14 Jun

ON IP TI SC R SU B

TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

HRW urges Kuwait to redress stateless citizenship

www.kuwaittimes.net

RAJAB 12, 1432 AH

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2 Amir 7accepts 38Sheikh 20 resignation Ahmad’s Assembly expected to debate PM’s grilling today

By B Izzak

Egypt grills Israeli ‘spy’ CAIRO: Egypt’s state security prosecution yesterday began questioning an Israeli man suspected of spying for the Mossad intelligence agency, state television reported. Ilan Grapel was detained on Sunday from a Cairo hotel and ordered to be held for 15 days pending investigation. The US embassy in Cairo confirmed that Grapel is a “US-Israel dual national” and said US consular staff had visited him. “We have confirmed that Ilan Chaim Grapel, age 27, is a US citizen and was detained on June 12, 2011 by Egyptian authorities,” embassy spokeswoman Elizabeth Colton told AFP. “A consular officer visited Mr Grapel on June 13 and confirmed that he was in good health,” she said.

News of his arrest was plastered over the front pages of the press, with the state-owned Al-Akhbar describing it as a “painful Egyptian hit against the Mossad”. Grapel, who according to state media is a “Mossad officer”, is accused of sowing sectarian strife and chaos in Egypt after a popular uprising forced president Hosni Mubarak to step down on Feb 11. Authorities said on Sunday that the Israeli man had been “posing as a foreign correspondent,” and that his movements and phone calls had been monitored before his arrest.

Several pictures of Grapel were released showing him in Israeli army uniform posing with other soldiers, and shaking hands with worshippers at a mosque in Cairo. Another picture shows Grapel standing in Tahrir Square - the symbolic heart of protests that brought down Mubarak - wearing sunglasses and holding a large sign that read: “Oh stupid Obama, it is a pride revolution not a food revolution.” Another front-page photo on the state-owned daily Al-Ahram and shown repeatedly on state TV shows Grapel holding a microphone in a mosque, apparently “preaching”.

Israeli commentators said reports that an Israeli citizen had been arrested for spying for the Mossad in Cairo seemed strange. “I can’t imagine that there will be any Israeli reactions, but anyone who knows even a little bit about these things knows that you don’t have an Israeli with an Israeli passport sitting in a foreign capital collecting things,” said Channel 2 news analyst Ehud Yaari. Last year, Egypt - which signed a 1979 peace treaty with Israel - said the confessions of an Egyptian accused of spying for Israel had led to three espionage cells being dismantled in Lebanon and Syria.

“This whole story is totally delusional as far as I am concerned ... any connection to working with the Mossad (the Israeli spy agency) is (wrong),” Daniel Grapel, Ilan’s father told Israeli Channel 2 in an interview Continued on Page 13

Max 43º Min 28º Low Tide 03:48 & 17:16 High Tide 09:38 & 23:48

TAFILEH, Jordan: Jordan’s King Abdullah II greets people during his visit to this city, 200 km south of Amman, yesterday. — AP

Bottles, stones hurled at Jordan king’s motorcade Govt denies any attack AMMAN: The motorcade of Jordan’s king came under a rare stoning attack in the south yesterday, a security official said in comments denied by both the palace and government a day after the monarch vowed to enhance reforms. “(The rear) part of King Abdullah II’s motorcade was attacked with stones and empty bottles by a group of men in their 20s and 30s after the king’s car entered (the southern city) Tafileh,” the official said of yesterday’s royal visit. “Nobody was hurt and the motorcade changed its route.” He added, without elaborating, that police “tackled the infiltrators and made arrests”.

A palace source confirmed that members of the Royal Guard who accompanied the king were not hurt, but the royal court and the government denied the incident. “It is absolutely groundless. Footage taken during the visit to Tafileh proves that,” a court official told AFP. And government spokesman Taher Adwan said “the motorcade of his majesty the king was not attacked”, telling the state-run Petra news agency that

the “visit to Tafileh was successful”. “All that happened was a quarrel between police and people who wanted to greet the king,” who ordered several multi-milliondollar development projects in the city, Adwan said.

Another security source told AFP that “around 60 people hurled stones at police, injuring 25 of them including one seriously, because they were not invited to meet the king”.

A group calling itself the “Freemen of Tafileh” accused security forces of preventing them from seeing the monarch. “Those who do not represent the people of Tafileh have been chosen to sit with the king,” it said.

“We have been marginalised in a provocative step that shows how security apparatuses control the people.”

One witness, Tafileh shopkeeper Yazan Abu Yousef, 26, said that as crowds approached the motorcade leaving Tafileh, to hand-deliver petitions to the king, antiriot police pushed them away “savagely” and people responded with stones.

Continued on Page 13

KUWAIT: HH the Amir yesterday issued a decree accepting the resignation of deputy premier and minister of housing and development Sheikh Ahmad AlFahd Al-Sabah who quit over a dispute with the prime minister. A second decree was issued assigning Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammad AlSheikh Ahmad Al-Fahd Sabah to carry out the duties of Sheikh Ahmad until a new minister is appointed. Sheikh Ahmad submitted his resignation a few days ago after MPs said to be close to Prime Minister Sheikh Nasser Mohammad Al-Ahmad Al-Sabah voted against a request by Sheikh Ahmad to refer a grilling against him to the Assembly’s legal and legislative committee to investigate if the grilling was constitutional.

The committee ruled on Saturday that the grilling is in line with the constitution and that Sheikh Ahmad must accept to debate it in the National Assembly. The debate was scheduled to take place today. Sheikh Ahmad, 48, joined the Cabinet for the first time 10 years ago as information minister. In 2003, he was moved to the energy post which then included the ministries of oil and electricity and water. He remained in the post until July 2006 when he was dropped following early general elections after he was engaged in a confrontation with opposition MPs over reforming the country’s electoral system.

Sheikh Ahmad however returned to the Cabinet three years later with an added authority. He was appointed as deputy premier, minister of housing and development, and was given charge of the KD 30.8 billion development plan which ran into obstacles because of continued political tension in the country.

Assembly Speaker Jassem Al-Khorafi said he received the Amiri decree accepting the resignation of Sheikh Ahmad and that both his grilling and the report of the legal committee have been removed from today’s agenda. Khorafi said the Assembly will go directly to the grilling of the prime minister on his alleged favoritism of good ties with Iran at the expense of relations with Gulf Arab states. It is not immediately known whether the premier will accept to face the Continued on Page 13

40 years after leak, Pentagon Papers are out

KHALDEH, Lebanon: A Lebanese army soldier removes burning tyre barricades which were set by supporters of Tala Arslan, a Druze politician, after they blocked the southern highway by burning tyres and setting earthen barriers south of Beirut yesterday. — AP

Hezb dominates new Lebanon government BEIRUT: Nearly five months after his appointment, Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati yesterday announced the formation of a 30-member cabinet in which Hezbollah and its allies hold a majority.

Mikati, a billionaire Sunni businessman, announced his line-up following arduous negotiations over key portfolios including the justice and telecommunications ministries, now controlled by the Syrian- and Iranian-backed Hezbollah alliance. “This government is a government for all Lebanese, no matter what party they support, be it the majority or the opposition,” 56-year-old Mikati told a news conference at the presidential palace.

But Lebanon’s pro-Western opposition bloc, led by former premier Saad Hariri, has boycotted the new cabinet which it has slammed as a “Hezbollah government”. Mikati’s cabinet - which does not include any women - has 19 ministers representing the Shiite militant group Hezbollah and its allies. The remaining 11 were chosen by Mikati, President Michel Sleiman and Druze leader Walid Jumblatt.

The government must now be approved by at least half of the members of Lebanon’s 128-seat parliament, in which the Hezbollah-led alliance has a small majority.

Continued on Page 13

WASHINGTON: Four decades ago, a young defense analyst leaked a top-secret study packed with damaging revelations about US conduct of the Vietnam War. Yesterday, that study, dubbed the Pentagon Papers, finally came out in complete form. It is a touchstone for whistleblowers everywhere and just the sort of leak that gives presidents fits to this day.

The documents show that almost from the opening lines, it was apparent that the authors knew they had produced a hornet’s nest.

In his Jan 15, 1969, confidential memorandum introducing the report to the defense chief, the chairman of the task force that produced the study hinted at the explosive nature of the contents. “Writing history, especially where it blends into current events, especially where that current event is Vietnam, is a treacherous exercise,” Leslie H Gelb wrote.

Asked by Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara to do an “encyclopedic and objective” study of US involvement in Vietnam from World War II to 1967, the team of three dozen analysts pored over a trove of Pentagon, CIA and State Department documents with “ant-like diligence”, he wrote. Their work revealed a pattern of deception by the Lyndon Johnson, John Kennedy and prior administrations as they secretly escalated the conflict while assuring the public that, in Johnson’s words, the US did not seek a wider war.

The National Archives released the Pentagon Papers in full yesterday and put them online, long after most of the secrets spilled. The release was timed 40 years to the day after The New York Times published the first in its series of stories about the findings, on June 13, 1971, prompting President Richard Nixon to try to suppress publication and crush anyone in government who dared to spill confidences. Prepared near the end of Johnson’s term by Defense Department and private analysts, the report Continued on Page 13

TRIPOLI: In this image made from video broadcast by Libyan State TV on Sunday, Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi plays a game of chess with the visiting president of the World Chess Federation Kirsan Ilyumzhinov. — AP

Gaddafi plays chess as fighting rages in Libya MOSCOW: As the world awaits Muammar Gaddafi’s next move, the Libyan leader has been playing chess with the visiting Russian head of the World Chess Federation. Kirsan Ilyumzhinov, the controversial president of the World Chess Federation (FIDE) and former head of the Russian desert region of Kalmykia, met Gaddafi on Sunday despite the conflict with rebels and claims of mass rights abuses by the regime. Ilyumzhinov said yesterday he had no regrets about playing a game with Gaddafi in Tripoli, boasting that he outclassed the Libyan leader but in the end offered a draw. “I would happily meet with anyone,” he told Moscow Echo radio by telephone from Libya. “I am not a politician, I went there as a sportsman,” he said.

Ilyumzhinov said that he found Gaddafi to be “calm ... normal and adequate. We played chess and we talked.”

The surprise meeting with Gaddafi is not the first time Ilyumzhinov has sparked controversy with his eccentric antics. He has repeatedly claimed to have met aliens and even on one occasion to have been shown round their spaceship. Seemingly untroubled by the conflict in Libya, Ilyumzhinov noted that explosions had been heard while he was in Tripoli but seemed more interested in thanking Gaddafi for his help in “developing chess in the country”. As a player, Ilyumzhinov said that Gaddafi is “of course weaker, much weaker than me ... just an enthusiast who Continued on Page 13

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TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

LOCAL

Police crackdown on Twitterville Anyone qualifies tobe a celebrity

By Hussain Al-Qatari KUWAIT: Micro-blogging website Twitter has been recently causing quite a lot of problems in Kuwait. Take for example, the arrest of user Nasser Abul, a Shia extremist who wrote offensive messages against the ruling families of Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. Abul is not the only user whose opinion tweeted on Twitter caused him a problem. A number of other Twitter users have been interrogated by the State Security Police.

Opinions expressed on Twitter have caused a large number of intolerant individuals to spew out angry threats of attack on the supposed

offenders and their families.

Some were even threatened that if they do not deactivate their accounts, they would be hurt. In a handful of instances, users gave in to those threats and actually disappeared from the website, whilst others were removed without a trace.

Twitter user and Bahraini revolution supporter Hadeel Bugrais is one such individual.

Af ter being condemned by intolerant fellow-t weeters opposing her pro-Shia sentiments over the issue of Bahrain, she deleted her Twitter account. A number of users claiming to be her friends say that she was given an ultimatum: to either delete her account or be held by the

State Security Police for questioning. Rumors about the arrest of other Twitter users have circulated, but could not be verified. The Kuwait Times’ requests to obtain a statement from officials at the State S ecurit y Depar tment have failed.

Several months ago, antigovernment Twitter user M ishari Buyabis was questioned by State S ecurit y Depar tment officers for his anti-government posts. After being questioned, he published posts claiming that certain influential people had offered to pay him money if he would agree to change his views and post pro-government tweets. Buyabis has over

30,000 followers on Twitter, placing him on the same level as some celebrities.

I t is wor th noting that Twitter has now replaced blogging in Kuwait. While in the mid-2000’s blogging played an essential role in combating media censorship and shaping politics in the country, today it has become politics-free.

Twitter on the other hand has become the main channel that reflects the ideas and worries of the Kuwaiti public, with almost all parliamentarians and political activists engaging on the website with their audience.

The fact that Twitter is as accessible to the audience as text-messaging and is avail-

able on different platforms on smart phones and computers makes it a less elitist arena.

While on the pro side, Twitter opened the door to conversation bet ween officials and activists with their audience freely and without boundaries, like parliament members and voters, it also comes with a heavy baggage of cons. One can safely say that the level of sectarian and racist debate on Twitter is torrential. I n Twitterville, anyone qualifies to be a celebrity. The method for obtaining that status remains debatable. S ome Kuwaiti Twitter celebs are k nown because of their unorthodox opinions, others for their satirical views.

Quality assessment of teachers soon KUWAIT: Education Minister Ahmed Al-Mulaifi said on Sunday that the development and quality assessment of teachers are two of the principal issues on his agenda.

In an article on his personal website, he also assured the public that the new performance assessment criteria for teachers would be simple, accurate and difficult to manipulate, further noting, “The private sector is applying the same reward and punishment system.”

On his Twitter page, meanwhile, the minister stressed that whilst he does not have a magic wand, “I have a clear vision of what I intend to accomplish...however, after my first period in office, I came to realize that there are very effective elements that will surely help me accomplish my objectives and there are others who benefited from previous systems and do not want any change. These individuals are trying to thwart any reform.......but I can tell who’s who.” —Annahar

Local Spotlight

Power cut problem Muna Al-Fuzai

muna@kuwaittimes.net

T

his is the same old topic we are forced to discuss every year. This subject has been endlessly criticized and condemned by everyone except for the Ministry of Electricity and Water. I support everyone who raises a voice against automated power cuts. In a country like Kuwait, that claims to be rich, such incidents should not occur during summer, regardless of the country’s climatic conditions. It is a shame! Well, when the concerned government body fails to tackle the matter for many years, there is a valid reason behind why it is blamed for shortcomings. Amusingly, power cuts are also given slick-sounding names like ‘automated cuts.’

Why do we have to endure this every year? Why aren’t the government and the Minister of Water and Electricity not performing their duties? Even our eagle-eyed MPs with rapier-sharp tongues have ignored this problem for so many years.

The point we are missing here is that this has been going on and on for years in the beginning of every summer. Strangely, it is shameful that none of these officials have tried to solve the real problems of electricity in Kuwait. They have promised to build new power stations which have never seen the day light yet!

Extended power cuts will go on during summer vacation time in July and August. So, is it really all about the public’s high consumption rates?

Now , Ramadan this year will fall during peak summer time. I doubt if the ministry will do anything positive to resolve the situation.

Recently, my area experienced a power outage.

The only individual who was generous enough to pick up the phone and answer was a pleasant Indian man. I wonder where all the high-ranking officials who we see in newspapers every day have disappeared to? I think they dismiss this as a rather ‘trivial’ issue because none of them are suffering any consequences.

Here is a tip: If you can afford to leave Kuwait during summer, please go ahead and do it. Do not return until school begins.

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TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

local

HRW discusses bedoon issue Govt solution efforts praised

By Nawara Fattahova

KUWAIT: The Philippines Embassy hosted a reception on Sunday evening to mark the occasion of the country’s 113th year of independence. A large number of diplomats including an assistant undersecretary at Ministry of Foreign Affairs attended the event. — Photos by Joseph Shagra

News

in brief

MoH to conduct reshuffle KUWAIT: In view of the recent remarks made by the Audit Bureau on the performances of several overseas health offices, the Ministry of Health (MoH) intends to reshuffle officials across various sectors and departments, reported Aljarida. They explained that the ‘expected’ reshuffle will include the positions of two assistant undersecretaries that remained vacant for a while, in addition to the heads of a number of departments such as medical information, medical records, planning, follow up department and nursing that aim to induct fresh blood in the department.

5,000 charged with tardiness KUWAIT: More than 5,000 Ministry of Interior employees, including police officers have failed to report to duty at least once during the past year. This was revealed by Staff Brigadier General Shehab AlShemmari, Director of the Ministry of Interior’s Supervision and Inspection Department. He added that at least 108 employees did not complete the required work period, reported Al-Qabas. In a recent interview with Al-Qabas daily, Al-Shemmari further revealed that the department issued warnings to 941 individuals and made 2,604 penalty recommendations. Violations were detected through inspection tours carried out in 2010.

MoC creates new telecom law KUWAIT: The Parliament will soon discuss and pass a new 13-chapter telecommunications law that was recently prepared by the Ministry of Communications, reported Aljarida. Officials added that the new law includes provisions to establish a special department for Telecommunications and IT that functions as an independent entity.

Nine dead in road accidents KUWAIT: Nine people - eight expatriates and a Kuwaiti national - died in accidents on Kuwait’s roads in the past week, according to the latest figures from the Ministry of Interior’s traffic department. The ministry called on road users to be more careful while driving and to comply with traffic regulations in order to ensure greater road safety.

KUWAIT: Highlighting bedoons’ (stateless residents) plight in Kuwait, the Human Rights Watch (HRW) held a press conference in cooperation with the Central System to Resolve Illegal Residents Affairs (CSRIRA) at the Marina Hotel yesterday. Several bedoons flocked to the conference and interrupted the speakers, as a result of which organizers had to make hurried speeches.

Priyanka Mutapar thy, a researcher in Middle East Affairs at Human Rights Watch commended the steps taken by the Kuwaiti government to resolve the problems, “The 11 newly facilities approved by the government to bedoons are a positive step. The demonstrations held by some bedoons last February coincide with the Arab uprising, attracted attention to this issue. The benefits proposed by the government are to solve the humanitarian situation these people face,” she said.

Mutaparthy met with experts and officials in Kuwait to review the new policies taken by the Kuwaiti government to solve the issue. “Kuwait has not made promises to address citizenship claims made by many bedoon residents,” Human Rights Watch stated in a report released yesterday.

“Granting citizenship is a sovereign issue of every country and done in accordance with international laws. HRW thinks that not all those who claim to be bedoon have the right to obtain the country’s citizenship. The government should place clear-cut criteria on which applications are reviewed. Also, bedoons should be granted the right to move the court on this matter. The government should treat individual reasons behind the issue,” she concluded.

Musaed Al-Shimeri , Secretary General of Kuwaiti Bedoon Gathering ‘Takoun’ reviewed the stateless residents’ situation and added that not all demands were fulfilled such as obtaining citizenship, retirement rights, realestate ownership. He also added that birth and marriage certificates were not issued to bedoons, “If the situation continues as it is today and this issue remains unsolved, the problem will aggravate for fourth and fifth generation of bedoons,” he stated.

Al-Shimeri then put forward some suggestions such as issuing a five year identity card that can provide them with other necessary documents.

Nawaf Al-Bader, Secretary of the Kuwaiti Bedoon Gathering noted that the 11 benefits provided by the government has already

UN official urges Baghdad to recognize Kuwait-Iraq border

By A Saleh KUWAIT: A senior United Nations official yesterday urged the Iraqi government to officially recognize the borders previously agreed and endorsed by a UN resolution.

Calling on the Iraqi government to “forget the past with regard to [Iraq’s] relations with Kuwait and benefit from Europe’s experience after World War II,” Ad Melkert, the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General, said “the issue of recognizing the border with Kuwait will be a very important step in restoring Iraq to its normal position within the international community.”

Melkert asserted that while “many important steps have been taken [by Iraq] recently to end the outstanding issues with Kuwait, with the formation of a bilateral committee which was able to hold its first meeting in March and agreed to hold a second meeting this month,” the issue of Iraq’s recognition of the border with Kuwait is a vital step and “will be one of the aspects mentioned in the report to the UN Security Council during the current period.”

The Iraqi government, said Melkert needs to “take this step since it is very important for members of the Security council to achieve this and will make it easier for them to reintegrate Iraq into the international community.”

Further to his analogy with Europe in the post-war period, the senior UN official said, “There is no logic in returning to the past; what is logical is that the issues involved in the dispute are resolved.”

Melkert pointed out that although his own nation, the Netherlands, as well as other European nations suffered horrendously from the German regime’s actions during World War II, after 1945 and the overthrow of the regime the situation changed dramatically, with Germany becoming a friendly and cooperative state. He stressed that it is vital to “stress the possibilities” at the heart of the current Kuwait-Iraq border dispute and to “move the situation forward to diplomacy between Iraq and Kuwait in one generation only.”

Science Club gets telescope in time for lunar eclipse KUWAIT: The Kuwait Science Club’s Astronomy and Space Department yesterday announced the installation of a new, sixteen-inch astronomical telescope just in time for the lunar eclipse expected on June 15.

The club has one of the largest astronomical observatories in the Gulf region, which works automatically with the help of a direct com-

munication satellite to monitor astronomical phenomena.

Researcher Yasmin Al-Saber, who is also the director of the depar tment, explained in the press release issued to mark the occasion that on June 15 Kuwait will witness this year’s first lunar eclipse with the full moon. AlSaber added that the total eclipse

of the moon will be seen across the Middle East, as well as in East and Central Asia, Western Australia, Central and West Africa and South America.

The eclipse, which is expected to last approximately 100 minutes, will be visible for approximately one hour and 20 minutes from around midnight on June 15. — KUNA

KUWAIT: Mohammed Al-Wheib, Iman Al-Nasser, Priyanka Mutaparthy, Musaed AlShimeri and Nawaf Al-Bader during the press conference held yesterday at the Marina Hotel. — Photo by Joseph Shagra been in existence since 1986, which were later withdrawn. He called holding a trial on the nationality issue, and to compensate those who were harmed by wrongful measures undertaken.

The Kuwaiti government provides bedoons with several benefits. The government established the Central System to Resolve Illegal Residents Affairs (CSRIRA) to find a solution to their problems.

Since the body’s establishment about six months ago, many of the difficulties they faced have been alleviated, “They now get medical care without presenting a Civil ID. They can use the health insurance card to receive treatment free of charge,” said I m a n A l - N a s s e r a re p re s e n t a t i ve f ro m CSRIRA. The CSRIRA has charted out additional plans, “We will soon provide children with free schooling, and increase employment opportunities. We are also mulling over on allowing them to benefit from free education at Kuwait University. It takes time to implement these measures. Also, not all applicants who have made claims really deserve the facilities or citizenship,” she added.

In February and March 2011, hundreds of bedoons staged a protest against the government’s failure to act on their demands. In response, the government has promised some new benefits, including the issuance of birth, marriage, and death certificates, free health care, and access to jobs. “If implemented, these will be positive steps,” the

Human Rights Watch noted.

Since the mid-1980s, the government has maintained that the vast majority of bedoon are ‘illegal residents’ who have deliberately destroyed evidence of other nationality, while denying individualized reviews of their claims.

The Kuwaiti government provides certain handouts, and on May 26 agreed to provide ration cards for food allowances through state-run co-operative societies. While some bedoon carry identification cards, permitting them to avail of services available to the bedoons, those who have failed to register do not possess any valid documents.

Background During a census that was conducted shortly after Kuwait’s independence, a significant number of people living on the outsk ir ts of Kuwait, par ticularly nomadic Bedouin tribes, failed to provide relevant information. Some were illiterate and could not produce documents to prove their claims under Kuwait’s nationality law, while others simply did not understand the relevance that citizenship would later gain.

In the 1960s and 70s, Kuwait allowed bedoons the same access to social and public services as citizens, except for voting rights. The documents and investigations help prove that the vast majority of bedoon are nationals from neighboring countries who destroyed documents in the hope of acquiring Kuwaiti citizenship.

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Years

LOCAL

Development plan unaffected by minister’s resignation Ministries coordinate to tackle extremism KUWAIT: The execution of the development projects being carried out as part of the government’s major development plan will go ahead as planned despite the development minister’s recent resignation, according to a senior government official. Speaking on condition of anonymity, the official, a member of the Supreme Council for Planning and Development’s (SCPD) Secretariat General, lauded the previous development minister, saying that the recently resigned minister Sheikh Ahmad Al-Fahad Al-Sabah, who was also Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Housing, had conscientiously monitored the implementation of the development plan and issued a number of executive directives concerned with it. “[Sheikh Ahmad] Al-Fahad’s presence gave special support to the plan,” the insider said, adding that the former minister had met with senior officials from other state departments on more than five occasions during his tenure.

“Those meetings, in addition to meetings

between the SCPD and state departments, helped to ensure that 58 percent of the projects included in the first year’s schedule for the development plan were carried out, while the percentage increased in the second year to 60 percent,” the insider said.

The SCPD official also voiced hope that the next development minister to be appointed would decide to hold any senior officials who are negligent in committing to their duties accountable for their actions in delaying the implementation process.

Meanwhile, four state bodies are currently working together closely to develop effective strategies to counter the rise of extremist ideologies in Kuwaiti society and protect the young from being influenced by ideas promoting terrorism.

Speaking on condition of anonymity, a state official said that the talks between senior officials at the various ministries are focusing on strengthening the role played by families in raising young people capable of oppos-

ing fundamentalist ideology. The official said that once the ministries of education, the interior, information and Awqaf and Islamic Affairs have put the final touches to the blueprints for these strategies, they will refer them to the cabinet to be endorsed as quickly as possible. The official also noted that a number of these strategies will be implemented in coordination with neighboring nations experiencing similar problems.

“Families have the duty to raise children to be willing to accept different opinions, who can engage in healthy dialogue while avoiding the company of people exhibiting immoral behavior or extremist ideologies,” the official said, adding that the strategies will focus on efforts to spread awareness of the importance of positive, conscientious parenting.

The strategies are also expected to include programs to strengthen moderation within minority groups in Kuwait, as well as tackling sectarianism in the media.

KISR, KNPC sign research study contract

KUWAIT: Inspectors from the Nuwaiseeb border checkpoint confiscated 800 kg of several types of fish that were imported from a Gulf country. The entire shipment was destroyed after it was found to be unfit for human consumption, announced the director of Imported Food Department and Kuwait Municipality. The Head of Food Arrivals Department in Nuwaiseeb Yousuf Al-Enezi said that “we are more determined to continue our efforts to stand up against those who are trying to harm people.” — Photo by Hanan Al-Saadoun

KUWAIT: Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR) signed yesterday a contrac t with Kuwait National Petroleum Company (KNPC) on conducting a research study on marine nature, and spread of pollutants at KNPC’s two refining sites.

The sites are Mina Al-Ahmadi oil refinery and Mina Abdullah, with a cost of KD 184,700 for the 16-month research study.

KISR Director General Dr Naji Al-Mutairi, said in a statement, that this study aims at knowing the environmental dimensions and the geological and topographic nature of the refineries along with conducting necessary marine surveys to get to know their ecological status.

Al-Mutairi said that, through this study, environmental samples will be collected and analyzed, then results will be checked in order to put forward proposals for the best means to carry out a plan on expanding the two refining sites in what

ensures the environmental sustainability, asserting this study comes within the framework of boosting KISR efforts on preserving the country’s natural resources.

He added that the study also aims at developing scientific research to serve various environmental sectors, and establish the required balance between development and the environmental protection, noting that KNPC takes pride in KISR feats, and that the company is interested in the ecological conservation, and boosting the environmental sustainability concept.

Meanwhile, Mahmoud Liri, KNPC Quality, Assurance and Suppliers’ Service Team leader, said that the oil sector allocated big sums of money in order to protect the environment, noting that KNPC set up a special department to protect the environment and preser ve the human health. — KUNA

KUWAIT: Kuwait Arts Association held an exhibition titled ‘Summer Arts’ in Hawally, on Sunday. The exhibition was attended by a large number of art lovers. — Photos by Yasser Al-Zayyat

KUWAIT: Information and Communications Minister Sami Al-Nisf paid a visit to the Kuwait Journalists Association on Sunday. He was received by the Acting Chairman and Secretary General Faisal Al-Qinae and board members. Both sides discussed issues of mutual interest.

KUWAIT: Official spokesman of the Ministry of Interior Brig Gen Mohammed Hashem Al-Sabr was admitted to the Military Hospital following an ailment. He underwent a medical checkup and is currently placed under observation.

VIVA wins ‘Best Strategic Telecommunication Portal’ Award KUWAIT: Kuwait Telecommunications Company VIVA, celebrated further victory for the 2011 year when this year’s Pan Arab Web Awards Academy announced VIVA as the web winner for; Best Strategic Telecommunication Portal, the portal is evaluated based on concept and creativity, technical ease of use and navigation, content and structure, visual design solution and aesthetics as well as interactivity. Commenting on this recent success, VIVA, CEO Salman Al-Badran stated, “Recognition in this high-level standard category demonstrates the company’s continual determination, to offer the most efficient and leading designs in the development of our future innovations.”

The company was awarded the 2011 ‘Best Strategic Telecommunication Portal’ Award by the Pan Arab Web Awards Academy during the awards ceremony, which took place at the Phoenicia Intercontinental Hotel in Beirut, Lebanon on Tuesday, June 7, 2011.

The Pan Arab Web Awards is considered by the industry as one of the top award programs in the Arab region, as it aims to inspire and reward web creators to meet professional and international standards.

3 dead, one hurt in crash

By Hanan Al-Saadoun KUWAIT: Three men - two Asians and a Kuwaiti died, whilst a fourth man, also Asian, was injured in a head-on collision on Subbiya Road. The injured man was rushed to hospital, whilst the bodies were removed for autopsy.

Deadly fall An Asian man died of fatal injuries he sustained when he fell from a height while working on a telecommunication tower in Ahmadi. An investigation has been launched into the incident.

Offensive driver A Farwaniya traffic patrol officer has lodged charges against a Kuwaiti man, accusing him of launching a verbal tirade of insults when the officer issued him with a traffic citation in Ardiya.

Ahmadi crackdown During a security crackdown in Ahmadi, police arrested 55 residency violators as well as 12 fugitives and two people suspected of committing indecency offences. In a separate incident, police arrested a man wanted in connection with 12 counts of fraud. The fugitive was arrested at a cafe in Salmiya.

Family murder Police are hunting for the stepson of a Syrian woman shot dead at her home in Abu Hlaifa yesterday as the primary suspect in her murder.

According to a police insider, the woman and her stepson had apparently been at loggerheads for some time before he shot her four times at her home.

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local Kuwait Digest

The premier feels proud!

By Ali Mahmoud Khajah

L

ocal politics , details of grilling motions, ruling family members’ disputes, MPs’ memos and many others have prevented me from writing about more important topics such as the essence of building societies and developing them.

By this, I mean the youth that have become the main topic each statesman or official likes referring to in speeches. To top it all, HH the PM recently patronized a famous Kuwaiti convention under the name of ‘Proud to Be Kuwaiti.’ He not only patronized the event but also improvised a speech in which he stressed that he, as well, was Proud To Be Kuwaiti. His speech actually gave an impression that the youth faced no problems whatsoever and that all roads led to youth projects!

However, the real life of Kuwaiti youth is different, as many of them are usually forced to spend over twothirds of their monthly salaries on everyday life needs such as housing, food, household labor and other expenses. If any of these young people, who have no other income, wished to save some pennies to purchase a house instead of the government-providing ones that have reached the southern borders, he will have to save for 20 years. This happens if property prices remain the same. The only solution for such young people is to purchase a house before they grow old, start their own businesses that provide an extra income. However, by going to the so-called industrial areas, a young man will find them fully booked without any effort on the government’s side to build new ones. This may lead them to the Free Trade Zone where they end up spending thousands before the zone bans all commercial activities.

They then decide to march to Qurain markets and spend thousands of dinars before the government decides to evict most commercial activities despite the questionable validity period of their licenses!

The government kills every single hope of making a better living. Remember that words are not enough alone to change facts! — Aljarida

Kuwaiti students in NZ all safe KUALA LUMPUR: The chairman of the Kuwaiti Cultural Bureau for Australia and New Zealand confirmed yesterday that all the Kuwaiti students in the city of Christchurch, which was hit by a 5.5-magnitude earthquake yesterday, are safe and well. Bureau head Al-Atheri said that he had contacted the students in the city and made sure that they were unharmed and have the necessary support. He added that the Kuwaiti Cultural Attache, who is currently on an official mission to New Zealand, had also confirmed the students’ safety. Universities in the quake zone suspended their exams as a precautionary measure and the students will be informed when classes are set to resume.

In the past seven months, Christchurch has witnessed 25 earthquakes, with a deadly quake in December claiming more than 181 lives. — KUNA

Dubai tourism campaign launched in Kuwait ‘An unforgettable summer’

By Nisreen Zahreddine KUWAIT: The Dubai Chartered Institute of Marketing yesterday held a press conference at the Missoni Hotel to announce the events and activities organized for tourists travelling to the neighboring Gulf state this summer. The press conference was held in coordination with Emirates Airlines and is a part of the institute’s regional campaign, which is being promoted in most countries in the region.

The ‘Dubai: An unforgettable summer’ campaign starts with a wonderful world from June 20 till Sept 10, in addition to “Dubai Summer surprises” between June 22 and July 31. This event is directly followed by Ramadan activities to reach “Eid in Dubai” activity during Al Fitr. The institution also launched a website for the activities that lay under this campaign schedule.

Ibrahim Saleh, the general coordinator for the festivals and the deputy executive manager of Dubai institution for marketing and activities said that Kuwait is one of the important states that the institution gives special care for communication with it being one of the major

tourist-exporting countries to Dubai.

Asmaa Al Rahmah, sales manager of Emirates Airlines in Kuwait invited people in Kuwait to visit Dubai during summer and to benefit from the special offer “Summer smiles in Dubai” which allows the families from 112 destinations to enjoy their summer vacations in Dubai through Emirates Airlines especially that the mission is easier with increasing the flights to reach 4 flights daily.

Saleh went through the activities during the press conference saying that it will be ongoing for 40 days of shopping festivals and fashion shows for adults and kids in addition to special shows for kids. Resorts and hotels in Dubai are also preparing for this festival with luxurious offers and appropriate prices.

Wonderful world welcomes at expo center of Dubai Airport this year guests with a new package of offers and shows in addition to musical and vocal shows for bands and artists from all over the world along with competitions and entertainment in addition to prizes and valuable presents.

On the other hand, special activities and preparations are organized to wel-

KUWAIT: As part of its corporate social responsibility program, the Commercial Bank of Kuwait (CBK) recently supplied Al-Raja school with special office equipment. CBK has been expanding its social role by supporting charities and providing financial aid to various community groups.

“Some sectors of society, especially children with special needs, are marginalized in terms of public awareness and funding,” explained the bank’s Public Relations director Amani AlWarie. “This donation is an achievement in the bank’s policy and in accordance with its social mission which calls for more concern about social issues and for the provision of the required resources so that these children can laugh and learn in an environment which is comfortable, enjoyable and tailored to their needs.”

School principal Muneera Al-Zamil expressed her great appreciation to the CBK management’s concern for the students’ wellbeing, wishing the bank progress and success for the future.

KUWAIT: Commercial Bank of Kuwait (CBK) officials with Al-Raja school students

VERONA, Italy: Abdulaziz Saud Al-Babtain pictured with officials during the function.

By Mehdi Al-Nemr

“I’ve always dreamt of making a clear mark on Arabic poetry, yet I never expected international poetry to make its mark on my life,” AlBabtain said.

The award, and the presidency, granted to Al-Babtain for his important role as a patron of culture, her-

itage, poetry, and the creative arts, and consequently his strengthening of dialogue among civilizations, mark a new chapter in his life, he said. “From local exposure to international recognition,” he proudly said, alluding to the international recognition he has earned. — KUNA

Greater media freedom planned KUWAIT: Information Minister Sami Al-Nisf has reportedly issued three directives to allow foreign media greater freedom on the local market.

An information ministry insider said that the three new decrees would mean greater media freedom for Kuwait overall.

In the first of the three direc-

come the holy month of Ramadan and the Eid period where the celebrations will be full of traditional and authentic activities that are related to the traditions of UAE people. The Eid festival will be held in Dubai in several malls and hotels

Finance with a conscience

Al-Babtain dedicates honorary title to Arab poets

VERONA, Italy: The President of the Kuwait-based Babtain Prize for Creative Poetry Foundation (BPCPF), Abdulaziz Saud Al-Babtain, said yesterday that his selection as the honorary president of the World Poetry Academy is an award to all Arab poets.

In an exclusive interview with KUNA, Al-Babtain said he was pleased that Arabic poetry is gaining recognition, as well as appreciation of its global significance.

The distinguished Kuwaiti figure was speaking following a two-day event hosted by the World Poetry Academy, after he was presented with the medal of the city, which is well known for its patronage of the arts and music.

Al-Babtain was elected unanimously by the World Poetry Academy’s members to continue the efforts of the late Senegalese ‘poet-president’ Leopold Sedar Senghore.

KUWAIT: Officials addressing the press conference. — Photo by Joseph Shagra

tives, Al-Nisf, who is also communications minister, instructed that the licensing of satellite TV channels and operators would be restructured so that they come under the aegis of local firms, to be licensed by the ministry.

The second decree authorizes the publication of foreign newspapers and magazines in Kuwait so

long as they comply with the state’s printing and publication legislation.

The third, meanwhile, concerns the formation of a movie censorship body, to be chaired by the ministr y ’s Assistant Undersecretar y for the Journalism and Publications Sector. — Al-Jarida

and public places to ensure that everybody will enjoy their times while visiting Dubai.

For more information, the website for summer activities in Dubai is: www.dubaievents.ae

12 pupils suspended as exams start KUWAIT: Twelve pupils at Kuwaiti schools were suspended on Sunday for cheating in exams on the first day of the examination period, as almost 33,000 high school students across the country began their finals.

During a tour of several schools in different areas, education minister Ahmad Al-Mulaifi stressed that no examination papers had been leaked, urging pupils not to be distracted or misled by false rumors that a number of papers had indeed been leaked.

Speaking to reporters, the minister said that the Ministry of Education (MoE) had taken every possible precaution to ensure the absolute security around the preparation, storage and transportation of exam papers, which he said were carried out in conditions of “absolute secrecy.”

Meanwhile, MoE Undersecretary Tamadher Al-Sderawi announced that the ministry’s finance department has received the funds to be used to pay the allowances for teachers recently approved by the Civil Service Commission (CSC).

On another issue, the ministry has approved a project to provide school pupils with software editions of their textbooks from the start of the next academic year.

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‘Detective’ mugs, robs Asian in Al-Daiya area Robbery attempt foiled KUWAIT: Police are trying to verify whether the man who recently mugged an Asian expatriate in AlDaiya is a real detective or an impersonator after discovering that the handcuffs he used on his victim are from the Ministry of Interior’s police force. The victim told officers at the area police station that his assailants, a man dressed in traditional Kuwaiti garb and an Asian accomplice, stole KD400 from him and forced him to sign an unidentified blank document before handcuffing him and escaping.

Fatal crash A young man from another GCC nation died in a car crash on the Seventh Ring Road. His body was removed for autopsy.

Kuwait Digest

Mismanagement of our funds

By Mudaffar Abdullah

K

uwait’s share of daily oil exports as stipulated by the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries is 2.22 million barrels in addition to another 650,000 unused barrels.

According to the state budget, a barrel is estimated to be sold for $60, although the real price is well over $100.

I believe this ‘silly’ introduction was necessary to prove that our nation does possess excessive amounts of money, which ought to be utilized to develop the nation. However, the facts about Kuwait strongly suggest that these funds are not being used properly, but instead are being arbitrarily squandered in the form of gifts and grants rather than going towards genuine human development. The second government university project has been delayed for decades, the e-government project is not yet finished, recreational projects have been suspended since the late 1980s, diseases are spreading at an alarming rate amongst Kuwaitis, the country is flooded with ‘loose’ unskilled workers and the bedoons issue is still unresolved; these are only a very few amongst the endless number of major problems facing our country.

Kuwaiti citizens are envied for living in an oilrich country where they receive a fair share of oil revenue to run their daily errands and meet their future aspirations in a way that does not exist in many other nations. On the other hand, the state sector bodies are killing all the hopes and aspirations generated by the wealth earned from selling so much oil. Amongst other things, we have officials holding forged qualifications, inedible food, and government establishments wrongly utilizing oil revenues to spend on overseas medical treatment trips, as well as politically-motivated ‘jobs for the boys’ in very sensitive sectors such as oil and education.

It is these very same envied citizens who, along with their families, flee the country to Dubai for even the shortest vacations or holidays in search of a smile. It is the very same citizens who demonstrate in open areas demanding changes in how the state is run, who are encouraged to work for the private sector but are abandoned by the government when they do. Yes, these are our citizens who do not find theatres, recreational venues, superb libraries, clean streets, high-quality and reliable power and water supplies that don’t face regular cuts with the excuses of reprogramming or maintenance; it is the very same citizens who receive vile media messages, whether in written or audio-visual media, that manipulate the unity and coherence of this small society for the sake of profit-making and competition.

The management of the oil revenues, that are daily added to the state’s coffers requires a completely different mentality to be successfully utilized. These revenues came from natural resources with no input into their creation from us Kuwaitis; they are like a fortune falling from the blue, so why don’t we manage them properly? Oh our government, the people are too tired! Oh our parliament, the people long to smile! — Al-Jarida

GCC in advanced stages of cooperation JEDDAH: GCC countries have achieved “advanced stages” of cooperation in various spheres, said the Director of GCC Affairs Department at the Kuwaiti Foreign Ministry, Ambassador Humoud Al-Roudan, affirmed.

Al-Roudan made the statement upon his arrival here for a GCC meeting, due here today. The meeting will be held at the level of a special committee tasked with drafting resolutions and the final statement of the 119th session of the GCC ministerial council.

In order to consolidate these achievements, the Kuwaiti paper to be presented in the meeting calls for “patience on the accession of Morocco and Jordan to the GCC,” Al-Roudan stressed.

This issue needs a thorough study and evaluation for the possibility of integration, especially that the current six GCC states have distinctive identity and laws dating back to more than 30 years, and “ it’s difficult to add new changes to them without adequate consideration,” he added.

Al-Roudan said the meeting will discuss the issue of the Natural Disaster Center, which the GCC have agreed for it to be headquartered in Kuwait. The center coordinates with the United Nations in this regard.

The meeting will also discuss the current developments on both Arab and international arenas, especially in Egypt and Yemen. The Kuwaiti delegation was received by Deputy Consul Sultan Al-Subaie of the Kuwait Embassy — KUNA

Deadly fall An Arab construction worker who fell from a height whilst working at a building site in Fahaheel was pronounced dead at the scene.

Police have launched an investigation into the incident.

Burglars thwarted Police are seeking three unidentified would-be burglars who failed in two separate attempts to rob a home in Abdullah Al-Salem due to the alertness of the family’s domestic staff. The three men apparently targeted the house when they discovered that the owners were out of the country, but had not reckoned with the presence of the domestic staff and fled when they saw that

the house was occupied after all.

Police believe that the men are one of a number of gangs targeting homes believed to be empty over the summer period while the homeowners are holidaying overseas.

Flag fuss An expatriate Arab man has been referred to the State Security Department after he was caught throwing a pile of Kuwaiti flags into a dumpster in Farwaniya. On being questioned, the man told police that he was simply disposing of old, worn-out flags and meant no offense by his actions.

Woman kidnapped Police are hunting for an Asian woman who was abducted in the Shuwaikh area, with her kidnapper calling her husband to demand a ransom of KD400. The worried husband immediately went to local police to report the incident, and police are using hi-tech tracking equipment to track the wife’s phone in their efforts to locate and apprehend the kidnapper and free the woman.

Drugs cases An investigation is underway after a police officer found a plastic bag filled with drugs in his house in Jabriya after returning from work.

The officer, a First Lieutenant, immediately called colleagues to report his discovery and fellow officers were quickly at the scene, impounding the goods and launching an investigation. Meanwhile, an unem-

Bus breakdown A team of security officers was put on high alert to secure a road leading to the Central Prison when a bus carrying 50 inmates broke down on its way to the jail. No irregular incidents were reported, and the bus resumed its trip as soon as the problem was fixed.

