appeared. She said she would want to know if the effect holds up for 80-yearolds as well. “If it’s real, it should,” she said. — AP

PENNSYLVANIA: Tina Reese leads a word game for residents at a nursing home in Lancaster. —AP

FDA sets new limits on arsenic in apple juice WASHINGTON: Parents who have been fretting over the low levels of arsenic found in apple juice can feel better about buying one of their kids’ favorite drinks. The Food and Drug Administration is setting a new limit on the level of arsenic allowed in apple juice, after more than a year of public pressure from consumer groups worried about the contaminant’s effects on children. Nationwide, apple juice is second only to orange juice in popularity, according to industry groups. Studies have shown that the juice contains very low levels of arsenic, a cancer-causing agent found in everything from water to soil to pesticides. The FDA has monitored arsenic in apple juice for decades and has long said the levels are not dangerous to consumers, in particular small children who favor fruit juice.

OHIO: In this Sept 15, 2011 photo, an apple and a pitcher of apple juice are posed together in Moreland Hills. — AP But now the agency is putting in place a strict standard on how much arsenic is acceptable in apple juice, limiting the amount to the same level currently permitted in drinking water. Under the new regulation, apple juice containing more than 10 parts per billion could be removed from the market and companies could face legal action. Agency officials stressed that the vast majority of juices on the market are already below the threshold. “Overall the supply of apple juice is very safe and does not represent a threat to public health,” said FDA Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg, in an interview with The Associated Press. “We decided to put forward this proposed action level to give guidance to industry and to assure ongoing safety and quality.”

An FDA analysis of dozens of apple juice samples last year found that 95 percent were below the new level. The standard specifically targets inorganic arsenic - the type found in pesticides - which can

be toxic and may pose a cancer risk if consumed at high levels or over a long period. Organic arsenic occurs naturally in dirt and soil and passes through the body quickly without causing harm, according to the FDA. In 2008 FDA regulators set a “level of concern” for arsenic at 23 parts per billion in apple juice. The agency has the authority to seize juice that exceeds that level. But agency officials played down the significance of the older figure this week, calling it a “back of the envelope” calculation that was used to assess one juice shipment detained at the border.

“It was not a full blown, science-based number,” said Michael Taylor, FDA’s deputy commissioner for foods. The FDA’s new number is based on lifetime exposure to arsenic and the potential for long-term cancer risk. Taylor says the number reflects a very cautious approach, since it’s unclear how much arsenic exposure can trigger the disease. “There isn’t a known threshold for the carcinogenic effect, so we assume the possibility of effects all the way down to the lowest dose,” Taylor said. The agency will take comments on the draft regulation for 60 days before making it binding.

Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports, last year called for a limit as low as 3 parts per billion. While the FDA didn’t go that far, the group still praised the agency for taking action. “While we had proposed a lower limit, we think this is a perfectly good first step to bring apple juice in line with the current drinking water limits,” said Urvashi Rangan, the group’s director for consumer safety.

While the Environmental Protection Agency sets arsenic limits for drinking water, there have never been similar standards for most foods and beverages. The FDA is also considering new limits on arsenic in rice, which is thought to have higher levels than most foods because it is grown in water on the ground, optimal conditions for absorbing the contaminant.

“We don’t have standards like this in most foods, so it’s an important precedent,” Rangan said. Environmental groups like Food and Water Watch have also lobbied the FDA on the issue. And television’s Dr Mehmet Oz made arsenic a national issue in 2011 when he raised an alarm - some say a false alarm - over apple juice, based on tests his show commissioned by a private lab. All of the experts including the government and the consumer advocates - agree that drinking small amounts of apple juice isn’t harmful.

The concern involves the effects of drinking large amounts of juice over long periods of time. Another point of agreement is that children under 6 shouldn’t be drinking much juice anyway, because it’s high in calories. Health experts say children under 6 shouldn’t drink any more than 6 ounces of juice a day - about the size of a juice box. Infants under 6 months shouldn’t drink any juice at all.

The American Academy of Pediatrics said Friday children should be encouraged to eat whole fruit adding, “it is not necessary to offer children any juice to have a well-balanced, healthy diet.”— AP

Ireland approves ‘life-saving’ abortions for first time DUBLIN: Irish lawmakers yesterday overwhelmingly approved abortion for the first time in limited cases where the mother’s life is at risk, in a vote that revealed deep divisions in the predominantly Catholic nation. The change was prompted by the death last year of an Indian woman due to complications from her pregnancy, but more broadly ends years of uncertainty over the legal status of terminations in Ireland. Legislators voted through the bill by 127 to 31 against in the early hours after two days of marathon debate in parliament. It will now go to a vote in the upper house, where the government has a majority.

But in a sign of the rifts that remain on the issue, a junior minister quit her post after voting against the bill and faces exclusion from Prime Minister Enda Kenny’s ruling Fine Gael party. Kenny revealed recently he had received abusive letters written in blood and opponents of the bill have branded him a murderer, while 35,000 abortion opponents marched in Dublin on Saturday. “I am deeply disappointed to have to vote against the government’s abortion bill today,” said Lucinda Creighton, junior minister with responsibility for European Affairs in Kenny’s cabinet.

The Protection of Life During Pregnancy Bill allows for abortion in circumstances where doctors certify there is a real and substantial risk to the life of the mother, as opposed to a risk to her health. It also permits a termination when one obstetrician and two psychiatrists unanimously agree that an expectant mother is a suicide risk. The “suicide clause” in particular has divided society, with some anti-termination lawmakers warning that it will lead to a more liberal abortion regime in Ireland.

The bill follows a 2010 European Court of Human Rights ruling that found Ireland failed to properly implement the constitutional right to abortion where a woman’s life is at risk. Under a 1992 Supreme Court ruling, women in Ireland are legally entitled to an abortion if it is needed to save a mother’s life-but six successive governments have failed to introduce legislation to reflect this. The global attention following the death of 31-yearold Indian woman Savita Halappanavar in a Galway hospital last October prompted Kenny’s government to act.

Halappanavar had sought a termination when told she was miscarrying, but the request was refused as her life was not at risk at the time. She died of blood poisoning days after miscarrying. Human Rights Watch, the US-based rights group, said the new Irish legislation still “fails” women. “The new law leaves intact the broad criminal ban on abortion. A woman pregnant as a result of rape, for example, or whose pregnancy is not viable, still can’t get a legal abortion in Ireland,” HRW said in a statement. —AFP

health & science SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Kuwait

KNCC PROGRAMME FROM THURSDAY TO WEDNESDAY (11/07/2013 TO 17/07/2013)

SHARQIA-2 MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (DIG-3D) 9:15 PM WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG) 11:30 PM

AVENUES-1 WORLD WAR Z (DIG) WORLD WAR Z (DIG)

9:30 PM 11:45 PM

SHARQIA-3 TATTAH (DIG) THE PURGE (DIG)

9:00 PM 11:30 PM

9:30 PM 11:45 PM

AVENUES-2 MAN OF STEEL (DIG) NOW YOU SEE ME (DIG)

AL-KOUT.2 WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG) WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG)

9:00 PM 11:45 PM

MUHALAB-1 BEKAS (DIG) THE PURGE (DIG)

9:15 PM 11:45 PM

9:45 PM 12:05 AM

AVENUES-3 TATTAH (DIG) TATTAH (DIG)

AL-KOUT.3 BEKAS (DIG) MAN OF STEEL (DIG)

9:15 PM 11:30 PM

MUHALAB-2 WORLD WAR Z (DIG) TATTAH (DIG)

9:45 PM 12:05 AM

9:15 PM 11:30 PM

AVENUES-4 WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG)

AL-KOUT.4 TATTAH (DIG) SIBERIAN EDUCATION (DIG)

10:30 PM

BAIRAQ-1 WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG) WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG)

9:15 PM 11:45 PM

BAIRAQ-2 BEKAS (DIG) TATTAH (DIG)

9:00 PM 11:00 PM

MUHALAB-3 MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (DIG-3D) 9:00 PM WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG) 11:15 PM

AVENUES-5 THE PURGE (DIG) TATTAH (DIG)

9:00 PM 11:00 PM

FANAR-1 BEKAS (DIG) WORLD WAR Z (DIG)

9:30 PM 11:30 PM

360º- 1 THE PURGE (DIG) THE PURGE (DIG)

10:30 PM 12:30 AM

BAIRAQ-3 MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (DIG) THE PURGE (DIG)

9:45 PM 12:05 AM

FANAR-2 MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (DIG) THE PURGE (DIG)

10:00 PM 12:15 AM

360º- 2 OFFICER DOWN (DIG) NOW YOU SEE ME (DIG)

10:00 PM 12:05 AM

PLAZA MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (DIG) WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG)

9:00 PM 11:15 PM

FANAR-3 SIBERIAN EDUCATION (DIG) MAN OF STEEL (DIG)

9:00 PM 11:15 PM

360º- 3 WORLD WAR Z (DIG-3D) WORLD WAR Z (DIG)

9:15 PM 11:30 PM

LAILA WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG) WORLD WAR Z (DIG)

9:15 PM 11:45 PM

FANAR-4 WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG) WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG)

9:15 PM 11:45 PM

360º- 4 BEKAS (DIG) BEKAS (DIG)

9:45 PM 12:05 AM

AJIAL.1 SINGAM 2 (DIG) (TAMIL)

9:15 PM

9:15 PM 11:30 PM

360º- 5 WAHED SAHIH (Re -Release) WAHED SAHIH (Re -Release)

AJIAL.2 SINGAM 2 (DIG) (TAMIL)

10:00 PM

AJIAL.3 BEKAS (DIG) WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG)

9:00 PM 11:00 PM

FANAR-5 TATTAH TATTAH

10:15 PM 12:15 AM

MARINA-1 BEKAS (DIG) THE PURGE (DIG)

10:00 PM 12:15 AM

360º- 6 NOW YOU SEE ME (DIG) MAN OF STEEL (DIG)

9:15 PM 11:30 PM

MARINA-2 TATTAH (DIG) WORLD WAR Z (DIG)

9:30 PM 12:05 AM

360º- 7 SIBERIAN EDUCATION (DIG) SIBERIAN EDUCATION (DIG)

9:30 PM 11:45 PM

MARINA-3 MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (DIG-3D) 9:15 PM WHITE HOUSE DOWN (DIG) 11:30 PM

AL-KOUT.1 MONSTERS UNIVERSITY (DIG-3D) 9:30 PM WORLD WAR Z (DIG-3D) 11:45 PM

AJIAL.4 BHAAG MILKHA BHAAG (DIG) (HINDI) 9:30 PM METRO-1 SINGAM 2 (DIG) (TAMIL)

9:00 PM

METRO-2 SINGAM 2 (DIG) (TAMIL)

10:00 PM

No. H1819475 in future I am known from this name Husain Godichand, s/o Kosar Godichand, Res. Obrimohalla, Sagwara.