Officials interrogated Two senior Ministry of Interior officials are facing questioning over the unwarranted release of a detainee. Police in Mubarak AlKabeer had arrested the suspect, an Iranian man, two weeks ago over his violation of residency regulations, with senior officials subsequently discovering that he was released without the approval of the relevant officials. The two senior MoI officers, Acting Assistant Undersecretary for General Security Affairs Maj Gen Tariq Hamada and Director of Security for Mubarak Al-Kabeer Governorate Maj Gen Dulaihi AlHajri, are set to be questioned over suspicions that senior officials authorized the release of the man, who has since been recaptured and referred to the deportation authorities. — Al-Rai, Al-Qabas

Beauty of Kuwait on display KUWAIT: The Avenues is hosting this week a photo gallery taken from the book ‘Jebt El Hala Mn Wain?’ (Where did you get this beauty from?), which was launched by the Kuwait Hotels Company to celebrate the United Nations World Environment Day, in its initiative to promote corporate social responsibility and to reinforce the importance of environmental awareness among members of the community in addition to its ongoing support of young Kuwaiti talent. The exhibition includes a number of stunning photographs that were taken by talented Kuwaiti photographers from the Kuwait Voluntary Work Center (KVWC), designed to express their passion for photography and for Kuwait’s wildlife and natural landscapes.

All of these images, some of them award winners, have raised the profile of Kuwait across the world. In support t of this initiatives, The Avenues management have emphasized that they are keen to host numerous exhibitions and events that aim to raise the awareness of social issues and promote environmental awareness. They are always eager to support local talented people to be creative, where they are given an opportunity to express their ideas and hobbies. They pointed out that environmental Photo Gallery gives an opportunity for visitors to enjoy the charm and beauty of the picturesque nature of Kuwait.

KUWAIT: One of the photographs on display.

KUWAIT: The outgoing Ambassador of Romania Constantin Nistor hosted a reception at the embassy on Sunday evening. Diplomats, high officials and media personalities attended the reception. — Photos by Joseph Shagra

Study recommends re-pricing water supplies KUWAIT: A special team from the Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR) presented a proposal to reprice water that is supplied to residents in Kuwait. A study was conducted to assesses production costs as well as the financial benefits of a price increase.

The study indicates that increasing prices, ranging between 200 fils and KD 1.7 per 1,000 imperial gallon, can eventually lead for consumption rationalization levels that saves up to 13.7 million imperial gallons; which forms 11.5 percent of the current consumption rates.

Furthermore, the study notes that such price increase will help reduce governmental subsidization of water by KD 116 million a year, saving up to 20 percent of the total subsidization value, reported AlQabas.

Khairan resort to host Ideal Son Award ceremony KUWAIT: The Touristic Enterprises Company’s ( TEC) Khairan Resort will host the ‘AlBaghli Ideal Son Award’ for the fourth consecutive year. The awards ceremony will be supervised by Ibrahim Tahir Al-Baghli CEO of the Kuwaiti Society for Elderly Care and official sponsor of the award.

Adnan Zinedin, Managing Director of the Khairan Resort, expressed gratitude to the organizers for selecting the facility to host the event, promising that special entertainment programs will be staged during the open day.

The day-long event will take place on June 23, 2011. Senior citizens and volunteers will be honored. Ibrahim Al-Baghli commended the ‘distinguished

ployed Indian man was caught redhanded in Khaitan in possession of 150 grams of heroin and 300 narcotic tablets in a police sting operation.

On being questioned, the man told officers that he was working for a drug dealer currently serving a sentence in Central Prison.

Ibrahim Al-Baghli

Adnan Zinedin

social role’ played by TEC, prompting them to select one of its facilities to host the award for the past four years. He noted

that the event takes place under the patronage of Dr Mohammad Al-Afasi, Minister of Social Affairs and Labor.

The award’s official poster

Four Kuwaitis honored at Jerusalem conference AMMAN: Participants in the Jerusalem Conference have honored four eminent Kuwaiti personalities for their role in supporting the cause of the holy city of Jerusalem.

The conferees, at the conclusion of the convention, that concluded late on Sunday, honored the general coordinator of Kuwait Society of Engineers, Mu’jab Al-Ajmi, Sami Al-Adwani, the Chairman of the Palestine Committee at Al-Rahma International Society, Khalil Hamad, the head of the Amman bureau of International Islamic Charitable Organization, and the chairman of the Amman office of the Joint Kuwaiti Committee.

The dean of the Jordanian engineers, Abdullah Obeidat, praised in a statement at the ceremony, the State of Kuwait for supporting the cause of Jerusalem, struggle of the Palestinian people against the Israeli occupation and Israel’s bids to wipe off the Arab identity of the holy city and drive its natives out of it.

Obeidat also praised the Kuwaiti authorities that supported the convention, namely the ambassador in Amman, Dr. Hamad Al-Duaij, as well as their efforts for promoting the brotherly ties between the peoples of the two countries.

Al-Ajmi said that the honoring of the Kuwaiti personalities was actually addressed to the State of Kuwait for its support for the Palestinians’ struggle for the liberation of their lands and establishing their independent state. He affirmed significance of the convention for shedding light on conditions and hardships of the natives of the city, affirming the Arabs’ rights there. Other eminent Kuwaiti figures who were also honored were the former chairman of the Islamic Charitable Organization, Yusuf Al-Hajji. — KUNA

TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

Berlusconi suffers fresh blow in referendums

Deadly suicide attack hits Pakistani capital Page 11

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BOYNUYOGUN: Syrian refugees are seen in the tent compound in Boynuyogun, Turkey, near the Syrian border yesterday. According to Turkey’s Foreign Ministry the number of Syrians who fled their country seeking refuge in Turkey climbed to nearly 7,000, prompting Turkish authorities to start building a fourth tent compound in the border area.—AP

Syrian forces round up hundreds AMMAN: Syrian troops rounded up hundreds of people in a sweep through villages near Jisr Al-Shughour yesterday, fleeing residents said, after President Bashar AlAssad’s army retook the rebellious northwestern town.

Nearly 7,000 Syrians have fled the region around Jisr AlShughour, seeking sanctuary in neighboring Turkey, while thousands more are sheltering in rural areas just inside Syria, activists say.

Yesterday’s wave of arrests followed an assault by troops, tanks and helicopters to regain control of the town, one week after authorities said 120 security personnel were killed there in fighting they blamed on “armed groups”. Some residents said those killed were soldiers who had mutinied, refusing to shoot protesters and joining demonstrators calling for an end to Assad’s rule.

The town of 50,000, just 20 km (12 miles) south of the Turkish border, is the latest focus of a military crackdown on the protests which have swept Syria for nearly three months and continue despite the deaths of hundreds of civilians. Refugees from Jisr Al-Shughour said the military was combing villages to the east of the town and arresting hundreds of men between the ages of 18 and 40, in a pattern seen in other military crackdowns since the unrest started in March.

Residents said the army unit that took the town was commanded by Assad’s brother Maher. Ahmad Yassin, 27, said he left his 7,000 sq metre plot of land east of Jisr al-Shughour early yesterday when a force of 200 soldiers and men wearing black came in armored personnel carriers and cars and poured petrol on the wheat crops.

“I tried to save my three cows but there was no time.

I put my wife and two children in the car and drove straight to the border,” he said. His account of troops setting fire to crops echoed reports from other refugees, but the official state news agency has accused “armed terrorist groups” of burning land as sabotage.

Syrian rights groups say 1,300 civilians have been killed since the start of the uprising. One group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, says more than 300 soldiers and police have also been killed. Syria has banned most foreign correspondents, making it difficult to verify accounts of events.

The government says the protests are part of a violent conspiracy backed by foreign powers to sow sectarian strife. Army units “have taken total control of Jisr Al-Shughour and are chasing remnants of the armed terrorist gangs in the woods and mountains,” the Syrian news agency said on Sunday. It said a soldier and two armed men were killed in clashes around the town. The army defused explosives planted on bridges and roads and uncovered mass graves holding mostly mutilated bodies of 12 security men killed by armed groups, it said.

Thousands of people from Jisr Al-Shughour, located on a vital road junction, had already fled to Turkey before Sunday’s assault. Turkey has grown increasingly critical of Assad and has now set up four camps to accommodate refugees. In a sign of tension between Syria and Turkey, which had close trade and political ties before the crisis, supporters of Assad protested outside Turkey’s embassy in Damascus on Sunday. Turkey’s Anatolian news agency said some people climbed the embassy walls and hung a Syrian flag, and Syrian security forces prevented some protesters from trying to lower the Turkish flag.

A resident said the crowd then tore down tourist posters on the outside wall of the embassy. France, with

British support, has led efforts for the United Nations Security Council to condemn Assad’s repression of the protests but Russia and China have suggested they may use their veto power to kill the resolution. A spokesman for British Prime Minister David Cameron said newly reelected Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan welcomed British efforts to put pressure on Assad at the United Nations.

French Foreign Minister Alain Juppe has said Assad had lost the legitimacy to rule Syria. The White House condemned the Syrian forces’ latest violence in the “strongest possible terms” and said Assad should step aside if he will not lead a democratic transition. Assad, who inherited power when his father died in 2000, has offered some moves aimed at appeasing protesters, lifting a 48-year state of emergency and promising a national dialogue- steps which have been dismissed by many activists.

The privately owned Syrian newspaper Al-Watan said a committee formed to investigate the unrest had imposed a travel ban on the former governor of Deraa, where protests broke out on March 18, and its head of security. It said there would be “no immunity for people who committed crimes”. — Reuters

Gaddafi’s envoy to UAE given 72 hours to leave DUBAI: The United Arab Emirates has given Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi’s ambassador 72 hours to leave, a day after it recognized the rebels’ National Transitional Council, a diplomat told AFP yesterday.

“The UAE foreign ministry has informed the ambassador of Gaddafi’s regime in Abu Dhabi that it now recognizes the NTC as a legitimate Libyan government. Therefore, his diplomatic mission in the country ends within 72 hours and he must leave,” the diplomat said on condition of anonymity.

The Libyan envoy was told that “the embassy will be handed over to the NTC which the UAE deals with as a government.” A foreign ministry official told AFP that the oil-rich Gulf state “is taking all measures needed to implement its recognition of the NTC.” The decision to recognize the NTC as the “sole legitimate representative of the Libyan people” was announced Sunday by Foreign Minister Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al-Nahayan, who said the UAE would soon open a provisional office in Benghazi, the Libyan rebels’ stronghold.

“The NTC has, in practice, become the representative of Libya and the Libyan people. Therefore, the United Arab Emirates will create relations with it at government level in all questions concerning Libya,” the minister said. The UAE move comes after a meeting on Thursday in Abu Dhabi of the contact group on Libya. The federation becomes the 12th nation to recognize the NTC as “sole legitimate representative”, after Australia, Britain, France, Gambia, Italy, Jordan, Malta, Qatar, Senegal, Spain and the United States. — AFP

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Libyan rebels claim breakout from Misrata Fighting rages for fourth day

SANAA: Female anti-government protestors attend noon prayers during a demonstration demanding the resignation of Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, in Sanaa, Yemen yesterday.—AP

Yemeni factions consider power transfer deal SANAA: Yemen’s acting president agreed yesterday with opposition parties to begin discussions on how to transfer power from the country’s embattled president, an opposition spokesman said. The official, Abdullah Oubal, said the agreement provided for the opposition and President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s ruling party to open a dialogue to find a way to ease Saleh out of office in accordance with proposals put forward by Yemen’s Gulf neighbors. Saleh has publicly accepted the proposals in the past, but has been evasive about implementing them.

Yesterday’s agreement may not end the country’s political impasse or prevent renewed clashes between forces loyal to Saleh and armed tribesmen opposed to his rule. However, it suggests that the acting president, Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, is exercising his constitutional powers despite the vast influence wielded by Saleh’s inner circle and family. The meeting was the first between an alliance of opposition parties and Hadi, who has been Yemen’s acting president since Saleh left for Saudi Arabia on June 5 for medical treatment from wounds he suffered in an attack on his compound in Yemen’s capital, Sanaa.

A senior Yemeni official in the Saudi capital, where Saleh is hospitalized, said Tuesday that the president’s condition was stable but not improving. The official spoke to The Associated Press by telephone and on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the subject.

Yesterday’s meeting, thought to have been convened under Western pressure, took place at Hadi’s Sanaa residence, which witnesses said was surrounded by members of the special forces, an elite outfit led by Saleh’s son and one-time heir apparent, Ahmed.

Top ruling party officials Sultan alBurkany and Ahmed Ben Daghr joined Hadi on the government side for the negotiations, according opposition spokesman Oubal. Tensions remain between forces loyal to Saleh and armed tribesmen led by Sadeq al-Ahmar, a onetime ally of the president who switched sides in March to join protesters staging mass demonstrations to demand the president’s ouster.

The two sides fought fierce street battles in Sanaa in late May and early this month, causing extensive damage to several neighborhoods. Officials close to al-Ahmar said yesterday that 100 of their fighters were killed and another 325 wounded in the fighting between May

23 and June 4. In the capital Sanaa, news of the agreement between Hadi and the opposition appeared to have no immediate impact. Witnesses said troops loyal and opposed to Saleh have been significantly reinforced, with more checkpoints and plainclothes gunmen visible on the streets. Beside the armed tribesmen, troops from the elite 1st Armored Division, whose commander mutinied and joined the protesters in March, have been squaring up in the capital against the presidential guard and the special forces, both under the command of the president’s son. Airstrikes, meanwhile, targeted Muslim militants in control of a southern Yemeni town, killing three suspected extremists yesterday, military and medical officials said. The massive antigovernment protests which erupted across Yemen in February have weakened the central government. Militants , including suspected Al-Qaeda members , captured two southern towns in late May, fueling concerns that the terror group could take advantage of the chaos.

The Yemeni officials said the airstrikes struck Jaar, one of two militant-held towns in the province of Abyan. The other town is Abyan’s capital, Zinjibar. The upheaval that has gripped Yemen since mid-February has left Saleh too preoccupied to focus on the fight against AlQaeda, and the United States has stepped up covert operations in Yemen with airstrikes and drone attacks targeting members of the terror network. The recent US operations come after a nearly yearlong pause in American airstrikes, which were halted amid concerns that poor intelligence had led to bungled missions and civilian deaths that were undercutting the goals of the secret campaign.

In Taiz, Yemen’s second-largest city, military officials said gunmen destroyed two tanks and six vehicles belonging to Saleh’s presidential guard. The tanks and vehicles were destroyed during fighting early yesterday. In a separate incident, an army colonel was killed in a blast as he drove near the port city of Aden in southern Yemen, according to security officials. They said the blast was likely caused by a bomb planted in his car, but they would not speculate on motives.

The colonel was in charge of supplies at a major army camp in the city. The officials in Abyan, Taiz and Aden spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to reporters.— AP

MISRATA: Government artillery rained down on rebel forces yesterday but failed to stop their advance into key ground west of their stronghold at Libya’s major port. As fighting raged for a fourth day, Germany’s foreign minister paid a surprise visit to the rebel’s de facto capital.

Guido Westerwelle met with officials of the Transitional National Council, telling members of the nascent rebel government that Germany recognized the council as “the legitimate representative of the Libyan people” That position is similar to that of the United States, which has stopped short of outright diplomatic recognition of the council.

The move was, nevertheless, another big diplomatic boost for the rebels and their four-month uprising to end Muammar Gaddafi ‘s 40-year rule in the oilrich North African country.

Germany refused to participate in the NATO air mission over Libya and withheld support for the nofly zone.

The rebels control roughly the eastern one-third of Libya as well as Misrata, the country’s major port. The also claim to have taken parts of coastal oil center of Zawiya in the far west. That port city is 18 miles (30 kilometers) west of Tripoli and a prize that would put them in striking distance of the capital. Control of the city also would cut one of Muammar Gaddafi ‘s last supply routes from Tunisia. Despite rebel claims, government spokesman Moussa Ibrahim said late Sunday that Gaddafi forces had driven off the attackers, and reporters taken to Zawiya saw secure streets and the green national flag flying over a central square.

The insurgents, for their part, claimed a high-ranking Gaddafi commander was badly wounded in the fighting.

“The wishful reporting of some journalists that the rebels are gaining more power and more control of some areas is not correct,” he said.

In the major fighting near Misrata yesterday, an Associated Press photographer at the rebel front lines said they had pushed along the Mediterranean Sea to within 6 miles (10 kilometers) of

MISRATA: Rebel fighters give the “v” sign following heavy clashes with pro-Gaddafi forces on the front line at Dafniya, about 25 miles (40 kilometers) west of Misrata, Libya yesterday.—AP Zlitan, the next city to the west of reinvigorated, and that Gaddafi ‘s by defections from his military Misrata. A rebel commander said defenders may become stretched and government inner circle. US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham his forces, using arms seized from thin.

“Over the past three days, we Clinton spoke again against the government weapons depots and fresh armaments being set fire under the feet of Gaddafi Libyan regime, telling the nations shipped in from Benghazi, forces everywhere,” Col. Hamid al- of Africa yesterday to sever links planned to have moved into Hasi, a rebel battalion command- Gaddafi despite his long support er, told AP. He said the rebels and patronage for many African Zlitan, by Tuesday.

Ali Terbelo, the rebel com- attacked “in very good coordina- leaders.

In a speech yesterday to diplomander, said other opposition tion with NATO” to avoid friendlyforces already were in Zlitan, try- fire incidents. “We don’t move mats at the African Union heading to encircle Gaddafi troops. If unless we have very clear instruc- quarters in Addis Ababa, the the rebels take the city they tions from NATO.” Rebels encoun- Ethiopian capital, Clinton said would be within 85 miles (135 tered a major setback, however, Africa should join most of the rest kilometers) of the eastern out- near the eastern oil town of Brega of the world in abandoning yesterday. Suleiman Rafathi, a Gaddafi . She said the Libyan skirts of Gaddafi ‘s capital, Tripoli.

An AP reporter with rebel doctor at the hospital in the town leader has lost all legitimacy to forces said shelling was intense of Ajdabiya where the casualties rule because of attacks on his yesterday morning with rockets were taken, said 23 rebels were own citizens. She’s urged all and artillery and mortar shells killed and 26 wounded in a gov- African leaders to demand that slamming into rebel lines west of ernment ambush about 22 miles Gaddafi accept a ceasefire and then leave Libya. She also said Dafniya at a rate of about 7 each (35 kilometers) east of Brega.

The front lines between Brega they should expel pro-Gaddafi minute. Dafniya is about 20 miles (30 kilometers) west of Misrata and Ajdabiya have been relatively Libyan diplomats from their Officials at Hikma Hospital in quiet in recent weeks, while fight- countries, suspend the operations of Libyan embassies and Misrata said government shelling ing has raged in western Libya.

Rebel fighters appear to be work with the Libyan opposition. killed seven and wounded 49 on In another diplomatic advace, Sunday. New casualty figures rebounding with help from the were not available but ambu- NATO blockade of ports still the rebels council won recognilances were rushing from the under government control and tion from the United Arab Dafniya line back into Misrata. alliance control of Libyan air- Emirates, adding a wealthy, influThe rebel thrust at Zawiya and space. Both have severely ential Arab state to the handful of movements farther east , near crimped the North African dicta- nations thus far accepting the Misrata and Brega , suggested tor’s ability to resupply his forces. insurgents as Libyans’ sole legitithe stalemated uprising had been And his control has been hard hit mate representatives.— AP

Khartoum agrees to conditional Abyei pullout

Dead Sea threatened both by shrinking and flooding EIN BOKEK: The Dead Sea is dying, goes the conventional wisdom: The water level of the fabled salty lake is dropping nearly 4 feet (1.2 meters) a year. Less well known: Part of the lake is actually overflowing, threatening one of Israel’s key tourism destinations. Israel is feverishly campaigning to have the Dead Sea , the lowest point on earth and repository of precious minerals , named one of the natural wonders of the world. At the same time, it’s racing to stabilize what it calls “the world’s largest natural spa” so hotels on its southern end aren’t swamped and tourists can continue to soak in the lake’s therapeutic waters.

Without intervention, “in five to 10 years, (the water) would flood the hotel lobbies, no question,” said Alon Tal, one of the researchers the government has commissioned to find a solution.

The Dead Sea is divided into a northern and southern basin, which are located at different elevations, largely disconnected and miles (kilometers) apart. That means the rising waters of the southern basin cannot simply pour into the shrinking basin in the north. Heavy industrialization is what’s causing the waters on the southern basin to rise. Chemical companies have built evaporation pools there to extract lucrative minerals from the lake. Millions of tons of salt are left annually on the floor of these pools, causing the water to rise 8 inches (20 centimeters) a year.

Israel’s tourism and environmental protection ministers are endorsing Tal’s most expensive proposal: A complex $2 billion plan to chip off the salt buildup

on the part of the lake that’s rising and send it by conveyor belt to the northern end that’s dropping. They ’re also demanding that Dead Sea Works Ltd. , the multibillion-dollar Israeli industry that mines the mineral-rich waters , foot the bill. “As the polluters, they should pay,” said Roee Elisha, associate director of the Dead Sea Preser vation Government Company Ltd, a branch of Israel’s Tourism Ministry. The Dead Sea, which is linked to the sites of the biblical Sodom and Gomorra, runs more than 60 miles (100 kilometers) through Israel, the West Bank and Jordan. Its minerals have been sought after since ancient times: The pharaohs were embalmed with the lake’s natural asphalt lumps, and Cleopatra is said to have used its skinrejuvenating salts and mud.

Today, the lake is one of Israel’s top tourism draws. Half of the 3.45 million tourists to Israel paid a stop there in 2010. Almost 200,000 stayed in the 4,000 hotel rooms along the lake. Locals flock there too, with more than 630,000 , or almost one in 10 Israelis , spending time at Dead Sea hotels last year.

Dead Sea tourism revenue totaled some $300 million last year, propping up an industry that accounts for thousands of jobs in a part of the country that otherwise offers limited employment opportunities.

Current efforts to preserve the Dead Sea as a natural treasure shine a spotlight on how extensively the lake has been exploited by modern industry , and how it paradoxically also depends on industry for its survival. — AP

BAGHDAD: Iraqi security forces inspect the scene of a suicide car bomb attack in Basra, Iraq’s second-largest city, 340 miles (550 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad, Iraq yesterday.—AP

Suicide bomber kills 4 people in southern Iraq BAGHDAD: A suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden vehicle into a police building in the southern Iraqi city of Basra yesterday, killing four people, officials said. Suicide bombings like yesterday’s are rare in the oil-rich Basra, where several international oil companies are developing some of the countr y ’s prized oil fields to bring in the sorely needed petrodollars for postwar reconstruction.

Provincial police chief Brig. Faisal AlEbadi said the bomber crashed through the gate and made it a few yards (meters) into the police compound in the city’s central Al-Ashar district before blowing up the car. Three policemen and one civilian were killed and 24 people were injured in the attack, which occurred during the morning rush hour, Al-Ebadi added.

Earlier, officials had said five people died. Conflicting reports on casualties and the causes of explosions are not uncommon in Iraq in the immediate aftermath of attacks. A health official,

speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, confirmed the toll.

Basra is Iraq’s second-largest province and home to about 70 percent of the country’s proven oil reserves of 143.1 billion barrels. It is Iraq’s only outlet to the sea and is the hub for most of Iraq’s oil exports of nearly 2.225 million barrels a day.

The provincial capital, also called Basra, is 340 miles (550 kilometers) southeast of Baghdad. While violence in Iraq is well below what it was during the intense Shiite-Sunni sectarian fighting in 2006 and 2007, militants are again stepping up deadly attacks around the country. Iraq’s government and political factions are mulling whether to ask that some American forces remain in the country beyond the Dec. 31 deadline for all US troops to withdraw after more than eight years.

There are mounting security concerns what will happen when the 47,000 US troops withdraw. — AP

JUBA: Khartoum has conditionally agreed to withdraw its troops from the disputed Abyei district, the south’s information minister said yesterday, on the second day of top-level talks in Ethiopia. “We have information that they have accepted to withdraw from Abyei as long they agree on the specific arrangement with regards to the Abyei administration,” Barnaba Marial Benjamin told the independent Sudan Radio Service.

“What troops that will be put to replace the Sudanese Armed forces (SAF-the northern army) when they withdraw, they will discuss the details of that security arrangement,” Benjamin said. “I think they have accepted the principle that they have to withdraw,” he added. There was no immediate confirmation from Khartoum, which said last week that it would withdraw its forces from Abyei only after a comprehensive political solution had been reached.

Northern troops overran the flashpoint border district on May 21, in response to an attack on a convoy of SAF troops and UN peacekeepers, The move prompted more than 100,000 people, mostly prosouthern Dinka Ngok farmers, to flee from the region, according to UN estimates. Khartoum also sacked the district’s southern-nominated civilian administrator and appointed an army brigadier in his place.

President Omar al-Bashir and southern leader Salva Kiir have been locked in talks in Addis Ababa since Sunday seeking to resolve the crisis in Abyei and another in neighboring South Kordofan state, with less than a month to go before the south wins international recognition as an independent state. Speaking in Tanzania earlier yesterday, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called on Khartoum to withdraw its forces from Abyei and urged both sides to accept an Ethiopian offer of peacekeeping troops.

“The government of Sudan should urgently facilitate a viable security arrangement starting with the withdrawal of Sudanese Armed Forces,” she said.

Mediators have described the talks in the Ethiopian capital as “tense.” Sources close to the negotiations say the atmosphere has been poisoned by the recent violence. For eight days, heavy clashes have raged between the SAF and northern members of the southern former rebel army in South Kordofan, north Sudan’s only oil producing state. Yesterday, the United Nations confirmed for the first time that the fighting in South Kordofan had spilled across the border into the south. “Fighting, including bombardments and artillery shelling, has been reported in 11 of the 19 localities in Southern Kordofan state, and has spread to Pariang County in Unity State, southern Sudan,” the UN humanitarian office (OCHA) said. — AFP

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Giffords injury leads to void in Senate race WASHINGTON: The shooting of Gabrielle Giffords in January has left Democrats in Arizona without a candidate for next year’s US Senate race even though party officials in Washington have declared the state a tremendous opportunity to pick up a seat.

Giffords would be the unquestionable favorite to represent the Democrats if she were able to run. As she undergoes therapy to recover from the January shooting, an alternative candidate has yet to emerge , in part, because of the uncertainty surrounding her political future.

“All of our hopes and faith were geared towards her,” said Andrei Cherny, chairman of the Arizona Democratic Party. “Because of what happened in Tucson, I think people are now thinking through the decision themselves.”

Some Democrats said the lack of an alternative at this stage is a worrisome sign that Democrats won’t field a strong chal-

lenger against the Republican nominee, most likely to be Jeff Flake. Incumbent Republican Jon Kyl is retiring after three terms in the Senate. “We’re stumbling around with names nobody knows,” said Raul Grijalva, a Democratic congressman.

“We’re left with second tiers, and that’s too bad, because I don’t think Flake should have a free ride and he’s beatable.” Grijalva said he believes that time is drawing near for the Giffords camp to say whether she will run for the Senate. He made clear he had no intentions of seeking the seat.

“There has been a deference and I think appropriately so,” Grijalva said. “Now, I think it’s kind of important to find out what their decision is going to be, because the more time that goes by, the lower the tier of candidates gets. Formidable people are going to defer to Gabby and that’s appropriate, but like I said, at some point, some decisions have to be made.” Privately, some

Democrats are pessimistic that her recovery will progress to the point she will run for the Senate. They view a run for her congressional seat as a more likely alternative.

Jim Pederson, the former chairman of the Arizona Democratic Party, said Giffords has plenty of time to decide and could win the Senate race even if she waited until 2012 before entering. “It can certainly wait until next year. If she were perceived in terms of her recovery to be a viable candidate, I think she could raise significant money overnight. She could conceivably wait another nine or 10 months, I think,” Pederson said.

Pederson acknowledged that her possible candidacy may be scaring off other Democratic candidates. Indeed, Pederson said he believe a Giffords candidacy would be so strong that any Democrats who jumped into the field now would probably step aside if she did get in. Grijalva said it

would be unreasonable to ask a Democratic candidate to enter the race as a potential placeholder. “This is Arizona. This is hand-to-hand combat from this point forward,” he said. “Once you’re in the fight, you cannot step out.” Giffords has made remarkable progress in the last five months, with neurosurgeon Dr. Dong Kim describing it as “almost miraculous.” Still, she remains a shadow of her former self.

Pia Carusone, her chief of staff, told the Arizona Republic last week that Giffords can express her basic wants and needs, but has difficulty stringing together sentences to verbalize more complex thoughts and feelings. Giffords, she said, relies heavily on hand gestures and facial expressions to communicate. “She is borrowing upon other ways of communicating. Her words are back more and more now, but she’s still using facial expressions as a way to express. Pointing. Gesturing,” Carusone

said. The description matches what experts expect from someone who has suffered a traumatic brain injury. Often, they can be easily disoriented, have trouble prioritizing, suffer from some memory loss and could have difficulty recognizing people. Some have difficulty doing several tasks at the same time. Most cognitive recovery occurs in the first six months to a year after an injury, though it becomes less noticeable as time progresses. In the second year, progress sharply drops. Carusone said it is too early to say whether she will resume her position in Congress. She says they have until May 2012 to decide. The staff also released photographs of Giffords on Sunday. The photos show her with shorter, darker hair but few signs she suffered a gunshot wound to the head. The timing coincides with plans to release Giffords from the hospital later this month or in early July.— AP

Post-op Chavez runs government from Cuba Signs debt law, worried about power-cuts

TUXTLA GUTIERREZ: Migrants jump out of a tractor trailer as Mexican federal police watch at police headquarters in Tuxtla Gutierrez, Mexico, Sunday.—AP

Mexico finds 210 migrants crammed in truck TUXTLA GUTIERREZ: Mexican police on Sunday discovered 210 mainly Central and South American migrants crammed inside a truck near the country’s southern border, an immigration official said. The dehydrated and hungry migrants were found when the truck was searched at a highway checkpoint, said the immigration official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk on the record.

Police detained the truck’s driver and his assistant, both of whom will be transferred to a maximum-security prison, the official said.

The migrants were mainly from Brazil, Guatemala, El Salvador and Nicaragua, but also from India. They were packed so tightly into the truck that they had to remain standing, official said. The official said the migrants had not eaten in 24 hours and were now being given food and water.

They are being held at a Chiapas federal police station awaiting deportation.

Each year, hundreds of thousands of illegal migrants cross Mexico’s southern border on their way to the United States. They are often smuggled in brutal conditions, packed tightly inside tractor trailers on long journeys. They are subject to robbery, extortion and kidnapping along the way.

Loa, a 23-year-old from El Salvador, was among the migrants detained Sunday. He

was prohibited by immigration authorities from giving his last name. Visibly haggard, Loa was buying a meat-filled sandwich passed to him through prison bars from a street vendor. “It was very hot and we had no water,” he told The Associated Press about his trek, which began Friday. His plan had been to reach Los Angeles.

The United Nations estimates that smuggling migrants into the United States is a $6.6 billion business annually. That doesn’t include another $1 billion paid by thousands of non-Mexicans to cross from Guatemala into Mexico and then travel north toward the US border, according to a 2010 U.N. report on transnational crime. In May, 513 people were apprehended in two trailers in Chiapas, bordering Guatemala.

They represented a cargo worth at least $3.5 million.

Another trailer filled with 219 people was discovered in January. William, 43, one of the 210 migrants picked up Sunday, said he paid $3,000 to smugglers to truck him from Guatemala to the United States to work.

He knew that once he was caught there would be no refund. “There’s no work back home,” said William, who would not reveal his last name. The truck was traveling on a highway bordering Veracruz state when it was stopped by authorities.— AP

CARACAS: Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez said he had his “full faculties” after an operation in Cuba and was still managing government affairs despite being ordered to rest for several days more.

Chavez, 56, had a pelvic abscess successfully removed on Friday during a scheduled visit to Cuba, forcing him to postpone his return to Venezuela. “I am in full control of my faculties,” Chavez told TV network Telesur, saying he was in constant touch with his ministers and giving orders for state affairs.

The operation, following a knee injury and string of colds that kept Chavez out of the public limelight for weeks, has put a spotlight on the health of a man who prides himself on loving sport and projecting a physically robust image.

Supporters have been praying for his recovery, while critics have been insinuating he may have something worse. “The operation was a success,” Chavez said. “There is no malignant sign and no infection.”

Ally and mentor Fidel Castro, the former Cuban president, had been at his bedside, bringing films and books to help him while away the time, Chavez said. “He attends to every detail.”

The president said he had signed a law to double the Venezuelan government’s debt limit this year. Chavez said he was also anxiously tracking power cuts that are irritating many in Venezuela.

The latest wave of blackouts, in the western oil-rich state of Zulia, have been headline news in Venezuela for days, with some residents taking up pots and pans to protest.

CARACAS: A supporter holds up a painting of Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez during a gathering by supporters wishing him a quick recovery in Caracas, Venezuela, Sunday.—AP “The electricity issue has me very Chavez’s open acknowledgment of LatinNews said. Without him in theworried,” Chavez said, urging Castro as his inspiration infuriates ory, the “revolution” might not survive while the removal of subsiVenezuelans to save power and his political opponents.

Chavez’s operation has set off dized oil shipments to Cuba and accusing some enemies of deliberchatter about his government’s other Caribbean and Central ately sabotaging the grid.

Asked when he would be back dependence on him, and his one- American governments could in Venezuela, Chavez said it was man domination of the political change the political dynamic impossible to predict but “it won’t apparatus. “Chavez has no obvious around the region, it added. In be long.” The socialist leader’s close successor with his immense charis- practice, though, Chavez plans to relationship with communist-led ma and unrivaled political talents, run for re-election in 2012 and is Cuba has been controversial at least among his small inner cir- currently favorite to win in most UK-based newsletter analysts’ views. — Reuters throughout his 12 years in office. cle,”

Venezuela struggles with repeated power outages

Obama hits road seeking jobs WASHINGTON: US President Barack Obama hits the road yesterday to take aim at the unemployment crisis inflicting misery on millions of Americans and casting a cloud of doubt over his nascent reelection bid. Obama was traveling to the 2012 swing state of North Carolina to chair a meeting of his Jobs Council, a group of top business executives set up to provide ideas about stirring jobs growth with unemployment at 9.1 percent.

The president was then due to head to another critical electoral state, Florida, to hold several fundraisers to bolster his campaign coffers as the 2012 presidential race erupts into life, before the November 2012 election.

Today, Obama heads to the US unincorporated territory of Puerto Rico in the Caribbean, where people are American citizens but cannot vote in general elections-but have close links to the Puerto Rican diaspora, a fast growing political demographic in Florida. Obama’s distinctly political travel comes as Republicans launch their nominating race for the right to take him on next year with a New Hampshire debate yesterday cer-

tain to including scything attacks on his economic record. The White House says the visit to North Carolina, which Obama narrowly carried in the 2008 election, and hopes to retain next time, is evidence of his administration’s focus on creating jobs. “This is a group of private sector leaders: business leaders, people running large and small companies, labor leaders; people who represent millions of Americans helping the economy every single day,” said Jen Psaki, deputy White House communications director.

The jobs council, headed by GE Chairman and CEO Jeff Immelt, will be holding its second meeting, and the first outside Washington. The session will be held at Cree, a lighting production company, which the White House sees as an example of US companies investing in future technologies, a trend it sees as vital to reigniting the economic recovery. Obama aides said the jobs council has a plan to address jobs growth over the short and long term, focusing on high growth sectors, areas of high unemployment and clean energy and health care sectors.— AFP

MORRISVILLE: President Barack Obama greets spectators after arriving at Raleigh Durham International Airport in Morrisville, NC yesterday.—AP

CARDENAL SAMORE: Lightning strikes over the Puyehue-Cordon Caulle volcano in Chile, seen from the international cross border way Cardenal Samore, in southern Chile, Sunday.—AP

Chile residents living near volcano urged to stay away SANTIAGO: Chilean officials ordered most residents already evacuated from homes near an erupting volcano to stay in shelters and with family and friends Sunday due to the threat of deadly landslides. The ash spread across the Pacific, prompting authorities to suspend flights in Australia and New Zealand. The Cordon Caulle volcano’s activity had diminished, but there was still a threat of deadly landslides containing mud and water as well as rocks and ash thrown from the volcano, Chile’s National Geology and Mines Service said in a statement.

About 4,000 Chileans have been evacuated since the volcano began erupting June 4. The agency said the area north of the volcano is in danger of landslides and avalanches. Thousands of passengers in Australia and New Zealand were affected as the ash cloud approached the two countries. Australia’s national carrier, Qantas Airways, grounded flights within the country and in New Zealand. National carrier Air New Zealand has not canceled or delayed any flights yet, instead choosing to adjust routes and altitudes to ensure aircraft remain clear of any ash, company

spokeswoman Tracy Mills said. But the company was continually assessing the situation and could be forced to suspend service, Mills said.

Despite the cloud’s expansion overnight, Virgin Australia started flying out of Melbourne, Tasmania and New Zealand again yesterday morning with a reduced schedule. More than two dozen Virgin flights were still suspended, and about 4,000 to 6,000 passengers stranded, said company spokeswoman Melissa Thomson.

Qantas, meanwhile, canceled more flights in and out of Melbourne, saying it would reassess at midday yesterday. All flights to and from Tasmania and New Zealand were grounded. The plume of ash could disrupt travel for the next several days and could reach the Australian capital, Canberra, yesterday afternoon, according to Airservices Australia. Volcanic ash hovering over the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires and the nearby Uruguayan capital of Montevideo forced officials there to cancel flights late last week. Air traffic began returning to normal Friday night and was operating normally early Sunday. —AP

CARACAS: President Hugo Chavez accused his political rivals on Sunday of sabotaging the country’s electricity grid and trying to pin the blame on his government for blackouts plaguing much of Venezuela. Repeated power blackouts in recent months have affected areas stretching from Venezuela’s western border with Colombia to eastern regions where hydroelectric dams produce roughly a third of the electricity that Venezuelans consume.

Many Venezuelans in affected areas appear to be growing impatient as government officials promise solutions to a problem that has persisted since 2009 despite billions of dollars in investment aimed at revamping the power grid. Opposition leaders, meanwhile, are trying to capitalize, blaming Chavez for a faulty power grid and the repeated outages.

Chavez accused his foes of provoking the outages, without presenting evidence of sabotage. “Sabotage, we have to be vigilant,” Chavez said, speaking from Cuba during a a telephone interview broadcast on Sunday by the Caracas-based Telesur television network. The president suggested that “a group of the right-wing, antinationalist opposition that is willing to do anything” is sabotaging the grid.

The most recent blackouts hit western Venezuela on Friday and Saturday, affecting several border states and the country’s second-largest city, Maracaibo. The outages began Friday night with the failure of a transformer in Zulia state, officials said. Other transformers exploded before dawn Saturday, knocking out 3,000 megawatts and affecting the states of Zulia, Trujillo, Merida, Tachira and Barinas. Aixa Lopez, director of the Committee for People Affected by Power Outages, a pressure group that monitors the extent of the problem, said blackouts , some of them lasting up to 20 hours , have repeatedly hit Caracas and at least 10 of Venezuela’s 24 states in recent months. Lopez said blackouts at hospitals have interrupted surgeries, damaged thousands of home appliances and disrupted activity at numerous businesses and public institutions, ranging from restaurants to schools. Several major outages in Caracas this year have shut down the subway and street lights, further aggravating traffic jams that snarl through streets, causing chaos in the bustling capital, she added.

“The situation is serious, and it’s unacceptable,” Lopez said. Vice President Elias Jaua said earlier Sunday the state electric utility, Corpoelec, is working to restore power in regions hit by outages. Jaua called for patience and urged residents of the sun-baked, sizzling state to reduce their use of air conditioning units.— AP

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Spanish Socialists mull early election MADRID: Spain’s governing Socialists are considering calling an early election in November to capitalize on a summer tourism surge that could boost the stagnant economy, party sources said. Elections must be held by March 2012 and polls suggest the Socialists will lose to the centre-right Popular Party-with voters blaming them for the country’s high unemployment rate and the economy.

Employment figures and economic growth typically rise as tourists flock to

Spain’s coastline in the summer. Positive figures could help the Socialists at least prevent the Popular Party from winning by such a landslide that it gets an absolute majority in parliament. Some party leaders fear the economy and jobs data could slump again over the winter after a seasonal tourism boost, said the sources, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who has rolled out unpopular austerity measures in a bid to keep Spain out of

the euro zone debt crisis, has said he will not run for a third term. For now Zapatero is against calling early elections, one source said, because he still needs to push the 2012 budget and pension and wage bargaining reforms through Parliament.

The legislative agenda will largely depend on whether the Socialists can continue to depend on support from small parties from Basque Country and Catalonia. Despite press leaks over the debate raging inside the Socialist party, its official line yesterday was

that the election would take place in March.

“The government’s will, the government’s desire, what the government wants, and what the Socialist party supports is to conclude this legislative period, to the end, until the spring, until March,” Marcelino Iglesias, the party’s organisational secretary, told reporters yesterday. Deputy Prime Minister Alfredo Perez Rubalcaba is expected to be anointed Socialist candidate in July. The risk premium on Spanish debt, as measured by the spread between Spanish and German

benchmarks, has crept up steadily in recent weeks, to about 252 basis points. The rising cost of Spain’s borrowing costs reflects investors’ concern that contagion from Greece’s second European Union bailout package will spill over into Spain.

Recent opinion polls show the Popular Party has around a 13 percent lead over the Socialists. The PP has repeatedly called on Zapatero to announce an early election, saying he does not have enough credibility to run the country. —Reuters

Berlusconi suffers fresh blow in referendums High turnout rewards opposition

ROME: Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi, right, and Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu attend a news conference, in Rome yesterday. —AP

Berlusconi rejects unilateral solutions in Mideast ROME: Italian Premier Silvio Berlusconi told a visiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu exactly what he wanted to hear yesterday, rejecting recognition of a Palestinian state by the UN General Assembly and insisting peace must come through negotiations.

Netanyahu was in Italy to rally European opposition to plans by the Palestinians to ask the UN to recognize a Palestinian state in September. Israel, backed by the US, opposes such a move, saying it will only push peace farther away.

Berlusconi echoed Netanyahu when asked about the UN statehood recognition at a press conference following the signature of several bilateral agreements.

“We don’t believe a unilateral solution can help peace,” Berlusconi said. “I believe peace can only be reached with a common effort, that is, with negotiations.” Italy is one of Israel’s closest friends in Europe, a fact stressed by both leaders yesterday.

“We have no better friend,” Netanyahu told the Italian leader. Netanyahu said peace cannot be imposed by the outside or by “one-sided UN resolutions,” which he said would not only violate previous accords but would harden the Palestinian position and make peace even more difficult. “Peace requires mutual compromises: Palestinian compromises, Israeli compromises. We both compromise. We’re prepared to do to that, but to do that you need a negotiation,” Netanyahu said.

The latest round of Israeli-Palestinian peace talks broke down last September, just three weeks after their launch, with the expiration of a limited Israeli freeze on Jewish settlement construction. The Palestinians say there is no point in negotiating as long as Israel continues to build homes in enclaves inside the West Bank and east Jerusalem , captured areas the Palestinians claim for their future state.

The Palestinians say they too would prefer a negotiated agreement. But if talks remain stalled, they say they will

turn to the UN for recognition in September. The move is not expected to immediately change the situation on the ground, but the Palestinians believe a strong UN endorsement will isolate Israel internationally and put heavy pressure on the Israelis to withdraw from occupied territory.

Seeking to break the deadlock, both the US and France have floated proposals in recent weeks to restart talks by focusing on the borders between Israel and a future Palestine. Both proposals say Israel should return to its pre-1967 lines, meaning a withdrawal from the West Bank and east Jerusalem, albeit with some modifications based on negotiated land swaps.

Neither Berlusconi nor Netanyahu spoke publicly about the details of the proposals. The French proposal calls for relaunching talks at a peace conference.

And Berlusconi even offered to host peace talks in Erice, Sicily, if both sides would come to the table. Italy, he said, would pick up the bill. “We expect it would be a long-term negotiation,” Berlusconi said.

The rival Palestinian leaderships, Fatah and Hamas, are due to meet today in Cairo to begin negotiations on forming a unity government, a prelude to taking their cause to the UN this fall.

Berlusconi said Italy was waiting to see what kind of government emerges, but stressed that the Palestinian leadership must recognize Israel’s right to exist as a Jewish state, must accept previous peace accords and must renounce violence.

Hamas has refused to renounce violence and recognize Israel. Netanyahu also warned about the risk Iran poses if it acquires nuclear weapons and the continued uncertainties about the final results of the string of popular uprisings in the Arab world. “It’s not obvious where the Arab Spring will go, but I will say this, that if Iran develops nuclear weapons, the Arab Spring could well turn into an Iranian winter,” Netanyahu said. —AP

ROME: Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi headed for a heavy defeat yesterday in four referendums after Italians turned out in large numbers for a vote he had urged them to boycott. The proposals to repeal Berlusconiera legislation on nuclear power, water privatization and trial immunity for government ministers had been opposed by the prime minister, who declared that he would not cast a vote.