(C 4455) 8-7-2013 TUITION Position available in Kuwait for a teacher/ psychologist.

Qualifications: male, degree in education, experience in behavior modification and or social skills training, excellent command in English.

Contact: 99114449/ 99602744. (C 4456) 8-7-2013

SITUATION WANTED Accountant, 8 yrs experience in GCC in MNC B.Com MBA Finance, proficient in SAP FICO/MM, Microsoft Navision Oracle, Peach Tree, Tally.

Looking for job. Contact: 66128352, ansar.aziz@hotmail.com (C 4459) 11-7-2013

112

Prayer timings CHANGE OF NAME

GOVERNORATE Ahmadi

PHARMACY

Sama Safwan Abu Halaifa Danat Al-Sultan

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

PHONE 23915883 23715414 23726558

Jahra

Modern Jahra Jahra-Block 3 Lot 1 Madina Munawara 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

Hawally

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

Jacinta Cyril D’Souza holder of Passport E 5379579 changed my name to Jayshree Manharlal Patel.

(C 4460) 13-7-2013 Thottakathu Abu, holder of Indian Passport No G9943123, issued at Kuwait 27/10/2008, hereby change my name to Aboo Backer Thattakathu. (C 4458) 11-7-2013 I, Ramdas V.M., S/o Kunhiraman M.V., Trikarpur, Kasaragod, holder of Indian Passport No. J 1329697 hereby change my name as RAMADAS. V.M. and this will be effected in all records connected with me. Objection, if any, may be intimated to the authorities within 15 days from the date of this notice.

(C 4457) 10-7-2013 I have changed my name from Husain, s/o Kosar Godichand, Indian Passport

Fajr: Shorook Duhr: Asr: Maghrib: Isha:

03:23 04:57 11:53 15:28 18:50 20:21

Al-Madena Police Station

22434064

Al-Murqab Police Station

22435865

Al-Daiya Police Station

22544200

Al-Fayha’a Police Station

22547133

Al-Qadissiya Police Station

22515277

Al-Nugra Police Station

22616662

Al-Salmiya Police Station

25714406

Al-Dasma Police Station

22530801

information SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

DIAL 161 FOR AIRPORT INFORMATION In case you are not travelling, your proper cancellation of bookings will help other passengers use seats Airlines BBC QTR JZR JZR SAI THY ETH GFA PIA UAE ETD FDB RJA RBG JZR JZR JZR MSR OMA QTR THY DHX FDB BAW KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC UAE ABY QTR FDB ETD IRA GFA IAW MSC UAE MSR THY MSR SVA KNE TMA KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC JZR JZR JZR JZR JZR SYR RJA QTR ETD UAE ABY UAL GFA SVA NIA GFA MSC JAI RBG FDB

Arrival Flights on Saturday 13/7/2013 Flt Route 43 DHAKA 148 DOHA 267 BEIRUT 539 CAIRO 441 LAHORE 764 SABIHA 620 ADDIS ABABA 211 BAHRAIN 239 ISLAMABAD 853 DUBAI 305 ABU DHABI 67 DUBAI 648 AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA 555 ALEXANDRIA 555 ALEXANDRIA 529 ASSIUT 503 LUXOR 612 CAIRO 643 MUSCAT 138 DOHA 770 ISTANBUL 170 BAHRAIN 69 DUBAI 157 LONDON 206 ISLAMABAD 416 JAKARTA 412 MANILA 382 DELHI 302 MUMBAI 855 DUBAI 125 SHARJAH 132 DOHA 55 DUBAI 301 ABU DHABI 3407 MASHAD 213 BAHRAIN 157 BAGHDAD 401 ALEXANDRIA 871 DUBAI 610 CAIRO 766 ISTANBUL 575 SHARM EL SHEIKH 500 JEDDAH 480 JEDDAH 213 BEIRUT 362 COLOMBO 538 SOHAG 344 CHENNAI 790 MEDINAH 284 DHAKA 352 COCHIN 357 MASHAD 777 JEDDAH 535 CAIRO 239 AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA 177 DUBAI 341 DAMASCUS 640 AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA 134 DOHA 303 ABU DHABI 857 DUBAI 127 SHARJAH 982 WASHINGTON DC DULLES 215 BAHRAIN 510 RIYADH 251 ALEXANDRIA 219 BAHRAIN 405 SOHAG 572 MUMBAI 553 ALEXANDRIA 61 DUBAI

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

OMA ABY IRA MEA MSR AXB KLM ALK UAE ETD QTR GFA JAI QTR FDB AIC UAL KNE KNE KNE KNE KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC JZR JZR DLH JAI MSR THY KAC

647 129 607 402 618 489 415 229 859 307 136 217 576 146 59 975 981 472 470 464 474 786 1714 176 788 104 118 562 674 502 542 1779 135 636 574 614 772 614

MUSCAT SHARJAH MASHAD BEIRUT ALEXANDRIA COCHIN AMSTERDAM COLOMBO DUBAI ABU DHABI DOHA BAHRAIN COCHIN DOHA DUBAI CHENNAI BAHRAIN JEDDAH JEDDAH JEDDAH JEDDAH JEDDAH JEDDAH GENEVA JEDDAH LONDON NEW YORK AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA DUBAI BEIRUT CAIRO JEDDAH BAHRAIN FRANKFURT MUMBAI CAIRO ISTANBUL BAHRAIN

20:00 20:05 20:10 20:15 20:30 20:35 21:05 21:10 21:15 21:30 21:35 21:45 21:55 22:00 22:20 22:25 22:40 14:35 15:05 20:55 22:30 22:40 18:35 17:45 15:00 18:45 16:00 19:55 19:25 18:50 18:15 21:20 23:00 23:10 23:20 23:30 23:45 23:00

Airlines AIC JAI UAL DLH MSR KLM BBC THY SAI THY ETH PIA UAE FDB RBG MSR OMA ETD QTR QTR FDB RJA GFA THY KAC BAW JZR KAC ABY KAC UAE QTR

Departure Flights on Saturday 13/7/2013 Flt Route 976 GOA/CHENNAI 573 MUMBAI 981 WASHINGTON 637 FRANKFURT 615 CAIRO 413 AMSTERDAM 44 DHAKA 773 ISTANBUL 442 LAHORE 765 ISTANBUL 621 ADDIS ABABA 240 SIALKOT 854 DUBAI 68 DUBAI 556 ALEXANDRIA 613 CAIRO 644 MUSCAT 306 ABU DHABI 139 DOHA 149 DOHA 70 DUBAI 649 AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA 212 BAHRAIN 771 ISTANBUL 537 SOHAG 156 LONDON 534 CAIRO 789 MADINAH 126 SHARJAH 787 JEDDAH 856 DUBAI 133 DOHA

Time 00:05 00:20 00:25 00:30 00:30 00:55 01:30 02:20 02:30 02:40 02:45 03:35 03:45 03:50 03:55 04:15 04:20 04:20 04:25 05:15 06:30 06:35 07:00 07:10 07:45 08:25 09:10 09:15 09:30 09:35 09:50 10:00

ETD KAC FDB JZR KAC GFA KAC IRA KAC IAW JZR KAC MSC JZR MSR THY KNE UAE KAC MSR KAC KNE JZR SYR SVA KNE RJA KAC JZR QTR ETD JZR ABY UAE GFA SVA UAL JZR NIA GFA KAC JZR KAC RBG MSC JAI FDB ABY KAC OMA KAC IRA MEA MSR KAC KNE DHX KLM ETD ALK UAE KAC QTR KAC GFA FDB KAC JAI QTR JZR KNE KAC JZR

302 101 56 356 501 214 541 3406 165 158 776 1713 406 176 611 767 481 872 561 576 673 473 1778 342 505 463 641 785 238 135 304 538 128 858 216 511 982 266 252 220 613 134 283 554 402 571 62 120 331 648 351 604 403 607 543 475 171 415 308 230 860 381 137 301 218 60 205 575 147 554 471 411 528

ABU DHABI LONDON DUBAI MASHHAD BEIRUT BAHRAIN CAIRO MASHHAD ROME AL NAJAF JEDDAH JEDDAH SOHAG DUBAI CAIRO ISTANBUL JEDDAH DUBAI AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA SHARM EL SHEIKH DUBAI JEDDAH JEDDAH DAMASCUS JEDDAH JEDDAH AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA JEDDAH AMMAN-QUEEN ALIA DOHA ABU DHABI CAIRO SHARJAH DUBAI BAHRAIN RIYADH BAHRAIN BEIRUT ALEXANDRIA BAHRAIN BAHRAIN BAHRAIN DHAKA ALEXANDRIA ALEXANDRIA MUMBAI DUBAI SHARJAH TRIVANDRUM MUSCAT KOCHI ISFAHAN BEIRUT LUXOR CAIRO JEDDAH BAHRAIN DAMMAM ABU DHABI COLOMBO DUBAI DELHI DOHA MUMBAI BAHRAIN DUBAI ISLAMABAD ABU DHABI DOHA ALEXANDRIA JEDDAH BANGKOK ASYUT

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

10:15 10:25 10:30 11:00 11:10 11:25 11:30 11:35 11:45 12:00 12:25 12:25 13:00 13:20 14:00 14:10 14:10 14:15 14:40 15:00 15:05 15:30 15:50 15:55 16:00 16:00 16:55 17:00 17:05 17:20 17:20 17:40 17:50 18:15 18:20 18:20 18:30 18:40 19:00 19:50 20:00 20:05 20:15 20:20 20:30 20:35 20:40 20:45 20:50 20:55 21:05 21:10 21:15 21:30 21:30 21:50 21:50 22:05 22:15 22:20 22:25 22:30 22:35 22:40 22:45 23:00 23:00 23:05 23:05 23:20 23:25 23:40 23:55

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Word Search

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C R O S S W O R D 2 4 9

ACROSS 1. The unit of frequency.

4. An unceremonious and disorganized struggle.

12. A reptile genus of Iguanidae.

15. A former agency (from 1946 to 1974) that was responsible for research into atomic energy and its peacetime uses in the United States.

16. An orange-red crystalline compound used in making red pigments and in dyeing.

17. (used especially of commodities) In the natural unprocessed condition.

18. A room or establishment where alcoholic drinks are served over a counter.

19. An adulterous woman.

20. A river in north central Switzerland that runs northeast into the Rhine.

21. Small tropical American tree bearing edible plumlike fruit.

23. In actual fact.

25. A desert in southern Israel.

26. United States writer (born in Poland) who wrote in Yiddish (1880-1957).

28. The compass point that is one point south of due east.

29. An official prosecutor for a judicial district.

30. The emotion of hate.

34. Indonesian wild pig with enormous curved canine teeth.

39. A black colloidal substance consisting wholly or principally of amorphous carbon and used to make pigments and ink.

41. Fermented alcoholic beverage similar to but heavier than beer.

42. Any of various cycads of the genus Zamia.

45. Capable of being scaled.

48. A reproach for some lapse or misdeed.

50. The branch of information science that deals with natural language information.

51. Small buffalo of Mindoro in the Philippines.

52. A stronghold into which people could go for shelter during a battle.

54. Rich Middle Eastern cake made of thin layers of flaky pastry filled with nuts and honey.

57. Feeling or showing extreme anger.

58. Desert shrub of Syria and Arabia having small white flowers.

61. A heavy brittle diamagnetic trivalent metallic element (resembles arsenic and antimony chemically).

63. Trade name for an oral contraceptive containing mestranol and a progestin compound.

65. A health resort near a spring or at the seaside.

67. A island in the Netherlands Antilles that is the top of an extinct volcano.

71. Round object that is hit or thrown or kicked in games.

72. A member of the Caddo people who formerly lived in the Dakotas west of the Missouri river.

76. A small piece of cloth.

77. Not in action or at work.

78. A tricycle (usually propelled by pedalling).

79. The sense organ for hearing and equilibrium.

80. A condition requiring relief.

81. The great hall in ancient Persian palaces.

82. A flat wing-shaped process or winglike part of an organism.

2. The state prevailing during the absence of war.

3. Lean end of the neck.

4. A metal urn with a spigot at the base.

5. A user interface in which you type commands instead of choosing them from a menu or selecting an icon.

6. A genus of Laridae.

7. An antiviral drug used in the treatment of AIDS. 8. A percussion instrument consisting of a pair of hollow pieces of wood or bone (usually held between the thumb and fingers) that are made to click together (as by Spanish dancers) in rhythm with the dance.

9. German dramatist and poet who developed a style of epic theater (1898-1956).

10. A database containing an ordered array of items (names or topics).

11. Issue or terminate (in a specified way, state, etc.).

12. A mountain range in western Russia extending from the arctic to the Caspian Sea. 13. An official language of the Republic of South Africa.

14. Turned or twisted toward one side.

22. The basic unit of money in Ghana.

24. A bottomless gulf or pit.

27. A painful emotion resulting from an awareness of inadequacy or guilt.

31. An international organization of European countries formed after World War II to reduce trade barriers and increase cooperation among its members.

32. Any of several small auks of north Pacific coasts.

33. Necessary foods or commodities.

35. Type genus of the Alcidae comprising solely the razorbill.

36. A signal transmitted along a narrow path.

37. A member of a Turkic people of Uzbekistan and neighboring areas.

38. A white powder with a pleasant taste and odor.

40. A Dravidian language spoken in south central India.

43. Type genus of the family Arcidae.

44. Of or relating to or resembling the eye.

46. Bearing or marked with a label or tag.

47. An edilbe seaweed with a mild flavor.

49. The branch of computer science that deal with writing computer programs that can solve problems creatively.

53. Acute lung injury characterized by coughing and rales.

55. The blood group whose red cells carry both the A and B antigens.

56. Having the properties of glue.

59. Avoid or try to avoid, as of duties, questions and issues.

60. A fine (often starched) net used for veils or tutus or gowns.

62. Any of various thermoplastic resins used to make things.

64. Plant with an elongated head of broad stalked leaves resembling celery.

66. Large burrowing rodent of South and Central America.

68. A particular geographical region of indefinite boundary (usually serving some special purpose or distinguished by its people or culture or geography).

69. Any of numerous local fertility and nature deities worshipped by ancient Semitic peoples.

70. A city in northern India.

73. Informal abbreviation of `representative'.

74. An agency of the United Nations affiliated with the World Bank.

75. A loose sleeveless outer garment made from aba cloth.

Yesterdayʼs Solution

DOWN 1. Small room on a ship or boat where people sleep.

Daily Sudoku

Yesterday’s Solution

SPORTS

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Yankees crush Kansas City NEW YORK: Derek Jeter got a hit in his season debut, but made an early exit because of a tight right quadriceps Thursday as the New York Yankees beat Kansas City 8-4.

Sidelined since breaking his left ankle in last year’s playoffs, Jeter returned to the Yankees and got an infield single on the first pitch he saw.

The Yankees captain finished 1 for 4, scored a run and drove in one. Jeter was the designated hitter and was pulled for a pinch-hitter in the eighth inning.

Jeter was set to take a test on his quad. He said it tightened up during his third at-bat. “I hope it’s not a big deal,” he said. Andy Pettitte (7-6) settled down after another shaky first inning. Ervin Santana (5-6) took the loss.

ORIOLES 3, RANGERS 1 In Baltimore, Chris Davis hit his major league-leading 34th homer to back Miguel Gonzalez, and the Baltimore Orioles beat Texas to earn a split of the four-game series.

Davis snapped an 0-for-17 skid and reached career highs in homers and RBIs (86) with a second-inning solo shot off Ross Wolf (1-2). His 34 home runs are the most in the majors before the All-Star break since 2001, when Barry Bonds had 39 and Luis Gonzalez hit 35.

Brian Roberts also connected for the Orioles. Gonzalez (73) allowed one run, four hits and two walks in 6 2-3 innings.

Baltimore has won each of the last 12 games he’s started at Camden Yards. Jim Johnson worked the ninth for his 31st save in 37 chances.

WHITE SOX 6, TIGERS 3 In Detroit, Joshua Phegley’s sixth-inning grand slam gave Chris Sale some long-awaited run support, and the Chicago White Sox defeated Detroit in a game that included a benchclearing incident. Chicago trailed 3-1 when Phegley connected off Anibal Sanchez (7-6). Luke Putkonen came on and got one out before throwing a pitch behind Alexei Ramirez, who started toward the mound before being restrained. The benches and bullpens emptied, but the situation didn’t really escalate. Sale (6-8) allowed three runs in 6 2-3 innings.

Addison Reed pitched the ninth for his 23rd save in 27 chances. Miguel Cabrera hit his 30th homer of the year, a solo shot in the fifth that gave the Tigers a 3-1 lead. Prince Fielder was up next, and Sale threw a pitch high and inside to the Detroit slugger.

RAYS 4, TWINS 3 In St. Petersburg, Matt Moore won his 13th game this season, Luke Scott and Evan Longoria consecutive homers and the surging Tampa Bay Rays beat Minnesota for their eighth straight win.

Moore (13-3), who was added to the AL All-Star team after initially being left off, gave up three runs and three hits while striking out 10 over 7 1-3 innings. He won his fifth straight start and setting a team record for victories before the AllStar break.

Jake McGee got his first save pitching a scoreless ninth.

Scott and Longoria hit solo shots in a span of three pitches off Mike Pelfrey (4-7) as the Rays took a 3-1 lead in the sixth.

RED SOX 4, MARINERS 3 In Seattle, Daniel Nava hit a two-out single in the top of the 10th inning to score pinch-runner Jackie Bradley Jr., and the Boston Red Sox rallied from a four-run deficit for the second time in a four-game series against Seattle.

Ryan Lavarnway walked to open the 10th against Tom Wilhelmsen (0-3) and was replaced by Bradley. Brock Holt laid down a sacrifice bunt and Nava later singled.

Koji Uehara pitched the 10th for his seventh save as the Red Sox took three of four in the series. Reliever Steven Wright (1-0) allowed three hits in 5 2-3 innings.

INDIANS 4, BLUE JAYS 2 In Cleveland, rookie Danny Salazar pitched six superb innings to win his major league debut, leading the Cleveland Indians past Toronto.

Salazar, who began the season in Double-A, allowed just one run and two hits. The 23-year-old righty didn’t give up a hit until the sixth and struck out seven. Chris Perez gave up a run in a shaky ninth but got his 11th save. Asdrubal Cabrera homered in the first off RA Dickey (8-10). — AP

ATLANTA: Justin Upton No. 8 of the Atlanta Braves slides safely into second base against Zack Cozart No. 2 of the Cincinnati Reds after hitting a double in the fourth inning. —AFP

Braves roll over Reds ATLANTA: Freddie Freeman celebrated his newly won All-Star berth by driving in four runs with three hits, and the Atlanta Braves beat Mat Latos and the Cincinnati Reds 6-5 on Thursday night.

Freeman held off Dodgers rookie Yasiel Puig to win the fan voting for the final spot on NL All-Star roster. The first baseman drove in two runs with a first-inning double and added run-scoring singles in the second and fourth innings.

Justin Upton also had three hits to help Tim Hudson (6-7) earn his second straight win.

Craig Kimbrel pitched the ninth for his 25th save. Latos (8-3) lasted only four innings in his shortest start of the season. He allowed six runs on nine hits and two walks. The six earned runs allowed matched his season high.

Braves right fielder Jason Heyward left the game in the second inning with a strained right hamstring.

PHILLIES 3, NATIONALS 1 In Philadelphia, Kyle Kendrick outpitched All-Star Jordan Zimmermann, pinch-hitter Kevin Frandsen hit a tiebreaking double in the seventh and Philadelphia beat Washington.

Frandsen is hitting .355 (11 for 31) with 10 RBIs as a pinch-hitter this season. Kendrick (86) allowed one run and five hits in seven innings to help Philadelphia take three of four from the defending NL East champions. The Phillies (46-47) are 7-3 since July 2 and are within 11/2 games of the second-place Nationals. Zimmermann (12-4) gave up two runs and eight hits, striking out six in 6 1-3 innings. Antonio Bastardo pitched a perfect eighth and Jonathan Papelbon finished for his 20th save in 24 tries. Kendrick overcame a season-high four errors by the Phillies. Chase Utley had a career-worst three errors.

CUBS 3, CARDINALS 0 In Chicago, Edwin Jackson earned his third straight win, combining with four relievers on a four-hitter, and Anthony Rizzo drove in all the runs to lead the Chicago Cubs over St. Louis. St. Louis had the tying run at the plate in the ninth inning after Kevin Gregg dropped a throw covering first on Allen Craig’s grounder, and David Freese walked.