The referendums needed a quorum of more than 50 percent to be valid and looked set to meet the target easily. With supporters of the proposals considered far more likely to turn out to vote, they are expected to pass overwhelmingly. According to figures from the Interior Ministry, turnout was running at 57 percent with some 98 percent of the vote counted, a huge turnaround from the lacklustre participation in previous referendums.

Berlusconi, facing mounting problems since heavy local election losses last month, appeared to concede defeat at least in the nuclear referendum when he told a news conference the vote had probably ended prospects for atomic energy in Italy.

“Following the decision the Italian people are taking at this moment, we must probably say goodbye to the possibility of nuclear power stations and we must strongly commit ourselves to renewable energy,” he said. The vote could not have come at a worse time for the 74-year-old premier, who faces a sex scandal and three fraud trials and who was weakened by crushing losses in last month’s local elections, including in his northern power base, Milan.

The centre-left opposition campaigned hard to get voters to the polling stations. The last referendum to reach a quorum was in 1995. Six have been declared void since then.

After what he called “an extraordinary day”, Pierluigi Bersani, leader of the centre-left Democratic Party, called for Berlusconi to resign. “The government and Berlusconi really have to reflect on this. After the local elections and now the referendums, it would be irresponsible for them not to,” he said.

Roberto Maroni, a senior minister from Berlusconi’s increasingly impatient coalition partners the Northern League, said the government was running out of steam and needed to relaunch an ambitious reform program very soon. “I think Berlusconi is still capable of

MILAN: A ballot box is being opened to be counted after the closure of the polling stations in Milan, Italy yesterday. Premier Silvio Berlusconi conceded yesterday that Italy will “probably” have to give up plans to revive nuclear energy in a tacit acknowledgment that referendums challenging government policies have succeeded. —AP winning a much higher degree of consensus than he has so far but this is the last test,” he told the daily Corriere della Sera. A stagnant economy, one of the world’s highest levels of public debt and 30 percent youth unemployment are among the problems facing a government riven by divisions over issues ranging from tax to the NATO campaign in Libya.

Economy Minister Giulio Tremonti, widely credited with shielding Italy from the financial market crisis, has insisted on rigid budget discipline but faces growing opposition from cabinet colleagues alarmed that the policy is electoral poison.

A confidence vote in parliament on June 22, intended to test the government’s majority after a reshuffle last month, will be the next marker of whether Berlusconi has the support to see out his term until its scheduled end in 2013. “Berlusconi has to show he is brave and launch an ambitious program for the next two years. He should do it now, on June 22 in parliament,” said Interior Minister Maroni, whose party’s support is vital for the government’s majority.

With speculation growing that cabinet

Fire kills 12 at South African home for mentally disabled JOHANNESBURG: An overnight fire killed 12 residents of a home for the mentally disabled in a town east of Johannesburg, the emergency services department said yesterday. Another 27 were injured in the fire at the Struitsbuild Care Centre in the town of Springs, municipal emergency spokesman Rogers Mamaila said.

Three dozen firefighters rushed to the scene after midnight, Mamaila told Radio 702.

“We managed to take them out and now we are busy taking them to hospital but most of them for minor injuries, burn injuries and smoke inhalation,” Mamaila said. About 27 residents were taken to area hospitals, he said. The management of the pri-

vately-owned centre believe that the fire might have been caused by a cigarette.

All those who died were women aged between 30 and 45.

The wing which was gutted by the fire accommodated 59 people.

Family members of the dead have began arriving at the scene and are receiving counseling. “They are being told what has happened

Turkey’s Erdogan focuses on consensus after big win ANKARA: Turkey ’s Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan will start a third term of one-party rule strengthened by Sunday’s decisive election victory but also burdened by the need for consensus to push ahead with plans for a new constitution. Erdogan will have to focus first on a pressing foreign policy issue right on his borders: unrest in neighboring Syria has led to nearly 7,000 Syrian fleeing to Turkey to escape a brutal crackdown by forces loyal to President Bashar Al-Assad, with more coming every day.

But analysts said Erdogan also must find ways to revive a stalled bid for membership of the European Union and break down French and German reluctance to let Turkey in. Erdogan, whose AK Par ty has transformed Muslim Turkey into one of the world’s fastest-growing economies and ended a cycle of military coups, won 49.9 percent of the vote, or 326 seats, in Sunday’s parliamentary election.

The vote was AK’s biggest electoral tally since it first came to power in 2002 but the party failed to win the 330 seats it needed to call a referendum to recast the constitution, written almost 30 years ago during a period of military rule. Financial markets were cheered yesterday as investors saw the mixed result forcing the AK Party to

ANKARA: Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan addresses his supporters gathered in front of his Justice and Development Party headquarters in Ankara, Turkey, late Sunday. —AP compromise with others to make the constitutional change. The Turkish lira strengthened against the dollar and bonds also gained.

“The new constitution requires consensus and dialogue with other parties and the society at large,” Cengiz Aktar, a professor at Istanbul’s Bahcesehir University, told Reuters. “We will see if Erdogan is ready for these with his majority or will he go his own way and

divisions may bring down the government before 2013, yesterday’s referendum provides a snapshot of the electorate’s mood.

Berlusconi has been a major supporter of atomic power, which the centre right says is indispensable for the future of a country that imports nearly all its energy. However polls say most Italians oppose building nuclear power stations, which they consider unsafe in a country prone to earthquakes.

Aware of the likely backlash following the disaster at Japan’s Fukushima reactor in March, the government had suspended its nuclear plans but a referendum could block them for decades. Another referendum would repeal the so-called “legitimate impediment” that allows ministers to skip trial hearings against them if they are on government business, which Berlusconi’s critics say is for his personal benefit by possibly delaying his four concurrent trials. Two others concerned the privatization of water utilities. The government says privatization is essential to finance better services while opponents say it would lead to higher prices. — Reuters

impose his own views on Turkey- in which case we will have difficult times.”

Turkish newspapers lauded his success. “Turkey loves him”, “The master of the ballot box”, said front page headlines next to pictures of a smiling Erdogan waving to cheering supporters outside party headquarters.

Critics fear Erdogan, who has a reputation for being intolerant of criticism, might use the victory to cement

power, limit freedoms and persecute opponents. In a victory speech before thousands of flag-waving supporters in the capital Ankara on Sunday night, he pledged “humility ” and said he would work with rivals. “People gave us a message to build the new constitution through consensus and negotiation. We will discuss the new constitution with opposition parties. This new constitution will meet peace and justice demands.”

The new leader of the secularist opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP), which garnered its best result in more than 30 years with 25.9 percent of the vote, warned Erdogan that he would be watching his movements closely. “We wish all success to AKP, but they must remember there’s a stronger main opposition party now,” Kemal Kilicdaroglu said. Analysts saw scope for political turbulence in Turkey.

“The anticipated preparation of a new constitution has the potential to create significant political uncertainty, as it may well raise profound and controversial issues related to the division of power, secularism, religion, nationalism and ethnic minority rights,” Ed Parker, Fitch’s Head of EMEA Sovereign Ratings, said in a statement issued yesterday. — Reuters

and are being taken to identify their loved ones,” said Sello Mokoena, the Gauteng health department spokesman. Last August, 22 elderly people died at a retirement home in Nigel on the southeastern outskirts of Johannesburg. In February a deadly fire killed 13 children and two adults at an orphanage in KwaZulu Natal. — AFP

Clinton calls for peacekeepers; Sudan leaders meet ADDIS ABABA: US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said yesterday that the US wants a peacekeeping force to be deployed to a contested region between north and south Sudan that is threatening to spark new conflict.

Clinton said the US wants to see northern troops withdraw from the disputed central region of Abyei, and would welcome Ethiopian peacekeepers being sent in. Meanwhile, Sudan President Omar al-Bashir and Southern Sudan President Salva Kiir met in Ethiopia’s capital for a second day of talks over Abyei. Last month northern troops moved into the region, sending tens of thousands of residents fleeing. Abyei is fertile land near several oil fields.

Both the south and north claim it as their own.

Clinton began yesterday in Tanzania and later arrived in Ethiopia to address the African Union. “We would welcome both parties agreeing to ask Ethiopia, which has volunteered to send peacekeepers and to do so as part of a United Nations mission that will be strengthened,” Clinton told a news conference. “The United States has made our view very clearly known to both President Bashir and Vice President Kiir and I am looking forward to hearing positive news out of their ongoing discussions.” Southern Sudan secedes from the north July 9 but tensions have been rising over border issues.

Ethiopian Foreign Ministry spokesman Dina Mufti said yesterday that no agreement has yet been reached between Sudan’s north and south. A date for northern forces to pull out of Abyei and a new peacekeeping mission are still being debated, he said. No official request has been submitted from the north and south for Ethiopia to lead a peacekeeping mission, he said. — AP

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international

Deadly suicide attack hits Pakistani capital Bombingkills one, wounds four ISLAMABAD: A bomber blew himself up in an Islamabad bank yesterday, killing a security guard and wounding four other people in the first suicide attack in the Pakistani capital for nearly two years. The attack comes with Pakistan on edge weeks after US Navy SEALs found and killed Osama bin Laden in the garrison city of Abbottabad, two hours’ drive from Islamabad, in a case that humiliated the seemingly all-powerful military.

LOGAR: In this May 20, 2011 photo, US Army Lt Col William Chlebowski checks a construction project funded by the US-led coalition in Khoshi, district of Logar province south of Kabul, Afghanistan. —AP

Work to foil Kabul attacks starts far from capital KHOSHI: The hilly stretch of highway south of Kabul offers a picturesque view of Afghanistan’s jagged mountains topped with silvery traces of ice. But the road could also spell trouble for the Afghan capital. It’s a dangerous smuggling route for weapons and bombs flowing into Kabul from southern Afghanistan and neighboring Pakistan. Curbing that flow is part of stepped-up efforts to tighten security in areas that serve as gateways into Kabul, where insurgents like to stage high-profile attacks.

“This is kind of a choke point,” Lt Col William Chlebowski said, standing on the road in Logar province, which is next door to the capital. “The stuff comes from Pakistan through here.” There have been about six suicide attacks in the first half of this year inside Kabul’s city center, down from 13 recorded by the UN during the same period in 2010. The reduction has been attributed to increased security inside Kabul and on roads leading into the capital. By comparison, many parts of Afghanistan , especially in the south and east , are subject to near daily attacks.

Security, however, remains tentative, aid groups and other western workers are often under travel restrictions in the city and one large-scale attack can change feelings about how safe Kabul is today.

Chlebowski observed an Afghan security force checkpoint being built here, then scaled a steep hill nearby to inspect the construction of two observation posts. From the lookouts, Afghan forces will be able to monitor foot and vehicle traffic moving through the mountains and valleys below. “The key is establishing the presence here of the Afghan security forces,” said Chlebowski, commander of the 5th Battalion, 25th Field Artillery Regiment.

Attacks in Kabul won’t be stopped 100 percent, he said. More important is that the people think the capital is safe, he said.

Few would argue that Kabul is safe, though insurgent violence inside the city so far this year has been less deadly than last, when some Afghan parents refused to let their children go to school. “The biggest challenge here are suicide bombers,” said Noorullah, a police commander at a crowded, noisy checkpoint in central Kabul where military convoys shared the road with ice cream vendors, cars, trucks and donkey carts.

“Most of the time, the insurgents come in from the south or east,” said Noorullah, who uses only one name. “Sometimes they are

using cars that are not suspicious, like ambulances.” In the most recent attack, a suicide bomber wore an Afghan police uniform to gain access last month to the main Afghan military hospital in Kabul. He killed six medical students. A month before that, a suicide attacker in an army uniform sneaked past security at the Afghan Defense Ministry, killing three.

Earlier this year, suicide bombers attacked a Western-style shopping mall, killing two security guards, and a Western-style supermarket, killing eight Afghans. The first suicide attack in the city this year was carried out by a bomber on a motorbike. He targeted a minibus carrying Afghan intelligence employees, killing at least two and wounding more than 30. The work to foil attacks on Kabul starts far from the capital.

The checkpoint Chlebowski visited is in Khoshi district in the remote mountains of Logar, more than 37 miles (60 kilometers) away. It is about 15 miles (25 kilometers) east of Pul-e-Alam, the capital of Logar. Once in Pule-Alam, insurgents can turn onto Highway 7 and head straight north into Kabul. Another route to Kabul from the south is along Highway 1 in Wardak province next to Logar.

There’s also a highway that runs east out of Kabul into Nangarhar province and on to the Pakistan border. On his way to the checkpoint under construction, the colonel passed members of the Kuchi nomadic tribe. They are suspected of smuggling weapons and explosives for the Taleban.

“They are absolutely bringing stuff in , that’s common knowledge,” Chlebowski said.

“To be truthful, I thought that maybe we should have stopped and searched them.

There were a lot of them.” In March, an Afghan civilian told Afghan security forces that a tractor trailer filled with bomb-making materials would be passing through Sayd Abad district in Wardak. Afghan police stopped the vehicle and found 10 suicide vests, 17 spools of detonation cord, 30 cell phones and more than 600 pounds (272 kilograms) of explosive chemicals. The driver got away.

Haqnawaz Haqyar Wardak, provincial police chief of Wardak province, says insurgents continue to launch attacks in the province but are not a strong fighting force. “They are like a thief in the night , coming quickly, planting a mine or ambushing and then running away,” he said. — AP

KARACHI: Pakistani policemen escort arrested paramilitary soldiers - their faces covered -as they arrive for a court appearance in Karachi yesterday. —AFP

Pakistan remands six soldiers in park killing KARACHI: A Pakistani anti-terrorism court yesterday remanded six paramilitary soldiers into police custody over the videoed killing of an unarmed man in a public park that shocked the nation.

“Administrative judge Maqbool Baqar of the anti-terrorism court has remanded six Rangers personnel and a civilian Afsar Khan to police custody for two days until tomorrow,” provincial prosecutor general Shahadat Awan told reporters.

The Rangers staff were named as Shahid Zafar, Mohammad Afzal, Bahadur Rehman, Manthar Ali, Liaquat Ali and Mohammad Tariq. Two of them, Zafar and Afzal, had been remanded for a first time on Friday. Khan was seen dragging the victim over to the paramilitary personnel in television footage and accused him of robbery. Security forces shot dead Sarfaraz Shah, 22, in a Karachi park last Wednesday over the robbery accusations, but his family has demanded justice, insisting he was an innocent stu-

dent. The supreme cour t on Friday demanded that the government remove within three days Major General Aijaz Chaudhry, head of the paramilitary in Sindh province, and Sindh police chief Fayyaz Leghari, over the killing.

But neither the interior ministry nor Leghari could be reached for comment as the deadline expired yesterday, while a spokesman for the paramilitar y declined to comment. Widely aired footage of the killing showed a cleanshaven man wearing black trousers and a navy shirt pleading for his life as a soldier cocked his rifle at his neck, then shot him twice in the hand and thigh.

As his blood poured onto the ground, the man begged for help from soldiers who appeared to do nothing but watchuntil he fell unconscious. The incident mirrored the killings last month in the southwestern Baluchistan province of five unarmed Chechens, one of them a pregnant woman, that are also under investigation.—AFP

Although it was not immediately clear who carried out the bombing, Pak istan’s main Taleban faction has claimed a series of high-profile attacks since the May 2 American raid, ostensibly to revenge bin Laden’s death. Police said the bomber detonated his explosives when challenged by the guard at a branch of the Silk Bank in the middle-class I-8 sector of the capital.

“I t seems to be a suicide attack, we have found the head and the body par ts of the bomber,” city police chief Wajid Durrani told repor ters. “One security guard is confirmed dead while two others are injured,” he told AFP, estimating that the bomber was aged 24 to 25 years old. Hospital officials put the number of injured at four. “ We have received one dead in addition to some body parts of the bomber,” doctor Farrukh Kamal at the city’s main hospital told AFP. “There are four wounded but they are out of danger,” he added. The front of the bank was badly damaged and hoardings smashed. Pieces of human flesh were scattered on the floor and several cars parked outside were also damaged, said an AFP reporter. “I was returning from lunch when I heard a deafening noise,” said Chaudhr y Yassir, who works in another bank nearby, told AFP. “I saw the guard. It’s difficult to describe his condition. He was being rushed to the hospital but there was no hope. “ The same building has a wedding hall in the basement but there was no function at the time of the blast,” Yassir added.

Islamabad is the most heavily protected city in the country and yesterday’s suicide attack was the first in the capital since December 2009, when a bomber attacked Pakistan’s navy headquarters, killing one person.

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan security officials examine the site of a suicide bombing in Islamabad, Pakistan yesterday. A suicide bomber blew himself up at a busy market in the Pakistani capital, killing at least one person in the first bombing in Islamabad in over a year and a half, police said. —AP On Sunday, a roadside explosion wounded three men near M alpur village just outside Islamabad. Police said the device had long been buried.

Prime M inister Yousuf R aza Gilani ordered the interior ministry yesterday to take “preemptive effec tive measures” to check the “menace” of bomb attacks.

Although bombings have targeted embassies, hotels and restaurants, the capital has been shielded in recent years from much of the Taleban - and AlQaeda-linked violence that affects the country’s northwest.

Two political killings hit the capital earlier this year. Minorities minister Shahbaz Bhatti and liberal politician Salman Taseer were shot dead separately for calling for amendments to con-

troversial blasphemy laws.

“We received no threats and we can’t say why we were targeted,” I mran Sheik h, the regional head of Silk Bank, told AFP. The bank is run by a consortium headed by the family of former Pakistani finance minister Shauk at Tareen, he said, adding that the building previously housed a branch of the Saudi Commercial Bank.

An AFP repor ter said the bomb brought down part of the bank’s ceiling. The boots and belt of the dead security guard lay on the blood-spattered floor and the walls were marked with blood and pellet marks. Papers and files littered the main hall while dust, dirt and glass fragments covered the desks and broken computers.

Almost simultaneously a

bicycle bomb went off in a military area of the southwestern city of Quetta, wounding two people. “It was a timer device attached to a bic ycle,” local police officer Jaffar Hussain told AFP, adding that one of the wounded was in serious condition. Quetta is capital of Baluchistan province, which borders Iran and Afghanistan and is in the grip of a regional insurgency for greater political autonomy and a greater share of the profits of natural resources.

Nearly 4,500 people have been killed across Pakistan in attacks blamed on Taleban and other Islamist extremist networks based in the tribal belt since government troops stormed a radical mosque in Islamabad in 2007.—AFP

India business critical of govt NEW DELHI: Three quarters of major companies in India are unhappy with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s government, saying that a governance crisis ranging from corruption sc ams to polic y limbo w i l l hi t e conom i c growth and their investment plans.

The survey of 75 leading companies by the Economic Times newspaper and Federation of Indian Industry and Chambers of Commerce (FICCI) is the latest sign of corporate unease with the Congress party-led government in a country where grievances from companies are rarely aired in public. The survey, published yesterday, said 80 percent of companies believed that decision-making by the governmen t h ad slowed an d 72 p erce nt fe a re d investment plans would be hit.

“The prevailing negative sentiment among domestic investors will have a bearing on the perception of foreign investors,” the Economic Times quoted Harsh Mariwala, president of FICCI, as saying. A separate survey by the Economic Times and Synovate of 43 leading company executive, also published yesterday, showed 63 percent believed that the governance crisis would likely hit India’s growth.

A sense of paralysis in the government focused on a telecoms scandal that may have cost up to $39 billion in lost revenue - has led to growing unease amid companies. That scandal has seen the jailing of one minister and several other executives. It has shaken India’s business elite with billionaires Anil Ambani and Prashant Ruia both questioned by police, something unheard of in India in recent times. Parliament has been virtually shut down during the last three sessions, with the main opposition Bharatiya Janata Party paralysing government attempts at legislative business. Few reform bills have been passed, including one to make it easier for industry to acquire land.

In January, a group of 14 public figures from industrialists to former central bank governors warned in an open letter that corruption and bad governance threatened India’s growth story.— Reuters

MUMBAI: Indian journalists hold a photograph of Jay Dey, a well-known investigative journalist who was gunned down Saturday by assailants, as they protest his killing in Mumbai, India yesterday. —AFP

Indian journalists protest after crime reporter killed MUMBAI: Hundreds of journalists took to Mumbai’s streets yesterday to condemn the killing of a prominent newspaper crime reporter and demand that the case be investigated by Indian federal police. Reporters carried pictures of Mid-day investigations editor Jyotirmoy Dey as they marched to the state government buildings in the south of the city, calling for those responsible to be arrested.

Dey, who wrote extensively about gangland activities in the country’s financial and entertainment capital, was gunned down in broad daylight near his home in a northern suburb of the city on Saturday afternoon. Four gunmen on two motorbikes shot him four times at point-blank range before speeding off. The 56-year-old was taken to hospital but was declared dead on arrival.

No arrests have been made but police are now probing whether the socalled “oil mafia” was behind the killing.

Dey had written a number of articles on

criminal gangs who steal subsidized kerosene from tankers to dilute higherpriced petrol and undercut the market with the resulting blend. “We want the case to be investigated by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). We have no faith in the local police,” one journalist, Jatin Desai, told AFP. He said about 125 journalists across the state have been threatened or assaulted in recent years, without any action being taken against the culprits.

A sit-in protest has been organized for tomorrow and local media may consider approaching the Bombay High Court requesting the federal probe if the k illers are still at large, Desai explained. Mid-day said on Sunday that Dey had covered crime in Mumbai for the last 22 years and was the publication’s investigations editor. He had previously worked for titles including the Indian Express and the H industan Times-both English-language dailiesand was the author of two books on Mumbai’s underworld.— AFP

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Protesters burn police car in southern China BEIJING: Protesters in southern China’s manufacturing hub torched emergency vehicles in an outburst of anger against police abuse of migrant workers, eyewitnesses said yesterday. Sunday night’s rioting followed three days of steadily growing unrest in the town of Xintang in Guangdong province, the linchpin of China’s crucial export industry. Accounts of the violence in state-controlled media have been sparse, but the official Xinhua News Agency says a government team has been sent to the area to quell rumors surrounding the unrest.

While violent protests in China have become frequent over the past decade, recent weeks have seemed particularly tur-

bulent. The vast region of Inner Mongolia last month saw its biggest street demonstrations in two decades, while a man angry over land seizures set off three homemade bombs at government buildings in a southern city, killing three people and wounding at least nine others. Thousands of protesters attacked government offices in the central city of Lichuan last week following the alleged beating death of a local city council member while in police custody.

Though the triggers for the events are different, most are driven by common resentments over social inequality, abuse of power and suppression of legitimate grievances. The Chinese leadership has reacted nervously to the turmoil, especially after

popular uprisings began sweeping the Middle East and North Africa this year. In recent months, hundreds of government critics have been questioned, arrested or simply disappeared. The violence in Xintang broke out Friday evening after a pregnant woman was pushed to the ground in a sweep against street vendors, most of whom are migrants from the southwestern province of Sichuan. Such disputes are common and bystanders often side with the vendors and accuse police of heavy-handed tactics.

Crowds soon gathered, blocking traffic and attacking government offices with bottles and bricks, Xinhua said. Police arrested 25 people accused of inciting the unrest,

Xinhua said, adding that no deaths or injuries had been reported.

Violence continued to brew and tens of thousands of people gathered Sunday night at a major highway interchange, setting fire to more than two dozen emergency vehicles and fighting with police and paramilitary forces, said a salesman at the Xintang Ruilong clothing factory located close to the scene of the clash.

“It was such a horrifyingly spectacular scene,” said the salesman, who gave only his surname, Wang. “You can never imagine what it looked like if you were not there.”

Wang said the violence began after police adjuncts known as municipal management officers began beating migrants working as

sidewalk vendors, ostensibly on orders from local government officials. Vendors then contacted relatives and friends who arrived in groups and began smashing vehicles and fighting with security forces, he said.

A female worker from the nearby Fengcai clothing factory, also surnamed Wang, said managers barred the 400 migrant workers from leaving the plant Sunday night. “There were many people out on the streets late last night, shouting and trying to create chaos. Some of them even smashed police vehicles,” Wang said. Video of the protests posted online showed crowds blocking traffic, attacking cars and setting aflame buses, possibly dispatched to transport security forces. — AP

Strong quakes again rock shaken New Zealand city Over 40 people taken to hospitals

FUKUSHIMA: In this May 10, 2011 file photo released by Tokyo Electric Power Co., workers check the status of the water level indicator at the Unit 1 reactor building at the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear power plant in Okuma town, Fukushima Prefecture, northeastern Japan. —AP

Japan: 8 nuclear workers over-exposed to radiation TOKYO: At least eight workers trying to bring Japan’s crippled nuclear power plant under control have been exposed to more radiation than allowed under new safety standards, government officials said yesterday. Three of six reactors at northeastern Fukushima melted down after the March 11 quake and tsunami knocked out power to the plant. Tens of thousands of people have been evacuated from the area around the plant.

The operator of the Fukushima Daiichi plant, Tokyo Electric Power, also known as Tepco, had previously said two workers had been exposed to more radiation than allowed. The exposure of the additional six workers was discovered after almost 2,400 workers underwent testing, officials said. Workers have been battling to bring the leaking reactors to a stable shutdown after the giant March 11 quake and tsunami that triggered the world’s worst nuclear accident since Chernobyl in 1986.

Concerns about worker safety have been growing as the struggle to contain the crisis drags on and even Tepco

acknowledges that it will be tough to hit a target of stabilising the reactors by January. Many experts on radiation believe that the risk of cancer and other disease rises with the amount of exposure. “The development is extremely regrettable,” said Hide Nishiyama, a spokesman for Japan’s nuclear regulatory agency.

Nishiyama said the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency had told Tepco to investigate the cause of the exposure and to take steps to make sure that it was not repeated. Japanese officials from embattled Prime Minister Naoto Kan on down have been widely criticized for their handling of the nuclear disaster, which has prompted a complete rethink on the future of nuclear energy in the quake-prone country. The tsunami that crashed into the plant after the 9.0-magnitude earthquake has been estimated at around 14 metres (46 ft), nearly two-anda-half times the height of the protective wall at Fukushima. The quake and tsunami alone killed about 24,000 people.— Reuters

Vietnam holds live-fire drill amid China tensions HANOI: Vietnam put on a show of military strength in the tense South China Sea yesterday, risking the ire of Beijing in the face of a deepening maritime rift with its powerful neighbor. Relations between the communist nations have sunk to their lowest point in years following recent sea confrontations which reignited a long-standing dispute over sovereignty of two potentially oil-rich archipelagos.

A successful first barrage of naval artillery, lasting about four hours, took place about 40 kilometers (25 miles) off Quang Nam province in central Vietnam, said a naval officer in Danang city who asked not to be named. He declined to reveal how many ships had been mobilized but said no missiles were fired. A similar night drill would start at 7:00 pm and last about five hours, the officer added.

Although Vietnam’s foreign ministry described it as routine annual training, analysts say the drill has raised temperatures in the South China Sea, where Asian nations have conflicting claims over potentially energy-rich waters. The exercise “is designed to send China a message that Vietnam refuses to be pushed around”, said Ian Storey, a regional security analyst with the Institute of Southeast Asian Studies in Singapore.

“I think the Chinese will react very badly to this,” he added. The drills are inside the area Vietnam claims as its 200 nautical mile economic zone. Hanoi last month accused Chinese surveillance vessels of cutting the exploration cables of an oil survey ship inside the area. On Thursday Vietnam alleged a similar incident in the zone, saying a Chinese fishing boat rammed the cables of another oil survey ship in a “premeditated” attack.

Beijing countered by warning Vietnam to halt all activities that it says violate China’s sovereignty in the disputed area.

“No one wants a war but the possibility

of some shots being fired in anger or of some ships running into other ships has increased,” said Ralph Cossa, president of Hawaii-based Pacific Forum CSIS, a research institute. Despite that possibility, Cossa said all sides will ensure that any escalation will “not get out of control”.

The United States said it is “troubled” by tensions triggered by the maritime dispute. The naval drill is about 250 kilometres from the Paracel Islands and almost 1,000 kilometers from the Spratlys, the archipelagos which are claimed by both nations and which straddle strategic shipping lanes.

Vietnam has said it wants to see peaceful resolution and adherence to international laws. Beijing, too, says it is committed to peace in the South China Sea, but its more assertive maritime posture has caused concern among regional nations and beyond. Tensions have risen this year between China and Manila, another claimant to the Spratlys, which yesterday said it would from now on refer to the South China Sea as the “West Philippine Sea”. Taiwan on the weekend reiterated its claim to the Spratlys, and said missile boats and tanks could be deployed to disputed territory.

Brunei and Malaysia have also staked claims in the area. Vietnamese bitterly recall 1,000 years of Chinese occupation and, more recently, a 1979 border war.

More than 70 Vietnamese sailors were killed in 1988 when the two sides battled off the Spratlys. About 300 people in Ho Chi Minh City and in Hanoi held antiChina rallies on Sunday to proclaim Vietnam’s maritime sovereignty for the second weekend in a row.

Demonstrations are rarely allowed in Vietnam. In interviews, protesters voiced support for the naval drill. “It shows to China and to the world that we will do everything to protect our land and our sea,” said Tran Bao, 36. —AFP

WELLINGTON: Strong aftershocks rattled New Zealand’s quake-devastated city of Christchurch again yesterday, toppling one of the few buildings still standing downtown and sinking thousands of homes into darkness. Bricks crashed down in the cordonedoff city center, where only workers have tread since it was devastated in February’s major earthquake. About 200 people were there when the quakes struck yesterday, and two were briefly trapped in a church.

More than 40 people have been taken to hospitals with minor injuries from falling debris, the city council said. “ We are being enveloped with dust,” Christchurch Mayor Bob Parker told New Zealand’s National Radio. “It is very, very scary.”

All across the city, people fled buildings in panic when a 5.2-magnitude quake struck during lunchtime; just over an hour later, a 6.0 hit, according to the US Geological Survey.

Smaller quakes were also recorded. Several buildings were damaged in the central city and suburbs.

“All the shops have fallen down,” said Renee Murray, who works at a Domino’s Pizza in a suburb. “Half of the roof has fallen in (but) they have not fully collapsed.” Thousands of aftershocks have followed the 6.3-magnitude quake that killed 181 people on Feb. 22. That tremor and its aftershocks have been very shallow, which along with proximity to the city, have made them ver y destructive.

Yesterday’s temblors were six miles (10 kilometers) deep, according to the USGS. About 47,000 homes in the city’s eastern suburbs were without power yesterday night, when temperatures were expected to approach freezing. Rocks tumbled down hills in the area, which was among the hardest hit in February, and silt bubbled from the earth, a process known as liquefaction that sometimes happens during a quake. After the February quake, 300,000 tons of silt had to be scraped away, and the silt alone made thou-

SUMNER: A cliff-top house is seen after its portion fell over a ledge in Sumner, near Christchurch, New Zealand yesterday following an earthquake. —AP sands of homes uninhabitable.

On one road yesterday, an SUV tipped front-first into a sinkhole that opened in the asphalt. A police car sank into another. Roger Sutton, chief executive of the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority, said the extra damage to the city center means some buildings that had been salvageable “are now seriously damaged and will have to be brought down.” The group’s demolition manager “was driving (during the 6.0 quake), and there were buildings coming down in front of him, coming down behind him,” Sutton said. “He’s very lucky to be alive.”

Two people who were injured were salvaging windows from St. John’s Church when the facade, the last wall standing after

South Korea: North may have miniaturized nuke warhead SEOUL: North Korea may be able to load a nuclear warhead atop a missile, though South Korea has no substantive evidence the North has the technology to do it, Seoul’s defense chief said yesterday. North Korea conducted two nuclear tests in 2006 and 2009 and is thought to have enough plutonium for at least a half-dozen weapons. But experts doubt whether the North has mastered the miniaturization technology to mount a nuclear warhead on a missile.

Defense Minister Kim Kwan-jin told a parliamentary committee there is a “possibility ” the North may have developed such a miniaturized nuclear warhead. “I judge it’s time for it to have succeeded in miniaturization,” Kim said, according to a National Assembly-run webcast. “Considerable time has passed (since the two nuclear tests). Looking at other countries’ cases, there is a possibility the North may have succeeded.” Kim, who was answering a lawmaker’s question, said his belief is just an “assumption” and South Korea has not acquired any intelligence supporting it.

Kim also told lawmakers he

believes the North’s short-range missile launch two weeks ago was a test of a rocket with improved range and accuracy. “I think the North succeeded in that test,” he said. Earlier yesterday, Kim’s ministry submitted to the parliamentary committee a report saying North Korea has been conducting naval infiltration drills off its east and western coasts in recent days.

“Chances for surprise attacks ... are increasing,” Kim said, according to his office.

International talks on ending North Korea’s nuclear threat have been stalled for more then two years, and in November, North Korea revealed a uranium enrichment facility that could give it another way to make atomic bombs.

The Koreas are technically still at war after the 1950s Korean War ended in a truce, not a peace treaty. Seoul blames the North for two deadly attacks last year in which 50 South Koreans were killed. North Korea in recent weeks has threatened to attack South Korea to protest its troops’ use of photos of Pyongyang’s ruling family as targets during firing drills. — AP

SEOUL: South Korean Foreign Minister Kim Sung-hwan delivers a speech during ASAN Plenum forum in Seoul, South Korea yesterday. —AP

February’s quake, collapsed. Police said they were rescued and taken to a hospital with cuts and bruises. Another building nearby fell, according to police, and the dean of Christchurch Cathedral said the collapsed building suffered new damage.

“This has been a setback for Christchurch and its people, but it does not lessen our resolve to rebuild,” Prime Minister John Key told reporters. “The people of Christchurch should know all New Zealanders are thinking of them and will continue to support and stand by them in this very difficult time.” New Zealand’s earthquake monitoring service GNS Science said yesterday’s quakes were within a predicted range but are likely to trigger new aftershocks themselves. — AP

Australian prime minister refuses Dalai Lama talks CANBERRA: Prime Minister Julia Gillard has ruled out meeting the Dalai Lama this week in a move that will please China, Australia’s most important trading partner, and rile a crucial government supporter, the Greens party. Gillard ended speculation on whether she would meet the Tibetan spiritual leader when he visits Canberra, the national capital today.

“Australian prime ministers have not met the Dalai Lama on every occasion he has visited Australia,” her office said in a statement yesterday. Instead, a government lawmaker will meet privately with the 75year-old Buddhist monk, it said. It did not name the lawmaker. “Given the frequency of his travel to Australia, the government believes the current arrangements are appropriate,” the statement said.

Previous Australian prime ministers have held unofficial meetings with the spiritual leader, but even those low-key talks have irked China, which buys vast quantities of Australian raw materials including iron ore, coal and natural gas. Beijing reviles the Dalai Lama and frequently denounces him, alleging that he wants independence for Tibet. Gillard was Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s deputy when the Dalai Lama last came to Australia in 2008. Both Rudd and Gillard were then overseas, so the exiled Nobel Peace Prize winner met Sen. Chris Evans, who was the center-left government’s third highest ranking lawmaker and acting prime minister.

Gillard’s snub surprised some obser vers.

Opposition leader Tony Abbott, whose conservative coalition appears more popular than her government in recent opinion polls, plans to meet the Dalai Lama during his 11-day Australian visit which began last Thursday. Australian National University political scientist Brett Bowden suspects Gillard is attempting to demonstrate her independence from the Greens party, whose support her Labor Party relies on to govern.

The opposition accuses Gillard of being a puppet of Greens leader Sen. Bob Brown. “She’s been trying get arms lengths from the Greens, but plenty of people are meeting the Dalai Lama against China’s objections including (President Barack) Obama,” Bowden said.

Brown issued a statement earlier saying he was “working hard to urge Prime Minister Gillard to meet his holiness.” “There will be a great feeling of pleasure around Australia if she takes 10 minutes off to do just that,” Brown said. Conservative Prime Minister John Howard was the last Australian leader to meet Tibetan Buddhism’s highest spiritual authority in 2007. The Dalai Lama recently relinquished his political authority over Tibetans, but remains their spiritual leader. — AP

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LONDON: Former England wicket keeper turned professional artist Jack Russell unveils his piece of ‘cric-art’, a painting on a canvas of 36 full size Slazenger bats, at Lord’s Cricket Ground yesterday. — AP

40 years after leak, Pentagon Papers are out Hezb dominates new Lebanon government Continued from Page 1 was leaked primarily by one of them, Daniel Ellsberg, in a brash act of defiance that stands as one of the most dramatic episodes of whistleblowing in US history.

As scholars pore over the 47-volume report, Ellsberg said the chance of them finding great new revelations is dim. Most of it has come out in congressional forums and by other means, and Ellsberg plucked out the best when he painstakingly photocopied pages that he spirited from a safe night after night, and returned in the mornings. He told AP the value in yesterday’s release was in having the entire study finally brought together and put online, giving today’s generations ready access to it.

At the time, Nixon was delighted that people were reading about bumbling and lies by his predecessor, which he thought would take some anti-war heat off him. But if he loved the substance of the leak, he hated the leaker. He called the leak an act of treachery and vowed that the people behind it “have to be put to the torch.” He feared that Ellsberg represented a left-wing cabal that would undermine his own administration with damaging disclosures if the government did not make him an example for all others with loose lips.

It was his belief in such a conspiracy, and his willingness to combat it by illegal means, that put him on the path to the Watergate scandal that destroyed his presidency. Five burglars broke into the Washington headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate building on June 17, 1972, apparently to install clandestine electronic monitoring devices. The burglary led to evidence of widespread wrongdoing within the Nixon White House and the eventual demise of the administration with Nixon’s resignation on Aug 8, 1974.

Nixon’s attempt to avenge the Pentagon Papers leak failed. First the Supreme Court backed the Times, The Washington Post and others in the press and allowed them to continue publishing stories on the study in a landmark case for the First Amendment of the US Constitution that, among other things, guarantees freedom of the press. Then the government’s espionage and conspiracy prosecution of Ellsberg and his colleague Anthony J Russo Jr fell apart, a mistrial declared because of government misconduct.

The judge threw out the case after agents of the White House broke into the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist to steal records in hopes of discrediting him, and

after it surfaced that Ellsberg’s phone had been tapped illegally. That Sept 1971 break-in was tied to the Plumbers, a shady White House operation formed after the Pentagon Papers disclosures to stop leaks, smear Nixon’s opponents and serve his political ends. The next year, the Plumbers were implicated in the Watergate break-in.

Ellsberg remains convinced the report - a thick, often tough read - would have had much less impact if Nixon had not temporarily suppressed publication with a lower court order and had not prolonged the headlines even more by going after him so hard. “Very few are going to read the whole thing,” he said in an interview, meaning both then and now. “That’s why it was good to have the great drama of the injunction.”

The declassified report includes 2,384 pages missing from what was regarded as the most complete version of the Pentagon Papers, published in 1971 by Democratic Sen Mike Gravel of Alaska. But some of the material absent from that version appeared - with redactions - in a report of the House Armed Services Committee, also in 1971. In addition, at the time, Ellsberg did not disclose a section on peace negotiations with Hanoi, in fear of complicating the talks, but that part was declassified separately years later.

The 40th anniversary provided a motivation for government archivists to declassify the records. “If you read anything on the Pentagon Papers, the last line is always, ‘To date, the papers have yet to be declassified by the Department of Defense,”‘ said A J Daverede, director of the production division at the National Declassification Center. “It’s about time that we put that to rest.” The center, part of the National Archives, was established by a 2009 executive order from President Barack Obama, with a mission to speed the declassification of government records.

If not with the same personal vendetta, presidents since Nixon have acted aggressively to tamp down leaks. Obama’s administration has pursued cases against five government leakers under espionage statutes, more than any of his recent predecessors. Most prominent among the cases is that of Pfc Bradley E Manning, an intelligence analyst accused of passing hundreds of thousands of militar y and State Department documents to WikiLeaks. The administration says it provides avenues for whistleblowers to report wrongdoing, even in classified matters, but it cannot tolerate unilateral decisions to release information that jeopardizes national security. — AP

Bottles, stones hurled at Jordan king’s...

Continued from Page 1 Another suggested Tafileh’s youth were upset that Mayor Salim Rawahneh didn’t allow them to attend the meeting with the king. “The mayor invited people he favors and who live far away in Amman, but not us,” said the young unemployed man, who declined to be identified. “We wanted to give petitions to the king, we wanted to tell him about our difficulties in not finding jobs, but we were beaten and humiliated.”

Just like other Jordanians, people in Tafileh, 179 km south of Amman, have been protesting for several weeks to demand reforms, effective measures to fight corruption and the ouster of the government. The desert town, which has received little government support in the past, has high unemployment and lacks the shopping malls, movie theaters and modern services found in the capital.

Residents here intercepted the motorcade of Prime Minister Maaruf Bakhit in May and tried to prevent him from visiting the city. Yesterday’s developments came a day after the king vowed to enhance political and socioeconomic reform and promised a new electoral law leading to a parliamentary government, in a bid to face popular discontent and pressing demands for change.

In his first televised address since pro-reform protests started in January, the king pledged a new electoral law he said would result in “a parliament with active politicalparty representation... that allows the formation of governments based on parliamentary majority... in the future.” But the powerful Islamic Action Front (IAF), which wants an elected premier rather than one named by the king, was sceptical about the monarch’s pledges. “The king has expressed hopes, as we have heard several times in the past, but he did not give specifics and there were no guarantees,” Zaki Bani Rsheid, head of the IAF’s political office, told AFP. “The king has repeatedly complained that successive governments did not implement his reform vision. Why would we be confident that things would be different this time?”

A national dialogue committee has proposed new legislation on elections and parties, but its proposals have been criticised by the Islamists and conservatives as not ensuring a fair representation. “We seek a state of democracy, pluralism and participation through political

reforms... away from the dictates of the street and the absence of the voice of reason,” the king said in his speech.

Also, the security apparatus that many say has turned Jordan into a police state generates as much anti-government resentment as the poverty afflicting much of the kingdom’s population of 6 million. Jordan’s intelligence, police and other security bodies assist their US ally in such troubled areas as Iraq and Afghanistan, and share information with Israel in its struggle against Palestinian and other Arab militants. Jordanians themselves appreciate the agencies’ foiling of Al-Qaeda and other terror plots.

But domestically the security structure intrudes into ordinary Jordanians’ lives by controlling permissions for jobs, for acquiring immigration visas and other privileges, and sometimes clamp down on regime critics. “Literally, one can’t do anything in Jordan without security’s approval,” noted Omar Abu Seif, 27, an unemployed man.

Abdullah must tread a delicate line in reforming Jordan’s electoral system, which dissidents complain is skewed to support for political control by the monarchy.

He has to strike a balance between his traditional bedouin allies and Palestinian refugees and their descendants, who fled successive wars with Israel and have long demanded a greater political role. “Jordanian bedouins want to cling to the power they have, while Palestinians want more rights,” said Hani Horani, head of the Jordan Research and Study Center. At the same time, he said, “both don’t want the boat rocked.” Abdullah is also faced with powerful conservatives within his own ranks, wary of reforms.

“People tell us that the king is talking to locals and foreigners about his willingness to move forward,” said political analyst Mustafa Hamarneh. “But conservative elements in the upper levels of power are mobilizing against this very process of openness, and the forces of democracy are not very strongly rooted yet.” He said the outcome of pro-democracy revolutions in Egypt and Tunisia will likely affect the course of events here. Abdullah is hedging his bets on additional US aid and a new agreement with oil-producing Gulf Arab states to ease economic woes in a country barren of natural resources and saddled by a multibillion-dollar foreign debt. — Agencies

Continued from Page 1 In a sign of simmering discord between Mikati and the Hezbollah alliance, Druze MP Talal Arslan immediately resigned from his post as state minister in the new cabinet, accusing the premier of being a “liar” and of seeking to deprive the minority Druze of key cabinet posts. One of the main challenges facing the new cabinet will be how to deal with a UN-backed investigation into the 2005 assassination of ex-premier Rafiq Hariri.

Hezbollah forced the collapse of the previous government headed by Hariri’s son after he refused to disavow the Special Tribunal for Lebanon. The Netherlands-based court is widely expected to indict Hezbollah operatives in the killing, a move the militant group has repeatedly warned against.