Alfonso Soriano made a shoestring catch on Jon Jay’s liner to end the game. Cardinals manager Mike Matheny was then seen arguing vehemently with plate umpire Dan Bellino and appeared to make contact with him.

The Cubs escaped with the win, and Gregg got his 16th save in 18 chances. St. Louis’ fivegame winning streak ended. Jackson (6-10) struck out five without a walk in seven innings. Starlin Castro added three singles and

scored two runs for the Cubs, who won for the fifth time in six games.

DIAMONDBACKS 5, BREWERS 3 In Phoenix, Martin Prado lined a two-run single in the eighth inning, Wade Miley pitched eight effective innings, and Arizona topped Milwaukee to snap a three-game losing streak. Miley (6-7) gave up a pair of homers in the first three innings before settling down. Adam Eaton helped Arizona close to 3-2 with a two-run triple in the fifth inning, Jason Kubel tied it with a sacrifice fly the next inning and Prado capped the comeback with the bases loaded against Jim Henderson (3-3) in the eighth. Brad Ziegler worked around two runners in the ninth to earn his second save, a night after Heath Bell blew a save with two outs in the ninth in a loss to the Dodgers.

Jonathan Lucroy hit a two-run homer, and Carlos Gomez had a solo shot for the Brewers.

Milwaukee starter Yovani Gallardo allowed three runs and four hits in six innings.

GIANTS 4, PADRES 2 In san Diego, Pablo Sandoval hit his first home run since May 21, and All-Star Madison Bumgarner settled down to allow four hits in seven innings as San Francisco beat San Diego in a matchup of the worst teams in the weak NL West. The defending World Series champion Giants, who snapped a four-game losing streak, had lost 19 of 24 coming in and were a

season-high 10 games under .500.

Bumgarner (10-5) allowed two runs on three hits in the first inning and then retired 14 in a row before Carlos Quentin singled with two outs in the sixth. The lefty struck out six and walked one. The Giants are 2-8 in July, with Bumgarner getting both wins. Sergio Romo pitched the ninth for his 21st save in 24 chances. The Padres have lost 16 of 19.

San Francisco broke through in the eighth with two runs and three hits off Luke Gregerson (4-5). San Diego starter Jason Marquis failed for the fifth time to get his 10th victory. He allowed two runs and seven hits in 5 1-3 innings, struck out three and walked two.

DODGERS 6, ROCKIES 1 In Los Angeles, Chris Capuano pitched shutout ball for 6 1/3 innings, Mark Ellis drove in four runs, and the Los Angeles Dodgers beat Colorado for their fifth win in a row.

The Dodgers moved above .500 for the first time since April 15. Capuano (3-6) allowed six hits, struck out a season-high eight and walked none to earn just his second win at home and first since beating Miami 5-3 on May 12. Drew Pomeranz (0-3) gave up three runs and seven hits in four innings, struck out four and walked five in his third start of the season. Ellis went 3 for 4 with a walk, the fourth time he has had three or more hits in a game this season. — AP

MLB results/standings Cleveland 4, Toronto 2; Tampa Bay 4, Minnesota 3; NY Yankees 8, Kansas City 4; Chicago White Sox 6, Detroit 3; Boston 8, Seattle 7 (10 innings); Baltimore 3, Texas 1; Philadelphia 3, Washington 1; Atlanta 6, Cincinnati 5; Chicago Cubs 3, St. Louis 0; Arizona 5, Milwaukee 3; LA Dodgers 6, Colorado 1; San Francisco 4, San Diego 2.

American League Eastern Division W L PCT Boston 57 37 .606 Tampa Bay 53 40 .570 Baltimore 51 42 .548 NY Yankees 50 42 .543 Toronto 44 47 .484 Central Division Detroit 50 41 .549 Cleveland 48 44 .522 Kansas City 43 46 .483 Minnesota 37 52 .416 Chicago White Sox36 53 .404 Western Division Oakland 54 38 .587 Texas 53 39 .576 LA Angels 44 46 .489 Seattle 40 52 .435 Houston 32 59 .352

GB 3.5 5.5 6 11.5 2.5 6 12 13 1 9 14 21.5

National League Eastern Division Atlanta 53 39 .576 Washington 47 45 .511 Philadelphia 46 47 .495 NY Mets 40 48 .455 Miami 33 57 .367 Central Division St. Louis 55 35 .611 Pittsburgh 54 36 .600 Cincinnati 51 41 .554 Chicago Cubs 41 49 .456 Milwaukee 37 54 .407 Western Division Arizona 48 44 .522 LA Dodgers 46 45 .505 Colorado 44 49 .473 San Francisco 41 50 .451 San Diego 41 52 .441

6 7.5 11 19 1 5 14 18.5 1.5 4.5 6.5 7.5

SPORTS

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Osunaarashi brings African flavor to sumo in Japan NAGOYA: In a sport steeped in ancient rituals and Japanese tradition, one young foreigner faces the weighty issue of how to keep faithful to his religious observances and be competitive in one of the biggest sumo arenas.

Wrestling under the name Osunaarashi, which translates as ‘Great Sandstorm,’ the 21year-old Abdelrahman Ahmed Shalan is the first professional sumo wrestler from the African continent.

Being an outsider has had its challenges.

But while he’s slowly been adjusting to life in the elite sumo ranks, the young Egyptian does have a unique problem at the 15-day Nagoya tournament where his rivals rely on every part of their preparation being in sync — the event coincides with the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. And for Shalan, that means strict fasting — not something usually associated with the larger-than-life image of sumo wrestling.

“I love sumo. Sumo means everything to me,” he told The Associated Press in an interview as the Nagoya tournament was commencing. “I’ve sacrificed being with my friends, being with my family, being in university. I’ve put all my cards on the table and now we’ll see what happens. I believe in myself and believe in my dream.”

Shalan arrived in Japan less than two years ago and has quickly risen up the ranks after only eight tournaments. He made his debut in the elite juryo division last Sunday with a win over Mongolian Oniarashi. He weighs in at 315 pounds and stands 6-foot-2 tall. While his size is a great advantage, his win over Oniarashi proves he relies on more than just brute force as he calmly got a grip of his opponent’s belt after the faceoff and deftly forced him out of the ring.

Since arriving in Japan, the wrestler now known as Osunaarashi has done remarkably well, compiling a 45-7 record and winning two titles in the junior divisions. Only two other non-Japanese wrestlers have reached the juryo division from eight tournaments Hawaiian Konishiki and Estonian Baruto.

“He will get to the top division, I have no doubt about that,” sumo columnist Mark Buckton said. “He has a very strong upper body, but that doesn’t necessarily translate to success in sumo. Hopefully, he will be able to develop his lower body and learn to fight on the belt.” As much as he likes the attention, Osunaarashi said there are pressures that go with being the first African and Arab wrestler.

It “has many good points and some bad points,” he said. “I feel a lot of stress because I am the first African sumo wrestler, so the whole world is watching to see what the first African in sumo will do.”

Due to timing of the July 7-21 Nagoya tournament during Ramadan, Osunaarashi can’t eat or drink during daylight and must find time for prayer. It’s something he learned to cope with at last year’s Nagoya tournament but he said the toughest part is not being able to drink water in the stifling summer heat. Even some spectators are struggling in temperatures topping 99 degrees with high humidity. “For me (Ramadan) is not a big problem,” Osunaarashi said. “I got used to it last year in Nagoya. The biggest problem is water. I can’t drink water during the day. I eat after midnight, then sleep. But it’s not a big problem, I am used to it.”

On some occasions, a main meal consists of little more than a rice ball at 3 a.m. during the fast. That’s not much to go on when your

JAPAN: In this photo taken Saturday, July 6, 2013, Egyptian sumo wrestler Osunaarashi (second from left) trains with his stablemates in Inazawa, near Nagoya, central Japan.

The 21-year-old Abdelrahman Ahmed Shalan is the first professional sumo wrestler from the African continent under the name Osunaarashi, which translates as ‘Great Sandstorm.’ —AP bout is at 3 p.m. Just how well Osunaarashi there is a broad distinction between wrestlers will be able to cope in the full 15-day tournain the top two divisions, which are called ment remains to be seen. Until now, his tourmakuuchi and juryo. Wrestlers in the makunaments have been only seven days. uchi and juryo divisions are known as sekitori Now that he is in the elite division, and receive a regular monthly salary as well as Osunaarashi knows things will be a lot other perks, while those in the lower four divitougher. Through the first four days of the sions are considered to be trainees and tournament, he had three wins against one receive a small allowance instead of a salary. loss and will be hoping for at least a winning All the top foreign wrestlers in sumo’s elite record of 8-7 at the end of the tournament. If he puts together two solid tournaments, Osunaarashi could be promoted to the top division for the season-ending tournament in November.

“People have told me to be careful now CHRISTCHURCH: Tom Marshall scored a that I’m in juryo,” Osunaarashi said. “People brilliant try to seal a 25-17 victory for the say the wrestlers are tougher and the Crusaders over a dogged Hurricanes in wrestlers are great, but I feel I am tough and Christchurch yesterday but it was not great, too.” Osunaarashi was introduced to enough to knock the rival Chiefs off the top sumo at the age of 14. A sumo coach in Egypt of the New Zealand conference. suggested he give it a shot because of his The Crusaders had needed a four-try size. He weighed 265 pounds at the time, but win to take a bonus point and put pressure lost seven out of seven bouts to a wrestler on the Chiefs, but managed only three as half his weight and realized there was somethe Hurricanes fought to the finish. thing more to the sport than he’d first Defending champions Chiefs can head assumed. into their final regular-season match So he studied videos of former grand against the Blues on Saturday assured they champion Takanohana to get a better underhave a week off before a home semi-final standing of the sport. That helped, obviously. regardless of the outcome.

He won a bronze medal at the 2008 world The Crusaders cemented a home playoff junior sumo championships and moved to in the first week of the postseason but will Japan in 2011 to pursue his career full time. have plenty to ponder after a disjointed Many in sumo were impressed that he came display in front of home fans. to Japan just after the earthquake, tsunami The Hurricanes were already out of the and nuclear crises that devastated the counplayoffs but took it to the hosts and pulled try’s northeastern coast. within a point in the last 15 minutes when Then, as now, things haven’t been entirely winger Julian Savea scored a late try. easy for him in Japan. Sumo wrestlers live in The visitors searched desperately for a communal training stables where all aspects late score, but jet-heeled winger Marshall of their daily lives from meals to what they dribbled a kick to the left corner in the final wear are dictated by strict traditions. Like all minutes and bolted half the length of the the younger wrestlers in the lower ranks, field to touch it over the line.