Since his appointment in January with Hezbollah’s blessing, Mikati has declined to spell out whether his government will cease all cooperation with

the court. In a clear sign that he does not expect a smooth road ahead, Mikati yesterday urged the Lebanese people to judge his government by its actions and not its individual members or the parties they represent. “This government is fully aware that the future is not all rosy and that it will face obstacles, challenges and traps,” he said.

A major point of contention in the negotiations over the new line-up was the interior ministry, which will now be headed by retired army general Marwan Charbel, considered close to the president. The new foreign minister, Adnan Mansour, is a former ambassador to Iran which along with Syria is a major backer of Hezbollah. The defence ministry is now in the hands of Hezbollah’s Christian allies. Mikati’s appointment in January sparked the ire of Lebanon’s Sunnis, who are largely loyal to Hariri and saw the move as a bid by Hezbollah to sideline their community.

But Mikati has endeavoured to por-

tray himself as an independent politician and not a Hezbollah puppet.

Under Lebanon’s complex power-sharing system, the prime minister must be a Sunni Muslim, the president a Maronite Christian and the speaker of parliament a Shiite Muslim. The first head of state to congratulate Lebanon on the new government’s formation was Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad.

Damascus was forced to pull its troops out of its smaller neighbour after Hariri’s assassination, ending 29 years of military and political domination.

The UN special coordinator for Lebanon, Michael Williams, congratulated Mikati on the new government and said he hoped it uphold “its... commitment to Lebanon’s international obligations” in a statement released by Williams’ office. The United States, a major donor to the Lebanese army which blacklists Hezbollah as a terrorist organisation, has warned that the formation of a government led by the militant group is likely to affect ties. — AFP

Amir accepts Sheikh Ahmad’s resignation Continued from Page 1 grilling or he will seek referring it to the constitutional court like what he did with a previous grilling last month. But it is certain that if the debate of the grilling goes ahead, it will be held in a secret session like the previous two grillings the prime minister faced.

This grilling was filed by opposition MPs Mohammad Hayef, Mubarak Al-Waalan and Waleed Al-Tabtabaei. It alleges that the prime minister has pursued a foreign policy that is biased towards Iran at the expense of the Arab states in the Gulf. The three MPs also accused the

prime minister of failing to react promptly to requests to send ground troops to Bahrain to help crush Shiiteled protests there that turned violent. The lawmakers however have withdrawn one issue from the grilling regarding the Kuwaiti medical team that went to Bahrain but was sent back by Manama. The three MPs said they removed this issue because it may raise sectarian tensions. The grilling also questions the prime minister for inviting Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Akbar Salehi to visit Kuwait in May after a Kuwaiti court sentenced three men to death for allegedly being members of an Iranian spy ring.

Gaddafi plays chess as fighting rages in Libya Continued from Page 1 knows where to put the pieces and play a Scholar’s Mate (a rudimentary checkmate)”.

Gaddafi’s eldest son Muhammad, with whom he also played, is however a “serious player, who knows the theory of chess”. But despite his superiority over the Libyan leader, Ilyumzhinov “diplomatically” decided not to press ahead for a victory and instead offered a draw, which Gaddafi accepted.

Ilyumzhinov described his trip as a “working visit” and noted that he had recently been in Afghanistan and would soon visit Iraq. He said no one tried to stop him visiting Libya, although one FIDE vice president,

whom he did not name, pulled out of the trip “because his wife did not let him go”.

Russian television showed Ilyumzhinov meeting Gaddafi, who was wearing dark glasses, and later presenting him with a chess set made in Kalmykia, the Buddhist region he headed from 1993 to 2010. Ilyumzhinov had told the Interfax news agency late Sunday that Gaddafi had made clear he was not going to leave Libya despite the international pressure to quit. The two men have known each other since at least 2004, when FIDE held its world championship in Tripoli.

Mikhail Margelov, of President Dmitry Medvedev’s special envoy for Libya who held talks with the opposi-

tion last week, told the RIA Novosti news agency that Ilyumzhinov had told him about the trip and the game in advance. Margelov, who like Medvedev has said that Gaddafi should quit, appeared to suggest that Ilyumzhinov should have used the game to send a message to a Libyan leader. “I advised him to play white, go E-2 to E-4 (a classic offensive opening move) and make Gaddafi understand that his game is coming to an end,” he said. Russia is positioning itself as a possible mediator in the Libya conflict and Margelov said he is planning to travel to Tripoli next week once security arrangements have been made. He is, however, not expected to meet with Gaddafi. — Agencies

Egypt grills Israeli ‘spy’ Continued from Page 1 in Hebrew from his home in New York. Ilan Grapel once wrote that he hoped to promote Israeli policies in the Arab world, according to information he and others posted on websites. Daniel Grapel said his son was working in Egypt as part of his university studies. “He is volunteering as part of his studies and he gets (academic) credits for summer work ... He had to stay in Egypt for three months as part of the American agency that is connected with transferring refugees from Egypt,” he said.

Grapel’s mother, Irene, said her son had worked for Saint Andrew’s Refugee Services, a non-governmental organisation, in Cairo, adding that he holds US and Israeli citizenship.

On his Facebook page, Grapel made no secret of his presence in Egypt, writing that he was “preaching at AlAzhar”, an Islamic university in Cairo, and that he had studied at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore,

Maryland. The reference to al-Azhar later disappeared from the page.

Photographs of Grapel on the Facebook page, on the website of the Israel Project - a pro-Israel group where he trained in media relations in 2008 - and in the online newsletter of an organisation that raises funds for Israeli soldiers, matched those in a video clip of the suspect released by Egypt. Articles about Grapel’s military service in Israel appeared in the New York Daily News and Israel’s Haaretz newspaper in 2006. They said he had been wounded in the Lebanon war that year while serving as an Israeli paratrooper and had immigrated to Israel in 2005 from Queens, New York, at the age of 22.

“He is a very special guy. He’s an Arabist,” Tsiki Ood, who said he was a friend of Grapel’s, told Israel Radio, describing him as an American immigrant. “He’s very intelligent ...

He spoke Arabic. I hope he gets out of this trouble.” After the war, Grapel

spoke in the United States at fundraisers for wounded Israeli soldiers, according to the Internet newsletter of the Friends of the Israel Defense Forces organisation, which also cited his injury in Lebanon.

It showed him in his paratroop uniform standing next to US fundraisers and Israeli diplomats at functions in Chicago and Houston in 2006. Two years later, Grapel took part in the Israel Project’s media fellows program in Jerusalem on “educating top young leaders in how to educate the press on Israel and Iran”.

In a comment that appears on the Israel Project’s web page about the program, Grapel said he had been impressed by an Israeli Foreign Ministry official’s briefing on conveying Israel’s positions to the Arab world. “It would be very rewarding for me if I were to be able to communicate as effectively (as the official) in such anti-Israel environments,” Grapel wrote. — Agencies

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OPINION

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The right of others to disagree

By Sheikh Ibrahim Ramadan

A

mong the things I remember from my mother, may she rest in peace, is a meaningful story attributed to the Prophet Abraham (PBUH). The story goes as follows: Abraham never liked to eat except with guests, to the extent that he would frequent popular places with the hopes of finding a fellow patron with whom he could share his meal. One day, on his quest to find someone with whom to share his food, he met an old man in his 80s. After the usual ritual of invitation and greeting, they sat at the table and Abraham said: “Brother, say grace to God and help yourself to the food.”

The guest looked at him and replied: “I do not recognise the presence of a God, so I cannot say grace to him.” Abraham was irked and tried in vain to convince the old man of his erroneous statement.

Feeling desperate, he took the food away and pushed the man out of his tent. When Abraham was alone, God reproached him for what he did to the old man.

But Abraham tried to justify that the man was an atheist and a non-believer. God said to him: “I have known about him for the past 80 years, yet I continue to provide for him. You, however, could not tolerate to feed him one meal.”

Abraham rushed out after the old man to apologise. Surprised, the old man listened to Abraham explain what had happened, and said: “A God who reproaches a man who worships Him, in favour of someone who denies Him, is a generous God.” I relate this story not to debate whether it happened, but to benefit from the lesson it lends itself to so convincingly. There are many religious texts that advocate honouring human beings regardless of their religion and speaking in defence of the right to choose one’s faith without compulsion. These texts direct us to respect the right of the other to be different, in both belief and behaviour. After all, God has said: “Verily we have honoured the Children of Adam” (Holy Quran 17:70).

Those who reject the right of the other to disagree are misinterpreting the texts and are making their understandings a basis for their own faith, limiting the vast scope of religion and distorting its compassion. In this way they tend to narrow respect for their religion - or at least for some part of it.

As a result, the responsibility borne by community leaders becomes greater and more important, and they have to exert more effort to prove to the multitudes that the right of the “other” to exist and to disagree is equal to the right of the “self ”, and the defence of the rights of the “other” mirror one’s defence of the rights of the “self”. In complementing each other, people gain strength and are enriched.

Their conflict and disagreement is weakness and loss.

To prove this, it is not sufficient to cite religious and non-religious cultural texts, but rather to abide by these guidelines in everyday life so that man can realise that his fate is connected to that of the “other”, in good times and in bad. It is a matter of education and guidance, as well as a matter of doctrine and philosophy. Joint efforts among religious guides, educators, parents and teachers to emphasise joint spaces are examples of this type of behaviour. Their joint efforts are significantly larger than mere disagreements, and represent important factors in winning this round.

One must also admit that the violent struggle and conflict in which societies live do not serve the concept of accepting the other. Human beings cannot interact rationally and reasonably when they feel that their very existence and identity are threatened. Such feelings result in reactions that have dire effects of enlarging the gap and deepening the rift. Knowing the other closely will reveal his similarity to the “self”.

This will contribute to emancipating the individual and making him or her more capable of communicating and cooperating. The earlier this happens, the larger the dividends.

NOTE: Sheikh Ibrahim Ramadan studied at the Lebanon Azhar Institute in Beirut, and received a Higher Certificate in Islamic Sharia and a diploma in Comparative Jurisprudence (fiqh) from Beirut Islamic University —CGNews

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

The editor reserves the right to edit any submission as necessary.

Double whammy for Bahraini peace drive

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ahrain’s efforts to restore peace and prosperity received twin blows over the weekend as opposition forces staged their first rally since martial law was lifted and the governing body of world Formula One racing rescinded a decision to hold the Bahrain Grand Prix in October.

A mass demonstration by the country’s majority Shiites on Saturday was peaceful.

Under the slogan “Bahrain, a homeland for all,” thousands of protesters gathered in the Shiite city of Sar to demand political reforms and a more democratic legislature. But human rights activists warned that the rally was organized by moderates and that demands for more far-reaching reforms would be testing the government’s tolerance. “ There are opposition groups that demand to topple the regime and others that demand reform. Al-Wefaq demands reform,” Nabeel Rajab, president of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights told The Media Line, adding that more radical oppositionists were still held in prison.

A day before the rally, Bahrain’s most senior Shiite cleric, Sheik Isa Qassim said Friday is no chance for talks with the nation’s Sunni rulers so long as security forces maintain their clampdown on protests. “We cannot negotiate in such conditions,” Sheik Qassim told worshippers in a mostly Shiite area outside the capital of Manama, according to AP. King Hamad Al-Khalifa is in a delicate posi-

tion. While many in his government feel threatened by what they say is Iranian interference aimed at toppling his Sunni regime, Bahrain is under pressure from the U.S. and from human rights groups to end the wave of arrests and summary justice. Those concerns could jeopardize Bahrain’s role as a regional financial center.

Speakers at Saturday’s rally made a special effort to emphasize national unity and disregard sectarian divisions, and Bahraini police responded in kind by not intervening to quell the protest. In an effort to assuage government concerns about covert Iranian involvement with the opposition and charges of dual loyalty, a banner posted Sunday on the Facebook page of Al-Wefaq, the country’s main Shiite opposition group, declared, “Sunni and Shiite Brothers, we will not sell our nation.” and “Come, my dear Sunnis, let us join hands and develop our political structure and safeguard the future of our children.” “Today, everyone is talking about reform,” Jasim Hussain, a former parliament member for AlWefaq, which organized Saturday’s rally, told The Media Line. “There are serious efforts to bring things back to normal.”

King Hamad imposed martial law on March 15, one day after he called in a Saudiled Gulf force to crush weeks of protests. At least 30 Bahrainis were killed and thousands injured in clashes with the army. The Saudi troops remain and many opposition leaders

remain jailed, but martial law was formally lifted June 1. And, in an effort to show he is talking with the opposition rather than just suppressing it, a day before he lifted martial law, the king announced the formation of a national dialogue committee.

While protestors were calling for democratic reforms during the weeks of protests, the opposition was mostly Shiites, who constitute about 70 percent of the island kingdom’s population but face discrimination in jobs, housing and political power. Shiite leaders vehemently deny the charges that they are allied with Shiite Iran. “The opposition isn’t calling for the establishment of a state similar to Iran, but for the participation of everyone in reform for the sake of Bahrain,” Sheikh Ali Salman, leader of Al-Wefaq, announced during Saturday’s rally. Rajab said the opposition still demands from the government to refurbish Shiite mosques damaged during the riots and release political prisoners, incorporating them in the process of national dialogue.

King Hamed on Saturday appointed parliament chief Khalifa Dhahrani to head the national dialogue with the opposition, set to begin on July 1. But Al-Wefaq said it opposed the nomination. “The real dialogue to take place with the opposition should be conducted by the king or the crown prince,” Al-Wefaq parliament member Khalil Al-Marzouq told Reuters. “The dialogue in question is a central

point of contention between the royal family and the people.”

Rajab, the human rights activist, agreed that nominating Al-Dhahrani bode ill for the government’s seriousness. “The parliament doesn’t represent the people,” Rajab said. “The nomination of the head of such a controversial institution sends a negative message about the legitimacy of this dialogue.”

Meanwhile, Bahrain Grand Prix - an annual event that the government uses to showcase the kingdom - has stalled. The race, traditionally held in March, was cancelled in the face of the mass protests that paralyzed the kingdom. But soon after martial law was imposed, officials began lobbying to reschedule the event. Formula One czar Bernie Ecclestone supported a proposal for a rescheduled October race, but the organization representing 11 of the 12 racing teams said they opposed the reinstatement. In a statement, they said their opposition was based on logistical and insurance grounds rather than human rights concerns.

Nevertheless, the reversal strikes a blow to the economy both in terms of lost revenue from spectators and other tourists and to the country’s image. Unnamed Bahraini businessmen expressed their disappointment at the decision. They told the Bahraini daily AlWatan on Sunday that the country stood to lose between $300 million 500 million as a result of the cancellation. —Media Line

Men out of Saudi women’s clothing shops

By David E Miller

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or Fatma Qaroub, a 28-yearold personal trainer from the Saudi commercial capital of Jedda, buying lingerie has been an embarrassing affair. Every time she went shopping, she would encounter male vendors who would ask her about her measurements, her preferred style and whether she was married or single. Qaroub was fed-up. So she started a Facebook page titled “Enough embarrassment,” which quickly garnered 11,000 supporters. Other women initiated campaigns to boycott Saudi women’s clothing shops that employed men only.

It seems that the pressure has finally borne fruit. King Abdullah issued a list of decrees pertaining to employment in the kingdom a week ago. Among them, an order to “feminize” women’s clothing shops in Saudi Arabia within the month. Males employees are out and, because the sexes are forbidden to mix at the workplace, they will be replaced by women. “This is a very important decision for women,” Qaroub told The Media Line. “Female unemployment was the main reason for my campaign, but also the unnecessary shame women face.”

An-ultra conservative kingdom governed by the orthodox Wahhabi stream of Sunni Islam, Saudi Arabia imposes strict gender segregation in the public sphere. But the kingdom is also under pressure to create jobs for Saudis, especially for women who are increasingly educated and demanding opportunities outside their traditional place in the home.

Even as rising oil prices and

production are fueling strong economic growth, unemployment is over 10 percent. Last month, Labor Minister Adel said companies would be able to keep an expatriate employee on their payrolls for no more than six years and that some businesses might lose the right to hire foreigners altogether. In 2005, when the pressure to “Saudize” the labor

cult to segregate male and female shoppers. The Saudi-owned daily Al-Hayat reported that 15 female cashiers were re-hired this month in the Carrefour shopping center in eastern city of Al-Khabar, nine months after the Labor Ministry forced them to quit. The solution was to create a sex-segregated checkout line. “We won’t allow [gender] mixing,” a Carrefour

portive of “feminization” than women because they now realize the humiliation their wives suffered. Women’s organizations in Saudi Arabia estimated that as the decision is implemented, as many as 5,000 jobs will immediately become available. But Saudi businessman Fawwaz Al-Hakir was much more optimistic, telling Al-Arabiya that as many as

Women shop at a mall in the Saudi capital Riyadh on Sunday. —AFP market was less intense, the Labor Ministry gently requested lingerie shops to replace male salesmen with women. But the decision was never implemented.

While women work as doctors and journalists and in business, retailing is considered to be especially sensitive because it is diffi-

employee assured viewer on the Arab satellite channel Al-Arabiya.

“Families will be serviced by female cashiers whereas single men will work with male cashiers.”

Qaroub said that due to the wide media coverage her campaign received, she has found that men have become more sup-

500,000 jobs for women would materialize within three years. He said more positions would be needed as women begin frequenting clothing shops without embarrassment.

But Eman Al-Nafjan, a Riyadhbased blogger and feminist activist, questioned the new deci-

sion, saying the devil was in the details. “It’s not very clear how they will implement the decision in one month’s time,” Al-Nafjan told The Media Line. “Even people who are supportive of the decisions have many questions.” AlNafjan said women are only employed in “women only” malls, which exist throughout the kingdom, but are of lesser quality than regular malls. She said the short time slot for implementation outlined in the decree was unrealistic. “Today, women mostly work in the education, health and banking sectors. Saudi women don’t know how to work in shops,” she said. “Will all the current salesmen be fired?”

The decision was framed by the government as an employment issue, not a women’s rights one. Al-Nafjan admitted that the decision contributed in bettering the skewed Saudi labor market.

She said that during a recent visit to a mall, she was pained to encounter a female college graduate working as a security guard at the entrance to a fitting room in a clothing shop, while expatriate male vendors manned the cashiers.

“I have nothing against foreign workers, but why are we importing expats when we have all these women who are desperate for a job?” Al-Nafjan said she believed between 85-90 percent of sales clerks in Saudi shops were foreign. Following the royal decision, Qaroub said she would abandon her “Enough Embarrassment” Facebook campaign, substituting it with a new campaign titled “The Embarrassment is Over.” The new campaign will focus on the need for training women to work as shop vendors. —Media Line

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ANALYSIS

Syria challenges Turkey’s policies

By Ibon Villelabeitia and Tulay Karadeniz

T

urkey has put huge effort into improving ties with its neighbours in the Middle East but the unrest in Syria may force a rethinking of its foreign policy now that Sunday’s election is out of the way. Turkey’s “zero problems with neighbours” policy has made Ankara into a regional power and Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan a hero in the Arab street. But with more than 5,000 Syrian refugees fleeing across the border to escape a crackdown by President Bashar al-Assad, the long-time NATO member and European Union-candidate is reminded of the awkward position it has put itself in trying to champion democracy while befriending the region’s autocratic leaders.

Erdogan, who won a third consecutive term in Sunday’s election, has stepped up his criticism of Assad after having embraced him in recent years.

“The whole policy of warming up to Syria has collapsed,” said Semih Idiz, a foreign policy expert for Milliyet daily. “After the elections I expect Turkey to reevaluate its Middle East policy. It has not brought the results expected.” Other “Arab Spring” uprisings have tested Turkey’s ability to look after its new interests, but Syria - an Iranian ally with a volatile ethnic and religious mix lying in a web of regional conflicts - poses particular challenges.

While Turkey has urged Assad to implement reforms and has added its voice to growing international condemnation by calling the crackdown “inhu-

mane, savage repression”, Iran has supported the Syrian regime. Ankara and Tehran, which have also forged closer ties in recent years, compete for influence in Damascus. “ The Syrian crisis has the potential to make ties between Ankara and Tehran frostier. If Iran or (Lebanon’s Shiite group) Hezbollah get involved in Syrian affairs Turkey will have to tell

hearing of his election win on Sunday.

Some analysts say Turkey has been turning away from the West under Erdogan over the past decade. Last year, 22 percent of Turkey’s exports went to the Middle East and Nor th Africa, double the share in 2004.

While Turkey’s bid for membership of the European Union has dragged on since formal nego-

forced to leave projects unfinished.

Turkey has held joint military exercises and joint cabinet meetings with Syria and has abolished visa requirements, but those agreements might now be scaled down. Erdogan, whose country quietly hosted a conference of Syrian opposition figures last week, has said that after Sunday ’s vote Ankara

A Syrian refugee walks in the tent compound in Boynuyogun, Turkey, near the Syrian border yesterday. —AP foreign powers to stay out,” Idiz said. Meanwhile the Syrians seeking refuge in Turkey are delighted by the decision to keep the country’s doors open to them - around 300 Syrians in the border area cheered and shouted “Long live Erdogan” on

tiations began in 2005, Ankara has pursued free-trade accords with Jordan, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq. In Libya, where Turkey had ventures worth $15.3 billion before an uprising against Muammar Gaddafi began in February, Turkish firms were

would talk to Assad in a “very different manner”. Hugh Pope, an analyst at International Crisis Group, said events in Syria have shown the limits of Turkey’s policy and exposed the reality that Ankara has little leverage convincing Assad to change.

“Turkey is terribly frustrated at Assad, but I don’t think any country has any leverage in Syria at this point. The regime is in a survival mode,” Pope said.

However, he said Turkey’s close business and people’s ties might give it some leverage in the future. The wars in neighbouring Iraq brought refugees and severely disrupted trade with Turkey, but now Turkish firms are busy doing brisk businesses in Iraq. “Whatever happens in Syria Turkey will adapt.”

Turkey was caught off guard at the time of the 1991 Gulf War, when 500,000 people flooded across the border from northern Iraq, but this time has started early preparing for a possible mass influx of Syrian refugees.

When the 2003 invasion of Iraq was being planned, Turks made arrangements to set up a buffer zone inside Iraq to look after any refugees on Iraqi soil. In the event, only around 10,000 came.

Some media have reported that Turkish political and military officials are considering a similar zone in the Syria case if the number of refugees increases sharply, but officials have told Reuters they are not aware of such plans. When asked about the possibility, Defence Minister Vecdi Gonul told reporters: “It’s not on the agenda right now”.

Damascus would not welcome the prospect of Turkish boots on Syrian soil. Turkey and Syria went to the brink of war in 1998 when Ank ara exerted pressure on Damascus to expel Kurdistan Workers Par ty (PKK ) rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan who was sheltered there. The expulsion and capture of Ocalan resolved the crisis. —Reuters

IMF cyber attack boosts calls for action

By Peter Apps

G

overnments, multinational corporations and global institutions are losing the battle against computer hackers and must combine their resources if they are to lock out cyber intruders, experts say. The International Monetary Fund has joined Sony and Google on a growing list of hacking victims but it is hard to identify the culprits who consistently manage to keep one technological step ahead of their pursuers. “This is an example of technology developing faster than the frameworks and sometimes the regulations around that,” said Unilever chief executive Paul Polman on the sidelines of a World Economic Forum meeting in Jakarta.

Cyber security experts say the only way to effectively combat the menace is for the public and private sectors to join forces and combine greater regulation with international action. “Clearly we are losing the battle,” said

Vijay Mukhi, one of India’s leading cyber security experts. “We are not doing enough... every year we hope things will change but now people like me have turned cynical. It requires cooperation on a global scale,” he said.

Earlier this month, Internet giant Google pointed the finger at Chinese hackers for an attempt to access the Gmail accounts of assorted rights activists, officials and others.

Entertainment giant Sony suffered serious damage to its reputation after hackers accessed the details of thousands of PlayStation users, while Lockheed Martin and Citi also reported attempts to steal data. The growing complexity and seriousness of cyber attacks has begun to break down some of the stigma of being a victim, firms, government and organisations realising they must work together.

“There has been a real change,” said John Bassett, senior fellow for cyber security at London’s Royal United Services Institute and a

former senior official at Britain’s signals intelligence agency GCHQ. “There is much more awareness of the threat (and) organisations are being much more open about the attacks they face. Lockheed, Google and now the IMF are showing far more openness than organisations would have done a year ago.”

Experts like Alexander Klimburg, said the attempt to steal sensitive information from the IMF, the global lender of last resort, was a chance for all sides to come together to confront a common menace. “This is potentially a great opportunity to launch a “communal” investigation into an attack on a “communal” institution,” said Klimburg, a cyber security specialist at the Austrian Institute for International Affairs. “If fingers can be pointed, they should be pointed. The only way to stop such attacks is ‘naming and shaming’, and in this case, unlike those of individual national governments, there is a clear global interest at stake.”

With the volume of data stored online increasing exponentially every year, some specialists say the problem is escalating out of control and action must be taken. While some civil liberties campaigners fear giving governments greater control of the Internet would undermine privacy, others say that same privacy is already being undermined by both criminal and state-linked hackers.

Countries such as the United States have begun to publish national doctrines on cyber security and warfare but talks on international standards and agreements seem remote. In reality, most states engage in some form of electronic espionage but some worry it is now getting out of control. The Stuxnet computer worm widely believed to have been built by a state intelligence agency to attack the Iranian nuclear program through reprogramming centrifuges to inflict damage on themselves is seen by some as a sign of things to come. —Reuters

US troops leaving Saddam palaces

By Rebecca Santana

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vailable soon: nine palaces in lakeside complex frequented by visiting kings and dictators, beautiful molded ceilings and light fixtures, many bidets, Saddam Hussein mural and former prison cell.

As is, with Tomahawk missile damage. Contact: US Army. Thus might read a real estate ad for the Victory Base Complex, one of the many properties the US military is vacating as the Dec 31 deadline for its withdrawal from Iraq approaches. It will leave behind probably some of the most elaborate, some would say tacky, office spaces ever used by American soldiers, sailors or Marines.

The US military has been headquartered in the complex near Baghdad International Airport almost since GIs reached Baghdad in 2003. Countless US dignitaries have passed through.

It is an odd place to work, surrounded by so much Saddam history and grandiosity. By the time the dictator was toppled, he had built about 75 palaces and VIP complexes nationwide. That is according to the then US military historian’s report on the Victory Base Complex written last year. Touring the complex is a bit like touring Saddam’s mind. There is the Victory over Iran palace, commemorating the 1980-1988 war he started that ended in stalemate and half a million dead. And the Victory over America palace commemorating the 1991 Gulf War in which a US-led coalition drove Saddam’s invading forces out of Kuwait. “Any war that Saddam survived was a victory,” said Col. Les Melnyk, the current US military historian in Iraq. Now the Iraqi government must figure out what to do with all this square footage. It already is turning a palace complex in the southern city of Basra into a museum. A palace near the ruins of Babylon may become a hotel. Bahaa Mayah heads an Iraqi committee that

decides on the fate of the palaces and recently toured the Victory complex. He thought it would make a good presidential complex, being near the airport. “When a foreign president or prime minister visits Iraq, we close all the streets, and a lot of security measures are taken and so it really disturbs the traffic inside Baghdad,” he said. “So the best place is near the airport where the president can receive his guests without any security burden.” Before

rates the former barracks of his elite Republican Guard. There is the jail cell he occupied after his capture by US forces, the room where he was interrogated, the spot where he gardened while awaiting trial and the dolly to which he was strapped when he was taken out of the building.

Government spokesman Ali alDabbagh said the jail cell will become a museum.

A prime property at the Victory complex is Al Faw palace, whose con-

most dramatic - and, as it turns out, most damaging - alteration grew from paranoia. Flying over the building, he thought he saw a cross woven into the design and suspected the Yugoslav architects did it on purpose. “He assumed, being the paranoid man ... that he was, that they were trying to insert a Christian symbol into his country. So he made the decision on the spot to double the size of the palace,” Melnyk said.

The result of the hasty remake is

In this April 26, 2011 photo, US Army soldiers walk through Al Faw palace in the Victory Base Complex in Baghdad. —AP Saddam’s building spree, it was a country club for Baghdad’s elite, and still sports the old signs advertising parking spaces and casino hours.

Saddam had his initials etched into the walls, columns and ceilings of almost every building. One of the last known murals of Saddam deco-

struction became Saddam’s personal architectural hobby. He made more than 400 changes to the plans, according to the history of the complex. “It has gorgeous ceilings and chandeliers, but we use it like a regular office building albeit with a lot more marble,” Melnyk said. Saddam’s

that the back half of the palace is unstable, Melnyk said. Cracks are showing, chunks of the walls are falling off, and the palace may cease to be inhabitable. Meanwhile, the staircases are chipped and nicked after years of US troops’ weapons accidentally banging into them. The

troops do not mind climbing three floors just to use the massive bathroom - 12 sinks in one room alone.

The bidets are used to store toilet paper. The US military has made many improvements to the palaces it has occupied - smoke detectors, new wiring, upgraded plumbing. Interiors have become cubicled office space and machines clean the floors at Al Faw. The security agreement governing the withdrawal, however, does not require the US to fix any damage it has caused to these buildings.

It does not help that the palaces were not always built very well. In the back of Al Faw, the paint looks haphazardly applied to the plaster ceiling moldings, the chandeliers in the hallway do not line up and the floor tiles are uneven. Saddam was thinking “Versailles”, but the materials he bought were more half-price sale at Home Depot. At Al Faw the banisters are gypsum, not marble. The Arabic script on the walls looks like gold but it is really brass. The largest building in the complex is the Victory over America palace, its ceiling holed by an American bomb, its walls featuring graffiti left by American troops. It is a cavernous building with a walk-in fireplace, sweeping staircases and nooks high above the massive ballroom where Saddam could spy on his guests.

Melnyk did not know why the building was bombed. But he joked that its name probably did not help.

At water’s edge is a building that the US targeted with a Tomahawk missile, believing Saddam was inside.

The roof collapsed, killing some 200 officials of the ruling Baath Party who were watching a movie. It was later used by the US to train sniffer dogs in the hunt for bodies in the wreckage, Melnyk said. In another part of the building, he said, US forensics teams identified matter scraped from the side of an empty pool as brain parts, suggesting someone was executed there just before the invasion. —AP

focus

Lessons from South Asia for an Arab Spring

By Ali Gohar and Lisa Schirch

P

eople power and the use of mass nonviolent action are not new to Muslims.

Even before Gandhi, political and spiritual leader Abdul Ghaffar Khan – now more widely referred to as “Bacha Khan” – was drawing on Islamic and tribal teachings to train “nonviolent soldiers” in 1920s India (now Pakistan) to rely on their honour, courage and the truthfulness of their cause to confront the powerfully armed British Empire.

When people’s movements use violence against state military forces, history shows that they are almost always defeated. But when people use nonviolence, giving the state no pretext for repression, they gain the moral authority and support that, in many cases during the last hundred years – such as in Chile and South Africa – leads to a successful transition from dictatorship to democracy.

Youth in parts of the Middle East are leading the “Arab Spring” social movements, pressing for change today. They believe the international economic and political system excludes their voices and offers little hope.

Khan grew up in a similar world circa 1900, watching the exploitive relationship between landowners and poor tenant farmers in Peshawar Valley, and listening to local leaders tell families not to send their children to school so as to keep them poor and underpowered. After completing his secondary education, Khan also received a commission to be part of a prestigious corps of Pukhtoon (also known as Pashtun or Pathan) soldiers in the British Army, but refused due to his anticolonial sentiments.

Searching for more authentic religious leaders, Khan discovered Islamic values of peace and charity toward others by studying the teachings of the Qur’an and the life of the Prophet Muhammad. Khan promoted education and social reform, teaching about core values of Islam and Pukhtoonwali, the cultural values and way of life of the Pukhtoon tribe.

He started 70 schools that taught both boys and girls, including his own daughter, even though this went against the norms of the Pukhtoon culture of the day.

Just as today’s governments aim to suppress the Arab spring, the British recognised Khan’s leadership as a threat, closed his schools and jailed him for three years. But instead of accepting defeat, Khan planned a more strategic social movement. In 1928 Khan started the newspaper PUKHTOON, teaching sacrifice, courage, nonviolence and charity towards others. Building upon this media outreach, he organised a grand jirga meeting in 1929, in which tribal leaders assembled together, to start an organised nonviolent movement called the “S er vants of God.” Wearing red shirts and walking in straight rows, these unarmed youth were deeply spiritual, studied Islam and practiced nonviolent drills daily to test their ability to endure repression without retaliation.

The British tried to silence the Red Shirts by firing on them, imprisoning and torturing them. They too suffered like today’s brave citizens across the Middle East. But unlike some of today’s rapidly developing social movements from Bahrain to Syria, the Red Shirts spent years training and connecting their religious values in nonviolence with a clearly articulated set of political, social and economic alternatives.

Khan’s Red Shirts were not just “against” British colonialism. They provided local leadership for education and development, and stood up for the dignity and rights of their community. They balanced affirmations of the rights and dignity of all people with teachings about responsibility and sacrifices needed to serve those same communities.

At its height, there were 100,000 red-shirted Servants of God, more than any other “nonviolent army” in the history of humanity. Each person in Khan’s army took an oath of nonviolence, vowing not to harm their enemies but also forgiving family and friends in domestic quarrels. All were volunteers and embraced a life of simplicity. This holistic approach fostered incredible group discipline to prevent instigators from provoking them to violence.

The beauty of nonviolent action is that throughout history, people around the world discover it on their own without getting trained or having superhuman qualities. The heroes of this Arab Spring are not magnificent saints. They are ordinary people, putting their lives on the line for change. But it is also true that any great art form improves with study.

Marching in the streets is not the only element of social change. The internal dialogue, training, and development of both structures and economic, political and social platforms are missing in many of today’s movements.

Khan’s efforts to build the internal structure of his nonviolent army hold important lessons for today’s Arab spring.

NOTE: Ali Gohar is a rahbar (guide) and Founder of Just Peace International in Peshawar, Pakistan. Lisa Schirch is Professor of peacebuilding at Eastern Mennonite University and Director of the 3D Security Initiative —CGNews

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Years

sp orts Colon put on disabled list

Japanese wrestler banned TOKYO: Three-times Japanese Greco-Roman wrestling champion Katsuya Kitamura was banned for two years yesterday after testing positive for anabolic steroids, meaning the 25-year-old will miss the London Olympics next year.

The triple 96-kilo national champion, the first Japanese wrestler to fail a drugs test, told Japan’s anti-doping agency JADA he took the substance by accident after buying supplements abroad. “We never thought our wrestlers bought supplements from overseas,” Japan Wrestling Federation (JWF) general secretary Yuji Takada told local media.

“This has smeared the sports community with the London Olympics coming up. We will take measures to ensure this does not happen again.”

Kitamura-who the JWF said tested positive for the banned muscle-building substance drostanolone-is not expected to appeal the ban, Japan’s Kyodo news agency reported. The wrestler has represented Japan at two world championships without winning a medal. — Reuters

NEW YORK: The New York Yankees took another hit to their starting rotation when right-hander Bartolo Colon was put on the disabled list on Sunday after straining his left hamstring in Saturday’s game.

Colon, a former American League Cy Young winner who signed with New York before the season, has been a surprisingly strong contributor to the Yankees after missing last season with an injury.

The 38-year-old Colon gave up two hits in 6-2/3 shutout innings Saturday to improve to 6-3 and lower his earned run average to 3.10. Colon said he was feeling bet-

ter Sunday and hoped he would return quickly.

“I feel good,” the Dominican said through a translator. “I just have a little bit of pain and I’m on the DL right now, 15 days. So hopefully I can pitch after that.”

Also missing from the Yankees rotation is Phil Hughes, who has resumed throwing after being sidelined with a “dead” arm. Joining Colon on the disabled list Sunday was reliever Amauri Sanit, who has a right elbow injury.

Pitcher Hector Noesi and outfielder Chris Dickerson were called up from the minors to replace Colon and Sanit. — Reuters

Plushenko regains status MOSCOW: Former Olympic champion figure skater Evgeni Plushenko of Russia has had his amateur status restored, clearing him to compete at the 2014 Games in his home country.

The International Skating Union on Sunday approved an appeal by the Russian figure skating federation to restore Plushenko’s amateur status, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported, citing federation executive director Valentin Piseyev. The ISU stripped the 2006 Olympic champion of eligibility last August. After finishing second to Evan Lysacek at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, Plushenko skipped the following world championships citing injury

Braves top Astros in NL HOUSTON: Tommy Hanson struck out a career-high 14 in seven innings while Brian McCann and Dan Uggla hit tworun homers as the Atlanta Braves beat the Houston Astros 4-1 in the National League on Sunday for their sixth straight win.

Hanson (8-4) gave up one run and three hits. He struck out five in a row early in the game and fanned the last three batters he faced. The Astros lost for the eighth time in nine games and struck out 17 times overall. Uggla hit his eighth homer, a shot to left field off Brett Myers (2-6) that put Atlanta up 2-0 in the first inning.

with five strikeouts to win consecutive starts for the first time since April 2007. Reyes had three hits for his MLBleading 33rd multihit game, homering two pitches after pinch-hitter Scott Hairston also did in the ninth.

Jason Isringhausen and Bobby Parnell each pitched an inning to finish off the shutout, the Mets’ fourth this season. Kevin Correia (8-5) unraveled late after being perfect through 4 2-3.

Brewers 4, Cardinals 3 In Milwaukee, Prince Fielder hit the go-ahead homer in the sixth as the Brewers knocked St. Louis out of first place

D’backs 5, Marlins 1 In Miami, Daniel Hudson allowed one run in six-plus innings and Stephen Drew had three hits and two RBIs as Arizona handed Florida its 10th loss in 11 games. Florida had at least one hit in every inning but left 13 runners on base.

Hudson (7-5) won for the seventh time in eight games since starting the season 0-4. He gave up eight hits with three walks and seven strikeouts.

Florida’s Brad Hand (0-2) struggled in his second MLB start after holding Atlanta to one hit in six innings in his debut Tuesday. Hand pitched five innings and gave up four runs, three of them earned, on five hits and five walks.

HOUSTON: Atlanta Braves’ Tommy Hanson delivers a pitch during the first inning of an MLB baseball game against the Houston Astros. — AP

Super Dan set for Super Series swoop SINGAPORE: Chinese great Lin Dan is poised to seize control of badminton’s showpiece Super Series in Singapore this week as he goes in search of the only major honour to elude him.

Strutting “Super” Dan, a pin-up for millions of adoring Chinese, needs only to reach the quarter-finals to overtake series leader and world number one Lee Chong Wei, who is missing the event to train for August’s world championships.

Olympic champion Lin, a four-time AllEngland winner, is the only player to achieve the “Golden Grand Slam” by also lifting the world championships, World Cup, Thomas Cup, Sudirman Cup, Asian Games and Asia Championships titles.

But badminton’s answer to Roger Federer has had to watch Lee sweep all three Super Series titles to date after China boycotted the 2008 and 2009 finals. Lin played too few events to make it to last season’s finale.

Lin, 27, who is married to Chinese former world champion Xie Xingfang, lies just 4,160 points behind Lee after winning the Korea Open and narrowly losing to his Malaysian arch-rival in a classic All-England final in March.

The Singapore Open is the fifth leg of the 12-stop series with the top eight men’s and women’s singles players and doubles pairs qualifying for the season-ending tournament in December. Badminton is in need of some positive headlines after a

Phillies 4, Cubs 3 In Philadelphia, Ryan Howard drove in three runs to lead the Phillies to its fifth win in seven games. Howard’s two-run single in the seventh put the Phillies ahead for the first time. Chase Utley also had two hits with a double and two RBIs for the Phillies, who took three of four from the Cubs in their series. Aramis Ramirez homered for Chicago, which has lost 11 of 13.

Roy Oswalt (4-4) ended a four-game losing streak, which matched the worst of his career. He allowed three runs on five hits while striking out five and walking two.

Cubs reliever Sean Marshall (3-1) was the loser.

Nationals 2, Padres 0 In San Diego, Danny Espinosa hit a sacrifice fly in the ninth to score the go-ahead run for Washington.

Espinosa’s fly ball to right field, caught by Chris Denorfia, scored pinch-runner Brian Bixler. Laynce Nix followed with an RBI single to right to seal the victory for the Nationals.

The Nationals took three of four to get the team’s first series win in San Diego since 2001. Todd Coffey (2-0) pitched one inning for the win and Drew Storen worked the ninth for his 15th save.

Dodgers 10, Rockies 8 At Denver, James Loney hit his second career grand slam and rookie Rubby De La Rosa pitched five effective innings before leaving with a forearm cramp to help Los Angeles hold off Colorado.

Matt Kemp hit his NL-leading 20th homer and Rod Barajas added another for the Dodgers. De La Rosa (3-0) picked up the win for Los Angeles, while his Colorado counterpart, Ubaldo Jimenez (1-7), surrendered a careerhigh three homers.

Carlos Gonzalez and Troy Tulowitzki each hit two-run homers for Colorado in the seventh, but the Rockies couldn’t pull out the win.

Mets 7, Pirates 0 In Pittsburgh, Chris Capuano pitched seven strong innings and Jose Reyes homered as New York shut out the Pirates. Capuano (5-6) allowed three hits and two walks

in the NL Central division.

Jake Westbrook (6-4) had pitched a shutout into the sixth before Fielder got his 19th home run of the season.

Fielder, who went 2 for 3 with a walk and two RBIs, has an NL-leading 58 RBIs for the year.

Shaun Marcum (7-2) won for the first time since May 21, a span of three starts that included a loss and consecutive no decisions. He allowed three runs on five hits with eight strikeouts and a walk over seven innings.

plan to force women players to wear skirts, intended to attract a bigger audience, drew a barrage of negative publicity before it was eventually shelved. But several top stars-including Lin, who complained of a stomach ache - missed media commitments yesterday, prompting concern from the Badminton World Federation (BWF) and world number five Peter Gade.

“Of course in some cases you can say that the players also need to promote themselves better and the BWF needs to do that in an even more professional level,” Gade said. “I know they’re doing the best we can but still we need to raise the bar in my opinion.”

Officials said they would seek explanations after men’s champion Sony Dwi Kuncoro and 2004 Olympic gold-medallist Taufik Hidayat failed to front media, and women’s title-holder Saina Nehwal was an hour late.

Five Chinese players did turn out for journalists, but they sat stony-faced and gave such glib answers that disgruntled media asked whether they disliked giving press conferences.

China’s women’s world number one, Wang Shixian, insisted she had “matured” since last month’s Sudirman Cup, when she was shocked by Germany’s Juliane Schenk.

Wang and her namesakes Wang Yihan and Wang Xin top the women’s seedings, as well as the series standings, and look set to dominate. — AFP

Giants 4, Reds 2 At San Francisco, Aubrey Huff had three hits and two RBIs as the Giants rallied to beat Cincinnati. Nate Schierholtz delivered the go-ahead sacrifice fly off reliever Jose Arredondo (0-2) during a two-run seventh inning that helped the Giants earn a split of the four-game series.

Jonathan Sanchez walked five and struck out five in six innings. He forced three inning-ending double plays.

Ramon Ramirez (2-0) earned the win and Brian Wilson pitched a scoreless ninth for his 18th save. — AP

MLB results/standings Major League Baseball results and standings on Sunday.

NY Yankees 9, Cleveland 1; Seattle 7, Detroit 3; Boston 14, Toronto 1; Arizona 5, Florida 1; Tampa Bay 9, Baltimore 6; NY Mets 7, Pittsburgh 0; Philadelphia 4, Chicago Cubs 3; Atlanta 4, Houston 1; Chicago White Sox 5, Oakland 4; Minnesota 6, Texas 1; Milwaukee 4, St. Louis 3; LA Dodgers 10, Colorado 8; Kansas City 9, LA Angels 0; Washington 2, San Diego 0; San Francisco 4, Cincinnati 2.

American League Eastern Division W L Boston 39 26 NY Yankees 36 27 Tampa Bay 35 30 Toronto 32 34 Baltimore 30 33 Central Division Cleveland 34 29 Detroit 35 30 Chicago White Sox 33 35 Kansas City 29 37 Minnesota 26 39 Western Division Texas 36 31 Seattle 34 32 LA Angels 31 36 Oakland 28 39

Philadelphia Atlanta Florida NY Mets Washington Milwaukee St. Louis Cincinnati Pittsburgh Chicago Cubs Houston San Francisco Arizona Colorado LA Dodgers San Diego

National League Eastern Division 40 26 38 28 32 32 32 33 30 36 Central Division 38 28 38 29 34 33 31 33 25 39 24 42 Western Division 37 29 36 30 31 34 31 36 29 38

PCT .600 .571 .538 .485 .476

GB 2 4 7.5 8

.540 .538 .485 .439 .400

3.5 6.5 9

.537 .515 .463 .418

1.5 5 8

.606 .576 .500 .492 .455

2 7 7.5 10

.576 .567 .507 .484 .391 .364

0.5 4.5 6 12 14

.561 .545 .477 .463 .433

1 5.5 6.5 8.5

Twins thrash Rangers MINNEAPOLIS: Francisco Liriano narrowly missed out on his second no-hitter of the season as the Minnesota Twins beat the Texas Rangers 6-1 in the American League on Sunday.

Liriano (4-6), who held the Chicago White Sox hitless in on May 3, was perfect through the seventh inning against the high-scoring Rangers before Adrian Beltre led off the eighth with a single.

Liriano matched a season high by striking out nine batters in eight innings, allowing two hits without a walk. The Twins scored five times in the seventh, an inning that included an injury to Texas starter Matt Harrison.

Harrison (5-6) left after being struck on his arm by Danny Valencia’s line drive leading off the seventh.

Red Sox 14, Blue Jays 1 In Toronto, Jon Lester pitched two-hit ball over eight innings and David Ortiz and Kevin Youkilis each homered and drove in four runs as Boston won its ninth in a row.

Adrian Gonzalez and Dustin Pedroia also homered for Boston, which never trailed while sweeping the three - game series against the Blue Jays.

Gonzalez connected in the first off Kyle Drabek (4-5) for his 13th home run. Gonzalez leads the majors with 60 RBIs and has driven in at least one run in nine straight games.

Lester (9-2) got his AL-leading ninth win of the season.

Yankees 9, Indians 1 In New York, Derek Jeter had a pair of RBI singles and Alex Rodriguez drove in three runs as New York beat slumping Cleveland.

Jeter singled during a five-run fifth inning and again during a three-run eighth, closing within seven hits of 3,000 for his career.

Curtis Granderson went 4 for 4 and drove in a pair of runs, and Brett Gardner had a pair of doubles, a triple and scored three times. New York had a season-high 18 hits in the game.

Freddy Garcia (5-5) beat Cleveland for the first time in seven tries. Orlando Cabrera reached 2,000 career hits with a single for the Indians, who have lost nine of 10.

Lin Dan in action in this file photo

but soon appeared in a couple of exhibition events without the federation’s permission. He apologized to the federation in April. Plushenko, who is recovering from a knee operation in Germany, sent a message Sunday on Twitter saying that he had good and bad news for his fans. “I underwent knee surgery and had my meniscus cut a bit,” he wrote.

“And the good news is that I can compete now. I’ll be back on track in two weeks.”

Three-time world champion Plushenko, who also won silver at the 2002 Olympics, will be 31 when the 2014 Winter Games are held in Sochi. — AP

Mariners 7, Tigers 3 In Detroit, Miguel Olivo hit two home runs and Felix Hernandez pitched eight strong innings to lead Seattle over the Tigers.

The Mariners trailed 2-0 and hadn’t hit the ball out of the infield when Olivo led off the

MINNEAPOLIS: Texas Rangers’ Elvis Andrus (front right) is safe at second on a two-base error

by Minnesota Twins third baseman Luke Hughes (not shown) during the seventh inning. — AP

fifth with a home run. Seattle went on to score three runs in the inning, and Olivo added a two-run shot in the eighth.

Hernandez (7-5) allowed three runs on nine hits, while striking out six. Rick Porcello (6-4) allowed three runs on six hits for Detroit.

Royals 9, Angels 0 In Anaheim, California, Vin Mazzaro pitched seven solid innings and Kansas City turned five double plays to beat Los Angeles.

Alex Gordon, Billy Butler and Chris Getz each drove in two runs for the Royals, who won seven of their last 10 meetings with the Angels.

Mazzaro (1-1) gave up five hits and walked five in his third start with Kansas City. He forced double-play grounders by Torii Hunter, Howie Kendrick, Mark Trumbo and Bobby Abreu, while Hank Conger lined into the other one. The Angels were shut out for the ninth time this season and lost for the seventh time in eight games.

White Sox 5, Athletics 4 In Chicago, Adam Dunn hit a three-run homer to back seven strong innings by Phil Humber as Chicago topped Oakland. Humber

(6-3) pitched at least seven innings for the fifth straight start. He struck out a career-high seven and gave up four hits.

The White Sox took the lead with two runs in the seventh. Mark Teahen scored on a throwing error by Scott Sizemore and Paul Konerko had an RBI single. Guillermo Moscoso (2-3) took the loss.

Rays 9, Orioles 6 In Baltimore, Johnny Damon hit his 27th career leadoff home run and Evan Longoria had an inside-the-park homer and three RBIs as Tampa Bay cruised past the Orioles. Justin Ruggiano had three hits for the Rays, who clinched their first winning road trip of 11 or more games since 2003. Tampa Bay is 6-4 so far on a four-city journey that concludes in Detroit on Monday.

Damon had two hits and scored twice.

The 37-year- old has reached base in a career-best 37 consecutive games. Longoria hit the third inside-the-park homer in the 20-year history of Camden Yards; Butch Davis did it for Texas in 1993 and Detroit’s Shane Halter hit one in 2003. Wade Davis (55) got the win and is now 4-0 in his career against Baltimore. — AP

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Tyson makes it alive and well to Hall of Fame NEW YORK: It took Mike Tyson a lot of years to travel the road from Catskill to Canastota in New York. A betting person might have got good odds a few years back that any induction of Tyson into the International Boxing Hall of Fame would be of the posthumous variety.

But Tyson was very much alive on Sunday, his daughter on his lap as he smiled and waved at fans gathered for the boxing’s hall annual parade. The out-ofcontrol character he once was is the only thing dead now, and Tyson tries to bury his former persona even deeper every time he opens his mouth.

The crooked smile and bizarre tattoo on his face are the only reminders of the day when the now slimmed down vegetarian and budding movie star was indeed the baddest man on the planet. He doesn’t even look like

a heavyweight anymore, much less one who would terrify opponents long before they entered the ring. But they don’t induct bit players in Hollywood comedies into the Hall of Fame. You have to at least play a fighter to get in the boxing hall, which was how Sylvester Stallone also found his way there on this day. The best fighter among the inductees wasn’t even Tyson.

Julio Cesar Chavez, the Mexican who relentlessly beat down almost everybody put into the ring against him, was a much more accomplished boxer than Tyson and was as feared by smaller fighters as Tyson was by the heavyweights.

The best speaker was Stallone, who closed his talk with a famous line from the “Rocky” movies, telling the crowd in Canastota that “Yo, Adrian, I did it.” Tyson, meanwhile, was so overcome by

emotion that he couldn’t even finish remarks that were meandering at best to begin with.

Yes, Iron Mike was cr ying.

Crying unabashedly, as he tried to honor the memory of the late Cus D’Amato, who became a surrogate father to him growing up in nearby Catskill. But if this was a way to finally close a career that no longer needs closure, consider it done.

The Mike Tyson who was honored for his work in the ring is still a fan of the sport that made him rich and famous at an age where he had no idea how to handle either money or fame. He still appears at big fights in Las Vegas, where he is always greeted by fans with the biggest applause of anyone sitting ringside.

They remember the fighter who wore black trunks, no socks, and threw left hooks so powerful they knocked guys down even

when they missed. The fighter who instead of celebrating was more likely to walk over to his vanquished opponent to make sure he was all right.

The fighter who was so fascinating they couldn’t take their eyes off of him even as his life spun out of control. What they don’t remember is that Tyson was a one-trick pony, a fighter who relied on intimidation and brute power to make up for what he lacked in boxing skills.

His corner men would call out numbers for punch combinations they wanted Tyson to throw, but by the time he became the youngest heavyweight champion ever at the age of 20 he was pretty much done listening to anybody about anything.

His career peaked with a string of knockouts in the late ‘80s, including a 91-second one of a petrified Michael Spinks in

Atlantic City. But Buster Douglas stopped him in one of the biggest upsets ever in 1990 and things pretty much went downhill from there.

While he looked ferocious again briefly after serving prison term for rape, he was unmasked

by Evander Holyfield for good in 1996 and from there it was just a matter of chasing paydays. Look at his record objectively, and there’s no way he goes down as one of the great heavyweights ever.

But no one — especially those among us who were along for the ride in his brief prime — ever looked at Tyson objectively. He’s Hall of Fame material just for being Mike Tyson. There was nothing more spectacular than a Tyson fight, nothing more electrifying than the wait just before the opening bell.

That he survived prison, drugs,

street fights and the people who always had a hand in his pocket is remarkable enough. That he has reinvented himself in recent years as a lovable philosopher and student of life is way more remarkable. “You reach a point in your life where you find out all you believed in life was a lie and you want to start life all over again,” Tyson told me a few months ago.

“I want to be a good person, not just be known as a great person.”

He predicted before going to Canastota he would not make it through his speech before breaking down, and he was right.

Memories of his beloved Cus were too close to the surface But that was all right to the several thousand fans who cheered him with chants of “Come on Mike” as he struggled for words. Seeing Tyson there alive and — and quite well — was more than reward enough.—AP

Button grabs rain-delayed Canadian GP Gordon clinches Sprint Cup race

MONTREAL: McLaren Mercedes driver Jenson Button, of Britain, celebrates after winning the Formula One Canadian Grand Prix auto race.—AP

MONTREAL: Jenson Button celebrated his greatest victory on Sunday after overtaking Red Bull’s Formula One world champion Sebastian Vettel on the last lap of a raindelayed Canadian Grand Prix thriller.

Vettel, who skidded wide under relentless pressure just a few corners from the finish, recovered from his error to take second place ahead of Australian team mate Mark Webber.

The race, a chaotic epic packed with incident that will be remembered as a highlight of any season, had earlier been halted for more than two hours as rain lashed the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve.

Button had to fight through from the back of the field to deny the runaway championship leader a sixth victory in seven races.

Along the way he squeezed McLaren team mate and fellow Briton Lewis Hamilton into the wall and out of the race and also collided with Ferrari’s Fernando Alonso, ending the Spaniard’s hopes when his car spun and was stuck on a kerb.

Despite his error, Vettel stretched his overall championship lead to 60 points with the 23-year-old German now on 161 to Button’s 101.

“It’s definitely my best race ... I’ll remember this for a long time,” said Button, the 2009 world champion who had never before won in North America.

Button made six visits to the pitlane-five regular stops and one drive-through penaltybefore storming back into contention as the track dried. The race, punctuated by five safe-

ty car periods as well as the rain delay, finished more than four hours after it started.

“We did a lot of things to contribute to the show today but at the end of the day that was just fantastic,” said McLaren team principal Martin Whitmarsh. “ We knew we had to put pressure on Sebastian and he made a mistake. You can forgive him for that. He’s driven so well this year but Jenson was just incredible. That’s the stuff of champions, that’s the stuff of dreams.

“He had the confidence, he went for it, he just attacked and attacked. What a fantastic result for him and the team.” Seven times world champion Michael Schumacher, a seven times winner in Canada, narrowly missed out on the first podium of his comeback by bringing his Mercedes home in fourth place.

Russian Vitaly Petrov finished fifth for Renault while Brazilian Felipe Massa forced his way past Sauber’s Kamui Kobayashi on the line in a virtual photo-finish.

Jaime Alguersuari was eighth for Toro Rosso, a big boost for the Spaniard whose team mate Sebastien Buemi was 10th, with Brazilian Rubens Barrichello scoring points for Williams for the second race running.

The stewards, one of them Brazil’s former world champion Emerson Fittipaldi, had their hands full with a list of incidents under scrutiny but decided no further action was required and the results stood.

That allowed the 31-year-old Button to celebrate one of Formula One’s greatest charges to secure his 10th career victory. The race was

one of two parts, first water-logged with drivers urging for it to be halted on safety grounds and then exploding into action after the halt as the rain lifted and a dry line emerged.

Vettel, starting on pole for the sixth time this season and behind the safety car, was leading when the race was red-flagged and cars ordered to park on the starting grid after just 24 of the scheduled 70 laps had been completed.

After one of the longest delays in Formula One, he was back in front again but under pressure after Button made the right tyre call at the right time and began to take huge chunks of time out of the German’s lead.

The race was the first run in wet weather this season, a new challenge for tyre supplier Pirelli, and the heavy spray and standing water made for a tough afternoon as cars skidded and spun out around the circuit.

Hamilton’s bid for a Canadian Grand Prix hat-trick, after winning on two of his previous three visits, ended after just eight laps when he tried to get past Button along the pit straight and they collided.

“What’s he doing?” Button asked in amazement over the team radio while Hamilton parked his damaged car on the track, bringing out the safety car.

Hamilton, who was involved in two collisions in the previous race in Monaco, had also tangled earlier with Webber. “I think Lewis thought the chequered flag was in Turn Three,” joked the Australian.—Reuters

LONG POND: Jeff Gordon moved into a tie for third on NASCAR’s Sprint Cup career victories list, winning for the 84th time when he took the checkered flag Sunday at Pocono Raceway.

Gordon led most of the final 40 laps and won for the second time this season.

His 84 wins tie him with Bobby Allison and Darrell Waltrip for most in NASCAR history. Richard Petty leads with 200 wins and David Pearson is second with 105. Gordon won in February at Phoenix International Raceway and has multiple victories in a season for the first time since 2007. Gordon tied Bill Elliott with five wins on the 2 1/2-mile triangle track.

Gordon’s victory at Phoenix ended his drought at 66 races without a win. This 11-race winless stretch was just a blip compared to that. “When you see what he’s done in his career, not just this decade, not just in the 2000’s, but all the way back to the ‘90s, he’s a true legend in this sport,” Kurt Busch said. Busch, the pole sitter, was second and Kyle Busch third. Kyle’s Busch fun was short-lived.

NASCAR announced his No. 18 Toyota failed post race inspection with a height issue on the left-front end. His car will be taken to NASCAR’s research and development center. Jimmie Johnson and Kevin Harvick rounded out the top five. Dale Earnhardt Jr. continued his rebirth with a sixth-place finish. It capped a great day for Hendrick Motorsports — first, fourth and sixth. Gordon, the four-time Cup champion, first won at Pocono in 1996.

He won again in 1997 and 1998, then waited until 2007 to reach Victory Lane again.

This win was a bit more special for Gordon, who turns 40 in August. His first order of business once he hopped out of the car was a kiss from his daughter, Ella.

Team owner Rick Hendrick’s offseason

decision to shake up his organization has proved an early success. Gordon and crew chief Alan Gustafson have the No. 24 Chevrolet in fantastic shape for a spot in the Chase for the championship. “I feel a lot better about it, that’s for darn sure,” Gordon said. Gordon entered the race having led a record 918 laps at Pocono Raceway. He added 39 to the total Sunday.

Some of the early contenders fell off.

Denny Hamlin, who led early and has four wins here, ran into tire woes and dropped back to 19th. Carl Edwards lost his grip on the points lead — his 40point lead was sliced to six — when a bad engine knocked him out early. He finished 37th. Once those two were out of contention, the 500-mile race belonged to Gordon. The Busch brothers tried to catch him, but just didn’t have enough in the end. “I’m giving it all I’ve got and I just can’t close the gap,” Kurt Busch said. Wins have been harder to get for Gordon as his career stretches into its 20th season. He hit double-digits three straight seasons (1996-98), but had winless seasons in 2008 and 2010.

“It’s harder and harder to win in this day and age,” Kyle Busch. “We see it every year.” Gordon hit a rough patch after his Phoenix victory — including a 36th at Las Vegas and a 39th at Richmond — but a change in the Chase format this year put an added emphasis on wins.

That stamps Gordon as a contender for that fifth title — the same number as Johnson. “A lot of hard work has gone into this,” Gordon said. Gordon was behind the wheel this week for the 2hour drive from his New York City apartment to the Poconos. He said he loves it any time he can get himself to the track.

No doubt, he loves it even more when he can park in Victory Lane.—AP

Jeff Gordon in action in this file photo

Focus and fun key to must-win Game Six

VANCOUVER: Canucks goalie Roberto Luongo makes a glove save against the Boston Bruins in this file photo. —AP

BOSTON: Boston Bruins goalie Tim Thomas feels the trick to winning late yesterday’s do-or-die Game Six in the NHL’s Stanley Cup finals is to focus on what he can control and have some fun like a kid.

The Bruins, trailing the series 32, must beat the Canucks in Boston’s TD Garden to force the championship to a decisive seventh game, which would be played in Vancouver tomorrow.

Thomas’s per formance has been strong despite Vancouver’s series lead and he said he cannot change the way he approaches the game despite the must-win circumstance Boston faces.

“You try to get the same focus that you had as a kid when you were out playing on the pond, and you’re just enjoying the game,” the

37-year- old told repor ters in Boston on Sunday after the team’s practice skate.

“If you approach it like that it can be really fun,” said Thomas, a favorite to win this season’s Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s top goaltender with one of the more acrobatic styles in the league.

Vancouver goalie Rober to Luongo has come under fire from the Boston media for saying his more conser vative style would have helped him make the save that Thomas missed in the Bruin’s 1-0 loss in Game Five.

“Listen, I k now we’re in the Stanley Cup Final and everything is under the microscope and going to get blown out of proportion,” Luongo said, adding that repor ters ignored the positive

comments he made about Thomas.

Vancouver, on the brink of their first NHL championship, will try to clinch the series in a Boston arena where they were trounced in Games Three and Four by a combined 12-1 score.

Canucks coach Alain Vigneault said they know what they have to work on to get their first road win of the series. “(In the) two games in Boston, the second periods were a problem. We played real well in the first two periods, and for whatever reason, the game got away from us in the second,” Vigneault told reporters.

“We need to make every shift in ever y period count and that ’s what we’re going to tr y to do tomorrow.” —Reuters

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Compton cricket team gains international renown COMPTON: Compton Cricket Club players have sipped tea with Prince Edward at Buckingham Palace, played against Aborigines in the Australian outback, and swapped stories of violence-torn neighborhoods with residents of Belfast. At home, though, it’s another story.

American cricketers are already an anomaly, but when they come from Compton, a city on Los Angeles’ southern border known more for gangsta rap and gang shootings, heads near and far spin faster than a cricket bowler’s windup.

“I tell people I play cricket and people automatically think it ’s croquet or an insect,” said player Ricardo Cazarez. “I just tell them go look it up on YouTube.” Decked out in cricket’s obligatory whites, they boast batsmen, bowlers and wicket-keepers (batters, pitchers and catchers) like any other 11-member team, but they profess their passion for the sport in pure Compton style.

Several players sport tattoos saying “cricket outta Compton” and “from gats to bats” (“gats” is street slang for guns). The team, named “the Homies and the Popz,” raps cricket-themed songs titled “Shots” and “Bullets.” A couple players have served jail terms. One missed the Australian trip because he was on parole. Another was killed in a driveby shooting. And two others died in traffic accidents.

“With these guys, seeing is believing,” said Katy Haber, a British film producer whose role as manager encompasses

everything from fundraising for overseas trips to accompanying players to court appearances. Thanks to the far-flung reaches of the old British Empire, the genteel sport is huge around the globe. But in the United States it’s viewed more as a novelty, unique for its slow pace and matches that can last days. Less known about cricket is its high level of sportsmanship.

Arguing with the umpire and “sledging,” or deriding opponents to distract them, are banned. Players are expected to report their own outs if missed by the umpire and applaud good plays by opponents. That etiquette was what drew Compton team founder Ted Hayes to the game in 1995 after Haber invited him one day to play with the Beverly Hills & Hollywood Cricket Club.

Hayes saw that the sport’s code of conduct contained larger life lessons of fair play and civility that could be a useful teaching tool. “This improves citizenship,” said Hayes, who headed a Skid Row homeless shelter at the time. “You’re a much better person when you come off the field.” He and Haber formed a team at the shelter, and then reoriented it to youth, recruiting players from Compton schools.

“I thought it sounded dumb, but a friend went and I liked the fact that you caught balls barehanded so I went,” said Emidio Cazarez, Ricardo’s brother who was in eighth grade at the time and is now team co-captain. They trained with the Beverly Hills club, where they impressed players

with their athletic ability and, as time went on, their staying power. “We get the odd American who wants to try it out, but it usually doesn’t work out,” said Jeremy Reed, team captain. “These guys have really taken

LOS ANGELES: In this Sunday, April 3, 2011 picture, player Bryan Robbins of the Compton Cricket Club, also known as ‘the Homies & the Popz,’ places bails on top of three stumps to form a wicket in preparation for a game against the Simi Sluggers in Los Angeles. —AP

to it.” Other local teams, which mostly comprise expats from cricket-playing nations, were flabbergasted when the Homies showed up on the field in the San Fernando Valley where the Los Angeles Social Cricket Alliance holds its matches. Their loud pregame cheer of “Compton!” is quite a contrast to the chiseled British accents and singsong cadences of South Asian English that are more common among the alliance’s eight clubs.

“When I first heard about them, I said ‘no way’,” said Mahmood Jadwet, founder of the Simi Valley Sloggers, a team on the outskirts of Los Angeles. “But when we played them, it was amazing talent.”

The Homies have had up and down seasons, depending on time for practice. Last year, the club, whose members work as plumbers, flooring installers, journeymen and billing clerks, ranked sixth out of the league’s eight teams. But cricketers say the sport is more than just winning and losing.

The game’s etiquette has helped them mature beyond the confines of urban street culture. They’ve learned to mingle with people of different backgrounds, gain self-confidence and control their tempers. “Growing up in Compton, you’re always defensive. You don’t talk to people,” said Emidio Cazarez, 28.

“I’m more social.”

Isaac Hayes, Ted’s son, credited cricket with steering him away from gangs as a youngster. “It takes guys who usually aren’t kind to each other and makes them say ‘Hi, nice to see you again’,” he said.

“It’s helped me see the world is bigger than my backyard.” The Cazarez brothers, whose third brother Jesse was killed in the driveby, said the sport’s emphasis on accepting the umpire’s call helped them cope. “If something doesn’t go your way, keep your head high and just go with it,” said Ricardo Cazarez, 26. “Life’s not fair sometimes.”

The first US cricket team to undertake a tour to Australia, the team’s fame is spreading. They’ve been invited to play and give inspirational talks to gang members in Birmingham, England, and to compete in the Sarasota Cricket Festival in Florida this fall. Haber is rustling up sponsors.

Closer to home, Ted Hayes is organizing a cricket summer program at an Orange County middle school and has convinced four Los Angeles police officers from the Counterterrorism and Special Operations Bureau to take up the sport. He’s training them so they can join the Homies.

Assistant Commanding Officer Blake Chow said the bureau’s goal is to eventually sponsor a cricket team as a way to build better relations with Muslim youth. “Cricket can be another tool to reach out in that community,” Chow said. “It’s a game built on respect and civil conduct. I think it has a lot of potential.” For some of those on the Compton team, the goal is more personal.

“I don’t want to go back to prison,” said, Efren De Lucas, 25, who served time on weapons charges. “I want to learn this.”—AP

Frazar gets maiden PGA Tour victory in Memphis

SPRINGFIELD: Yani Tseng of Taiwan holds up the Bruce Callis trophy on the 18th green after winning the LPGA State Farm Classic. —AP

Yani bags State Farm Classic SPRINGFIELD: Top-ranked Yani Tseng of Taiwan closed with a 4-under 68 to win the State Farm Classic on Sunday, handing Cristie Kerr her third straight secondplace finish.

Tseng had a 21-under 267 total on the Panther Creek course for her seventh tour title in four years. She also won the season-opening LPGA Thailand this year.

“I just kept telling myself: ‘Focus! Focus!”‘ said Tseng, who was bogey-free over the final two rounds. “I missed a couple of putts but I still was able to make some birdies.”

Tseng bought retired Swedish star Annika Sorenstam’s house — with its giant trophy case — in Florida in 2009. “I go back to my house and see all that empty space and I try to fill it up,” Tseng

said. “I want to put all my amateur trophies in there and get closer.” Kerr, the 2010 winner, finished three strokes back, shooting a 67.

“I played good. I just needed to get some of those putts to the hole, give ‘em a chance to go in,” Kerr said. “It would have been nice to make birdie on the last hole, but it didn’t matter. She was too far ahead.” Paula Creamer and Brittany Lincicome (70) were equal third at 16 under.

This could be the final State Farm Classic on the LPGA Tour. The title sponsor, State Farm Insurance Companies, has declined to renew its commitment after this year and a replacement sponsor has yet to be found, putting the event in danger of folding. —AP

Stage set for Royal Ascot ASCOT: Royal Ascot hosts six of the top 15 rated thoroughbreds in the world next week when the five-day meeting, hosted by Queen Elizabeth II, starts today.

The pomp and ceremony will be ratcheted up several notches as Royal Ascot celebrates its 300th anniversary this year. The meeting commences with three consecutive Group 1 races, the first of which is the Queen Anne Stakes, named after the monarch who saw the potential of Ascot heath in 1711.

Canford Cliffs clashes with three-times Breeders’ Cup winning mare Goldikova in the 1,600m contest. Canford Cliffs’ victory in the Group 1 Lockinge Stakes at Newbury in May was considered the fourth-best performance in world racing this year by the International Federation of Horseracing Authorities.

Later in the St James’s Palace Stakes the world will once more catch a glimpse of Frankel, whose demolition of a classy field in the 2,000 Guineas at Newmarket in April ranks alongside Black Caviar, the Australian sprinter, as the best performance by any racehorse in the world.

Trained by Sir Henry Cecil, who received a knighthood in the Queen’s 85th birthday honours list on Saturday, Frankel has reportedly grown in stature since winning the first British Classic of the season.

“He’s stronger than Newmarket and has done very well physically since the race. He’s growing up and beginning to relax a lot more and we’re very happy with him,” said Cecil.

“He’s more complicated than most as he wants to get on with things but he’s not a monster. He’s just a hot-blooded individual,” he added. Also on the

Tuesday card is the King’s Stand Stakes, which alongside the Golden Jubilee on Friday forms the first two British legs of the Global Sprint Challenge, a series of nine races that take place around the world from February to December. The third race of the series in Britain is the July Cup, held at Newmarket next month.

Tomorrow So You Think, third in the Melbourne Cup in November, bids to improve on his two subsequent runs in Ireland that have placed him in third place on the world stage.

The exciting Australian recruit has left trainer Bart Cummings and now races for Aidan O’Brien. The five-year-old colt has barely been extended in both of his runs this season and is the 1-2 favourite for the Group 1 Prince Of Wales’s Stakes, run over 2,000m.

In opposition are a host of highly-rated colts such as Twice Over, whose victory in the Maktoum Challenge in Dubai in March is considered the equal of Planteur’s success in the Prix Ganay in April. The performance of both colts is rated seventh in the world rankings, while Rewilding, who lines up for Godolphin, is ranked 13th for his victory in the 2,400m Dubai Sheema Classic at Meydan racecourse in March.

Rewilding last ran over the shorter distance of Wednesday’s contest when trained by Andre Fabre in France in 2010 and Simon Crisford, Godolphin’s racing manager, is eager to try the experiment of dropping the colt back.

“It’s a touch race,” said Crisford. “He’s running over ten furlongs, which is a first for him since he left France. It is going to be an interesting exercise to see how he copes with it. — AFP

MEMPHIS: American Harrison Frazar beat Sweden’s Robert Karlsson on the third hole of a sudden-death playoff to win the St. Jude Classic on Sunday for his first PGA Tour title.

The 39-year-old Frazar, in his 355th career start, matched pars with Karlsson on the first two playoff holes and then parred the parfour 12th, which gave him victory when the Swede chipped 12 feet past the hole from greenside rough and failed to make the par putt.

“I never thought this would happen,” Frazar said in a TV interview after his breakthrough win. “The last few years have been long and tough.”

“It’s been tough on me physically, emotionally. I wasn’t sure this would ever happen, but I’m very proud.” Frazar, who had considered quitting the tour, battled back from seasonending hip surgery last August and missed five successive cuts this year before regaining his form.

“It just shows you how sometimes when you let your guard down or you let your expectations soften, you can free yourself up,” said Frazar.

While the American finally tasted victory after four career second-place finishes on tour, Karlsson fell agonisingly short once again at TPC Southwind.

Karlsson, aiming for his first US Tour win after 11 European Tour victories, also lost here

MEMPHIS: Harrison Frazar kisses the championship trophy after winning the St. Jude Classic golf tournament. —AP last year in a four-hole playoff to Briton Lee Westwood.

Frazar and Harrison both finished the regulation 72 holes tied on 13-under-par 267 after

Karlsson shot two-under-par 68 in the final round, and Frazar posted 67 after making a bogey at the 72nd hole after finding water with his approach.

“It was a great match, and someone has got to win and someone has got to lose,” said Karlsson. “This time it was me. I’m very, very proud of the way I played and handled myself.”

Tied for third place on eight-under-par 272 were Camilo Villegas of Colombia (64), Japan’s Ryuji Imada (66), American Charles Howell III (66) and twice U.S. Open winner Retief Goosen of South Africa (69).

Karlsson, 41, who led after the second and third rounds, maintained his one-stroke lead over playing partner Frazar until the American caught him on 14-under with a birdie at the par-three 11th.

By then it had become a two-man race and the final pair matched pars in a tense battle. The Swede opened the door for Frazar at the long par-four 17th where he pulled his drive into deep rough left of the fairway and made bogey. Frazar gave up his one-stroke advantage on the last when he landed his approach shot on the fringe left of the flag and watched his ball spin away down a slope into the drink and made a bogey to set up sudden-death. Karlsson showed his grit, by making an eight-foot par at the last to maintain the tie. —Reuters

Wiebe ends Champions Tour drought CONOVER: Mark Wiebe parred the third playoff hole following a weather delay and won the Greater Hickor y Classic on Sunday when James Mason missed a four-foot par putt.

Wiebe earned his first Champions Tour title since 2008 in a bizarre finish that

included a delay following the first extra hole at Rock Barn.

Mason, a Monday qualifier, three-putted from 20 feet to end his chances of earning a one-year playing exemption on the tour.

In a tournament played in intense heat that yielded a 54hole Champions Tour record

CONOVER: Mark Wiebe holds the trophy after winning the Greater Hickory Classic Champions Tour golf tournament at Rock Barn. —AP

1,147 birdies, both players birdied the 18th in regulation to finish at a tournament-best 19 under. That move them past clubhouse leader Fred Funk, who shot 62 and finished in a share of third with Chip Beck.

The 53-year-old Wiebe, who shot a 7-under 65 in regulation, ended a 77-tournament winless streak. For the 60year-old Mason, it was heartbreak finish to what was nearly a career-changing week.

Mason, whose last win came in 2002, was playing in his first Champions Tour event of the year. He had lost his playing privileges and was 0 for 5 in qualifiers until he shot 62 on Monday, including an ace, to get into the field.

“A win would have meant ever ything. It would have been the culmination of my career,” said Mason, who shot a 65 on Sunday. “That probably would have given me another year and a half out here. I still get a nice check, but a win would have been a total redo of my career again.

But hopefully I’ll get one.”

Loren Roberts (65) and Nick Price (66) were equal fifth, two shots back. Jeff Sluman (67) finished alone in seventh, three back.

Bob Tway, who led by one shot after the first and second rounds, faded after a doublebogey on the sixth. He shot 71 and fell back to eighth place.

Wiebe and Mason both made nearly identical 15-foot birdie putts on the first playoff hole at No. 18. Immediately after Mason’s putt, a storm moved into the area and play

was delayed for just over an hour. For a while, the two golfers sat in their carts near the clubhouse chatting before a break in the weather had the players hustling back to the 18th tee. Wiebe then missed a birdie putt from 15 feet to send the players back to No. 17.

Wiebe’s tee shot on the par3 landed 40 feet left of the hole. His first putt ran five feet by, but he curled in the par putt. Mason sent his birdie putt past the hole, then missed the next putt for his first bogey of the day.

“I feel for James,” Wiebe said. “I’m tickled to have won this tournament, beside myself, so happy. I’m sorry for James that’s the way it happened for him. He played great this week.” Funk ’s 62 ended a wild week which began when he earned a spot in next week’s U.S. Open in sectional qualifying.

Two days later he injured his left thumb when he hit a railing with his club on the deck during a warmup swing.

He got a cor tisone shot Thursday night and said he felt better Sunday. He then took the outright lead with a birdie on 16 and faced the prospect with a birdie-eagle finish of recording the Champions Tour’s first 59. “It did enter my mind,” Funk said.

But Funk narrowly left a birdie putt short on 17 and his approach shot to 18 from 65 yards came up well short of the hole.

He then missed the long birdie putt and could only watch as Wiebe and Mason moved past him. —AP

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Busy summer for Asian stars in European market SEOUL: The summer transfer market will be a busy one for some of the top talent from Asia, with established stars chasing bigger deals and another group of young guns heading to Europe.

Keisuke Honda and Park Chu-young are looking for new clubs after proving their worth in Europe, while top continental prospects Takashi Usami of Japan and South Korea’s Ji Dong-won are set to join some of football’s biggest leagues.

Australians Lucas Neill and Harry Kewell are also on the move _ with 32year-old Kewell considering a move into the A-League amid much speculation in his homeland. Ji could be the first to complete a deal.

The 20-year-old Chunnam Dragons striker is expected to sign with Sunderland and become the eighth South Korean to play in the English Premier League.

“Of course I want to go to Europe,” Ji said after scoring for Chunnam at Incheon United on the weekend. “Talks are progressing to that end.”

Ji has a buy-out clause in his K-League contract and will cost Sunderland, a midranking team, around $1 million (euro697,000). The amount has been criti-

cized in the Korean media as too low for one of the country’s top prospects.

“The club and my agent know the details of the contract well,” Ji said. “I don’t know so much. It is not a big problem and won’t be difficult.” After scoring in a friendly against Ghana last week — his sixth goal in 11 internationals — the striker is looking forward to returning to England where he spent 10 months in 2007 as a member of Reading’s youth team.

“That was just a short time but I learned a lot. The lifestyle is not easy but I want the challenge of playing there again,” he said. “I worked hard in the Kleague to play in Europe. The opportunity has come more quickly than I thought.”

Usami also has a buyout clause in his contract with Gamba Osaka and the J-League club is resigned to losing the player.

Usami is only 19 and is expected to join German giant Bayern Munich. There are a growing number of Japanese players impressing in the Bundesliga with Shinji Kagawa at Borussia Dortmund and Atusto Uchida at Schalke already making their marks in the league.

“If I have a chance then I want to move to Europe while I am still young but I can’t

make any comment (about the move),” Usami told local media last week while on duty with the Japanese national team.

Borussia Dortmund has also been linked with teenage Australian Mustafa Amini, who plays in the A-League for Central Coast Mariners.

At 32, Kewell is still one of Australia’s biggest stars and is on the move after leaving Turkish team Galatasaray. The former Leeds United and Liverpool player has been reportedly linked to newly promoted English Premier League team QPR, but Australian teams are vying with the London club for his signature.

Clubs in Sydney and Melbourne are reportedly trying to lure Kewell, although there are concerns that they will struggle to meet the player’s financial demands, reported in the Australian media to be around $2.5 million (euro1.7 million) a year.

“Any successful Socceroo who is interested in returning to Australia, be it Tim Cahill or Harry or whoever, will be of interest to us, and Harry is one of the most successful of all time,” Sydney FC chief executive Dick Melton said.

“Whether it’s the right time for him

remains to be seen but we need to show respect to our fans and Harry in that if he decides to come back to Australia, we’ll put our case forward.” Kewell’s manager, Bernie Mandic, told yesterday’s Sydney Morning Herald newspaper that some of the speculation about Kewell’s asking price was absurd, adding that any move back to Australia would be on an entirely incentive-based deal. Like Kewell, Neill has been released by Galatasaray. But the Socceroos captain has ruled out a return to Australia just yet.

The 33-year-old ex-Blackburn Rovers, West Ham and Everton defender wants to stay in Europe to improve his chances of playing at the 2014 World Cup. “I still feel I’ve got a lot to offer there. I want to be playing at the highest level possible for me, to reward myself and my country with more opportunities,” Neill said.

Asian players who have already made their names in Europe are also ready to transfer to bigger clubs and leagues. Park, South Korea’s captain, is leaving AS Monaco after three seasons. The striker scored 12 goals as the club was relegated from France’s top tier, and at the age of 25,

has already stated that he will head elsewhere.

“My first choice is to play for a team in the UEFA Champions League,” Park said this month. Expected to cost around $9 million (euro6.2 million), he has been linked with moves to Liverpool and Bolton Wanderers of the English Premier League.

Liverpool, as well as Manchester City and Arsenal, has also been mentioned as a possible destination for Honda. One of the stars of the 2010 World Cup for Japan, Honda could leave CSKA Moscow this summer.

Ali Al Habsi is likely to leave Bolton. The Omani goalkeeper was loaned by Bolton to Wigan Athletic last season and helped to keep Wigan in the Premier League.

Such were his performances that he was named Wigan’s Player of the Season and the club wants to make him a permanent member of the roster. Bolton is asking for $8.1 million (euro5.6 million).

Japanese defender Yuto Nagatomo is another player about to have a loan deal made permanent. Nagatomo spent the second half of last season with Italian giants Inter from fellow Serie A club Cesena. —AP

Mexico, Costa Rica in q-finals

BUENOS AIRES: Boca Juniors’ Martin Palermo gestures to fans after playing his last match at La Bombonera stadium after an Argentine league soccer match with Banfield. Palermo is retiring from professional soccer. —AP

Velez win title, Palermo says adios to Bombonera BUENOS AIRES: The party at Boca Juniors for striker Mar tin Palermo’s last Bombonera match before retiring was louder than Velez Sarsfield’s Argentine title celebrations on Sunday.

Boca could not manage a victory to mark their 37-year-old record marksman’s home farewell and were held 1-1 by Banfield, hours after Velez clinched their eighth league title with a match to spare after beating Huracan 2-0 away on the season’s penultimate weekend.

Second-placed Lanus bowed out of the race after their first home defeat of the Clausura championship, 1-0 to Argentinos Juniors, left them four points behind Velez. Palermo did not add to his Clausura tally of six goals as Nicolas Colazo put Boca ahead less than two minutes into the second half before Banfield put a damper on the festivities equalising with a Facundo Ferreyra header six minutes from time.

“I still can’t believe it. Palermo, who is my idol, came to greet me at the final whistle and wish me the best for the future,” a stunned Ferreyra told Futbol Para Todos. “I experienced so many things at this ground. I never imagined the fans would show me so much affection ... I’m enjoying this moment which is unique,” a tearful Palermo said.

Thousands of fans lined the streets leading to the Bombonera before the match to cheer Palermo as he was taken to the ground known as the Chocolate Box in a convertible Torino.

Leading figures of Argentine soccer including Diego Maradona were at the ground where two fork-lift truck came onto the pitch after the final whistle to pick up the entire goal in front of the ter-

races as a gift to Palermo.

“This goal is special for me. Every time the ball hit this net it was an emotional moment,” Palermo told the crowd before a show of fireworks.

Velez celebrated their title two hours after their match at Huracan, the time it took for Argentinos to end Lanus’s hopes in a later kickoff. “We deserved it because we’re the best (team) in Argentine football,” Velez’s Ricky Alvarez was quoted as saying by spor ts daily Ole (www.ole.com.ar).

Uruguayan striker Santiago Silva headed Velez into the lead six minutes after halftime in a match played behind closed doors because of a ban on spectators at Huracan’s Duco stadium after crowd trouble three weeks ago.

Substitute David Ramirez converted a late penalty for his eighth goal of the championship as Velez’s top scorer after team mate Sebastian Dominguez and Huracan defender Facundo Quiroga were sent off in the 75th minute for fighting.

Argentinos scored their winner in the 57th minute when Gustavo Oberman’s lob came back off the post to German Basualdo who squared the ball for striker Nicolas Blandi to fire home.

Boca’s arch-rivals River Plate drew 1-1 away to Estudiantes, Apertura winners in the first half of the season, and remain at risk of dropping into the relegation-promotion playoffs if they lose at home to Lanus in their last match next weekend.

Right back Paulo Ferrari fired River into the lead early in the second half with a fine left-footed shot from outside the box but defender Matias Sarulyte headed the equaliser six minutes later from a Leandro Benitez free kick. —Reuters

CHICAGO: A depleted Mexico squad reached the Gold Cup quarterfinals after capping an unbeaten preliminary stage with a 4-1 win over Costa Rica, which also advanced as the second-place team in Group A. Andres Guardado scored twice as defending champion Mexico took a 3-0 lead by the 26th minute against Costa Rica on Sunday. It was Mexico’s second win since five players were suspended last week for testing positive for the banned substance clenbuterol in results which the national federation is blaming on food contamination. Mexico finished the group stage with 14 goals from three wins and conceded just one goal: a 69th-minute strike by Marco Urena of Costa Rica.

Costa Rica finished with four points, equal with El Salvador but marginally ahead on goal differential. “It was easy for Mexico,” Costa Rica coach Ricardo Lavolpe said through an interpreter. “ Too simple.” Goalkeeper Guillermo Ochoa and defender Francisco Rodriguez, both regular starters for Mexico, were among the five players dropped from the squad last Thursday after the positive drug tests.

The Mexican federation has blamed the results on contaminated meat and applied to replace the players, but Concacaf officials are seeking more information before making a decision.

Coach Manuel de la Torre said Mexico’s goal remains the same, regardless of how many players he has to select from. “The main objective is to win the Gold Cup,” he said. “ This group very much knows what it needs to do to represent Mexico. Whatever situation is presented, the team knows the only way to get where we need to go is on the field.” Costa Rica, which has made the quarterfinals in the last five Gold Cups, was expected to be Mexico’s toughest opponent in the group stage.

But Mexico overwhelmed Costa Rica with its fast-paced, energetic style, much to the delight of the sellout crowd of 62,000 at Chicago’s Soldier Field — overwhelmingly supporting Mexico. Any hope Costa Rica had of an upset win was gone by the 20th minute, with Rafael Marquez (17th) and Guardado (19th) giving Mexico a quick 2-0 advantage.

“It was like a splash of cold water,” Lavolpe said. “We couldn’t react.” Guardado scored again in the 26th minute with a strike from the edge of the box. Pablo Barrera made it 4-0 in the 38th.

The margin could have even been greater, but Manchester United’s Javier Hernandez missed a shot from close range and Costa Rica goalkeeper Keylor Navas tipped a second-half shot by Salcido over the crossbar. “It’s true we played a good match,” de la Torre said. “But there is always room for improvement.”

El Salvador finished with a resounding 6-1 win over Cuba, with Rodolfo Zelaya scoring a goal in each half. Osael Romero, Lester Blanco, Arturo Alvarez and Eliseo Quintanilla also scored for El Salvador, which needed Mexico to thrash Costa Rica in the later match to have any chance of advancing.

Cuba finally got its first goal of the tournament when Jeniel Marquez scored in the 83rd minute. But the Cubans, who were eliminated with the loss, conceded 16 goals in the tournament — the most by any team.

Corinthians defeat Fluminense SAO PAULO: Striker Willian scored two first-half goals as Corinthians defeated defending champion Fluminense 2-0 on Sunday to close in on the top spot in the Brazilian league standings.

Corinthians is now only two points behind Sao Paulo, which beat Gremio 31 at home on Saturday to become the only team to start the tournament with four straight victories. Willian scored with a header off a cross by midfielder Danilo in the sixth minute, then converted a penalty kick in the 30th after former Sporting striker Liedson was fouled inside the area.

The loss at Sao Paulo’s Pacaembu stadium dropped Fluminense to 10th

place in the 20-team standings. It was the debut match for new coach Abel Braga, a former Marseille manager who was signed to replace Muricy Ramalho, who resigned earlier this year after leading the team to the national title in 2010.

“We allowed the early goal and that made things difficult,” Braga said. “But we played better in the second half and that was important looking forward.”

Fluminense also lost former Chelsea playmaker Deco, who left the match at halftime with an injured right leg. He missed several games last year because of an injured right thigh muscle.

In other matches, Palmeiras drew 2-2

with Internacional in Porto Alegre, while Ronaldinho’s Flamengo drew 1-1 with second-to-last-place Atletico Paranaense in Curitiba. Botafogo also defeated Brazilian Cup runner-up Coritiba 3-1 in Rio de Janeiro, while Bahia drew Atletico Mineiro 1-1 in Pituacu.

Internacional got on the scoreboard first when Palmeiras midfielder Marcio Araujo found his own net while trying to clear a cross inside the area.