Osunaarashi was required to perform a variZac Guildford and Andy Ellis scored the ety of menial tasks that included cleaning toitwo early tries for the Crusaders, who lets and washing the clothes of senior enjoyed good service from in-form flyhalf wrestlers.There are six divisions in sumo but

division must master the Japanese language and that’s something Osunaarashi is also grappling with.

Despite the hardships of the sumo world, not to mention homesickness, Osunaarashi has persevered. Now that he’s a sekitori, his life has changed considerably. He has his own room and gets an assistant to perform the mundane tasks he once had to do for others.

“Everyone has to go through the difficult tasks, “Osunaarashi said. “Sumo is all about persevering. You have to be willing to sacrifice many things to achieve success.”

Japan remains the only country where sumo is practiced professionally, yet the sport has had trouble attracting new local recruits and that has opened up opportunities for the likes of Osunaarashi.

Mongolians have dominated in recent years - producing the sport’s two current grand champions, Hakuho and Harumafuji.

There are 24 foreign wrestlers in the top two divisions of sumo out of a total of 70. It is part of a gradual shift in the sport. There hasn’t been a Japanese grand champion since Takanohana retired in 2003 and a Japanese wrestler hasn’t won a major tournament since ozeki Tochiazuma in 2006.

For now, Japan is home for Osunaarashi, who studied accounting and management in university. He has kept up with political developments in Egypt but says he’s too focused on sumo to get too caught up in it. “I follow what’s going on, but I don’t like the political stuff,” Osunaarashi said. “I’m just trying to do my best for my country and forget about politics. I don’t like to mix politics with what I am doing here. To make something good for my country, I have to do well in sumo.” Buckton also points out that many foreign wrestlers can be led astray by the temptations of nightlife in cities such as Osaka and Tokyo. —AP

Crusaders quell Hurricanes Dan Carter but may hope captain Richie McCaw can slot back into the team for the playoffs after a long sabbatical.

Carter kicked two penalties and two conversions to add 10 points. Victor Vito and Brad Shields scored early tries to keep the Hurricanes in touch. —Reuters

Tom Marshall in action in this file photo.

SPORTS

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Flawless Johnson in tie at John Deere Classic ILLINOIS: Rejuvenated by improved form with his driver, Zach Johnson made a strong start to his title defence at the John Deere Classic in Silvis, Illinois as he surged into a share of the lead in Thursday’s opening round.

The 37-year-old American piled up seven birdies in a flawless display for a sizzling seven-under-par 64 at the TPC Deere Run, finishing joint top with Colombia’s Camilo Villegas.

Burly Zimbabwean Brendon de Jonge was a further stroke back, mixing four birdies with an eagle at the par-five 10th to end the round level with Americans Matt Bettencourt and Daniel Summerhays.

Most eyes, however, will be firmly focused on Johnson who triumphed here last year with a birdie on the second hole of a sudden-death playoff to edge out compatriot Troy Matteson.

Johnson has now posted sub-70

scores in his last 17 competitive rounds on the par-71 layout.

“I am very pleased,” Johnson, a ninetimes winner on the PGA Tour, told Golf Channel after making four birdies in his last nine holes. “Very few mistakes, one maybe two errant shots. I was very much in control, and very in control on the greens. “I hit my driver beautifully, putted great and gave myself a lot of good opportunities. That’s all you can ask for.

Hopefully I can just continue that consistency for the remainder of the week.”

Johnson was especially pleased with his driving, a component of his game which gave him trouble early on this season when he missed the cut three times in his first seven PGA Tour events.

“It feels tremendous,” he smiled. “It’s at the point now with my driver that I must have been way off (before). I feel very comfortable.

“I’m going to be hitting bad drives but

I don’t feel I have to grind as much off the tee box. The consistency of left-to-right and right-to-left is always nice on these tee shots.

“But I still have a lot of work to do. I am never going to be content. The leaderboard here is packed and it will be come Sunday.”

One player who had a grandstand view of Johnson on Thursday was threetimes former champion Steve Stricker, who was paired with his fellow American in a high-profile grouping which also included Davis Love III. “It was a lot of fun, an enjoyable round with two friends and watching Zach play, Zach played great,” said Stricker, who charged into contention at one of his favourite events with an opening 67.

“He hit in there (close) a lot of times and when he sets the pace like that, you don’t want to fall too far behind. You know he’s played well here in years past

and you’ve got to stay up to him because I think he’s going to be tough to beat.”

Stricker made an explosive start to his round, holing out with a sand wedge to eagle his opening hole, the par-five 10th.

He got to five under for the round after 11 holes before recording two bogeys over his closing stretch.

“I kept it going for a little while, then ran into a couple of bad holes at four and five on the way in,” said the 46-year-old American, who was champion at the TPC Deere Run for three successive years from 2009. “But a good start overall. I wish I could have taken a little bit more advantage of that start but I am pretty pleased with the way I finished off the round.” South African world number 10 Louis Oosthuizen, the highest-ranked player in this week’s field, made a rollercoaster start, mixing five birdies with a bogey, a double and a triple for a oneover 72. — Reuters

Power game helps Perry

ONTARIO: Inbee Park, of South Korea, hits out of a sand trap beside the 18th green to within four feet of the hole during the Manulife Financial LPGA Classic. — AP

Stanford, Matthew lead Park at LPGA Classic WATERLOO: Angela Stanford and Catriona Matthew shot eightunder 63s to share the first-round lead at the Manulife Financial LPGA Classic on Thursday, two strokes ahead of top-ranked Inbee Park. Park is trying to become the first golfer to win four straight LPGA Tour events since Lorena Ochoa in 2008. Park was joined by American Irene Cho, Spain’s Belen Mozo and South Korea’s Hee Young Park and Meena Lee at 65. American Ryann O’Toole and South Koreans Jenny Shin, Amy Yang and Ji Young Oh were three shots off the lead at 66.

Defending champion Brittany Lang opened with a 69.

Stanford closed her late-evening round with three straight birdies to join Matthew atop the leaderboard under mostly sunny skies at Grey Silo Golf Course. “Today I hit it really good,” Stanford said. “So it was just one of those days that as a golfer you just love.” Players took advantage of soft conditions early in the day on the 6,330-yard course. Aggressive approach shots were rewarded before the greens started to dry up in the afternoon.

“We were pretty much able to attack the pins this morning,” Park said. “The next three days might be a little bit different if we don’t get any more rain, might play a little harder.”

Warm temperatures and sunny skies are in the forecast through the final round of the $1.3-million tournament on Sunday. The 24-year-old Park oozed confidence as she strolled down the fairways, apparently in complete control of her game on the way to her best first-round score of the season.

“Golf is a sport where you could miss the cut this week and you could win next week,” Park said. “There’s a lot of imbalance in this game and to keep this kind of level going for four weeks, five weeks, six in a row is a very tough thing to do. We really have to be strong mentally, you have to be physically strong.”

“Everything’s got to work perfect to win that many tournaments in a row I think. You could win six, seven tournaments a year, but I think it’s really tough to do in a streak, like in a row.” —AP

NEBRASKA: Kenny Perry’s prediction that improved power and accuracy off the tee would put him in contention at the US Senior Open proved correct as he split one fairway after another to move into a seven-way tie for the lead in Thursday’s opening round in Omaha, Nebraska.

Seeking a second successive major title on the over-50s Champions Tour, Perry birdied two of the three par-fives in challenging conditions on the way to a three-under-par 67 at Omaha Country Club.

Perry, who won last month’s Senior Players Championship by two shots, managed to avoid the notoriously thick rough on the hilly layout to end the day as one of a record seven coleaders after the opening round at the event.

Also carding 67s were Michael Allen, Jay Don Blake, Gary Hallberg, Tom Lehman, Mark O’Meara and Fred Funk.

The previous record for the number of co-leaders after the first round was five, set in the 1997 US Senior Open at Olympia Fields outside Chicago.

Germany’s Bernhard Langer was a further stroke back after a 68, along with Australian Peter Senior, American Rocco Mediate and Taiwan’s Lu Chiensoon. Perry, a 14-times winner on the regular PGA Tour, was delighted with his impressive start, having mixed five birdies with two bogeys to climb to the top of the leaderboard.

“I took care of the par-fives today and drove it nicely, kept it in the fairway, kept it in play,” Perry told reporters. “Like I said yesterday, if I hit it in the fairway, I really like my chances on this golf course. “I only missed a couple of fairways today so I was always attacking the pins. I could have shot a couple better, but I made two poor bogeys. I three-putted the parthree, five, and the other bogey I missed the green and didn’t get up and down.

“You make five birdies in Open conditions, as tough as it was out there, I was very happy with that. That’s about

OMAHA: Kenny Perry hits his tee shot on the fourth hole during the first round of the 2013 US Senior Open Championship. — AFP

as good as I could do.”

On Wednesday, Perry said in his pretournament news conference that he held a “a huge advantage” on the 6,711-yard, par-70 layout with his power game, mainly because of a new driver he put in his bag two months ago.

He delivered in style on Thursday with several booming tee shots as he hit nine of 13 fairways and reached 14 of 18 greens in regulation.

“It automatically put length on me, and it put in accuracy,” said Perry of his new driver. “It’s really freed me up off the tee, so I’m very happy with that.

That’s why I’m playing more aggressive. “If you’re off target this week, you’re going to shoot a really high score. The rough is brutal, and you’re going to be in some spots where you’re going to struggle to make double (bogey) from.

“I was lucky. I stayed away from all those areas, I was able to drive it beautifully. I hit my irons okay, putted okay.

It’s just a matter of executing and keeping that driver in play.”

Tom Watson, an eight-times major champion on the PGA Tour who has added six more majors in the senior ranks, opened with a level-par 70 despite not being in form with his approach play.

“The one thing I did very well today was my lag putt,” said the 63-year-old, who will captain the United States Ryder Cup team against holders Europe at Gleneagles, Scotland in 2014. “I didn’t hit the ball very well with my irons.

Even though I was in the fairway most of the time, I didn’t get it very close to the hole at all today. “I did a real good job of lag putting and finishing the deal on the green. That was the positive.” Englishman Roger Chapman, who won last year’s US Senior Open by two strokes in Lake Orion, Michigan, launched his title defense with a 74. — Reuters

sports

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Lorenzo clocks fastest time SACHSENRING: Spaniard Jorge Lorenzo was fastest in the opening practice session at the German MotoGP, yesterday, capping a remarkable comeback just two weeks after surgery on a fractured collarbone. The defending world champion rode his Yamaha around the Sachsenring circuit in a time of 1min 22.47secs to better compatriot and current championship leader Dani Pedrosa on his Honda by 0.174secs.