Palmeiras, eight-time league champions, rallied with two unanswered goals before forward Leandro Damiao scored the equalizer from close range off a corner kick in injury time. —AP

CHICAGO: Costa Rica’s Bryan Ruiz (right) controls the ball against Mexico’s Israel Castro during the first half of a Concacaf Gold Cup soccer match. —AP

CHICAGO: El Salvador’s Lester Blanco(17) scores against Cuba during the second half of a Concacaf Gold Cup soccer match at Soldier Field. —AP A Cuban player also defected during the tournament, leaving the team hotel in Charlotte, North Carolina. In an interview aired Sunday on Univision, 30-year-old Yosniel Mesa said he decided before the tournament to defect because he wanted to play professionally, an option not available to him in

Cuba.

A 5-0 loss to Mexico last Thursday, Mesa says he climbed down a fire escape ladder and ran to a car where family members were waiting. Mesa was listed as “injured” on Cuba’s team sheet for Sunday’s 6-1 loss to El Salvador in Chicago. —AP

Man United capture Jones MANCHESTER: Manchester United announced the capture of promising defender Phil Jones from Blackburn yesterday, marking Alex Ferguson’s first foray into the offseason transfer market.

The 19-year-old Englishman has agreed a five-year deal with the Premier League champions that he will sign after returning from the European Under-21 Championship. “This is a once in a lifetime opportunity and I am looking forward to a new challenge,” Jones wrote on his Twitter account.

Blackburn described the deal as a “club record,” which means it will eclipse

the 17.5 million pounds (then $29 million) that Manchester City paid for striker Roque Santa Cruz two years ago.

Even before the transfer was announced, United striker Wayne Rooney described Jones as “one of the toughest defenders I played against last season.” Jones, who only played 40 times for Blackburn, will face stiff competition for a spot in central defense from Rio Ferdinand, Nemanja Vidic, Jonny Evans and Chris Smalling.

“Welcome to Phil Jones, another top young talent joining the club,” Ferdinand said. “The future is bright.”

Jones passed a medical examination last week before traveling with the England Under-21 squad to Denmark where he played Sunday in a 1-1 draw against Spain. The signing reflects the importance manager Ferguson is placing on youngsters.

While United won a record 19th English title in May, the team was outclassed by Barcelona in the Champions League final.

Jones was one of four United players to feature against Spain, with Smalling, Danny Welbeck and Tom Cleverley also in action for England. —AP

Mexico, Costa Rica in Gold Cup q-finals

Gordon clinches Sprint Cup race

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Tyson makes it alive and well to Hall of Fame Page 17

MIAMI: The Dallas Mavericks celebrate after Game 6 of the NBA Finals basketball game against the Miami Heat. The Mavericks won 105-95 to win the series.—AP

Mavericks top Heat for NBA title MIAMI: The Dallas Mavericks and Dirk Nowitzki claimed their long-awaited first NBA title by winning Game 6 of the finals in Miami 105-95 on Sunday night, celebrating on the Heat’s home floor to avenge what happened five years ago.

The Mavericks won four of the series’ last five games this time, a turnaround that could not have been sweeter after the Heat won the 2006 title in Game 6 at Dallas. “I really still can’t believe it,” said the German star Nowitzki, who had 21 points and was voted Most Valuable Player of the finals series. “ Tonight,” Jason Terry said after leading Dallas with 27 points, “we got vindication.” LeBron James did not. Not even close, and a year unlike any other ended the way they all have so far — with him still waiting for an NBA title.

He scored 21 points for Miami, shook a few hands after ward, and departed before most of the Mavs tugged on their championship hats

and T-shirts. Chris Bosh had 19, Mario Chalmers 18 and Wade 17 for the Heat.

“We worked so hard and so long for it,” Nowitzki said.

“The team has had an unbelievable ride.” The Mavericks took control in the second half of the game after some wild momentum shifts in the opening two quarters. Miami took its last lead of the game just 64 seconds into the second half, lost it 16 seconds later and chased the Mavericks the rest of the way. Nowitzki sealed the win with 2:27 left, hitting a jumper near the Miami bench to put Dallas up 99-89. He then walked to the Mavs’ side slowly, right fist clenched above his head.

“This is a true team,” Mavs coach Rick Carlisle said. “This is an old bunch.

We don’t run fast or jump high. These guys had each other’s backs. We played the right way. We trusted the pass. This is a phenomenal thing for the city of Dallas.” Carlisle joined a highly elite group with the win — those with NBA

titles as both a player and a head coach. He was a part of the Boston Celtics team that won the championship over the Houston Rockets in 1986. Only 10 other men are on that list, including Lakers coach Phil Jackson and Heat President Pat Riley — who led Miami past Dallas in 2006 as coach and was the mastermind of what the Heat did last summer by getting James, Wade and Bosh on the same team with an eye on becoming a dynasty. But after 72 wins this season, including playoffs, the Heat lost their last game.

And that means this year was a disappointment — except to just about ever yone else in the NBA, or so it would seem. Hating the Heat became the NBA’s craze this season, and the team knew it had no shortage of critics, everyone from Cleveland (where “Cavs for Mavs” shirts were popular during these finals) to Chicago (the city James and Wade both flirted with last summer) and just about every place in

Lisicki lifts Aegon Classic title BIRMINGHAM: Sabine Lisicki, who slipped outside the world’s top 200 last year after seven weeks on crutches, beat fourth-seeded Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia 6-3, 62 to win the Aegon Classic yesterday.

The 21-year-old German, whose only previous tour victory was in Charleston in 2007, secured her second career title after the final had been postponed from Sunday due to rain.

In a performance showing how well she has recovered from an ankle injury and how ideally her game is suited to grass, Lisicki broke her opponent in the fourth game. From there, her booming serve and fierce ground strokes always made her the likely winner.

Yesterday’s success in the grass-court event comes a week before the start of Wimbledon, where Lisicki reached the quarterfinals in 2009. It also confirmed the wisdom of the Wimbledon committee which decided Sunday to give Lisicki one of two remaining wild cards for the championships. “I am in disbelief,” Lisicki said.

“I am shaking. It’s an amazing week. At the start of it I never thought I would be standing here today. The comeback from injury was so difficult, it means so much to me,” she said. The German only recovered some composure after gently being asked not to drip tears into the Maude Watson trophy, an elegant antique silver bowl.

Looking back at her recovery, Lisicki added: “There were so many doubters, and so much stuff coming from the sidelines that I wouldn’t get there. So I had this tunnel vision about getting back. I always thought I would.”

Hantuchova, who beat former top-ranked Ana Ivanovic in the semifinals, had been carrying a shoulder injury which may have affected her serve and was perhaps slightly below her best.

She only once looked like getting back into the match, at break point in the eighth game, only for Lisicki to produce two heavy, well-placed drives to escape trouble.

Lisicki, who was billed as one of the WTA Tour’s new young hopes when she reached the verge of the top 20 two years ago, now seems to be close to her level of 2009 and is clearly looking forward to Wimbledon.

“If I hadn’t been given the wild card, I would have been playing the qualifying tomorrow and it will be very helpful to be able to rest for a couple of days instead,” she said. “But I don’t want to put pressure on myself.”—AP

between lining up to take shots at Miami. “It goes without saying,” Heat coach Erik Spoelstra said. “You’re never really prepared for a moment like this. ... Neither team deserved this championship more than the other, but Dallas earned it.” For the second time, James went to the finals, only to see the other team celebrate. San Antonio won in Cleveland in 2007, and four years later, he saw the Mavs celebrate on his new floor. “It was a failure in ‘07 when we lost to the Spurs when I was in Cleveland,” James said. “It’s a failure now.” The Heat raced out to an early 2011 lead in the game, with James making his first four shots. But the advantage was quickly erased as Dallas went to the zone defense that befuddled Miami again.

Dallas then went on a 21-4 run over 51/2 minutes, making 9 of 12 shots.

Much of that came with Nowitzki on the bench with two fouls, the first time he’s received more than one in the

opening quarter of a playoff game this season. DeShawn Stevenson made a pair of 3-pointers within a span of 24 seconds to give Dallas a 40-28 lead with 9:42 left in the half.

But Miami scored the next 14 points to reclaim the lead at 42-40, a run broken only after Stevenson, Udonis Haslem and Chalmers got technical fouls with 6:25 left in the half following a midcourt altercation.

The Heat had chances to take command of the game in the second half and wasted them all. They missed 13 of their 33 free throws, let the Mavericks score 27 points off turnovers and simply couldn’t get a rebound in the final minutes.

Nowitzki finished 9 for 27, and the Mavs still won. He was 1 for 12 in the first half, and they were still ahead, 5351, thanks largely to Terry’s 19 points on 8-of-10 shooting, along with a 17-4 edge in points off turnovers. Plus, after James got off to such a fast start, he

had two points in the final 19 minutes of the half. He didn’t score in the second half until a layup with 1:49 remained in the third.

Jason Kidd made a 3-pointer late in the period, pushing the Dallas lead to 79-71. The lead was 81-72 entering the fourth, after Ian Mahinmi made a foulline jumper as time expired in the third — his third basket of the entire series.

When the Mavericks took a 2-0 lead in Dallas during the ‘06 finals, plans for their victory parade were announced.

But the Mavs didn’t win another game in that series. Now, that parade will finally happen with Dallas getting its first title more than 30 years after the team was founded in 1980. Kidd, at 38 years old, also got his first championship, as did Nowitzki at 32 and Terry at 33. Miami, meanwhile, faces a gloomy offseason. “It hurts,” James said.

“Of course. I’m not going to hang my head low. I know how much work as a team we put into it.”—AP

Murray crowned king of Queen’s

BIRMINGHAM: Germany’s Sabine Lisicki holds her trophy after defeating Slovakia’s Daniela Hantuchova 6-3, 6-2, in the Aegon Classic final.—AP

Venus returns with victory EASTBOURNE: American Venus Williams marked her return from an abdominal injury with an impressive 7-5 5-7 6-3 victory over Germany’s Andrea Petkovic at the Eastbourne championships yesterday.

The five-times Wimbledon champion, playing her first match since January’s Australian Open third round when she retired after one game also against Petkovic, looked completely at home on the slick grasscourts.

Despite opening the contest with two double-faults in difficult windy conditions on the southern English coast, she battled back from a break down to take the opening set. Petkovic, one of the most improved players on the Tour this year, hit back to level as the sun broke through on centre court but Williams, who turns 31 this week, raised her game when it mattered to claim victory against the eighth seed. Neither Venus nor sister Serena, who stole the spotlight on Monday despite not even playing after her decision to return here after a year out with injury and a life-threatening illness, are seeded at the traditional Wimbledon warm-up. Venus has not played at Eastbourne since she came through the qualifying rounds in 1997 while Serena, the 13times grand slam champion, made her only appearance a year later.—Reuters

LONDON: Britain’s Andy Murray clinched his second Queen’s title with a 3-6, 7-6 (7/2), 6-4 victory over French fifth seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga in the final yesterday.

Murray, who also won the Wimbledon warm-up event in 2009, is the first Briton to lift the Queen’s trophy twice since Francis Gordon Lowe achieved his second of three titles in 1914.

It was also Murray’s first ATP title since beating Roger Federer at the Shanghai Masters in October and earned the Scot a cheque for 77,500 euros ($112,000).

More important than any financial gain, this gutsy victory was the perfect confidence boost for the world number four ahead of Wimbledon, which starts in a week’s time.

Murray arrived in west London to begin his grass-court campaign nursing serious concerns over the ankle ligament injury he suffered at the French Open.

But the second seed has been able to put aside those fears as the ankle held up well and the manner of this come -from-behind win will have pleased him even more.

Murray said: “Tsonga was playing a different sport to me in the first two sets. He’s so much fun to watch. “He was using variation on his serve, and a lot of aggression. But I managed to break him eventually.

“My ankle has got much better.

This has been one of the most funs weeks I’ve had on the tour. I’ve loved it.” Tsonga added: “Of course there is a bit of frustration. I was not far from winning but this is tennis. “To win a match you have to take your opportunities and he played a good match.”

Tsonga had beaten Murray in a friendly game of table-tennis as they

LONDON: Britain’s Andy Murray lifts up the trophy after defeating France’s Jo-Wilfried Tsonga at the end of their singles final tennis match at the Queen’s Club grass court championships.—AP waited in vain for the rain to relent on Sunday, but it was not a lucky omen for the fifth seed in the rescheduled final. Tsonga landed the first blow as he broke for a 4-2 lead when he correctly challenged that his forehand was in. The flamboyant Frenchman has a well-deserved reputation as one of the game’s great entertainers and he showed off his trademark diving volley, as well as an athletic overhead smash, to keep Murray at bay in the next game.

Murray was struggling to find the majestic form that demolished threetime Wimbledon finalist Andy Roddick in less than an hour in the semi-finals.

Roddick had pleaded with Murray to “keep it social” during that rout but Tsonga was a far more obdurate opponent.

Even when Murray produced a sublime pass on the run to bring up two break points at 3-5, Tsonga came

up with a perfect forehand followed by a big serve to get out of trouble and clinch the first set.

Tsonga, who had the added incentive of avenging last year’s quarterfinal defeat by Murray at Wimbledon, won the point of the match to make it 2-2 in the second set by keeping his balance to chase down a net cord and then a lob before driving a blistering forehand winner.

To his credit, Murray kept battling away. He had four break points for a 53 lead, but Tsonga found a way out of trouble each time.

Tsonga had two break points of his own at 5-5 and this time Murray caught a break as a net cord saved the second. Both players were at their best now and Murray’s remarkable forehand through his legs was met with more Tsonga acrobatics as the Frenchman held serve to set up a tiebreak. —AFP

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Burgan Bank announces names of lucky winners of Yawmi Account Page 23 TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

GM envisions future of urban mobility

Recovery fears stalk global markets Page 26

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Oil dips as investors eye US economy Expectations rise on Saudi to increase output SAKHIR: In this file photo, oil workers are seen at an oil pump at sunset, in the desert oil fields of Bahrain. — AP

SINGAPORE: Oil edged lower yesterday, with Brent below $119, as growing investor concern about a slowdown in the United States and other industrialised economies combined with expec tations that top exporter Saudi Arabia would increase output. Japan’s core machinery orders unexpectedly fell in April, government data showed, adding to doubts about the pace of global economic recovery as the Federal Reserve’s $600 billion bond purchase program expires this month.

Brent crude for July slipped 20 cents to $118.58 a barrel by 0339 GMT, while US crude shed 35 cents to $98.94, trading close to a record discount of almost $20 to the European benchmark as a glut in the US Midwest persists. Saudi Arabia will raise output to 10 million barrels per day (bpd) in July, Saudi newspaper al-Hayat reported on Friday, as Riyadh goes it alone to pump more outside official OPEC policy, aiming to place additional supplies among Asian buyers.

“Saudi Arabia is going to attempt to increase oil production and there are ongoing concerns about a global economic slowdown,” said Serene Lim, an oil analyst at ANZ in Singapore. “I f we continue seeing US economic releases painting a weak picture, it’s

something to watch out for.

Today risk aversion is just flowing over from Friday.” US crude shed 2.6 percent in Friday’s session.

Asian stocks ex tended a seven-week losing streak and the dollar gained more than 0.1 percent against a basket of currencies, as European powers haggle over a fresh rescue pack age for Greece. The “money manager” speculator group cut its net long position on US crude futures and options by 33,466 contracts to 190,974 in the week to June 7 on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the Commodit y Futures Trading Commission said on Friday.

US producer prices and retail sales data today would provide a cue for prices, followed by industrial production and housing statistics due later in the week . Top oil expor ter Saudi Arabia has offered more crude to Asian refiners in July, evidence that it is taking steps to unilaterally increase supplies after OPEC talks collapsed last week. But Iran’s OPEC governor said over the weekend an increase in crude output by the Saudis would not change market conditions as demand is for lighter oil than the kingdom provides, reiterating Tehran’s stance there was no need to boost production.

Continuing unrest in the Middle East and North Africa kept a floor under prices.

Rebels fighting against Libyan leader Muammar G addafi launched an offensive on Sunday to retake the oil town of Brega but were repelled in a battle which k illed at least four fighters, rebels and doctors said.

The United Arab Emirates said on Sunday it had recognised Libyan rebels as the sole legitimate representative of the Libyan people, the state news agenc y repor ted, becoming the second Arab state to take such a move.

“The fact that over the weekend we saw some of the rebels fighting against Gadaffi forces and in Syria there are fears that it might slide into civil war will continue to support oil prices,” Lim said.

The main Syrian ac tivist group organising protests said on Sunday a violent crackdown had killed 1,300 civilians and called on President Bashar Al-Assad to step down to transform the country into a democracy.

In Yemen, talks to resolve the country’s political crisis have failed after the deputy to wounded President Ali Abdullah Saleh refused to speak with groups demanding he cede power immediately, opposition figures said. — Reuters

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B U S I NE S S

Rich Qatar needs to develop wealth management, says BCG Shell’s QatarPearlGTL ships firstgas oil DOHA: Qatar’s banking sector should develop its wealth management services to profit from the large number of high net-worth individuals in the wealthy Gulf state, Boston Consulting Group said yesterday. Qatar has the third-highest density of millionaires in the world after Singapore and Switzerland, with 8.9 percent of households having $1 million or more in assets to manage, according to a study done by the company.

“There is a large opportunity for local banks to seize. But so far in Qatar, there hasn’t been a bank that has got the business model right,” said Douglas Beal, managing director at Boston Consulting Group based in Dubai. “It’s not that they haven’t succeeded, it’s that they haven’t really tried yet.” The tiny Gulf state, which sits on the world’s third-largest natural gas reserves, has emerged in recent years as an economic powerhouse thanks to its copious supplies of natural gas.

It now is the world’s richest nation with the largest per-capita income, an obvious opportunity for wealth management. In 2010, Qatar had about $183 billion in assets under management, according to the study. Qatar is widely viewed as overbanked, with 18 banks operating in a nation of only 1.7 million, including seven

foreign-owned lenders such as European behemoths HSBC and BNP Paribas.

“In Qatar, there are too many banks chasing too few customers.

Wealth managers need to realise that they will be one of four or five providers to that individual. I don’t think any bank in Qatar has tried to address that yet,” Beal said. Banks in the Gulf Cooperation Council have only recently started to create wealth management businesses, with most of these targeting people with between $100,000 and $1 million to manage.

“If you’re in the asset management business in Qatar, you want to focus on the $5 million and above group. Most of the wealthy keep about one-third of their wealth onshore, and they’re looking for someone locally to manage that money. There’s a lot of profit to be made from that.” Globally,

the wealth management sector is expected to grow at a compounded annual rate of 5.9 percent from year-end 2010 through 2015 to about $162 trillion, driven by the performance of the capital markets and economic growth in emerging markets, the company’s report said.

Meanwhile, Royal Dutch Shell has shipped the first cargo of gas oil from its Pearl gas to liquids (GTL) plant in Qatar, it said in a statement yesterday. Qatar is a major gas producer but a minnow in oil output. A second train production is expected to start up before the end of 2011, the statement said.

The plant is the largest energy project ever launched in Qatar and is expected to reach full production capacity by the middle of 2012. “The Pearl GTL project will play an important role in further

CSR assigns stable rating to Boubyan KUWAIT: Capital Standards Rating Co (CSR) has assigned an Insurer Financial Strength Rating (IFSR) of BB and a national scale rating of BBB to Boubyan Takaful Insurance Company KSC (Closed). The outlook for the rating is stable.

This is the first time that CSR has rated Boubyan Takaful. CSR’s rating reflects Boubyan Takaful’s good capitalization and liquidity position relative to the risks underwritten. The rating also considers the strong shareholder support which has been instrumental in driving the company’s business since its establishment. However, Boubyan Takaful is relatively a new company, and the rating is therefore constrained by its small market share and high cost structure.

Investment losses impacting the company’s profitability, to some extent, have also put a downward pressure on the rating.

Boubyan Takaful, established in 2006, operates as the Islamic insurance arm of Boubyan Bank, and is the first insurance company with the ‘bancassurance’ model in Kuwait. The company, which mainly operates in Kuwait, offers a number of takaful policies covering marine and aviation, general accident, motor vehicles and life insurance segments. However, motor vehicles and life insurance segments dominate a significant portion of the company’s underwriting income contributing 43.7 percent and 24.8 percent respectively in FY 2010. In the same year, the company reported a combined ratio of 138.5 percent due to its high cost structure. High underwriting costs, driven by Boubyan Takaful’s expansion plans, along with the intense competition in the Kuwait insurance market will continue to strain the underwriting performance in the near future. Nevertheless, CSR believes that Boubyan Takaful might be able to alleviate the challenges on its underwriting performance, if

the company successfully implements its strategy of enhancing distribution network as well as product portfolio.

The company has good capitalization in relation to the insurance risk being underwritten.

As of FY 2010, the solvency ratio was 25.9 percent, and the underwriting leverage stood at a low of 0.65x as compared to the total capital base. The investment strategy is relatively conservative as the company invests mainly in managed funds. While the investment portfolio is moderately diversified, the funds are exposed to market volatility and during the last two years the unrealized losses negatively impacted the profitability of the shareholders’ account.

The outlook for Boubyan Takaful’s rating is stable. CSR views Boubyan Takaful’s strategy of maintaining adequate financial flexibility, and development of distribution network and product portfolio, as positive measures to improve market share and mitigate the intense competition in the Takaful sector. We anticipate that the company will continue to maintain adequate capitalization and conservative reserving practices. The rating could be upgraded in the future if Boubyan Takaful is able to gain a competitive position by garnering substantial direct market share. On the other hand, the rating may be lowered if there is further deterioration in the underwriting performance, or a significant increase in high risk assets, which could negatively impact the company’s capital adequacy.

According to CSR’s national scale, the rating of ‘BBB-KW’ reflects Boubyan Takaful’s credit worthiness relative to its domestic peers. CSR developed the National Rating Scale to facilitate the assessment of rated entities in the country, giving Kuwaiti and foreign investors a tool to make finer credit distinctions between local issuers.

enhancing our diversification of the North Field gas utilisation and will support the optimisation of Qatar’s competitive position in the world markets by supplying high quality GTL products,” Qatari Energy Minister Mohammed AlSada said in the statement.

The project, a joint development by Qatar Petroleum and Shell located at Qatar’s industrial city of Ras Laffan, will produce GTL products including diesel, kerosene, naphtha and lubricant oils, as well as condensates and liquefied petroleum gas (LPG). Once fully operational, Pearl is expected to produce 1.6 billion cubic feet of gas per day from the North Field, which will be processed to deliver an expected 120,000 barrels per day of condensate, LPG and ethane and an expected 140,000 barrels per day of GTL products, the statement said. —Reuters

Al-Mulla Exchange pioneers new concept KUWAIT: Scoring another first, AlMulla Exchange, which pioneered the concepts of Real Time Gross Settlements (RTGS) and National Electronic Funds Transfer (NEFT) facilities in Kuwait, is now offering account holders of Federal Bank in India the ability to transfer their money on a server to server connectivity using global safety standards. Federal Bank customers can now rest assured that within seconds of receiving the receipt from Al-Mulla Exchange, their Federal Bank account will be credited with the amount, in India at anytime, and that too without any manual intervention at both ends. This is applicable even on Indian public holidays.

Al-Mulla Exchange continues to understand the latent remittance needs of customers and then develops unique products that meet these requirements. Due to the efficiency of their personnel, excellent services, use of cuttingedge technology and the introduction of distinctive financial transaction products, within a shor t span of time Al-Mulla Exchange has been recognized as one of the most dynamic money remittance organizations in Kuwait.

KUWAIT: Al-Muzaini Exchange Co officials pose for a picture during the draw.

KUWAIT: Customers try their hand at winning in the draw.

Second draw on ‘Transfer and Win with Al-Muzaini’ KUWAIT: Al-Muzaini Exchange Co is the leading exchange company in Kuwait. The company has been established in 1942 and is known for its dedication towards its customers and the top quality services. AlMuzaini Exchange Co has more than 45 branches spread all over Kuwait including Kuwait International Airport as well as the latest branch in Zahra Area.

Al-Muzaini Exchange Co offer a wide variety of services including: banknotes exchange, remittance services, drafts, buying and selling of traveller’s cheques, door to door service for draft ad cash, sending drafts through international courier and instant money transfer through Western Union.

Al-Muzaini Exchange Co has recently launched its first 2011 yearly promotion under the theme “Transfer and Win” The campaign started on April 24 and will continue till July 7 and offers the chance

to win more than $120,000 cash prizes.

For every money transfer transaction, customer can have many chances to enter 3 draws.

The second draw took place on Thursday, June 9, 2011 at Al-Muzaini Farwaniya Branch at 7:30 pm under the super vision of the Ministr y of Commerce. Twelve winners of 12 cash prizes were revealed, with a total prizes cash amount of $25,000 (1st prize = $10,000, 2nd prize $5,000, 3rd prize to 10th prize each of $1,000) and here is the list of the lucky winners. The third draw will take place in Amman Street, Salmiya Branch on Thursday, July 14 at 7:30 pm. There will be 20 cash prizes with a total amount of $71,000 (1st prize $ 35,000, 2nd prize $10,000, 3rd prize $5,000, 5th to 20th prize each of $1,000).

Transfer now with Al-Muzaini and increase your chances to win.

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

.2700000 .4430000 .3910000 .3230000 .2780000 .2870000 .0040000 .0020000 .0743740 .7246080 .3810000 .0700000 .7103460 .0040000 .0430000

.2760000 .4550000 .4010000 .3330000 .2870000 .2960000 .0072500 .0035000 .0751220 .7318910 .4010000 .0770000 .7174850 .0072000 .0530000

CUSTOMER TRANSFER RATES .2739500 .2760500 .4457440 .4491610 .3932550 .3962700 .3251050 .3275970 .2803990 .2825490 .0527220 .0531260 .0431320 .0434620 .2893600 .2915780 .0351950 .0354650 .2213560 .2230530 .0034100 .0034360 .0000000 .0061890 .0000000 .0025280 .0000000 .0032360 .0000000 .0037560 .0746150 .0751870 .7268510 .7324220 .0000000 .3904530 .0730730 .0736330 .7117430 .7171990 .0000000 .0064200

Al-MuzainiExchange Co.

Japanese Yen Indian Rupees Pakistani Rupees Srilankan Rupees Nepali Rupees Singapore Dollar Hongkong Dollar Bangladesh Taka

ASIAN COUNTRIES 3.441 6.135 3.207 2.511 3.844 222.900 35.385 3.699

Philippine Peso Thai Baht Irani Riyal - Transfer Irani Riyal - Cash

6.341 9.042 0.271 0.273 GCC COUNTRIES 73.456 75.687 715.470 731.440 74.991

Saudi Riyal Qatari Riyal Omani Riyal Bahraini Dinar UAE Dirham Egyptian Pound - Cash Egyptian Pound - Transfer Yemen Riyal Tunisian Dinar Jordanian Dinar Lebanese Lira Syrian Lier Morocco Dirham

ARAB COUNTRIES 48.500 46.289 1.260 201.570 388.990 182.700 5.947 35.621

EUROPEAN & AMERICAN COUNTRIES US Dollar Transfer 275.350 Euro 396.640 Sterling Pound 448.680 Canadian dollar 283.110 Turkish lire 175.770 Swiss Franc 328.380 Australian dollar 290.470 US Dollar Buying 274.150 20 Gram 10 Gram 5 Gram

GOLD 283.000 143.000 73.500

BahrainExchange Company COUNTRY Australian dollar Bahraini dinar Bangladeshi taka Canadian dollar Cyprus pound Czek koruna Danish krone Deutsche Mark Egyptian pound Euro Cash Hongkong dollar Indian rupees

SELL CASH SELL DRAFT 293.500 292.000 731.920 731.950 3.970 3.708 285.000 283.500 540.600 14.100 54.000 167.800 223.700 48.400 46.374 398.400 396.900 36.050 35.900 6.330 6.145

Indonesia Iranian tuman Iraqi dinar Japanese yen Jordanian dinar Lebanese pound Malaysian ringgit Morocco dirham Nepalese Rupees New Zealand dollar Nigeria Norwegian krone Omani Riyal Pakistani rupees Philippine peso Qatari riyal Saudi riyal Singapore dollar South Africa Sri Lankan rupees Sterling pound Swedish krona Swiss franc Syrian pound Thai bhat Tunisian dollar UAE dirham U.S. dollars Yemeni Riyal

0.034 0.234 0.241 3.520 390.310 0.186 93.250 47.400 4.320 228.200 1.866 51.200 714.830 3.300 6.570 76.140 73.480 223.710 43.070 2.647 450.500 44.400 329.500 5.800 9.460 198.263 75.040 275.600 1.230

0.033

388.970 0.185 93.250 3.850 226.700

328.000 5.800 9.230 74.940 275.200

TRAVELLER’S CHEQUE 448.500 275.200

Sterling Pound US Dollar

DollarcoExchange Co. Ltd Rate for Transfer US Dollar Canadian Dollar Sterling Pound Euro Swiss Frank Bahrain Dinar UAE Dirhams Qatari Riyals Saudi Riyals Jordanian Dinar Egyptian Pound Sri Lankan Rupees Indian Rupees

Selling Rate 275.000 284.490 447.975 396.910 326.395 728.413 74.848 75.485 73.293 387.092 46.291 2.506 6.155

3.216 3.714 6.340 674.549 3.522 9.112 5.782 3.931 91.345

KuwaitBahrainIntlExchange Co. 714.650 3.215 6.350 75.710 73.480 223.710 43.070 2.510 448.500

GOLD 1,583.870

10 Tola

Pakistani Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Pesso Cyprus pound Japanese Yen Thai Bhat Syrian Pound Nepalese Rupees Malaysian Ringgit

Currency US Dollar Pak Rupees Indian Rupees Sri Lankan Rupees Bangladesh Taka Philippines Peso UAE Dirhams Saudi Riyals Bahraini Dinars Egyptian Pounds Pound Sterling Indonesian Rupiah Nepali rupee Yemeni Riyal Jordanian Dinars Syrian Pounds Euro Canadian Dollars

Rate per 1000 (Tran) 275.150 3.220 6.145 2.525 3.720 6.380 75.000 73.565 731.400 46.285 452.000 0.00003280 3.910 1.550 390.900 5.750 400.300 287.400

AlMulla Exchange Currency Transfer Rate (Per 1000) US Dollar 274.650 Euro 397.400 Pound Sterling 448.500 Canadian Dollar 283.100 Japanese Yen 3.450 Indian Rupee 6.147 Egyptian Pound 46.265 Sri Lankan Rupee 2.509 Bangladesh Taka 3.683 Philippines Peso 6.350 Pakistan Rupee 3.207 Bahraini Dinar 731.600 UAE Dirham 74.850 Saudi Riyal 73.400 *Rates are subject to change

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BUSINESS

Abu Dhabi’s TDIC mandates banks for bonds in program TDIC mandates RBS, HSBC, Standard Chartered DUBAI: Abu Dhabi’s Tourism Development & Investment Co (TDIC) has appointed banks to sell bonds from its existing $3 billion bond programme with road shows planned in the last week of June or early July, three sources told Reuters. The company is aiming to sell $1 billion in bonds, one source close to the discussions for the sale said yesterday. TDIC, which is building the Louvre and Guggenheim museums in Abu Dhabi, will have $1 billion left in the programme after hte latest issuance takes place.

Royal Bank of Scotland, HSBC and Standard Chartered are mandated for the issue, the sources confirmed. “ The DMO (Debt

Management Office) is pushing each of the entities to come out now before the summer in an orderly fashion,” he said. He added that TDIC is expected to launch a three-stop roadshow in the Middle East, Asia and London.

Set up in 2006, TDIC is the developer of tourism destinations in the oil-rich emirate of Abu Dhabi which is investing billions in industry, tourism and infrastructure. Abu Dhabi entities have been hitting the road in recent days to attract investors ahead of an expected slowdown in business activity during the summer. Abu Dhabi’s International Petroleum Investment Co (IPIC) said on Sunday it planned to hold non-deal investor meetings

and would only issue bonds in coordination with Abu Dhabi’s debt management office.

IPIC, fully owned by the Abu Dhabi government, hired banks to arrange the meetings in London this week, according to a document seen by Reuters. Borrowers in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), which has largely been shielded from the regional political unrest, are seeing the current narrowing spreads as an attractive invitation to tap global liquidity amid strong investor demand. Earlier this month, Dubai’s flagship carrier Emirates issued $1 billion priced at the tighter end of guidance. Dubai’s government is roadshowing for a potential bond this week. — Reuters

KUWAIT: Hamad Saleh Al-Khaledy and Ahmad Ramadan pose for a picture.

Al-Rihab & Ishbilya Co-op announces new campaign KUWAIT: Al-Rihab & Ishbilya Cooperative as per their commitment towards supporting their inhabitants and their franchisees, to give the best quality product with competitive prices launched a campaign from May 16, 2011.

The promotion has been launched in the auspicious presence of Hamad Saleh Al-Khaledy, Appointed Manager, Al-Rihab & Ishbilya Cooperative and several high ranking personnel from Al-Rihab & Ishbilya Cooperative and Ahmad Ramadan, Vice President, Gulf Express Co (an Al-Babtain group of Co) and Al Babtain Sales and Technical Managers.

To sponsor this campaign they have selected Gulf Express Co (an Al Babtain

Group of Co) due to their best professional expertise in lubricants, tyres, batteries and mutual strong relationship.

Gulf Express Co has a very strong service network of sales and service outlets spread all around the Kuwait market, there are 8 such well-equipped outlets backed up by qualified trained staffs, which are best in Middle East.

Gulf Express is one of the few companies in Kuwait which deals in product mix in car accessories with lubricants, tyres, batteries and car care products etc. They are the exclusive distributor for Total Lubricants, which is one of the major market players in the lube market in Kuwait with 10 percent market share.

Al-Tijari offers customers travel insurance scheme KUWAIT: Commercial Bank of Kuwait endeavors to provide its customer with state-of-the-art banking services and products that cater for their needs at all times. In keeping with this the bank takes pleasure to announce that it has renewed the insurance products policy concluded with Char tis Memsa Insurance Company Limited, a subsidiar y of American International Group Company (AIG) for the purpose of providing the bank’s cardholders and customers with a distinguished insurance scheme. The insurance scheme cover accidental death, sickness, medical treatment and loss of luggage and travel documents, delay or cancellation of flights. It further provides customer with the required travel protect for obtaining the Schengen Visa, and the free travel insurance offered to the bank credit card holders Ramzi Al-Sabouri, Executive Manager for Marketing and Sales at the bank said that the objective of the insurance scheme offered by Commercial Bank to its customers is to provide them with safety and security and keep them enjoying peace of mind at all times, noting that the bank’s cooperation with the global Chartis Company aims at offering customers a world class insurance services and personal concierge. Sabouri

Ramzi Al-Sabouri added that with the commencement of the travel season in Kuwait, customers can get benefit from the insurance scheme designated to satisfy all their needs by visiting any of Al-Tijari branches conveniently located throughout Kuwait or by visiting the airport branch operating around the clock, seven days a week.

Cobone.com offers MasterCard cardholders 5% off on deals DUBAI: Want to go on a sailing adventure, take horse riding lessons or dine at celebrated restaurants at great prices? MasterCard Worldwide, together with Cobone.com, the Middle East’s largest deal-of-the-day website, announced yesterday that MasterCard cardholders across the Middle East & North Africa will receive exclusive lifestyle deals viaCobone every day. All customers who use their MasterCard credit card on Cobone.com will receive an additional 5 percent off.

Cobone.com, a company majority owned by Jabbar Internet Group, one of the region’s specialists in e-commerce ventures, provides savings on hotels, goods, restaurants, spas and more across the M iddle East.

MasterCard credit cardholders, who have a card issued in the Middle East and Nor th African markets, will receive an additional 5 percent off, on value -added offers, which range between 50 percent to 90 percent on various lifestyle services and experiences. Deals could include; 50 percent off water park entry tickets, 90 percent off Pizza or a luxury yacht cruise around the Atlantis on the Palm. In addition, MasterCard cardholders will also benefit from receiving exclusive offers from Cobone.com every week.

“Unique to Cobone.com, is that we seek to feature every day one amazing thing to do in any given city for an unbelievable price,” said Paul Kenny, Founder and CEO of Cobone.com. “We seek to be a leading edge lifestyle provider and are delighted to team up with a leading payment solutions company, such as MasterCard Worldwide to bring consumer’svalueadded experiences.”

MasterCard cardholders simply need to register on Cobone.com to receive daily email alerts of the latest deal. Deals will only be activated once a minimum number of people have purchased the offer. MasterCard cardholders will not be charged until the deal is activated.

“At MasterCard, we are committed to working closely with various industry players to create campaigns that will resonate with MasterCard cardholders,” said Eyad Al-Kourdi, vice president and country manager, UAE, MasterCard Worldwide.

“We are delighted thatcardholders from the UAE havethe chance to receive exclusive lifestyle deals via Cobone.com. MasterCard cardholders can benefit from a variety of offers in travel, retail, dining, and wellness from Cobone.com, which they can enjoy this summer with friends or family.”

GM envisions future of urban mobility The automobile forever changed urban living and how we moved around the world. Yet the convergence of technologies that make up the DNA of the automobile has gone relatively unchanged for some 120 years. Today, however, a series of technological advancements and innovations make it possible, and arguably necessary, for a shift in this DNA that will revolutionize the automobile and address the challenges that face its future and its impact on the environment and on our urban lifestyles. The world’s population is expected to top 9 billion people by 2050, with over twothirds of these inhabitants residing in cities. This population explosion is also expected to drive vehicle ownership beyond one billion by 2030.

These trends will put incredible strain on our cities’ infrastructures and on our environment, which raises concerns regarding the sustainability of the current urban mobility model. Over the past year, carbon dioxide emissions worldwide surpassed 226 billion cubic meters and more than 14 billion liters of oil were consumed.

Meanwhile, a traffic accident occurs somewhere in the world once every 30 seconds, leading to some 50 million people injured annually as a result.

Traffic congestion is another issue. The average urban dwelling person spends on average 5.6 years of their lives stranded in traffic jams; a figure that seems set to rise as more vehicles take to the roads. These concerns have not gone unnoticed by General Motors, one of the world’s most prominent automakers. It has recognized that greater vehicle ownership will have serious implications on the environment, energy sustainability, road safety, congestion, land-use and the supply of natural resources. As a result, General Motors is developing a new breed of vehicle designed to combat these issues - the extended-range electric vehicle called the Chevrolet Volt and the futurist concept vehicle ENV. “Simply put, the current model of urban mobility is unsustainable over the longterm,” says Alan Taub, Vice

President of GM Global Research and Development.

“The rapid development of certain technologies and their integration into cars offers a silverlining to this outlook.

Recognizing this, at General Motors we believe that sufficient innovations to resolve these concerns currently exist, and if properly integrated and implemented, then the solution is within our grasp,” he adds.

General Motors is adopting advanced propulsion technology strategies that commit to both powertrain efficiency and energy diversity. The goal is to replace petroleum, tailpipe and C02 emissions, with a more sustainable energy model by 2030.

According to General Motors, the way forward is electrification. “Vehicle electrification is where the motor vehicle is powered partially or fully by electric motors. The path to electrification includes traditional hybrids, plug-in hybrids, battery-electric vehicles and extended-range electric vehicles where incremental electrical power can be generated by combined power sources,” explains Taub.

General Motors is leading the development of new, consumerfriendly electric vehicle technologies. As a first major step, the Detroit-based automaker already offers the Chevrolet Volt, an extended-range electric vehicle, in key markets around the world. Dubbed “the consumer’s car”, the Chevrolet Volt does not make any compromises on comfort and power while addressing the broader issues of dependence on petroleum and the environment. The Volt delivers up to 56.2 kilometers of electriconly, gas-free driving from a single battery charge; once the battery is depleted, its engine generator produces electricity to extend the vehicle’s range by an additional 547.2 kilometers.

Electric powered vehicles, such as the Volt, mean that automobiles can be powered by a wide range of new energy sources, including natural gas, clean coal, nuclear power and renewable resources like hydro-wind and solar power.

But looking to the longerterm, General Motors has even more ambitious plans to revolutionize the automobile. Working

closely with its partners in China at Shanghai Automotive Industry Corporation (SAIC), General Motors has developed the Electric Networked-Vehicle (EN-V) concept.

The EN-V aims to address a number challenges set to face urban mobility in the future.

The vehicle is propelled by electric motors in each of its two driving wheels, powered by rechargeable lithium-ion batteries that produce zero emissions. The concept vehicle can go 40 kilometers on a single charge, which is more than enough for the average urban commute. In addition, the ENV ’s relatively small size and maneuverability enables it to park in a space five times smaller than a standard automobile.

Combined, these factors eliminate the majority of harmful

optimal usage of city roads. As part of the autonomous vehicle technology, which brings the vehicle to life, the connectivity enables the EN-V to sense what’s around it and can react accordingly to either avoid a crash or decelerate to lessen an impact. This effectively means that journey times and road usage are optimized, and typical risks associated with travelling by car are minimized.

“General Motors’ solution is not only autonomous driving, but autonomy on demand. The fact is if you look at roads, a lot of people are doing things other than driving. The issue is not driver distraction. The issue is that driving is the distraction,” adds Taub.

The EN-V’s connectivity also means that the driving can be automated entirely, allowing

tailpipe emissions and issues of parking congestion. Its small size also requires fewer resources to build, which will minimize vehicle cost, weight, complexity and energy requirements.

“As we electrify, connect and redesign vehicles and create a new DNA for personal mobility, driving in the future will become a cleaner, safer, less oildependent, more convenient, fun and stylish than ever before,” says Taub. But the ENV ’s ability to revolutionize urban mobility lies in its technology that allows vehicle-tovehicle and vehicle -to infrastructure connectivity. The EN-V can plug into an intelligent urban network that can manage journey times, travel routes and speed to ensure the

the driver to browse the web on the way to the office, or conduct a video conference call while on the move, without worrying about driving, or making it on time. For longer trips, the entire family can enjoy a film or a live soccer match while mobile. Like the introduction of the first automobiles, the new breed of electric vehicles will change urban landscapes forever. Governments in major international markets, such as China, are already supporting their introduction through policy initiatives, subsidies and incentives. This will further promote technology advances, enable the development of necessary infrastructure to recharge electric vehicles, and encourage consumers to purchase these new vehicles.

Burgan Bank announces names of lucky winners of Yawmi Account KUWAIT: Burgan Bank held its Yawmi account draw announcing a total of 5 lucky daily prize winners, each taking home KD5,000. The lucky winners for the five daily draws took home a handsome cash-prize of KD5,000 each. The lucky winners are: Batool Basem Subhi Ghabrees Ahmed Abdulla Ahmed Jaghbeer Rita Dhar Daniel Karikkottu Daniel Thamar Abdulhussein Azizi Brojerdi

Muneera Al-Mukhaizeem

Congratulating the winners, Burgan Bank Chief Retail Banking Officer- GM Muneera AlMukhaizeem said: “I extend my warm wishes to the winners of last week’s Yawmi draw. Yawmi today is a well understood product, the popularity of which can be seen from the number of increasing account holders. We invite cus-

tomers to opt for this incentive to make the most from their savings and deposits.” Burgan Bank’s Yawmi account was the first in the country to have a daily draw, thereby entitling account holders who deposit KD500 for a period of 30 days a chance to win every day.

For every KD50 deposited in the account, the account holder receives an additional entry into the draw. Burgan Bank encourages everyone to open a Yawmi account and/or increase their deposit to maximize their chances to becoming a daily winner.

The more you deposit, the higher the chances of winning the draw. Opening a Yawmi account is simple, just visit your nearest Burgan Bank branch and get all the details. Or simply call our Call Center 1804080 and our executive will be more than happy to assist you. For further information visit www.burgan.com.

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Equities rebound ahead of Q2 results GLOBAL DAILY MARKET REPORT KUWAIT: Kuwait ’s equities rebounded strongly yesterday ahead of second quarter’s earnings results. Investors started to build positions focusing on the blue chips as they are looking for safe investment right now as they cannot take more risk. Blue chips surged, whilst small caps performed poorly during the session. All market indices managed to eke out gains.

Egypt developers lift index after row resolution

Market indices Global General Index (GGI), market weighted, ended the day up by 0.34 percent, at 195.38 point. Market capitalization was up for the day at KD31.98 billion. On the other hand, KSE Price Index closed at 6,317.6 point, adding 11.60 points (0.18 percent) to its previous close.

Market breadth During the session, 106 companies were traded. Market breadth was skewed towards advancers as 52 equities advanced versus 20 that retreated.

Daily trading activity Trading activity was up this session. The trades conducted in the services sector. Total volume traded was up by 22.37 percent with 118.40 million shares changing hands at a total value of KD18.23 million (15.09 percent higher compared to the day before). The services sector was the volume leader yesterday, accounting for 33.13 percent of total shares. The banking sector was the value leader, with 23.76 percent of total traded value. Kuwait International Bank was the most active in terms of volume and values traded during yesterday’s session, with 8.75 million shares exchanged at an aggregate value of KD2.86 million.

Top gainers and biggest decliners In terms of top gainers, Kuwait Remal Real Estate Company took the top spot for the day, adding 9.26 percent and closed at KD0.295. On the other hand, United Food Industrial Group shed 22.73 percent and closed at KD0.255, making it the biggest decliner in the market.

Sectors wise On a sector-by-sector basis, six out of the eight sectors managed to notch gains. Food

Developers lift Egypt, most Gulf markets rise

stocks led the pack of advancers with a 1.20 percent climb.

Livestock Transport & Trading Co was the biggest gainer in the sector, adding 5.45 percent, while heavy weighted Kuwait Foodstuff Company (Americana) bolstered the gains with a 1.30 percent improvement in its share price.

Bank stocks too were notable climbers, with the sector as a whole producing 0.81 percent in gains. The sector’s heavy-weights, National Bank of Kuwait (NBK) edged higher by 1.72 percent, while Gulf Bank jumped by 1.82 percent during the day.

Elsewhere, the Industrial index was also up by 0.37 percent. Within the sector, Shuaiba Industrial Company has received a purchase order for supplying small bags for a flour mill in Sudan. The order, which will last four months, is valued at KD0.137 million.

The scrip closed flat at KD0.184.

On the flip side, Services groups were the sole decliners yesterday, with the sector index recoiling by 0.63 percent. Kuwait Cement Company saw its share value depreciate by 3.33 percent. Meanwhile, Hilal Cement Company was the biggest percent-

age loser in the sector during the day, losing a 4.33 percent. Also, a drop of 1.89 percent in the heavy weighted stock, Zain, added to the index’ loss.

Corporate news Gulf Rocks Company has completed the sale of Khalijia 3 vessel in a public auction on June 11, 2011. Mumbai Port gave the goahead for the buyer to drag the vessel to the coast near the port. The vessel was sold for $4.025 million. The financial impact from selling the vessel cannot by specified currently, the company said.

Industrial and Financial Investments Company has sold its stake in Qatar-based Lusail Water Front project, which is valued at $10 million.The equity was sold at a total value of $12 million. Accordingly, it generated 2 million profit from the deal, which will be recorded in Q2-11 financial statements.

Oil news The price of OPEC basket of twelve crudes stood at $113.43 a barrel on Thursday, compared with $111.93 the previous day, according to OPEC Secretariat calculations.

CAIRO/DUBAI: Real estate developers helped drive Egypt’s benchmark index higher yesterday after the resolution of a land row while Saudi Arabia’s index extended gains on hopes of upbeat second-quarter results. The resolution of a dispute between the state and Saudi investor Price Alwaleed bin Talal boosted confidence that other land rows could be resolved, traders said.

Palm Hills Development rose 7.8 percent and SODIC finishes up 3.4 percent. The benchmark index closed up 0.7 percent. Elsewhere, Gulf markets were mostly higher. The Saudi benchmark climbed 0.5 percent, continuing the trend after Sunday’s technical correction. “We should maintain current levels, and stay above 6,500 until Q2 earning,” said a Riyadh-based fund manager, on condition of anonymity.

“We should stabilise because it seems earnings will be OK, especially the petrochemical sector.”

Oil prices have stayed above $100 a barrel in the second-quarter, indicating healthy margins for petrochemical producers. Most large-cap stocks rose with bellwether Saudi Basic Industries Corp up 0.2 percent, Al-Rajhi Bank gaining 1.4 percent and Saudi Telecom up 0.8 percent.

Saudi Electricity Co advanced for a third day, on seasonal interest from investors during summer months when utility demand surges. SEC will get a $13.6 billion, 25-year loan, the state news agency said yesterday.

Oman’s index rose for a third day, up 0.4 percent, as investors picked up stocks on attractive valuations.

“The Omani market needs a trigger; the overall valuations remain attractive,” said Kanaga Sundar, Gulf Baader Capital Markets head of research.

Nawras Qatar Telecom’s Oman unit, rose 2.5 percent, up from Wednesday’s all time low. Banks lifted Abu Dhabi’s index to a seven-week high, up 0.3 percent.

Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank and Union National Bank each rose 0.3 percent and National Bank of Abu Dhabi climbed 1.3 percent. Dubai shares also rose on speculation index compiler MSCI may yet upgrade the UAE to emerging market status. “It’s just speculation-we saw some buys in Abu Dhabi banks, but other than that it’s just locals playing the MSCI story,” said Matthew Wakeman, EFG-Hermes managing director for cash and equity-linked trading. “They (UAE) have ticked all the boxes... So we have reason to assume there’s a good chance (for an upgrade).” Dubai’s index rose 0.4 percent as large-cap stocks supported. Emirates NBD and Emaar Properties climbed 0.5 percent and 0.7 percent respectively.

Yesterday’s highlights Egypt The measure gained 0.7 percent to 5,550 points.

Saudi Arabia The benchmark rose 0.5 percent to 6,585 points.

Oman The index advanced 0.4 percent to 6,057 points.

Dubai The index climbed 0.4 percent to 1,558 points.

Abu Dhabi The index rose 0.3 percent to 2,710 points.

Kuwait The measure edged up 0.2 percent to 6,318 points.

Qatar The benchmark ended flat at 8,286 points.

Bahrain The measure eased 0.2 percent to 1,346 points. — Reuters

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Asian stock markets down amid recovery speculation HK set to hit rock-bottom and rebound

SHANGHAI: A Chinese construction worker looks on as he stands in front of a billboard advertising a new real estate development project yesterday. — AFP

China shows off landmark rail line BEIJING: China will this month launch what it is touting as the world’s longest high-speed railway built in one go to link the country’s two most important cities, officials said yesterday, shrugging off concerns over financing and high debt levels.

Costing 220.9 billion yuan ($34.1 billion), the 1,318-km (820-mile) Beijing-toShanghai line’s formal start marks the beginning of a massive effort to transform its sprawling rail network. The spending spree will amount to 2.8 trillion yuan ($431.7 billion) between 2011 and 2015.

The new line will whisk passengers through the Chinese countryside at 300 kph (188 mph), cutting travel time between the two cities nearly in half to less than five hours. In doing so, it will provide a model for how the government is seeking to efficiently transform passenger transport in a nation already accustomed to traveling by rail rather than by aircraft.

Railway Ministry officials told a news conference that the line, using “world-class technology standards”, was only the beginning of an investment splurge that could be an example to the world.

Over the next five years “railway investment will continue the trend of rapid growth. We will not slow down the pace, and there will be no cut in investments”, Vice Minister of Railways Hu Yadong said.

The 2.8 trillion yuan earmarked is an increase of 41.4 percent over the country’s previous five-year spending plan which finished in 2010. In 2010 alone, China’s railway investments amounted to 707.5 billion yuan, up 17.8 percent from 2009.

That funding will help China meet its goal of laying 45,000 km of high-speed track across the country by 2015. But the steep price tags for schemes like the

Beijing-Shanghai link carry their own financing woes, concerns the ministry has played down. China’s Railway Ministry is already heavily in debt. Its total liabilities jumped to 1.9836 trillion yuan at the end of March 2011, representing a 58.24 percent asset-liability ratio.

Former Railway Minister Liu Zhijun spearheaded the sector’s investment drive over the last decade, but his dismissal earlier in the year on “disciplinary violations”-a charge that usually denotes corruptioncalled into question the ambitious expansion plans. The ministry posted a rare pretax loss of 3.7 billion yuan in the first quarter of 2011, according to figures released by its finance department.

Yu Bangli, the ministry’s chief economist, said that with rail seen as a vital part of national infrastructure, the ministry had sufficient support from other departments to finance its massive construction projects. “Everyone can relax, funds for railway (construction) are guaranteed,” he said. Yu has previously told Chinese state media that he expects most high-speed lines to be profitable within four to seven years after construction. Shorter high-speed lines already connect Beijing to Tianjin, Shanghai to Hangzhou, and a few other cities, where their opening has caused dramatic cuts in flight services, or even total cancellations.

One-way economy class tickets for the Beijing-to-Shanghai run will cost 555 yuan ($86) to start, slightly cheaper than the lowest price, discounted air ticket between the two cities. But the ministry will be hoping to win passengers away from the airlines on a route notorious for its long delays due to airport congestion and military controls over air space. — Reuters

BANGKOK: Asian stock markets retreated yesterday as evidence mounted that recoveries in the world’s biggest economies have hit a roadblock. Oil prices fell below $99 a barrel, extending a big loss on Friday after a report said Saudi Arabia plans to boost its crude production. In currencies, the dollar was stronger against the yen and the euro. Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 0.8 percent to 9,436.49 after the government reported that core machinery orders fell unexpectedly in April by 3.3 percent from the previous month.

The drop came as companies canceled orders following a devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan that destroyed or damaged scores of factories.

The decline was the first in four months, evidence that the twin disasters continue to take their toll on Japan’s economy. The seasonally adjusted figure includes heavily electrical machiner y, engines, machine tools, road vehicles and aircraft but excludes orders for ships and utilities because of their volatility.

Toyota Motor Corp dropped 2.6 percent after announcing Friday that it expected its annual profit to dive 31 percent, hammered by production disruptions from parts shortages. Elsewhere, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index slipped 0.8 percent to 22,245.98, with blue chip property shares slumping after Hong Kong Monetary Authority Chief Executive Norman Chan announced further measures to cool property prices. Buyers of homes costing less than Hong Kong $7 million will have to make a 30 percent down payment, while the minimum payment was increased to 50 percent for homes costing HK$10 million or more.

China Overseas Land and Investment dropped 1.9 percent, while China Resources Land fell 2.3 percent. Linus Yip, a strategist at First Shanghai Securities in Hong Kong, said expectations of another

SINGAPORE: A tourist boat passes by the Marina Bay Sands, Singapore’s casino resort, yesterday. — AP rate hike in China were the main drag on markets. But he said shares in Hong Kong, which have been steadily down in seven prior sessions, were possibly oversold and due for a recovery.

“I think maybe they are oversold,” he said. “I think there is a possibility for Hong Kong to hit a shortterm bottom and actually rebound within a week.” South Korea’s Kospi was down 0.9 percent to 2,028.29, following a move Friday by the country’s central bank to raise its key interest rate for the fifth time in less than a year as it keeps up a battle against inflation. Investors tend to view rate hikes negatively since they make it harder to brow money, thus stifling growth. Fears that China was preparing to raise interest rates for a fifth time since October dampened sentiment for mainland shares.

“Although the economy is slowing down in general, the room for authorities to relax tightening poli-

cies is limited because inflation is still hovering at an elevated level,” DBS Bank Ltd in Singapore said in a report. The Shanghai Composite Index lost 1.3 percent, with oilrelated shares sagging amid expectations of a price drop for crude.

China National Offshore Oil Corp, or CNOOC, lost 1.8 percent.

Benchmarks in Singapore, Indonesia, Taiwan and Thailand also sank.

Adding to the gloom is the recession in Japan that resulted from the earthquake. Among other woes, the disaster resulted in a scarcity of key parts that disrupted manufacturing around the globe.

In the US, the economy isn’t growing as quickly as expected due in part to high prices. Since the market’s peak on April 29, more than 15 economic indicators, ranging from the number of new jobs added in May to how much consumers are spending at retailers, have been weaker than analysts

India braced for another rate hike

Japan core machinery orders decline 3.3% TOKYO: Japan’s core private -sector machinery orders, a leading indicator of corporate capital spending, posted a surprise decline of 3.3 percent in April, government data showed yesterday. The negative core data, which exclude volatile demand from power companies and for ships, followed a revised 1.0 percent gain in March and missed forecasts for a 1.2 percent increase, according to a Dow Jones Newswires poll. Orders rose in March, driving expectations that gains would continue as companies sought to replace goods destroyed in the March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

Analysts said the latest data was an indication of the impact on production of the March disaster which left more than 23,000 dead or missing, shattered supply chains and led to power shortages causing major disruption to Japan’s biggest companies. “Unexpectedly weak machinery orders suggest slow production and weak Japanese exports going forward,” said Daisuke Karakama, market economist at Mizuho Corporate Bank.

“The data may raise concerns that Japan capital spending in May and June

may not be as strong as expected,” he said. Fears of an electricity supplydemand imbalance going into the summer months have eased slightly, but the situation remains volatile, analysts say.

The government has called on companies and households to reduce electricity consumption by 15 percent in the Tokyo and eastern Japan region.

However, others said the decline was due to gains in recent months and did not represent a downward trend. “You don’t have to worry about a singlemonth dip,” said Yoshiki Shinke, chief economist at Dai-Ichi Life Research Institute. Japan’s economy contracted by an annualised 3.5 percent in the first quarter, the second consecutive quarter of shrinkage, which economists define as a technical recession.

In the aftermath of the 9.0 magnitude earthquake, industrial output saw its biggest ever fall and spending plunged as consumer and business confidence took a heavy hit. Many of Japan’s biggest companies saw profits tumble in the quarter and delayed forecasts due to the scale of the disaster’s impact on production and sales.— AFP

Belarus drivers ‘block border post’ in protest MINSK: Two hundred drivers in tightly-controlled Belarus blocked a border post for three hours in a show of anger against measures to battle an increasingly dire economic crisis, officials said yesterday. The drivers blocked the Bruzgi border post between Belarus and Poland in the western Grodno region on Sunday evening before being dispersed by the security forces, the interior ministry said in a statement.

It said that 14 participants in the “illegal demonstration” were arrested and charged with disturbing public order and failing to obey the security forces. They were protesting new rules implemented on Sunday that impose restrictions on fuel and other goods exported from Belarus in a bid to keep domestic supply solid and inflation down.

Footage of the protest posted on Youtube showed riot police summoned to prevent disturbances and the protestors joining hands, chanting slogans and singing.

The interior ministry statement said Grodno region governor Semyon Shapiro sought personally to persuade the demonstrators to go home and explained the rea-

sons for the restrictions. “But the demonstrators continued to block access to the the post and expressed dissatisfaction with the restrictions, using crude language,” it said.

The picket started at 6:00 pm local time and the police moved in just before 9:00 pm to break it up, with some protestors showing resistance, the statement said. Tear gas was used by an “unknown individual”, it said.

Cross-border trade with Poland is a major source of income in the Grodno region. The demonstration came after a protest by Minsk car drivers over soaring petrol prices last week prompted the government to impose a maximum fuel price limit. A gaping current account deficit and rises in Russian energy prices have prompted high inflation and currency devaluation in Belarus, a crisis that appears to be the most serious of President Alexander Lukashenko’s 17 years in power.

The authorities brutally cracked down on a protest after December’s presidential elections and until the Minsk car demonstrations there had been few reports of such public dissent in Belarus. — AFP

had predicted. On Wall Street on Friday, fears that the global economic recovery has stalled pushed the Dow Jones industrial average below 12,000 for the first time since March and drove the stock market lower for the sixth straight week.

The Dow fell 1.4 percent to close at 11,951.91.

The S&P 500 index fell 1.4 percent to 1,270.98. The Nasdaq dropped 1.5 percent to 2,643.73.

Benchmark oil for July delivery was down 31 cents to $98.98 a barrel in electronic trading on the New York Mercantile Exchange. The contract lost $2.64 to settle at $99.29 on the Nymex on Friday. The euro weakened to $1.4340 from $1.4355 in late trading in New York. The euro has fallen below its recent highs on signs that European policymakers have reached an impasse over how to handle Greece’s drawn-out debt crisis. The dollar strengthened to 80.53 yen from 80.32 yen.— AP

DHAKA: Policemen detain opposition activists on the second day of a 36-hour nationwide general strike called by the opposition against government moves to amend the constitution, yesterday. — AP

Vehicles attacked on 2nd day of Bangladesh strike DHAKA: Protesters set a bus on fire and smashed several vehicles yesterday on the second day of a general strike against government moves to amend the constitution, news reports said. The main opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party and its Islamic fundamentalist ally, Jamaat-eIslami, enforced the 36-hour nationwide strike beginning at dawn Sunday, a working day in Muslim-majority Bangladesh. It is scheduled to end at dusk yesterday.

Private television stations Somoy TV and ATN Bangla reported that the violence erupted yesterday in the capital, Dhaka.

Television footage showed riot police using batons to disperse the protesters.

The reports said no one was injured.

The opposition, which staged a similar general strike early this month, says the government wants to repeal a constitutional provision that requires it to hand over power at the end of its term to a nonpartisan administration to conduct new elections. A former chief justice is usually chosen to head the three-month caretaker administration.

The change would mean the next general elections, due in 2014, would be overseen by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

That could lead to vote-rigging favoring Hasina’s party, opposition spokesman Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir said Saturday.

Bangladesh, a parliamentary democracy, has a history of political violence, and opposition parties commonly stage general strikes to highlight their demands.

The latest strike closed schools and shops for the second straight day yesterday.

Even though more vehicles defied the shutdown, Dhaka was without its normal

bumper-to-bumper traffic. It is difficult to measure public support for the strikes, with many people staying home only to avoid attacks by anti-government protesters.

“I don’t like such strikes, but I’m not taking any chance,” said Abdul Alim, who shuttered his convenience store in Dhaka’s central Malibagh district. On the first day of the shutdown Sunday, authorities jailed 123 protesters in one-day trials for attacking buses and creating strikerelated violence, said Home Minister Shahara Khatun. Thousands of riot police patrolled the streets of Dhaka yesterday.

Police official Krishnapada Roy said former government ministers Hafizuddin Ahmed and Altaf Hossain were arrested Sunday for trying to lead a procession.

The two were in police custody yesterday, he said. “We will not bow to police harassment. Our protest will continue,” said opposition spokesman Mirza Fakhrul Islam Alamgir.

“The government wants to cling to power. That’s why it wants to amend the constitution,” Alamgir said. The government denies the charge. Its move came after the Supreme Court ruled that the provision, included in the constitution in 1996, is undemocratic. Since the provision’s introduction, Bangladesh has held three parliamentary polls supervised by nonpartisan interim governments.

Government spokesman Syed Ashraful Islam renewed a call to discuss the dispute in Parliament. “The door of talks is open,” Islam told reporters late Sunday.

“The opposition is welcome to discuss the political dispute in Parliament.” — AFP

MUMBAI: Indian policy makers look set this week to hike interest rates for the 10th time in just 16 months, even as the pace of economic activity shows signs of easing. Inflation is currently running at more than 8.5 percent-the highest of any large Asian economy-and bringing down the cost of living has become the main priority for the country’s central bank, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

Analysts expect the RBI to raise rates by 25 basis points at its mid-quarter monetary policy meeting in the financial capital Mumbai on Thursday.

“The RBI will take a calibrated approach, with a 25 basis points hike,” said Rupa Rege Nitsure, chief economist with state-run Bank of Baroda. “It will step off only when inflation shows signs of easing.”

RBI governor Duvvuri Subbarao believes that the current inflation rate is too high. At 8.66 percent in April, the wholesale price index-the government’s preferred measure of the cost of living-is well above the bank’s target of five to six percent.

The benchmark repurchase, or repo rate, at which the bank lends to commercial banks, is 7.25 percent while the reverse repo, paid to banks for deposits, is 6.25 percent. Subbarao has said he is prepared to act to tame inflation even at the expense of short-term growth. Analysts say relentless monetary policy action by the RBI has started to impact previously “overheated” sectors of the economy, such as automobiles, consumer durables and construction, where growth is easing. But the bank is unlikely to step off the accelerator yet until inflation starts to slow, they added. “For now, persistently high inflation rather than the moderation in growth will be the RBI’s focus,” said Sonal Varma, India economist at Nomura Securities.

“Inflation is very sticky and nagging,” added Siddhartha Sanyal, chief India economist with Barclays Capital. Annual inflation data for May is due out today and a level higher than April’s figure will place pressure on the RBI to raise rates further.

Economists expect the figures to be at nearly nine percent, particularly after food price rises climbed to 9.01 percent in the week to May 28.

India’s Congress-led government has delayed a decision to hike prices of diesel and kerosene, which is widely used in rural areas and is seen as the “poor man’s fuel”. It is under pressure after a spate of corruption scandals and is facing claims of being “anti-poor” for its inability to lower the cost of living, which has hit the country’s lowest-earners hardest.

Analysts say a hike in the cost of diesel would further stoke inflation because of its use in the transport of goods around the country. “The stillelevated inflation will worsen in the next few months due to the anticipated upward revision in local fuel prices,” said Rajeev Malik, senior economist with CLSA in Singapore. Asian economies from South Korea, Indonesia and Taiwan to China are all battling inflationary pressures.

A recent World Bank report warned that India’s economic growth could moderate to eight percent in the current financial year to the end of March 2012, due to rising inflation and slowing demand.

India’s finance minister, Pranab Mukherjee, estimates the economy will grow at 8.75 percent in 2011-12. The Indian economy grew by 8.5 percent in 2010-11, up from 7.4 percent in 2009-10.— AFP

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China’s Hu to try to end dispute over Russian gas BEIJING: Chinese President Hu Jintao will hope to put an end to a fractious dispute over Russian gas supplies vital for feeding China’s booming economy when he visits Moscow this week. Hu has made securing energy for the world’s second-biggest economy a diplomatic priority, but relations with Russia in this key area have not been smooth. The two sides have been bogged down in disagreements on pricing for the gas that Russian energy giant Gazprom would pump to China via two routes.

Russia’s ambassador to China warned last week that it would be inappropriate to set a date for the companies involved to conclude the deal, in which Russia would supply China with 68 billion cubic metres (bcm) per year of gas over 30 years. Gazprom’s CEO has stood firm that it would not accept lower profits on gas deliveries to China than

those on sales to Europe. Gazprom expects European consumers to pay around $500 per 1,000 cubic metres of Russian gas in the fourth quarter of this year.

An agreement on the gas project would be a big trophy for Hu, who has courted Russia as a way of increasing energy security as heady economic growth increasingly forces China to look abroad for oil and gas.

But neither side may be in a rush to conclude the deal just because Hu is visiting, said Zha Daojiong, professor of International Studies at Peking University and an expert on energy issues. “It takes time. It’s like placing a large number of orders for Boeing aircraft, but in the end there are technical and other reasons, and those contracts get revised. It’s quite normal,” Zha said.

“The political pressure is less of an issue.

It’s not as bad as has been portrayed. Both sides have always been cautious about protecting their interests.” Earlier this year, Chinese and Russian companies also got caught up in a dispute over the price of oil supplied through the first cross-border oil pipeline between the two countries. “The fact that the oil pipeline is established is positive for making sure this deal makes it through in the end,” said Duncan Innes-Ker, Beijing-based China analyst for the Economist Intelligence Unit, referring to the gas agreement.

“I don’t think the odd row over pricing threatens the long-term potential of this deal. As far as Russia is concerned, China is the biggest local market.” Russia has been more coy about energy cooperation with China, despite Moscow and Beijing both proclaiming themselves to be steadfast

friends. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, who was then Russia’s president, launched the ambitious plan for an eastern gas pipeline network during a visit to Beijing in 2006.

The prospect of an eastern gas pipeline route, following a deal on the oil pipeline that is now up and running, offered Gazprom a big second market to counterbalance its supplies to Europe, which Putin worried had too much of a hold on Russian gas exports.

For China, imports of Russian gas will provide a further pillar to prop up its rapidly growing gas market, which is already attracting growing volumes of liquefied natural gas by ship and receiving Turkmen gas via a pipeline.

Despite the gas dispute, China and Russia have been cooperating closely diplomatically on the wrenching unrest in the

Middle East, criticising NATO-led air strikes in Libya and snubbing a UN resolution to condemn Syria’s bloody crackdown on prodemocracy protesters. Russia and China are also the key drivers behind the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, which brings together Beijing, Moscow and central Asian governments to help coordinate security and economic policy in the region.

Even here though, Chinese analysts have warned of competing aims. “As a fast-growing economic power, China is more interested in promoting economic cooperation,” Su Zhuangzhi and Zhang Ning of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences wrote in the edition of the official China Daily. “But for Russia, security is the main priority and it wishes the organisation to take a geopolitical rival’s role against NATO and the United States,” they wrote. — Reuters

Summers calls for new boost to US economy GE CEOsays reportoutlines ways toincrease hiring

NEW YORK: In this file photo, trader Christopher Morie works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange. — AP

Recovery fears stalk global stock markets LONDON: Concerns over the US economic recovery and expectations China will raise interest rates again weighed on stock markets yesterday, while the euro was steady at the start of a potentially crucial week in the Greek debt crisis.

Over the past month, the economic newsflow has turned distinctly negative, particularly out of the US Investors are now worried that the mark up in share prices in the early part of the year may have been overdone - stocks are effectively a leading indicator of economic output for the period ahead.

Nouriel Roubini, a New York University economics professor notorious for predicting the 2008 financial crisis, cautioned against risky investments. “In the last month, things have changed, the evidence is that maybe this is not just a soft patch but something worse,” he said in a speech in Singapore. “If your horizon is the next two or three months, I would be a bit defensive on equities...This is time to be cautious, and safe rather than sorry.” In Europe, the FTSE 100 index of leading British shares was up 0.2 percent at 5,777, while France’s CAC-40 rose 0.1 percent to 3,809.22. Germany’s DAX fell 0.1 percent to 7,065. Trading activity in Europe was low as many countries, including Germany and France, were on national holiday though stock markets remained open for business. Wall Street was poised for a lackluster opening Dow futures were up 0.1 percent to 11,885, while the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 futures rose an equivalent rate to 1,265.

Given the public holidays in many parts of Europe and a light economic calendar in the US, analysts were skeptical that stocks would gain any momentum over the day. Today may have more to offer, with Chinese inflation data likely to stoke concerns that the People’s Bank of China will tighten monetary policy again soon. US retail sales figures for May will also provide an insight into the state of the U.S. economic recovery - consumer spending accounts for around 70 percent of the US economy. “All stock markets remain under pressure going into this week, and in the short-term at least, it is difficult to see the catalyst that is going to spark off a sustainable rally,” said David Jones, chief market strategist at IG Index.

In the currency markets, investors continue to monitor any developments surrounding the Greek debt crisis ahead of next week’s meeting of eurozone finance ministers in Brussels, where a fresh Greek bailout is on the agenda. On Friday, the euro tanked amid signs that policymakers in Europe have divergent views on how to deal with the Greek crisis, with the European Central Bank and the German government at odds on getting Greece’s bondholders to share some of the pain in helping the countr y.

Germany’s finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble has proposed that bondholders contribute a “substantial” portion of a fresh bailout package for Greece by giving the country an extra seven years to repay existing bonds. But European Central Bank president Jean-Claude Trichet has said nothing should be done that would be deemed “a credit event” by the ratings agencies and that any private sector involvement has to be done on a voluntary basis. “A failure to achieve a workable agreement by the end of the eurogroup meeting next Monday threatens the real risk of what Schaeuble described last week as the first unorderly default within the eurozone,” said Simon Derrick, senior currency strategist at the Bank of New York Mellon.

By late morning London time, the euro was up 0.1 percent at $1.4355.

That’s three cents lower than the onemonth highs it reached only last Thursday. Earlier in Asian trading, Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 0.7 percent to close at 9,448.21 after the government reported that core machinery orders fell unexpectedly by 3.3 percent during April. The drop came as companies canceled orders following a devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan that destroyed or damaged scores of factories. The decline was the first in four months, evidence that the twin disasters continue to take their toll on Japan’s economy. The seasonally adjusted figure includes heavily electrical machinery, engines, machine tools, road vehicles and aircraft but excludes orders for ships and utilities because of their volatility. South Korea’s Kospi closed 0.1 percent higher at 2,048.74 while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index finished 0.4 percent higher at 22,508.08. — AP

BANGKOK: This file picture shows a Thai airways aircraft at Suvarnabhumi Airport. Thai Airways announced yesterday that it would acquire 23 Airbus and 14 Boeing airplanes for about $3.9 billion to modernise its ageing fleet after a period of financial turbulence. — AFP

WASHINGTON: Former White House aide Larry Summers on Sunday urged expanded tax cuts on US workers’ wages, warning that America’s economy was at risk of years of Japan-style stagnation without a further boost. In an opinion piece published by Reuters on Sunday, Summers a Harvard professor and former Treasury secretary under President Bill Clinton-argued that it would be “premature” to withdraw fiscal support for the economy at the end of 2011.

Summers’ comments come as Republican and Democratic lawmakers debate ways to reduce the US deficit and as his former colleagues in President Barack Obama’s administration mull a temporary cut in payroll taxes for employers.

Summers said the United States might have faced a double - dip recession if Obama had not agreed to a deal last year with congressional Republicans to extend unemployment insurance benefits and payroll tax cuts for workers.

The deal was part of a wider package that included an extension of Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. “Fiscal support should be continued and indeed expanded by providing the payroll tax cut to employers as well as employees,” Summers wrote.

“Raising the share of the payroll tax cut from 2 percent to 3 percent would be desirable as well.” He said the cost would be a little over $200 billion. “These measures offer the prospec t of significant improvement in economic performance over the next few years translating into significant increases in the tax base and reductions in necessary government outlays,” he said.

In an interview, Summers offered more details of his idea, saying the $200 billion would cover both the expansion of the tax-cut and its extension through 2012. He also said the economy would benefit from an extra $100 billion in infrastructure spending over the next several years and recommended additional aid to states and cities. Summers, who headed the National Economic Council for the first two years of the Obama administration, said that the “greatest threat” to US creditworthiness was a sustained period of slow growth.

“This means that essential discussions about medium-term measures to restrain spending and raise revenues need to be coupled with a focus on near-term growth,” Summers wrote. “Substantial withdrawal of fiscal support for demand at the end of 2011 would be premature.”

White House debate During much of 2010, Obama’s economic advisers wrestled with a debate over whether to shift toward deficit reduction or pursue further fiscal stimulus. Summers and former White House economist Christina Romer were in the camp arguing that the recession that followed the financial markets meltdown of 2008-2009 was a unique event that required aggressive stimulus to avoid a long period of stagnation similar to Japan’s “lost decade” of the 1990s.

Former White House budget director Peter Orszag was among those who cautioned against a further big stimulus that was not coupled with deficit reduction in later years, as he warned of the danger of ballooning debt and deficits. The payrolltax cut was enacted late last year just before Summers returned to his teaching

job at Harvard University.

He left the administration hopeful that the package would be enough to restore the economy to vigor. Solid payroll growth in the first few months of the year offered reasons for optimism. In the interview, Summers listed several factors that contributed to the slowdown: the fallout on the global economy from Japan’s earthquake, concerns in European debt markets, high oil prices and a deceleration in China’s rate of growth.

But he also said the US economy is in a “cycle that has some of the characteristics of what happened in Japan” following the bursting of its asset bubble and that’s why it has struggled to regain its stride. “The economy isn’t as strong as I expected last winter,” Summers. He said that in post-bubble recessions, such as Japan’s in the 1990s and the Great Depression of the 1930s, there is a tendency to assume any pickup in growth means a return to normal growth but recoveries in those cases take much longer.

Separately, Jeff Immelt, chief executive of General Electric and head of Obama’s jobs and competitiveness council, said Washington should streamline permitting for construction projects and make it easier for tourists to visit the United States to help boost hiring and spur the economy.

In an opinion piece co -written with American Express chief executive Ken Chenault, Immelt said his panel’s “progress report” outlined ways to increase hiring in manufacturing, construction, healthcare, and tourism sectors. The opinion piece was released by the White House on Sunday ahead of publication in the Wall Street Journal yesterday. — Reuters

Venezuela sees growth in 2011 CARACAS: Venezuela’s government lifted its economic growth forecast for 2011 again on Sunday, this time to at least 5 percent, after an initial aim of 2 percent. President Hugo Chavez and other senior officials had said earlier this year the South American OPEC member’s economy, which recently emerged from an 18-month recession, would probably grow twice the budget forecast of 2 percent. Government statistics body INE’s president Elias Eljuri was more specific, however, telling local TV: “With all the plans the government is doing ... it will be at least 5 percent.”

The economy grew a better-thanexpected 4.5 percent in the first quarter, compared with the same period last year, on the back of government spending which looks set to acceler-

ate ahead of next year’s presidential election. Given the high price of crude oil, however, and last year’s weak statistical base, this year’s figures would be even healthier, some economists say, were it not for Chavez’s statist policies and squeezing of the private sector.

The economy shrank 1.7 percent last year. “The growth is felt in the most under-privileged sectors of the country, and in that sense, the perspectives are very positive,” Eljuri added.

Chavez is counting on social spending not only to drive economic growth but to bring him another sixyear term in a vote expected for December next year. His flagship project is a plan to build 2 million new, low-cost houses by 2017. — Reuters

MADRID: A protester sleeps in a tent as people go about their buisness in Puerta del Sol square yesterday. Most of the young demonstrators who camped out in one of Madrid’s busiest squares to protest bleak economic prospects have left the plaza to squads of cleaners after voting to end more than three weeks of vociferous protest. The protests began May 15 and spread to cities across Spain and elsewhere in Europe, striking a chord with hundreds of thousands of sympathizers. Some people have decided to stay on. — AP

Chile copper mine struggles after strike SANTIAGO: Output at Chile’s El Teniente mine, the world’s No 5 copper deposit, remained well below capacity on Sunday as staffing was limited by renewed violence from striking contractors, mine owner Codelco said.

The state miner had expected to return to full production this weekend, but protester violence on Friday led the company to hold many workers back from the 404,000 tonnes-a-year mine.

Some full-time staff were returning to work in extended shifts, minimizing bus trips that had been a flash point for protests, union leaders said.

“With the contingency plan, miners are sleeping up at the camp for three or four days at a time. We’re still far from normal staffing,” said Juan Meneses, president of El Teniente’s largest staff union. Codelco’s struggle

to recover output may keep pressure on global copper prices, stoking fears of a prolonged supply disruption in Chile, the world’s top copper producer.

The company did not provide an updated output figure on Sunday, but two staff union sources said the mine was producing less than half of capacity. Thousands of contractors went on strike on May 25 to demand Codelco and their employers increase wages and benefits as global copper prices hover near record levels.

Contractors met with their employers late Friday to lay out their demands, but have not heard back, protest leaders said. “ We expect to hear from them, and in the meantime our strike is holding firm,” said Marco Alarcon, a protest leader.

Codelco Chairman Gerardo Jofre said on Friday that the mine output dropped back to 40 percent of capacity after violence flared up and El Teniente could miss its output target for 2011. Still, he said there were no plans to break off contracted shipments with a declaration of force majeure.

Chief Executive Diego Hernandez said on Thursday that the company had lost about 7,000 tonnes of copper.

Codelco and unions pulled most staff workers off the job over a week ago after protesters threw rocks at buses carrying workers to the world’s biggest underground copper mine.

Codelco said on Friday that renewed violence was keeping around 6,000 contractors, more than half the total, from returning to work after they agreed to

ink new wage contracts.

Protest leaders denied that so many contractors have abandoned the strike, but acknowledged last week that hundreds have returned to work. El Teniente employs more than 10,000 contractors, most of whom support nonproduction operations, such as reinforcing tunnel walls, repairing machinery and distributing food, while the mine’s 4,000 staff workers focus directly on production.

The protest has drawn comparisons to a violent demonstration by contractors in 2007 and 2008 that forced Codelco to halt work at El Teniente and two other mines. Risk of contagion was seen low for now, but companies are monitoring for wage demands among contractors at their mines, union and company sources said. — Reuters

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TECHNOLOGY

Modern Etiquette: The pitfalls of social media WASHINGTON: I recently spent eight days in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) conducting training under the patronage of The Protocol Department Dubai.

One of the most striking things about the experience was the abundance of Blackberries, iPhones, and other digital devices seemingly in the hands of the entire populace.

I even noticed when I met with one of the UAE Rulers that he carries his iPhone like a warrior with a weapon.

I also noticed that in the UAE, protocol dictates stashing your digital device during face-to-face conversations and when making large, and small, business presentations - it’s considered rude and shows disinterest to do otherwise.

Yet, when I travel in the US and to other countries (for business and pleasure), mobile devices stay firmly in-hand, not just for checking email or headlines

but to visit social networking sites.

It’s important when courting international partners to realize that potential allies will surf the net for every nugget of information they can find on you and your company.

According to Twitter, more than 60 percent of users are from outside the US, while more than 70 percent of Facebook users reside outside the US Both companies are incorporating more languages to help boost usage in lowgrowth regions.

This has resulted in explosive growth - more than 4,300 percent in Taiwan, more than 3,800 percent in Brazil, and more than 2,900 percent in Thailand.

And that’s just the past two years!

This brings me to today’s crucial mandate. Be vigilant about maintaining a clean virtual image, especially if, like me, your business crosses international borders. Yes, there’s LinkedIn and other

professional sites, but don’t fool yourself. Facebook is not personal or private and it will be viewed and used by others to form an opinion about you.

Facebook privacy settings are minimal and need to be manually set for ‘high privacy’. There’s simply no need for business contacts to see a photo of you in swimwear or downing a beer at your in-law’s pool party.

Remember, a seemingly harmless image in your personal life can undo business opportunities in countries where drinking and scant dressing are taboo.

Tip: The best way to avoid any digital mis-steps is to take a proactive approach to networking - and all things business related - by asking business contacts to connect with you on a business platform like your web site or LinkedIn, where you should always have a recent ‘professional photo’ of yourself.

If a business associate that you don’t have a personal relationship with invites you to join their personal network, direct them to your business platform.

To avoid offending them, explain that you check your business platform (i.e., LinkedIn, web site) more frequently.

In addition to profile management, be mindful of any post you toss into the blogosphere, the Twittersphere, YouTube, MySpace or any other Newbie Digital Fare. Things can go awry if you are either inappropriate or too quick on the trigger.

Take for example the advertising executive who inadvertently sent a tweet from his client’s account (a major US automobile manufacturer) instead of his own. The use of profanity and criticism of the manufacturer’s drivers all in one sentence elicited profound results.

Although the executive quickly realized his mistake and deleted the post,

the damage was done. Soon, the client’s followers re-tweeted the faux pas and in short order the tweet found its way to numerous blogs and the desks of the agency’s client as well as agency execs.

The outcome was costly - the agency lost a very big account.

Even if the executive had tweeted from his personal account there would have been consequences. Virtually all social media content is available to anyone, anywhere, anytime and nothing is truly private, nor can it be permanently deleted.

So, whether you are a recent college grad on the job hunt or the CEO of a major company, here’s the Digital Golden Rule: If you wouldn’t print out the message or duplicate the photo or post the video under your own name and distribute it to every business contact you can think of, don’t post it, tweet it, or upload it. —Reuters

Japan 3-D pop avatar a real-world hit Hotteststars onthe J-pop scene TOKYO: Japanese teenage pop sensation Miku Hatsune has millions of smitten fans, a string of top hits and an image entirely unblemished by drug use, scandals or celebrity meltdowns. She doesn’t demand six-figure recording contracts, always shows up on time, never throws tantrums and won’t break a sweat during a two-hour live show in a concert hall packed with thousands of adoring followers.

MEDELLIN: Members of the “Thousand Swords” cultural corporation perform with foam rubber swords in a park in Medellin, Antioquia department, yesterday. Thousand Swords is a medievalist community which promotes the study of the history through role-playing games —which combine a contact sport with the fantasy of the age of the sword— among other cultural activities and thematic camps. —AFP

States weigh relaxing penalties for teen sexting PROVIDENCE: A congressman who sends an X-rated photo of himself jeopardizes his reputation and his job.

But in many states, teens caught doing the same thing can risk felony charges, jail time and being branded sexual offenders.

That’s because a minor who transmits a sexually explicit photo of themselves according to many state laws, is manufacturing and distributing child pornography. Lawmakers across the country, however, now say the problem of teen sexting didn’t exist when they enacted harsh punishments for child porn and are considering changes that would ensure minors don’t face jail time for youthful mistakes. “Let’s just call this what it is: stupid,” said Rhode Island state Rep. Peter M ar tin, a Democrat from Newport who is sponsoring a bill to downgrade teen sexting from a felony to a juvenile offense.

“These are kids we’re talking about. I don’t think minors should face these severe punishments just for being stupid.” Legislatures in Rhode Island and 20 other states have considered bills this year to adjust penalties for teen sex ting, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.

California lawmakers are considering legislation that would enable schools to expel students caught sex ting.

Florida lawmakers voted to punish teen sexting with a $60 fine and community service. Lawmakers in New York, where US Rep. Anthony Weiner is embroiled in a sexting scandal, have introduced legislation that would allow judges to send teens who send explicit photos to counseling instead of jail if prosecutors agree they meant no harm.

Studies show that one in five teens has electronically transmitted explicit photos of themselves, and one third say they have received such photos. It’s a 21st century update of “I’ll show you mine” with one critical difference: lewd photos can be passed on with the push of a button and live forever on the Internet. “It’s an extraordinarily common behavior among kids, like it or not,” said Amy Adler, a law professor at New York University who has studied how child pornography laws have been applied to sexting. “I hope lawmakers and prosecutors figure out quickly how to address it, because it’s not going away.” Parents and educators are the most likely to discover that a teen has sent or received lewd photos. Even when police or prosecutors get involved, most cases don’t result in felony charges. But it has happened.

Six Pennsylvania teens faced felony child pornography charges after police found underage boys swapping nude pictures of female classmates. Three girls were charged with manufacturing and distributing child porn, and three boys were charged with possession.

The case ended up in juvenile court, where the teens were sentenced to community service and curfews.

In another Pennsylvania case last year, a federal judge blocked a prosecutor from filing felony charges against teen girls caught in a sexting investigation. Last month, a Michigan prosecutor announced he had authorized felony charges against three 13- and 14-year-olds caught sexting.

In Rhode Island, a 16-year-old avoided felony charges last summer but pleaded guilty to disorderly conduct and indecent exposure. The boy had shown friends an explicit phone video of himself with a female student. He was sentenced to 200 hours of community service and prohibited from owning a cell phone with a camera for one year. Prosecutors and judges need more discretion to treat each cast of sexting differently, according to Sherry Capps Cannon, a former principal and high school administrator who recently graduated from Southern University Law Center in Louisiana, where she wrote a law review article examining laws surrounding teen sexting. There’s a big difference, she said, between an adult who emails an explicit photo of a young teen and a 15-year-old who sends such a photo to a boyfriend. But laws in most states make no distinction. “ The law has to acknowledge the intent of the person sending the photo,” she said. “Right now, laws designed to protect children are being used to punish them.” The legislation working its way through the R hode Island General Assembly would make sexting by minors a juvenile offense similar to truancy, or unexcused absences from school. The bill has passed the House and awaits a vote in the Senate. Under current law minors who transmit indecent photos of themselves could face criminal penalties including prison time and fines of up to $5,000. Teens who forward indecent photos of other minors, however, could still face child pornography charges. State Sen. John Tassoni led a state task force examining c yberbullying and other problems caused by teens using technology in inappropriate ways. He said parents and schools can help stop sexting by reminding students that mistakes committed in cyberspace can have longlasting, real-world consequences.

But as Weiner’s recent case shows, he said, there’s no age limit for inappropriate Internet use. And Tassoni doesn’t see the problem going away anytime soon.

“I tell these k ids that whatever they’re putting out there will live forever,” said Tassoni. “We need to discourage it, but charging them with felonies doesn’t seem to be the way to do it.” — AP

Too good to be true? Yes and no. Miku Hatsune is a 3-D computer animation.

The collaborative brainchild of software developers, a manga comic artist and a vast digital fan community, the virtual singer from outer space has become one of the hottest stars on the J-pop scene.

Next month she’s giving her debut US concert, the “Mikunopolis” show on July 2 at the Anime Expo 2011 in Los Angeles.

Miku may not, technically, be real, but that didn’t stop several thousand fans, most of them young men, from flocking to her latest live gig in Tokyo, where the android star enthralled her audience from an onstage screen.

“We can see her but we can’t touch her. We think she is a true idol, the purest kind of idol,” gushed 21-year-old literature student Keisuke Umeda, decked out in a Miku T-shirt and a range of her merchandise.

“She’s so cute, and she dances so well,” nodded his girlfriend Azusa Fushimi, 20, a design stu-

dent dressed in a self-made Miku outfit for the occasion, complete with body-length aquamarine pigtails.