Former world champion Valentino Rossi was third fastest on the second Yamaha and 0.194secs back, as he looks to build on his victory two weeks ago in the Netherlands.

Lorenzo appeared back on top form after an operation to repair a shattered collar bone and won the admiration of his peers and fans by finishing fifth behind Rossi at the Dutch GP, just 36 hours after delicate surgery.

The 26-year-old, who also won the MotoGP championship in 2010 is second in the world standings, just nine points behind Pedrosa.

Lorenzo-whom Rossi described as a “hero” for taking part in Assen-said on Friday that he had riddern against medical advice.

“In the Netherlands, I had a lot of pain throughout the race.

I admit that I was afraid. But I managed to get fifth place and only concede two points (to Pedrosa),” he told reporters. “That was the most important thing.”

Doctors had initially prescribed four weeks’ rest for Lorenzo, given his injuries after the 200 kilometres (124 miles) per hour crash during practice at Assen.

But they did not count on the defending champion’s will to compete, just 36 hours after a two-hour operation in Barcelona under general anaesthetic to repin his shattered left collar bone with a titanium plate and eight screws.

“I’m the first rider in history to race 48 hours after breaking a collar bone,” said Lorenzo, who is having several hours of physiotherapy every day.

“I’m proud even if I know as well that it could have ended badly. I could have fallen and lost everything. I wasn’t thinking and a little bit foolish.”

Doctors admitted they had a nervous wait as the race took place, with a bone fragment from the complex fracture near an artery providing particular concern.

Doctor Joaquin Rodriguez said on Friday: “This type of fracture can cause serious damage to the blood vessels under the collar bone.

“We tried to stop him racing but he’s stubborn. We then gave him a list of movements that he couldn’t do under any circumstances. “In particular we explained the signs which we would raise to force him to stop racing immediately.

“It (the race) was difficult to watch. My colleagues and I were very worried. Jorge gave us a lesson in physical and mental strength to go through the pain barrier.”

Given Rodriguez’s medical assessment, many observers have asked how race doctors gave Lorenzo the all-clear to race. But two race doctors at Assen told AFP that the rider had successfully passed a series of tests that were more demanding than the movements he had to make during the grand prix itslef. At Saschenring, Lorenzo has been dubbed “Kaizer Jorge” (Emperor Jorge), a reference to Germany football legend Franz Beckenbauer, who finished the 1970 World Cup semi-final against Italy with his arm in a sling and a broken collar bone.—AFP

GERMANY: Yamaha driver Jorge Lorenzo of Spain steers his bike during the first training session of the MotoGP of the Grand Prix of Germany. —AFP

SAN FRANCISCO: Emirates Team New Zealand (left) passes by Luna Rossa Challenge (right) of Italy, while training for the America’s Cup sailing event on Thursday. —AP

Jury sides with America’s Cup challengers SAN FRANCISCO; Tensions in the troubled America’s Cup could be easing after an international jury sided with challengers from New Zealand and Italy in their arguments that regatta director Iain Murray overstepped his authority in making rules changes following the fatal capsize of a third challenger’s catamaran two months ago.

One promising sign was that Italy’s Luna Rossa ended its boycott and sailed its 72-foot catamaran alone around the course on San Francisco Bay to collect its first point of the Louis Vuitton Cup for challengers. Luna Rossa’s scheduled opponent, Sweden’s Artemis Racing, remains a no-show while it works to get its second boat up to speed following the capsize on May 9 that killed Andrew Simpson and destroyed its first boat.

Simpson’s death led Murray to make 37 safety recommendations. Among them was a highly technical change to the winglets on the rudders of the fast, space-age boats. The New Zealanders and Italians protested, saying the changes were more about performance than safety.

The syndicates said their boats were designed and built under the old rules and they didn’t have time to build new rudders and, perhaps more importantly, test them. They also said they felt the change gave an advantage to defending champion Oracle Team USA, which doesn’t have to race until the start of the 34th America’s Cup on Sept. 7.

The jury ruled that a regatta notice issued by Murray had the effect of changing the AC72 Class Rule and was not in accordance with the protocol.

Murray was ordered to withdraw that notice, so the class rule reverts to how it was before he made the safety recommendations.

Last week, Murray said that if the jury sided with the challengers, he would have no choice but to go back to the US

Coast Guard to discuss the permit that allows racing on the bay. The jury ordered Murray to make the views of all the competitors known to the Coast Guard. Emirates Team New Zealand said in a statement that it was pleased the jury “has maintained the sanctity of the AC72 Class Rule in ruling that it can be changed only by unanimous consent of the competitors and the Regatta Director.”

The Kiwis added that they believe the jury’s decision “does not affect the substance of the safety plan” submitted with the application to the US Coast Guard for a permit or “the excellent work the Regatta Director undertook with the Review Committee.”

The Kiwis also said they’d like to help Artemis Racing, which has said it doesn’t have the proper rudders to comply with the rules. The Kiwis said they have proposed that when Artemis is ready to race, it be given dispensation from the class rule regarding rudder elevators as long as it otherwise complies with the class rule and safety recommendations.

“This would require the consent of the other competitors and we would strongly urge this be given,” the New Zealand statement said. “Artemis Racing is making a tremendous effort under difficult circumstances to get back on the race track and deserve support to help them achieve this.”

Tom Ehman, vice-commodore of the Golden Gate Yacht Club, which is trustee of the America’s Cup, said Murray’s 37 safety recommendations affected the protocol, the racing rules and the AC72 Class Rule. The teams agreed to amend the racing rules and the protocol, but seven changes that affected the class rule weren’t agreed on unanimously.

Murray thought he could accomplish that through the event permit.

America’s Cup CEO Stephen Barclay said racing can continue if the teams

abide by the existing class rule and safety rules. “If the teams take this step, it will ensure the safety plan remains intact and the U.S. Coast Guard Marine Event Permit is unaffected,” he said.

Murray said Emirates Team New Zealand and Luna Rossa are complying with both the AC72 Class Rule and the safety rules. He said he’ll need to discuss with the teams how the jury decision affects Artemis Racing. Artemis said it was disappointed that the jury’s decision leaves uncertainty but that it remains confident a solution will be found.

“It’s a bit of a tempest in a tea pot,” Ehman said. “There always seems to be some kind of controversy and they all get sorted out. I’m confident this one will as well.”

The Italians weren’t immediately available for comment. Oracle Team USA said in a statement that it respected the decision of the jury, continues to support Murray and that it believes all teams have benefited from his review.

Luna Rossa skipper Max Sirena said last week that the Italians would not race until the jury ruled, but that they would return regardless of the panel’s decision.

They sat out the regatta’s opening race on Sunday against the Kiwis.

Now, the regatta could see its first real race today, when Luna Rossa is scheduled to face Emirates Team New Zealand.

The Kiwis have twice sailed around the course alone, including the race the Italians boycotted and on Tuesday when Artemis Racing was the scheduled opponent. They have shown remarkable speed, reaching nearly 50 mph on Thursday. Emirates Team New Zealand was practicing on San Francisco Bay on Thursday, appearing to shadow the Italians as they finished their race.

Artemis CEO Paul Cayard said Saturday that his syndicate was about two weeks from beginning sea trials.—AP

SPORTS

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Klitschko wary of another Povetkin withdrawal BERLIN: World champion Wladimir Klitschko has admitted he has concerns whether challenger Alexander Povetkin will meet him in the ring on October 5 in Moscow after the Russian’s two previous withdrawals. Klitschko, 37, was first due to fight Povetkin in 2008, only for the Russian to injure his ankle while training, then the 33year-old pulled out of a second bout two years later when his father died. October’s clash at Moscow’s Olimpiyski Arena will settle which of the pair is the World Boxing Association’s champion and the fight details were decided 10 days ago after Klitschko insisted that the drugs testing is done in Germany.

The Ukrainian, who faces his 24th world title fight, told Hamburg’s Morgenpost he was “cautious in regards to Povetkin.

“In the past we twice agreed to fight and he withdrew. With Povetkin, you never know what happens,” added Klitschko, whose WBO, IBF and IBO titles are also up for grabs in Moscow.

With Klitschko holding WBA “super” champion status since his 2011 win over Britain’s David Haye and Povetkin deemed the governing body’s regular belt holder, the bout has been ordered to decide which is the true champion.

Povetkin, the 2004 Olympic heavyweight champion, has an undefeated record with 18 knock-outs in 26 wins, but Klitschko, who won Olympic heavyweight gold at the 1996 Atlanta games, says he hopes the Russian does not cancel on him for a third time.

“He really listens to what other people say, I hope people tell him that he should fight,” said Klitschko, who has 51 knock-outs in 60 wins with the last of his three defeats having come nearly a decade ago. Both fighters will walk away with a small fortune from the fight, with Klitschko standing to make a career-high 13.13 million euros ($17.1 million, £11.3 million) from the fight and Povetkin 4.4 million. The final date of the fight has only been set back following lengthy negotiations with the Klitschko camp refusing to have the Russians take care of the drugs testing, which will be conducted by Germany’s National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA). —AFP

Wladimir Klitschko

Germany’s women held by Dutch STOCKHOLM: Holders Germany were surprisingly held to a 0-0 draw by a tenacious Netherlands side in their opening Group B game at the women’s European Championship in Sweden on Thursday.

Dutch striker Manon Melis had the best of her side’s chances when she was one-on-one with goalkeeper Nadine Angerer but the Germany captain made a marvellous save with her right foot. Germany created plenty of chances but poor finishing stopped the seven-times European champions starting with a win. In Thursday’s early Group B game, Iceland scored a late penalty to snatch a share of the points in a 1-1 draw with Norway.

Kristine Hegland had given the Norwegians the lead in the first half, deftly steering the ball home past onrushing keeper Gudbjorg Gunnarsdottir. But with four minutes left, Sara Gunnarsdottir was felled in the box by Norway defender Marit Christensen and Margret Vidarsdottir slotted home the penalty to claim a point for Iceland. With hosts Sweden drawing 1-1 with Denmark and Italy opening the tournament with a goalless encounter against Finland in Group A, no team has won a match yet at Euro 2013. Group C gets underway on Thursday, when France face Russia and England take on Spain at the 12-team tournament. —Reuters

Photo of the day

Mike Whiddett performs at the NZ Drift Series Final in Taupo, New Zealand. www.redbullcontentpool.com

The real cost of the NFL’s business NEW YORK: In the past few months, more than two dozen NFL players and a sprinkling of front-office executives have been arrested for crimes ranging from petty to deadly.

No matter how bad it looks, remember that’s not a crime wave by any fair measure, let alone by league standards.

Think of it instead as just the cost of doing business. Everybody in the NFL already does. To be fair, any company with that employs 9,000 people is bound to have some bad apples. And this year’s number of arrests, give or take a few, lines up with last year’s pace.

So no one should have been surprised to awake Thursday morning to news reports that Patriots cornerback Alfonzo Dennard was arrested on suspicion of drunken driving in Lincoln, Neb. But because the NFL is all about image, about “protecting the shield,” as commissioner Roger Goodell never tires of saying, Dennard’s team pretended to be.

Another jersey trade-in offer may be in the works even as you read this. “The New England Patriots are extremely disappointed to learn of Alfonzo Dennard’s arrest,” a team statement said. “We take this matter very seriously and are working to get more information on the incident.”

Please. Let’s not forget the bottom line is always personal responsibility, and that Dennard climbed into his car likely knowing that the entire league and his team in particular - former Pats tight end Aaron Hernandez is being held on a murder charge - was already

feeling the heat. And that he was on probation after punching a cop during a fight in the same town a week before the 2012 draft. But let’s not forget, either - because the Patriots certainly can’t - that the reason they were able to pluck him all the way down at the seventh round of that draft is because Dennard had several previous scrapes on and off the field.

Once you stop to think about it, the cynicism that underpins the whole “crime-in-the-NFL” phenomenon is almost breathtaking.

A respected agent said earlier this week that just about every time he meets with one of the league’s general managers or personnel chiefs, the guy knows exactly how many potential troublemakers are on his roster. There’s even a code word for those players: “turds,” as in “I can’t risk a chance on another turd. We’ve already exceeded our quota.”

There’s upwards of 10 on just about every squad, the agent estimates. He said they tend to be clustered around a handful of defensive positions where meanness and a short memory are essential, with wide receivers being the most notable exception on the other side of the ball.

“They want guys who say ‘gimme the damn ball,” and guys who can turn around the play after they get beat and start talking trash right away about how it won’t ever happen again,” he said. “Without those nasty, selfish guys, competing on a regular basis is practically impossible.”

According to the agent, who asked

that his name be withheld because he’s still negotiating deals, the number of headaches a team takes on can generally be calibrated by how desperate it is to win.

Think of the Cincinnati Bengals a few years back, or on a smaller scale, how Cowboys owner Jerry Jones hired a bodyguard to make sure wide receiver Dez Bryant didn’t find himself in any more compromising positions. The problems in New England at the moment may spring from a different source - hubris, or as the agent put it, “too much faith in the ‘Patriot Way.’” But in every case, teams know exactly what they’re doing when they draft, trade or take a flyer on a knucklehead like Dennard. The only thing they can truly be “extremely disappointed” about is when one or another does something stupid or dangerous while they were his enablers.

There were at least 17 different teams touched by the more than two dozen arrests these past few months, and anytime a problem extends that wide, it usually runs top to bottom as well. As noted above, this is first and foremost about personal responsibility.

And to be fair, Goodell hasn’t been shy about doling out harsh punishment to any employee, and even harsher punishments to the league’s higher-ups.

But what’s clear is that his message, no matter how many times he warns rookies to “protect the shield,” is still being greeted in too many corners of the league with little more than a wink and a nod. So why not just spare us the lecture? —AP

SPORTS

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

City and Erdre teams vie for the ball

Pinocho and City emerge victorious

By Abdellatif Sharaa KUWAIT: The Kuwait Mini World Futsal Club Tournament continued its activities with matches of the second group that saw Bahrain’s Al-Muharraq team pay the price for missing several scoring opportunities and lost to Argentina’s Pinocho 1-2.

Meanwhile Romania’s City’Us excelled over

French fans Franc’s Erdre 6-4 in the strongest and most enjoyable matches so far.

Al-Muharraq began the match with hesitation and fear in front of Pinocho allowing to have virtual control of the match from the start and threatened to score several times, as Muharraq’s goalkeeper denied several chances coupled with bad luck for the Argentines.

Pinocho finally succeeded in scoring its first goal through Martinez Lucas, prompting Muharraq to change its strategy and threaten Pinocho’s goal through Jassim and Ahmad Saleh in addition to Abdallah Abbas and were able to force the Argentine team to defend in order to maintain their score. The relentless pressure resulted in the equalizer by Ali Saleh in the 17th minute before the first half ended.

Pinocho forced Muharraq to defend at

the start of the second half and depended on counter attacks but failed as the Argentines were able to quickly return to defending. Bahrain’s coach sent his experienced player Mohammad Abdelrahman (Ringo) into the attack and proved dangerous on Pinocho, as the goal keeper was outstanding. Pinocho’s Corazza Sebastian was able to score the winning goal.

In the second match which proved to be the best so far Romania’s team City’Us Tirgu-Mures lived up to its reputation with its strong performance scoring six goals against Franc’s Erdre. It took only one minute for City to score its first goal through Stoica Dumitru Mimi as the French goal keeper failed to make a save.

The early goal shocked the players of Erdre who were not able to regroup and allowed City to penetrate their goal several times which resulted in the second goal in the fourth minute, while the French remained stunned. City scored its third goal in the seventh minute making it harder and harder for their opponents to recover.

Erdre manager asked for a time out, and its player Javier Moreno scored the first goal in the 12th minute which gave them a new confidence.

But the joy was short lived as City was able to score the fourth goal through Lupu Robert, City then netted their second goal, City again counter attacked when CosminMarius scored the fifth goal ending the first half 5-2.

Erdre’s performance improved in the second half and had total control for sometime and scored its third goal in the 30th minute by its outstanding player Moreno, who then scored the fourth goal in the 37th minute before City sealed the match with its sixth goal in the dying minutes.

Today’s matches are as follows: Santiago Futsal v/s Kazema and MNK Alumnus v/s Chonburi.

Bahrain's Muharraq

Pinocho and Muharraq teams in action.

SPORTS SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

FIFA: Player market recovers as economies improve LONDON: Transfer spending is increasing globally as some countries recover from the economic downturn, a FIFA official said on Thursday, while questioning if clubs are hiding money from some player moves.

The first half of 2013 saw $929 million of international player trading, 40 percent more than the $664 million spent between January and June last year, and closer to the 2011 figure of $855 million.

“Certainly the economic fortunes of certain countries are getting better, others are falling,” Kimberly Morris, who oversees integrity at FIFA’s transfer unit, told The Associated Press. “I think people are maybe feeling a bit more optimistic on the whole and that may be the reason there is an increase. There is certainly a clear increase.”

The costliest deal in the summer transfer window in Europe so far has seen Brazil forward Neymar join Barcelona from Santos for 57 million euros ($74 million).

English clubs tend to be the biggest spenders, and the most expensive Premier League import this summer is currently Brazil midfielder Fernandinho, who was bought

from Shakhtar Donetsk by Manchester City for 30 million pounds ($45 million).

Registering cross-border deals with FIFA’s Transfer Matching System has been mandatory since 2010 in a bid to curb money laundering and corrupt deals. The online system requires buying and selling clubs to input matching information, including payment schedules, before a transfer is approved. Speaking at a World Sports Law Report conference in London, Morris questioned why the $929 million this year has been generated by only 12 percent of deals, with the rest appearing to be free moves.

Morris highlighted how the “bulk of transfers don’t generate the bulk of wealth.” “As a lawyer and as a compliance person I’m curious to know whether ... that’s actually representative or whether there’s a lot of money that’s not being captured. Because 12 percent and almost a billion dollars is a really interesting discrepancy.”

Morris is also concerned that some free transfers might be used to avoid taxes. “There is very interesting activity, particularly with Brazil-Uruguay and Argentina-

Uruguay where payers are moving for free and then being loaned out, where the money resides in the tax haven of Uruguay,” she said. “And that’s something we are looking at and considering why it is happening.”

FIFA has shown it will sanction clubs which break its transfer rules, with Argentine club Independiente and Italian side Genoa fined this year.

In a blocked deal for defender Julian Velazquez, Independiente tried to charge buying club Genoa for a document that should have been provided for free.

Genoa was also fined 35,000 Swiss francs ($37,000) for failing to submit documents to FIFA’s online process.

“What you are seeing is a much bigger appetite at the disciplinary committee level - as you saw with the GenoaIndependiente case - to impose sanctions that have some teeth,” Morris said. “Because if you fine a club 35,000, that’s going to maybe have a difference to their bottom line rather than just 5,000. If the fines get bigger and the fines get more pronounced it’s going to have a knock-on effect in terms of the behavior you see.” — AP

Panama in Gold Cup q-finals Belize players reveal bribe attempt

THAILAND: This file picture taken on July 11, 2013 shows Manchester United football player Wayne Rooney arriving at the hotel in Bangkok. — AFP

Rooney’s ours, Utd boss tells Mourinho BANGKOK: Manchester United boss David Moyes testily repeated that Wayne Rooney is not for sale Friday after he abruptly quit their Asian tour and Chelsea’s Jose Mourinho voiced his admiration for the unsettled star.

Moyes was careful not to be dragged into a row with Mourinho but he showed signs of impatience as he underlined his position that Rooney, who flew home with a hamstring injury just hours after arriving in Bangkok, would not be sold.

“Unless I was speaking Double Dutch, I think we’ve said Wayne Rooney is not for sale,” Moyes told a packed press conference in the Thai capital, where he will make his debut as manager today.He added: “It’s hard to keep repeating myself but I will do-Wayne’s a Manchester United player and will remain that.”

Moyes, Rooney’s former boss at Everton, said the England striker would be out for two to three weeks but will be fit for the start of the season on August 17. “It’s a blow that we’ve lost him because he’s been training well and looked very good,” said Moyes. “But unfortunately he just felt something in his hamstring, we double-checked it and he has a slight grade one injury there that’ll probably keep him out for two to three weeks... I don’t foresee any problem with Wayne starting the season.”

Rooney’s sudden departure did not ease speculation about his future which has been swirling since former United manager Alex Ferguson said the striker had asked for a transfer.

The 27-year-old has denied asking to leave the club but he has not confirmed his intentions either. Britain’s Daily Mail has reported that Chelsea are preparing a 60-million-pound ($90-million) bid.

Mourinho, who also arrived in Bangkok with Chelsea on Friday, was warm in his praise for Rooney and is also looking for a striker, but he stopped short of saying he wanted to sign the Liverpudlian. “It’s a funny, tricky question because from the ethical point of view, I cannot speak about players from other teams,” Mourinho said.

“But again you know me and you know it’s not my kind of character to speak with a little bit of hypocrisy. I always say what I feel, what I think. “I’ve always said he’s a player that I like very, very much but I cannot say more than that. Being fast and direct, I like him very much but he’s a Man United player.”

Mourinho may be mindful of a notorious “tapping-up” incident in 2005 when Chelsea were hit with heavy fines for holding a meeting with Ashley Cole, then at Arsenal. But Moyes, when asked about Mourinho’s comments, refused to rise to the bait. —AFP

SEATTLE: Gabriel Torres converted an 85th minute penalty to guide Panama into the CONCACAF Gold Cup quarterfinals with a 1-0 win over Martinique on Thursday, before Mexico beat Canada 2-0 to pick up their first victory of the competition.

Panama top Group A on six points from two games, ahead of Martinique and Mexico on three points apiece with Canada propping up the standings after two straight losses.

Martinique produced a big upset on the opening day of the 12-team competition by beating Canada 1-0 and they again showed levels of skill and organisation well beyond expectations for one of the tournament’s supposed minnows.

Panama were frustrated and created few chances but the game played at Seattle’s CenturyLink Field turned in their favor when Martinique were reduced to 10 men after Jacky Berdix was sent off for a second bookable offence in the 72nd minute.

Five minutes from the end, Panama substitute Jairo Jimenez was brought down inside the box by a reckless Sebastien Cretinoir challenge and Torres squeezed the penalty just past Martinique keeper Kevin Olimpa.

After their opening loss to Panama, six-times Gold Cup winners Mexico could ill-afford another setback and they attacked Canada from the outset in the second match of the Seattle double-header.

‘El Tri’ grabbed the lead in the 42nd minute when Jorge Enriquez’s delightful near post flick on from a Luis Montes corner set up Raul Jimenez for a thundering diving header.

Mexico’s second was controversial though, when Canada defender David Edgar was adjudged to have brought down Marco Fabian when it appeared the Mexican had fallen as he stretched for the ball without any contact.

Fabian converted the penalty and Edgar’s frustration spilled over in the 67th minute when he kicked out at Jimenez and was lucky to escape with just a yellow card.

Both teams hit the bar late on with Canada’s Marcel De Jong’s superbly struck 89th minute free-kick finding the woodwork before Javier Orozco’s header rebounded off the frame of the goal a minute later. Mexico face Martinique in the final round of Group A matches in Denver on Sunday, after Canada take on Panama at the same venue.

The tournament continues in Miami on Friday with the Group B clashes between Central American rivals Honduras and El Salvador and an all-Caribbean affair as Trinidad and Tobago play Haiti.

Meanwhile, two players from the Belize men’s national team have revealed that they were offered a bribe ahead of their CONCACAF Gold Cup opener against the United States, the confederation said on Thursday. Woodrow West and Ian Gaynair notified CONCACAF that they were approached ahead of Tuesday’s 6-1 loss to United States in

SEATTLE: Jean-Sylvain Babin no. 22 of Martinique (left) dribbles against Cecilio Waterman No. 11 of Panama at CenturyLink Field. — AFP

Portland, Oregon for a group stage fixture of the regional tournament.

The Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) said it has launched a full investigation into the matter alongside FIFA. Details of the bribe attempt were not disclosed but CONCACAF referred to “match manipulation” in their statement and said they have discovered who was behind the attempt.

“Initial findings of this investigation have resulted in a positive identification of the individual attempting the bribery,” CONCACAF said in a statement.

“We want to thank Woodrow West and Ian Gaynair and recognize them for their bravery and commitment to preserving the integrity of our game.” Internationally, soccer has been dealing with the growing problem of attempts to fix games by betting syndicates. — Reuters

SATURDAY, JULY 13, 2013

Sports

PORT-OF-SPAIN: India’s captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni (left) and teammate Virat Kohli hold the trophy after winning the final match of the Tri-Nation cricket series. India beat Sri Lanka by one wicket with two balls remaining. — AP

Lorenzo clocks fastest time at German MotoGP

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SCOREBOARD PORT OF SPAIN: Scoreboard of the Tri-Nation Series final between India and Sri Lanka at Queen’s Park Oval on Thursday: Sri Lanka U. Tharanga c Dhoni b B. Kumar 11 M. Jayawardene c Ashwin b B. Kumar 22 K. Sangakkara c V. Kumar b Ashwin 71 L. Thirimanne c B. Kumar b I. Sharma 46 A. Mathews c V. Kumar b I. Sharma 10 K. Perera st Dhoni b Ashwin 2 D. Chandimal c Ashwin b Jadeja 5 R. Herath st Dhoni b Jadeja 5 S. Eranga not out 5 L. Malinga c B. Kumar b Jadeja 0 S. Lakmal st Dhoni b Jadeja 1 Extras (4b, 6lb, 13w) 23 Total (all out, 48.5 overs) 201 Fall of wickets: 1-27 (Tharanga), 2-49 (Jayawardene), 3-171 (Thirimanne), 4-174 (Sangakkara), 5-176 (Perera), 6-183 (Chandimal), 7-193 (Mathews), 8-196 (Herath), 9-196 (Malinga), 10-201 (Lakmal).

Bowling: B. Kumar 8-4-24-2 (1w), V. Kumar 6-115-0, I. Sharma 8-1-45-2 (1w), Kohli 3-0-17-0 (1w), Raina 6-0-25-0, Ashwin 10-0-42-2 (1w), Jadeja 7.5-1-23-4 (1w) India R. Sharma b Herath 58 S. Dhawan c Sangakkara b Eranga 16 V. Kohli c Sangakkara b Eranga 2 K. Karthik c Jayawardene b Herath 23 S. Raina c Sangakkara b Lakmal 32 M. Dhoni not out 45 R. Jadeja lbw b Herath 5 R. Ashwin lbw b Herath 0 B. Kumar lbw b Malinga 0 R. Kumar c sub (Senanayake) b Mathews 5 I. Sharma not out 2 Extras (b2, lb2, w11) 15 Total (9 wickets; 49.4 overs) 203 Fall of wickets 1-23 (Dhawan), 2-27 (Kohli), 3-77 (Karthik), 4-139 (R Sharma), 5-145 (Raina), 6-152 (Jadeja), 7-152 (Ashwin), 8-167 (B Kumar), 9-182 (R Kumar) Bowling: Eranga 9.4-2-50-2 (1w), Lakmal 10-1-33-1 (3w), Mathews 10-1-38-1, Malinga 10-1-58-1 (3w), Herath 10-2-20-4 Result: India win by one wicket

Dhoni blasts India to tri-series title PORT-OF-SPAIN: Captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni hit an unbeaten 45 off 52 balls to give India a thrilling one-wicket victory over Sri Lanka in the Celkon Mobile Cup final at Queen’s Park Oval on Thursday.

Dhoni, returning from an injured hamstring, shared a lastwicket stand of 20 with Ishant Sharma as India reached its winning target at 203-9 with two balls to spare.

Opener Rohit Sharma anchored the run chase with 58 off 89 deliveries while Suresh Raina (32) and Dinesh Karthik (23) scored crucial middle order runs. Left-arm spinner Rangana Herath was Sri Lanka’s trump card with a career-best 4-20. Fast bowler Shaminda Eranga claimed 2-50 but was pounded for two sixes and a four by Dhoni, who scored 16 in the decisive final over.

Earlier, Kumar Sangakkara’s top-score of 71 led Sri Lanka but its last eight wickets subsided for 30 runs and it was bowled out for 201 off 48.5 overs.

Dhoni said he was always confident of getting his side over the line despite the tense finish. “I think I’m blessed with good cricketing sense,” he said.

“I thought 15 runs was something I can look for, the reason being the opposition bowler was not someone who was very experienced like (Lasith) Malinga or some of the other bowlers. I thought rather than taking chances against a Malinga or a

(Angelo) Mathews, I would take it to the end and take a chance against someone who is not so experienced. It worked and I’m happy it worked.”

Dhoni changed his bat for the final flourish. “It was a very heavy bat that was needed at that point of time. The weight of the bat was perfect for slogging,” he said. India’s run chase was set back early by Eranga, who claimed two early wickets with the new ball. Shikhar Dhawan and Virat Kohli both fell to outside edges to wicketkeeper Kumar Sangakkara. Left-hander Dhawan (16) got a big nick while Kohli (2) feathered a drive to leave India on 27-2 in the 11th over. Rohit Sharma and Karthik rebuilt in a 50-run third wicket stand. Karthik edged a cut hard to slip but India consolidated with Rohit finding another solid ally in Raina, the pair adding 62 for the fourth wicket before Herath turned the match on its head by ripping through the middle order.

Sharma hit five fours and a six before he was bowled playing back to a Herath delivery which crept along the ground.

Suranga Lakmal also chipped in with the wicket of Raina, who edged a big drive, and the innings was in crisis. India was 152-7 in the 38th over. India fell further behind when Bhuvneshwar Kumar (0) and Vinay Kumar fell to Malinga and Mathews respectively. India needed 20 off 22 deliveries.

Dhoni, who turned 32 four days ago, had been ruled out of

the series when he strained a hamstring just over a week ago in Jamaica. But he batted with typical calm to see his side through.

Earlier, the Sri Lankan innings was in good shape at 171-2 in the 38th over before Ashwin, Jadeja and Ishant Sharma inspired the decline.

Bhuvneshwar Kumar had made two early strikes after Dhoni won the toss and chose to bowl. The seamer claimed both openers in a lengthy opening spell. Upul Tharanga (11) was first to go, at 29-1 in the seventh over, advancing down the pitch but only inside edging his aggressive stroke through to wicketkeeper Dhoni. Jayawardene followed at 49-2 when he chased a wide outswinger and provided an easy catch for Ashwin at slip.

Sangakkara and Thirimanne had a bit of luck early as they forged a third-wicket stand of122 to tilt the balance towards Sri Lanka.

Thirimanne was just on 2 when he was dropped by Ashwin at slip off Ishant Sharma, while Sangakkara was 23 when Suresh Raina grassed a difficult return catch.

Veteran Sangakkara went past Sourav Ganguly into sixth place in the leading run-scorers in one-dayers when he reached 9 and played a masterful knock to anchor the innings.

Thirimanne was less fluent but they put their team in a fine position before the dramatic late collapse. Dhoni claimed three stumpings as Jadeja ran through the lower order. — AP