Below the strobe lights, TV cameras and disco balls, fans were jabbing the air with fluorescent glowsticks even before Miku showed up and while her very human support band was still fidgeting with their instruments.

An excited roar rippled through the crowd when she burst onto the stage as a cloud of pixels that morphed into the shape of a petite galactic manga vixen with thigh-high boots and an impossibly short miniskirt.

The programmers who created Miku are vague about her persona, but very specific about her stats-the teenage pop queen is 158 centimetres (five feet two) tall and weighs a dainty 42 kilogrammes (93 pounds).

What followed was an energypacked, pixel-perfect show with all the usual elements of a rock concert-light banter between star and audience, strobe lights, bursts of dry ice, and a series of wellreceived encores.

Unlike her flesh-and-blood pop sisters, Miku changed costumes at the speed of a mouse-click-wearing a sailor-girl school uniform one moment and a China-doll red silk number with a paper handfan the next.

To the casual observer, Miku’s strange show, held in March, could easily appear like a glimpse into a dystopian future when humans will slavishly celebrate computer programmes.

But to insiders and fans, the phenomenon is a far more participatory, collaborative and interactive experience than a normal concert, because fans don’t just sing along with the hits-they create them.

The software engine behind Miku is Yamaha’s Vocaloid music programme, which allows fans to literally put words in her mouth, by typing in lyrics and a melody that creates a synthetic voice track.

The company Crypton Future Media, based in Sapporo on the northern island of Hokkaido, created the Miku Hatsune character in 2007 with the help of a manga

Tech

artist and voice samples from a real singer, Saki Fujita.

Fans were invited to breathe life into her, and they have-posting more than 30,000 songs and films featuring the virtual star on video sharing websites such as YouTube and Japan’s Nico Nico Douga. The creative outpouring has spawned a number of realworld hits, and a compilation of Vocaloid songs featuring Hatsune Miku in May 2010 hit number-one on one Japanese weekly’s album charts.

Amid her meteoric rise, the galactic vixen really has reached for the stars.

When Japan launched the its Venus Climate Orbiter Akatsuki in May last year, the spacecraft carried three aluminium plates depicting Miku, thanks to a fan petition with more than 10,000 signatures.

US fans can see Miku live on July 2 at the “Mikunopolis” concer t, sponsored by Sega and To yo t a , a t t h e A n i m e E x p o 2 0 1 1 w h i c h r u n s a t t h e Lo s A n g e l e s Co nve n t i o n Ce n t e r from July 1-4. —AFP

tips

Storing data WASHINGTON: Which type of storage are you using for backups? If you’re still using DVDs, you’re probably wasting valuable time. The cheapest and fastest way to back up the data today is on a regular hard drive. Either an external hard drive, which connects to your computer using a USB port, or an internal model will suffice.

Remember when budgeting for data storage to think about buying twice the amount you’ll need - half for your files and programs, and the other half for the backup of those files and programs.

NORWALK: Ruben Rios who is a quadriplegic plays a video game using a special mouth controller in his home in Norwalk, California, Thursday, June 2. When Ruben Rios plays video games he uses top and bottom lip controls, a cross bar mouth joystick and a number of holes and tubes he can puff or sip into to articulate actions in game. —AP

An inventor with plenty of passion MUNICH: Daniel Gurdan has invested tons of passion into his flying robots. As at armslength, a helicopter-like vehicle rises into the sky, a grin spreads across the inventor’s face.

The flying machine has eight propellers and is equipped with a camera that beams crystal clear images back to a monitor in Gurdan’s hands.

The 28-year-old describes himself as a technology freak and develops “unmanned planes” or drones at his company in the town of Krailling near Munich. The word “drone,” however, is taboo for Gurdan as it has negative connotations due to its military use.

What makes his “flying platforms” unique is the special technology that allows them to be precisely guided and placed at an exact position in the air, according to Gurdan. That ability is something that can prove very useful in a situation such as a natural catastrophe like an earthquake or flood.

Photographer Markus Greber bought

one of the planes last year and set up a new business. Greber uses the unmanned plane to take a bird’s eye views of sporting events, real estate or just high perspective images.

He says that “the robot is child’s’ play to fly and is stable in the air even in strong wind.

It’s better than other models with different technology.”

Gurdan never planned on becoming an inventor - he’s always been one. “As a child I would dismantle toys to find out how they worked,” he recalls. He says he’s no more intelligent than the average person - just more inquisitive. He can put the career success he enjoys today down to that.

Even as a school kid Gurdan wrote a little piece of history. He has taken part seven times in Germany’s young scientist competition, “Jugend forscht.” The first time was at the age of 12 with an automatic drinks dispenser for cats. He’s been in the final four times and won the event twice. —dpa

Frequent breaks The amount of time you spend sitting in front of a computer is time spent not moving your body.

That ’s detrimental to your health, says Washington-based or thopedic surgeon Leo Rozmaryn. Your body was made to move, and the tiny and limited movements people make while sitting at a personal computer can lead to soft tissue injury. “Take frequent breaks and stretch your arms and legs at least every 20 minutes,” Rozmaryn says. Preferably, spend no more than four hours per day sitting at the computer.

Battery power You can conserve battery power on your notebook computer by using the “blank” screen saver.

Most operating systems today allow you to choose the type of screensaver you wish to use.

The standard “blank” screen is often not the default, but it is the one that draws the least amount of power. Fanc y screen savers can require significant computing power, which means that your notebook is working even when you’re not. That’s a waste, especially when your notebook is running on batteries.

Recordable CDs Recordable CDs are more fragile than the kind you buy from the store. The sensitive layer upon which data or music files are stored can be easily scratched or dirtied. So be especially careful with recordable media. You should not only store your CDs in protective layers but inspect the recording layer and gently wipe off dust or dirt when you see it. Any lint-free cloth moistened with water will do.

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

Coffee lovers with heart disease live longer NEW YORK: Women with heart disease who down a few cups of coffee each day tend to live as long as those who avoid the beverage, according to a study. The results, reported in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, add to already mixed findings on whether caffeinated coffee is a hazard for people at high risk of cardiovascular problems.

The study, which followed nearly 12,000 US nurses with a history of heart disease or stroke, found that those who regularly drank caffeinated coffee were no more likely to die than non-coffee drinkers during the study period, which spanned more than 20 years for some participants.

In fact, no link was found between a woman’s coffee intake and her risk of death from heart attack, stroke or any other cause-and this was true of even of women who drank four or more cups of coffee each day.

“Our results suggest that coffee drinking is okay for patients with cardiovascular disease, but it would be desirable to replicate our results in other populations,” said lead researcher Esther LopezGarcia, of Universidad Autonoma de Madrid in Spain. The results came from the long-running Nurses’ Health Study, which began tracking more than 100,000 female nurses in 1976. The researchers focused on 11,697 women who developed heart disease or had a stroke sometime between 1976 and 2002.

Of those women, 62 percent continued to drink caffeinated coffee after their diagnosis.

Overall, 1159 women had died by 2004. That risk was no greater among coffee drinkers than nondrinkers, including women who drank at least four cups a day. One possibility is that women in relatively worse health might choose to avoid caf-

feinated coffee, the study authors noted. But they found no evidence that changes in women’s coffee intake after their heart complication or stroke explained the findings. They also accounted for factors like age, weight, high blood pressure and diabetes, and still found no association between coffee consumption and the risk of death.

The findings, Lopez-Garcia said, support the idea that people with heart disease who already drink coffee don’t have to give it up. But she noted that one problem with the current study is that all of the subjects were nurses, so they might not be representative of women with heart disease in general.

The study also can’t discount coffee as a possible cause of cardiovascular problems, at least in some people. “What this study shows is that, in a general population, there’s no obvious harm, or

benefit, to consuming coffee after a heart attack,” said Ahmed El-Sohemy, an associate professor at the University of Toronto who has studied coffee intake and cardiac health.

“What this study doesn’t tell us is who might coffee be harmful to, and who might benefit from it.” Some research has linked coffee drinking to increased risks of high blood pressure in people who are naturally slow metabolizers of caffeine. But the reverse pattern has been seen in people who quickly process caffeine-more coffee, lower heart risks. Recent studies have pointed to the importance of genetics, El-Sohemy added, cautioning that it’s hard to make individual recommendations on coffee intake because of these genetic variations in metabolizing. “I don’t see how any results can be interpreted from studies that don’t take this genetic difference into account.” — Reuters

German shortcomings in focus as outbreak wanes Germany must pay for standard lab tests BERLIN: The battle against Europe’s deadly E. coli outbreak descended into cacophony and confusion. Now that the crisis is stabilizing, German officials acknowledge lessons to be learned.

Among the problems: a tangle of federal and regional authorities, chaotic communication and a system for reporting cases that many say is antiquated. Cases began appearing at the start of May, and the outbreak swelled to crisis level over the next three weeks, with the German city of Hamburg at the epicenter. It appears to be waning after sickening more than 3,000 people and killing 35.

“We must succeed in speaking with one voice in order to give citizens the necessary information, the necessary transparency”, Health Minister Daniel Bahr conceded after officials on Friday finally declared sprouts from a farm in northern Germany to be the culprit.

A case in point: the sprouts were first fingered as a likely cause by regional officials nearly a week earlier, but authorities backtracked when initial tests turned out negative.

A warning against cucumbers, tomatoes and lettuce, based purely on patient interviews, remained in place, causing major losses for farmers especially in Spain.

Hamburg officials for days fingered Spanish cucumbers as the probable source, but tests cleared them. The European Union’s health commissioner at one point warned Germany against issuing more premature conclusions about the origin of contaminated food. Critics

say the outbreak exposed weaknesses in Germany’s cherished but sometimes cumbersome federal system, in which alongside national institutions, 16 state governments have their own health authorities, a state of affairs that can result in long, potentially time-consuming, reporting chains.

An editorial in the medical journal Lancet remarked that “coordination of the German public health response seems to have been utterly absent” and said that underlined a wider lack of coordination in Europe. It said “there is a strong case for a Europe-wide review of national and continental responses to infectious disease outbreaks.”“The German press has been scathing.

“A jumble of responsibilities reigns,” German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung commented in an editorial. It noted that the battle involved at least four offices at federal level, plus the states’ health ministries and local health offices.

Some in the governing coalition think critics have a point.

“The cases that we are seeing today are brutal and come on very quickly, and in my opinion this diversity of official structures isn’t suited to it,” said lawmaker Hans-Michael Goldmann, head of parliament’s consumer affairs committee.

The current system, he said, dates back to the crisis a decade ago over the human form of mad cow disease an infection that usually takes years to develop. Goldmann told German radio that three federal authorities, the disease control center, the risk assessment and food safety agencies, which report to different ministries —

MALAGA: In this May 31, 2011 file picture a farm worker throws away cucumbers into a container outside of a greenhouse in Algarrobo, near Malaga, southern Spain. After a several-week battle against the deadly E. coli outbreak at times descended into cacophony and confusion, critics - and even German officials - say many lessons need to be learned for the future. — AP

should now be merged into a single agency focusing on health.

Another problem: a reporting system under which hospitals’ notifications of a serious illness still often wind their way to the national disease control center by conventional post.

Karl Lauterbach, a health policy spokesman for the opposition Social Democrats, called for those notifications in future to be e-mailed directly to the center. “We will examine in the (parliamentary) health committee how many infections could have been prevented by an obligation to report electronically,” Lauterbach told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper.

Bahr, the health minister, conceded that the issue needs addressing “after a phase of calm.”

“It’s incomprehensible to me, too, that we are still using antiquated means of communication here,” he said on ZDF television. Bahr said federal authorities were informed quickly of the infections by officials in Hamburg, but information needs to be exchanged faster in future “to get a nationwide overview quickly.” Paul Hunter, a professor of health protection at the University of East Anglia in England, said the outbreak could have been detected sooner if doctors regularly did lab tests on patients with diarrhea — a standard practice in Britain.

“The health system in Germany should surely be able to pay for standard lab tests for people with bloody diarrhea,” he said. “If they had been testing people earlier in Germany, this outbreak would certainly have been picked up far sooner.”

Flemming Scheutz, the head of a World Health Organization collaborating laboratory in Denmark, said many European countries’ health ministries “have no understanding” of the need to detect dangerous E. coli in the early stages.

“Once it hits like this, with a virulent strain, the entire diagnostic sector is not prepared for it because the techniques are not in place,” he said.

“The outbreak detection is delayed maybe a week, so that means the interviews with the patients go back maybe two weeks instead of one week and how many people remember what they ate two weeks ago?” German authorities also could have helped themselves by zeroing in on the few dozen cases of people who fell sick abroad after visiting the country, said Norman Noah, a professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. “Those people would have been far more likely to remember what they ate and where,” he said.

German officials have defended their warning on Spanish cucumbers, saying the vegetables were contaminated with a different strain of E. coli. But Noah said it should have been clear that was the wrong trail.

“A big clue was that the outbreak was so localized in northern Germany, yet Spanish cucumbers are sold everywhere,” he said. “That really did not fit.” — AP

Cockroaches may be asthma culprit for city children NEW YORK: Cockroaches have been identified as a possible explanation for dramatic neighborhood variations in asthma rates among New York City children.

In some neighborhoods, 19 percent - nearly 1 in 5 - of children have asthma, while in others the rate can be as low as 3 percent. Heavy traffic, industrial incinerators, and other outdoor air pollution sources have all been blamed in the past.

But researchers at Columbia University have now found that children living in neighborhoods with high rates of asthma were twice as likely to carry antibodies against a cockroach protein in their blood, a sign the children had been exposed to the insects and were likely allergic to them.

In addition, homes in the neighborhoods with high rates of asthma contained more of the allergen produced by cockroaches in household dust.

The study provides “further evidence that cockroach exposure is part of the story,” said study author Matthew Perzanowski.

“Cockroach allergen really could be contributing to disparities in asthma prevalence, even in an urban environment like New York City.”

For the study, published in the Journal of Allergy and Clinical Immunology, Perzanowski and his team visited in the homes of 239 seven- and eight-year-olds, half of whom lived in areas with high asthma rates.

Previous research has linked poverty to an increased rate of asthma in childhood, but to eliminate the influence of income or the results, the authors only included families with the same middleincome health insurance plan, to ensure they had the same income and access to health care.

More than half of the children already had asthma.

During the visits, the researchers collected dust from the children’s beds, then took blood samples to look for antibodies against various allergens associated with asthmaincluding dog, cat, mouse, dust mite and cockroach proteins.

Nearly 1 in 4 children in neighborhoods with high asthma rates appeared to be allergic to cockroaches, compared to 1 in 10 children living in areas where asthma is less common.

Cockroaches leave behind proteins that people inhale and can become allergic to, which in turn increases the chance they will develop asthma, Perzanowski said.

Homes in high-asthma communities also had higher concentrations of the cockroach allergen, as well as allergens associated with mice and cats. In addition, children who were allergic to cockroaches and mice were more likely to have asthma, noted Joanne Sordillo at the

Channing Laboratory of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, Boston, who reviewed the findings for Reuters Health.

“Mouse or cockroach allergen exposure may increase the risk of allergic sensitization (allergies), which is in turn related to the development of asthma in children,” she said.

Although cockroach-protein sensitization was more common in children in high-asthma neighborhoods, overall, children who were allergic to dust and cats were also more likely to have asthma.

Perzanowski said the issue of cat ownership is a bit murkier. Some previous research has found that children in homes with cats were more likely to be allergic, but in this study, having a cat did not predispose children to asthma. “It’s complicated. Avoidance of cats doesn’t seem to reduce your risk of developing asthma,” he said. — Reuters

LONDON: Microsoft tycoon Bill Gates speaks during a television interview at the GAVI (Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation) conference, in London, yesterday. — AFP

Britain, Bill Gates boost child vaccine funding LONDON: Britain and Bill Gates joined forces yesterday to pledge more than half the 3.7 billion dollars (2.6 billion euros) sought to vaccinate millions of children by 2015.

Prime Minister David Cameron told a donors’ conference in London that Britain would contribute a further 814 million pounds (1.3 billion dollars, 920 million euros) to GAVI (Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation), an aid group backed by the Microsoft tycoon.

He said the extra funds would treat 80 million children against preventable conditions such as pneumonia and diarrhoea, and save 1.4 million lives.

Gates followed Cameron’s pledge by saying his charitable foundation would commit an additional one billion dollars over five years.

Cameron said: “Today we come together because we have the chance to save another four million lives in four years. “Frankly the idea of children dying from pneumonia and diarrhoea should be absolutely unthinkable in 2011.

“But for many parents in the developing world it is a devastating reality.” Cameron said GAVI was a “great organisation” that had been one of the top performers in a British government review of aid groups.

The pledges have gone a long way towards GAVI’s aim of making up the 3.7-

billion-dollar funding shortfall in its aim to immunise 243 million more children and avert four million deaths by 2015.

GAVI has already vaccinated 288 million children in 19 countries.

It wants to extend the vaccination programme to another 26 countries.

Announcing his pledge, Gates said: “It’s not every day you give away a billion dollars but for a cause like this it’s exciting to be doing this.”

Pneumonia and diarrhoea kill three times as many children under the age of five as HIV/AIDS even though vaccines are available to prevent such deaths. Many developing countries cannot afford the vaccines.

British drug giant GlaxoSmithKline last week agreed that for sales to the world’s poorest nations it would slash 95 percent off the price of a vaccine for the diarrhoeal disease rotavirus.

Cameron told the conference Britain’s increased contribution to GAVI was in line with his decision to maintain the government’s international aid budget at a time when it was making cuts in many other areas. But he said he wanted to see poor nations become trading partners, not just recipients of aid.

“In the long term I know we will not help countries develop by just giving them money. — AFP

Extreme Makeover trainer aims for enormous changes NEW YORK: Chris Powell, trainer for the US reality TV show “Extreme Makeover: Weight Loss Edition,” may hold a degree in exercise science, but he says his business is transformation. That jibes nicely with his role on the series, where he serves alternately as coach, drill sergeant, cheerleader and shoulder to cry on to desperately obese people struggling to lose fully half their body weight. “Super obese is actually the technical term for the individuals that I work with,” Powell, who calls himself a transformation specialist, explained, “individuals with over 200 pounds (91 kilos) of extra fat on their bodies.”

Each episode follows one individual’s year-long metamorphosis. The 33-year-old Arizonian has been working with the super obese since 2003. “There’s something so magical about this group because they are the group that the cards are stacked against,” he said. While the TV transformations are dramatic, Powell said the methods can work just as well for the couch potato who needs to drop 20 pounds.

“From a diet and exercise standpoint, losing 20 or 200 pounds is almost identical.

It’s just scale,” he said. “The beauty of working with the super obese is that if they make one tiny change, like switching from cola to water, they see huge changes on the scale.” He also explained that because they have developed the muscle to accommodate their girth, a little movement goes a long way. “They’re sitting on huge metabolic engines and they don’t realize it,” he said.” If I just tell them to move 10 minutes, their calorie burn is through the roof.”

Powell, who has also studied biomechanics and physiology, describes his fitness philosophy as “a little of this, a little of that.” But whatever your goal, switch it up

and pick it up. “On the show everything is turbocharged,” he said. “Once they’ve cleared the medical (examinations), I push them. That very first workout is grueling.

Constant overloading is the only thing the body responds to.”

He’s also a firm believer in interval training. “Intermittent high- and low- intensity exercises in a randomized pattern get so much more out of the body,” he said, “and it’s an opportunity to experience relatively high intensity for short durations.” Powell works with therapists to ease participants’ transitions into their new bodies. “They’re taking on a whole new identity. It’s stressful, even though it’s a positive stress.”

So between bouts of self-pity over fried food deprivation and tears of exhaustion on the treadmill, participants are buoyed by dream vacations and what Powell calls “superman moments.” Halfway into one episode, Powell urged Rachel, a 21-year-old school teacher, to experience her new body by bungee-jumping off the Bridge to Nowhere in California. “It changes your identity,” said Powell, who encourages those without a network television-sized budget to create more modest milestones, like running a marathon, or a mile.

Powell said he’s a veteran of his own transformation, albeit from the opposite end of the scale. “I was the smallest kid in school, so I had fair share of bullying. It was not easy, but my parents bought me my first weights and I felt empowered for the first time. It changed my life.” Meanwhile, bungee-jumping Rachel dropped some 200 pounds and is working towards her personal training certification. “About half of the people I’ve transformed are working toward their certifications right now,” Powell said.

“They’re loving it.” — Reuters

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Scientists race to avoid a bitter climate change NEW YORK: The World Bank in February said rising food prices had pushed an estimated 44 million more people into extreme poverty over the course of eight months, triggering unrest.

That is putting ever mounting pressure on governments, agronomists and the farm industry to come up with ways of growing more food on less land and under harsher conditions.

“Everything we do in terms of developing our technology, bringing that to growers worldwide, is really about addressing the need to grow more from less,” said Davor Pisk, chief operating officer for Syngenta, the world’s largest agrochemicals firm.

The Swiss firm’s seeds business has flourished, growing to $2.8 billion in 2010, out of total sales of $11.6 billion, in large part for demand for Genetically Modified (GM) seeds to meet soaring demand in the United States for corn ethanol and for soyoil and soymeal in China.

Corn and soy, major elements of animal feed and biofuels, have attracted significant investment for new GM food varieties that have substantially boosted yields.

Corn and soybean are also much simpler genetically than wheat and rice.

Syngenta has developed corn and soy varieties that repel pests, fungi and are tolerant to a range of chemicals that kill weeds-all threats expected to get worse during climate change. It has also just released a hybrid called Agrisure Artesian that has resistance to drought.

“What we’re confident of being able to demonstrate is

that we can achieve a 15 percent decline in percentage of losses due to drought. So if you like, we get 15 percent yield preservation,” Pisk said. The next generation of varieties would aim for 25 percent.

GM is just one part of a suite of technologies growers need to meet demand and fight the impact of climate change, he said.

The problem is knowing just what sort of future lies ahead for farmers and exactly what varieties were needed for different growing areas.

Computer climate models have become quite good at showing how temperatures will change across the globe, but are less precise on how rainfall and storm patterns will change, particularly at local levels.

If you can’t predict the weather then you can try to beat it with new genetic strains of grain plants that will boost yields.

But crop yields would have to rise a lot faster than they have been. Scientists say yields will have to increase by around 1.5 percent a year to match the growth in the world’s population of around 1 percent a year. That may sound small, but the current pace of yield growth is well below that.

Overall, rice yields have more than doubled over the past half-century from 1.85 tonnes per hectare in 1960 to 4.29 tonnes in 2011/12, USDA data shows.

But the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in the Philippines says rice yields will have to rise another 11 percent to about 4.8 tonnes per ha by 2018/19 just to

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By comparison, corn yields have risen from 1.95 tonnes per ha in 1960 to 5.22 tonnes in 2011/12, propelled by soaring demand for animal feed and ethanol.

Wheat yields have gained more modestly to 3 tonnes in 2011/12 from 1.15 tonnes in 1960.

The production of rice, the staple for more than half the world’s population, has kept pace so far with consumption, thanks to advances made in the Green Revolution. But yields will have to keep rising and stocks kept at healthy levels to avoid the kind of panic purchases by governments and export restrictions that helped drive the food price crisis of 2008.

The danger is that climate change could cause yields to drop, in some cases dramatically so, according to a study by the International Food Policy Research Institute.

Its modelling of the impact of climate change on cereal crops showed yields in 2050 are likely to be lower than they were in 2000, with the most vulnerable being wheat.

But developing a new variety of higher-yielding wheat takes a minimum of seven to 10 years, mostly because it has highly complex genetics. It’s one reason why wheat, and to a similar extent rice, have fallen behind in yield growth and investment.

“In breeding new varieties for use in 20 years’ time, we need to have the necessary genes now. And I think that’s going to be tricky,” said Greg Rebetzke, a wheat breeder for CSIRO in Canberra.

One trick is to boost the early growth of wheat plants.

The dwarfing genes that triggered the Green Revolution cut the height of wheat plants and allowed the plant to focus on filling the grain head.

But the shoot that emerges from the seed is too short, limiting planting depth and access to water deeper in the soil. Rebetzke said CSIRO has found “alternative dwarfing genes” with no negative effects on early growth, which are “a major thrust in our breeding effort”.

To the north of London, the world’s oldest agricultural research station is working on ways to boost British wheat potential yields to 20 or even 25 tonnes in the long-term, far above the 8 tonnes produced there now.

The 1.6 ha Broadbalk field on Rothamsted farm dates back to 1843 when its founder, John Bennet Lawes, decided to test the power of artificial fertilisers. He had built the world’s first fertiliser factory a year earlier.

Walking in the same field where those trials started, project team leader Martin Parry explained how his team at Rothamsted and in the United States were looking at ways to super-charge photosynthesis in wheat by doubling the amount of CO2 inside the plant.

Parry, like many agronomists, believes a new global effort akin to what happened in the 1970s is needed to feed the world, beyond the promise of technology.

“We’re going to have to do it much more effectively.

We’re going to have use our resources like fertiliser much more efficiently and we’ll have to do it with less land,” he said. — Reuters

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Kuwait Times photography competition winner

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eah Moskaliuk, 2nd prize winner for photography competition receiving the awards from Adnan Saad Marketing Director Kuwait Times.

Announcement BAIA Summer Camp now open for registrations 2011 ON STAGE summer camp from 19 June to 06 July. Last year High School Musical, this year Camp Rock, Tangled, Cars...many more! From Page to Stage in just 3 weeks, through costume design, technicals, acting, singing, dance, music, make-up, film and lighting. Create a fabulous performance ON STAGE. Discounts available if registered before 01 June. Call 60052087 or mail administrator@baia.com.kw. Full details of all events and courses are available on www.baia.com.kw

Local school raises diabetes awareness

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he Dasman Diabetes Institute organized an educational program in coordination with the Department of Public Relations for the students of the French School in Kuwait in order to raise awareness for diabetes State of Kuwait is classified as the fifth

country worldwide in terms of high prevalence of diabetes, and the number of people with Type II is dramatically on the increase. Children and young adults are now experiencing a rapid increase due to the sedentary life style. This program is specifically targeted for school students

and their peers.

Although the incidence of Type II diabetes was more prevalent amongst individuals over 40, the main goal of the educational program provided by the Institute is to regularly attend the schools all over Kuwait to educate them on the risk factors

of diabetes, encourage a healthy lifestyle and make the right choices regarding diet and exercise.

With the increase of diabetes and obesity in Kuwait, these kinds of school programs are reaching new heights of popularity around the State.

Hoppin’ John String Band

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he Hoppin’ John String Band, a Bluegrass group, will be in Kuwait as part of a US Embassy sponsored visit and they’ll be conducting public performances in several locations. All public performances will open to the public and free of charge. No tickets or seat reservations will be required. Here are the details: The US Embassy Kuwait In cooperation with the National Council for Culture, Arts & Letters presents: The Hoppin’ John String Band Date: June 15, 2011 Time: 7:15pm to 8:30pm Location: National Council for Culture, Arts and Letters’ International Music Festival; Al-Dasma Theatre Date: June 16, 2011 Time: 9:00am to 10:00am Location: Live on Sabah Al-Watan (Al-Watan Television) Date: June 16, 2011 Time: 8:30pm to 9:30pm Location: The Higher Institute for Musical Arts Date: June 18, 2011 Time: 6:00pm to 7:00pm Location: Live on Raykum Shabab (Al-Rai Television) Date: June 19, 2011 Time: 7:15pm to 8:30pm Location: The Al-Babtain Central Library for Arabic Poetry.

Summer music festival

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he National Council of Culture, Arts and Letters in Kuwait proudly presents the Summer Music Festival 2011. The weeklong festival will feature live performances by artists, groups and bands from across the world as well as special workshops. All of the events are free of charge and will be held at the Abdulaziz Hussein Center in Mishref, Kuwait.

Today, June 14 - Hussain Al-Athamy Band of Iraqi maqam - 8:30 pm Tomorrow, June 15 - The Hoppin John Stringband - 8:30 pm The Hoppin’ John String Band performs and teaches music deeply rooted in the ballads, fiddle tunes, and traditions of the Appalachian Mountains of the United States. Comprised of two fiddles, guitar, banjo and bass, this band is sure to bring you to your feet and inspire you to sing along.

Thursday June 16 - Iraqi Maqam workshop 10:00 am, Traditional Music Night by Ma’youf Traditional Band - 8:30 pm The maqam workshop will take place in the auditorium of the National Museum. The traditional music night will feature the Ma’youf band, the popular traditional Kuwaiti group and will be held in the space in front of the Kuwaiti Maritime Museum.

Friday June 17 - Closing ceremony: Wa’ad Al Bahry band - 8:30 pm

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

Al-Sayer Group celebrates World Environment Day

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n celebration of World Environmental Day, which was on Sunday, June 5, Mubarak Naser Al-Sayer, CEO Al-Sayer Group, and Professor Mona Khaled Al Salal Director General of Ilawally education, and in the presence of a number of officials from both parties to attended to honor the winners of the contest for the third- best environmental performance. which carried the concept of Our Green schools as Muharak AlSayer explains in his speech as follows: “It has been approximately sixty years since the launch of Al-Sayer Group, which contributes its success to the Kuwaiti society at large in its development and growth and excellence to all its deserving people. and as a gratitude we feel national responsibility towards Kuwait s, where our role incumbent upon us to support social activities in various areas of the health or environmental or educational ... Etc. to benefit the community and enrich certain topics”.

Under this light Al Sayer continued by saying: “For Al Sayer Group to lead the reins of social initiatives we shall develop methodology in our beloved country “the State of Kuwait” through processes, programs and concrete activities in cooperation with concerned government authorities, including the Ministry of health and the Ministry of Education, which we seek through our partnership with them to lead the development plans that contribute to the creation of a generation aware of the environmental responsibilities, so they contribute in a practical and effective manner leading to improving the conditions of their surroundings in which they live in. to be delivered in turn to the future generations unharmed”.

Mubarak noted that through the follow-up of the course of the competition, which varied in themes for this year and included all levels of education, involving 115 schools and over 45 thousand participants on the website of the Social Responsibility of the Al-Sayer Group, we noticed a lot of posts that deserve all the praise and appreciation. weather lucky winners or not. On that note we thank all participants for their participation May God bless them all. We ask God Almighty to help us to deliver the concepts and goals of this competition while making us participant in creating a generation aware of its environmental problems, and its environmental social responsibilities.

The winning schools Kindergarten category I - First Place: Kindergarten Al Wasem 2 - Second Place: Kindergarten Al Ehsan 3 - Third Place: Kindergarten Al Yaqote Primary category First Place: Al Salam School Second Place: Anjafli School Middle School First Place: Umm Salamah Second place: Al Salmiya Girls Third Place: Al Qairawan Secondary school First Place: Fahd Al Douiri School

Students from FAIPS shine bright

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tudents of Fahaheel Al-Wataniah I n d i a n Pr i v a te S c h o o l ( FA I P S ) Kuwait emerged with flying colors in SHAASTROTSAV 2011, a Festival of Science organized by NSS Engineering College Alumni (Kuwait Chapter) in association with Gulf Universit y for Science and Technology (GUST). It was held on 6 May, 2011 in the state of the

art campus of GUST, Mishref-Kuwait. In the senior category, the first position was bagged by the students of FAIPS. for their model of ‘Solar Updraft Tower’ a simple but a very useful way of harnessing solar energy to generate electricity. The model was backed by unique computer presentations and graphic designs by Raunak Singh, S. Sudheesh and Aman Alam. In the

open category both the first and the second positions were secured by the budding scientists of FAIPS. Jeco Jacob, Akshit Tripathi and Kunal Singh topped by presenting the working model of ‘ Tesla Turbine’. V. Mahalakshmi and Swetha Sakthivel won the second position for the ‘Model Village’.

In another open Computer Animation

Contest, student Aditya Vishwanath won the first prize.

A large number of students also benefited by attending an excellent workshop on Robo Tech - Technophilia. The efforts made

by NSS College of Engineering Alumni towards popularizing science in such a unique way is highly appreciated.

A big congratulation to all the winners.

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Embassy Information EMBASSY OF ARGENTINA In order to inform that 23rd of October 2011, will be Argentine national election where all Argentinean citizen residents permanently in Kuwait can vote only if they are registered at the Electoral Register of the Argentine Embassy. The procedure of inscription ended on 25 of April 2011. To register it is necessary that Argentinean citizens should come personally at the Argentinean Embassy (Block 6, street 42, villa 57, Mishref) and present the DNI and four personal photos (size 4x4, face should be front on white background). For further information, contact us on 25379211.

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EMBASSY OF AUSTRALIA The Embassy encourages all Australians to register their presence in Kuwait through Smartraveller Online (see link below).

Australians who are registered are asked to update their details. The information provided will assist us in contacting you in an emergency. www.smartraveller.gov.au Kuwait citizens can apply for and receive visit visas to Australia online at www.immi.gov.au. This usually takes two working days. All others visa applications are handled by the Australian Visa Application Centre Tel. 22971110.

Witnessing and certifying documents are by appointment only, please contact the Embassy on 2232 2422.

The Australian Embassy is open from 8.00am to 4.00pm, Sunday to Thursday.

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EMBASSY OF BRITAIN The Visa Application Centre (VAC) will be closed on the same dates above. The opening hours of the Visa Application Centre are 0930 - 1630 Application forms remain available online from the UKBAs’ website: www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk or from the Visa Application Centre’s website: www.vfs-ukkw.com. And also, from the UK Visa Application Centre located at: 4B, First Floor, Al Banwan Building (Burgan Bank Branch Office Building), Al Qibla area, opposite Central Bank of Kuwait, Kuwait City. For any further inquiries, please contact the Visa Application Centre: Website: www.vfs-uk-kw.com E-mail:info@vfs-uk-kw.com Telephone:22971170. The Consular Section will also be closed on the same dates.

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Fawzia Sultan International School graduation - class 2011

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awzia Sultan International School (FSIS) held its graduation ceremony - Class 2011 at Radisson Blue under the auspices of Lieutenant General Abdullah Abdul Rahman Al Fares, Governor of Hawally.

Guests of honor were Ahmad Fawzi Al Saleh and Tariq Alsamarrai, Chairman & Managing Director of FAWSEC Educational Company and Mrs Martha Thompson, chair person of the school’s Board of Trustees.

Ceremony began with a recitation from Holy Quran by student Mubarak Abdullah Al-Ajmi and followed by

opening statements by William Morgan; the school Principal and Ms Tania Callaway FSIS Director. The ceremony included a wonderful speech by Ms Ekbal Behbehani; President of Parents Teachers Association who spoke to the audience about the meaning of struggle and hope in life and also commended on the wonderful efforts and support that FSIS administration provided to advance the students’ school lives and activities.

Ms Aisha Humaidhi Founder of K’s Path (Kuwait

Society for the Protection of Animals and Their Habitat) addressed the students with her own life story about following dreams and perusing targets and told them to expect troubles and difficulties but only to enjoy the sweet taste of successes later on.

The ceremony also included speeches by graduates Farah al-Khaldi and Mohammed Al-Kharafi and Abdulaziz Al-Omar who spoke about their educational journey at FSIS and recognized their parents and teachers role in their successes.

EMBASSY OF CANADA The Embassy of Canada is located at Villa 24, Al-Mutawakel St., Block 4 in Da’aiyah. Please visit our website at www.Kuwait.gc.ca.

Canada offers a registration service for all Canadians travelling or living abroad. This service is provided so that Consular Officials can contact and assist Canadians in an emergency in a foreign country, such as a natural disaster or civil unrest, or inform Canadians of a family emergency at home. The Embassy of Canada encourages all Canadian Citizens to register online through the Government of Canada Travel Website at www.voyage.gc.ca. The Canadian Embassy in Abu Dhabi provides visa and immigration services to residents of Kuwait.

Individuals who are interested in visiting, working or immigrating to Canada are invited to visit the website of the Canadian Embassy to the UAE at www.UAE.gc.ca.

Effective January 15, 2011, the only Temporary Resident Visa (TRV) application form that will be accepted by CIC is the Application for Temporary Resident Visa Made Outside of Canada [IMM 5257] form. All previous Temporary Resident Visa application forms will no longer be accepted by CIC and instead will be returned to applicants. Should old applications be submitted prior to January 15, 2011 they will continue to be processed.

To ensure that the most recent version of the Temporary Resident Visa application form is being utilized, applicants should refer to the CIC website.

As of January 15, 2011, forms are to be filled in electronically. The Embassy of Canada is open from 07:30 to 15:30 Sunday through Thursday.

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Unity in Diversity

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he AWARE Centre is hosting a presentation this evening entitled, “The sun is rising in the West: unity in diversity,” by Tahira Muhammad - American.

This presentation illustrates the passion of Muslims living in America, their continuous contribution towards the development of the nation and struggle to increase unity with other

religious faiths.

It shows how during difficult times, Americans have been able to stand side by side as one people transcending their cultural, religious or ethnic differences. This has proven that, to some extent, there is unity in diversity.

However, there are some challenges facing Muslims in the United States even from their own Muslim counter-

parts from various Islamic countries.

Join AWARE to learn about how Muslims and people of other faiths are now learning to co-exist with each other as well as goodwill initiatives by non-Muslim Americans towards bridging the gap between them and Muslims.

Tahira Muhammad is a proud born and raised African-American Muslim

originally from New York. After living in an Islamic country like Kuwait for over a year, Tahira has developed a new appreciation of the growing contribution of Western Muslims towards Islam. After 9/11 Tahira has been a strong advocate for the rights of Arab Muslims living in the United States.

For more information, log onto: www.aware.com.kw

EMBASSY OF GERMANY The Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in Kuwait wishes to announce that as of 1 May 2011, the external service provider Al Qabas Assurex is operating a Visa Application Centre in support of the German Embassy. Short-term visa applications for travels to Germany (e.g. for tourism, visits, business) are to be submitted to the service provider Al Qabas who for your convenience will ensure that all relevant documents are included in your application. Your personal appearance at the Application Centre is not required. Address of the Visa Application Centre: Al Qabas Assurex Sanabel Tower (Al-Babtain) Mezzanine (M3) opposite Sharq Mall Kuwait 22924444 Fax: 22924442 Further information are available on the following websites: www.kuwait.diplo.de www.qavisa.com ■■■■■■■

EMBASSY OF KENYA The Embassy of the Republic of Kenya wishes to request all Kenyans resident in or training through Kuwait to register with the Embassy. We are updating our database. This information is necessary in order to facilitate quick assistance and advise in times of emergency. Kindly visit in person or register through our website www.kenyaembkuwait.com. The Embassy is located in: Surra Area - Block 6 - Street 9 Villa 3 Tel: 25353362 - 25353314; Fax: 25353316.

■■■■■■■

EMBASSY OF NIGERIA The Nigerian embassy has moved its office to Mishref. Block 3, Street 7, House 4. For enquires please call 25379541. Fax25387719. Email- nigeriakuwait@yahoo.com or nigeriankuwait@yahoo.co.uk ■■■■■■■

Our place... our planet... our responsibility

A

s part of its ‘Responsible Business’ policy and in support to United Nations Environment Programme, the team of the Radisson Blu Hotel, Kuwait cleaned the area and planted many saplings at the staff accommodation with a view to see a ‘Clean and Green’ environment.

The other ‘Responsible Business activities organized by the Radisson Blu hotel,

Kuwait were as follows: * No smoking Day was observed on 31 May 2011 to draw attention to its negative health effects and the main cause of premature death and avoidable illness.The Radisson Blu Hotel urged smokers to wake up to a fresh new start free from tobacco smoke. * Ongoing collection of funds for World Childhood Foundation - the art-

work from the 16th Art Competition are available for sale for charity at the hotel’s Viking club and the Al Hashemi II foyer * The Viking Club hosted the annual Fun Run Competition, a friendly race for people who run for fun, on 13 May 2011.

The competition started at 9.00 am from Messillah Beach and ended at the Radisson Blu Hotel, Kuwait. The Fun Run was attended by Club members, hotel

guests and the staffs of the Radisson Blu Hotel.

Take Action & Make a Difference Improve the environment in your place - join Clean Up the World campaign The Radisson Blu Hotel, Kuwait is at the forefront - whether it be social, cultural or environmental activities - engaging with employees, guests and the local community.

EMBASSY OF PERU With the growing interest shown by Kuwaiti citizens and/or foreign residents in Kuwait for going for vacation and tourism to Peru and/or with the purpose of doing business over there, The Embassy of Peru in Kuwait did the effort and obtained as a temporary and immediate solution - till the opening of the consular section of Diplomatic Mission of Peru in Kuwait City - that the consular section of the Embassy of Peru in Qatar will attend those requests of granting such visas. Working hours: 9 am till 2 pm or call +974-4491-5944, Fax: +974-4491-5940 E-mail: info@peruembassy.com.qa

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TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

Years

TV PROGRAMS

00:45 Dogs 101 01:40 Untamed And Uncut 02:35 Into The Pride 03:30 Mutant Planet 04:25 Your Worst Animal Nightmares 05:20 Animal Cops Phoenix 06:10 America’s Cutest...

07:00 Meerkat Manor 07:25 The Really Wild Show 07:50 Jeff Corwin Unleashed 08:15 Natural Born Hunters 08:40 Breed All About It 09:10 Dogs 101 10:05 Dogs 101 11:00 Animal Cops Houston 11:55 SSPCA: On The Wildside 12:20 Wildlife SOS 12:50 Animal ER 13:45 Animal Cops Phoenix 14:40 Great Savannah Race 15:30 Animal Battlegrounds 16:00 The Really Wild Show 16:30 Jeff Corwin Unleashed 17:00 Natural Born Hunters 17:25 Dogs/Cats/Pets 101 18:20 Breed All About It 18:45 Planet Wild 19:15 Great Savannah Race 20:10 Cats 101 21:05 Life Of Mammals 22:00 Last Chance Highway 22:55 Into The Lion’s Den 23:50 Great Savannah Race

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

The Weakest Link Holby City New Tricks Eastenders Doctors Last Of The Summer Wine Fimbles Balamory Teletubbies Gigglebiz Fimbles Balamory Teletubbies Gigglebiz Fimbles Balamory Teletubbies Gigglebiz Fimbles Balamory Teletubbies Gigglebiz Last Of The Summer Wine The Weakest Link Inspector Lynley Mysteries Doctors Eastenders Holby City Last Of The Summer Wine Inspector Lynley Mysteries The Weakest Link Doctors Eastenders Holby City Inspector Lynley Mysteries The Weakest Link Doctors Eastenders Holby City Moses Jones Green Green Grass

00:15 Come Dine With Me 01:55 The Home Show 02:45 Come Dine With Me 04:50 Daily Cooks Challenge 05:20 Daily Cooks Challenge 08:45 Antiques Roadshow 09:35 Come Dine With Me 11:40 New Scandinavian Cooking 12:30 Antiques Roadshow 13:20 Cash In The Attic 14:05 Bargain Hunt 16:30 Come Dine With Me 17:45 Indian Food Made Easy 18:10 New Scandinavian Cooking With Andreas Viestad

18:35 New Scandinavian Cooking With Andreas Viestad 19:00 Antiques Roadshow 19:50 Cash In The Attic 20:35 Bargain Hunt 21:20 Come Dine With Me 22:10 The Home Show 23:00 Cash In The Attic USA

00:00 BBC World News 00:30 World Business Report 00:45 Sport Today 01:00 BBC World News America 01:30 Asia Business Report 01:45 Asia Today 02:00 BBC World News 02:30 Asia Business Report 02:45 Asia Today 03:00 BBC World News 03:30 Asia Business Report 03:45 Asia Today 04:00 BBC World News 04:30 Asia Business Report 04:45 Asia Today 05:00 BBC World News 05:30 Asia Business Report 05:45 Asia Today 06:00 BBC World News 06:30 Hardtalk 07:00 BBC World News 07:30 World Business Report 07:45 BBC World News 08:30 World Business Report 08:45 BBC World News 09:30 World Business Report 09:45 Sport Today 10:00 BBC World News 10:30 World Business Report 10:45 Sport Today 11:00 BBC World News 11:30 Hardtalk 12:00 BBC World News 12:30 World Business Report 12:45 Sport Today 13:00 BBC World News 13:30 World Business Report 13:45 Sport Today 14:00 GMT With George Alagiah 14:30 GMT With George Alagiah 15:00 BBC World News 15:30 World Business Report 15:45 Sport Today 16:00 Impact With Mishal Husain 17:30 World Business Report 17:45 Sport Today 18:00 BBC World News 18:30 Hardtalk 19:00 The Hub With Nik Gowing 20:30 World Business Report 20:45 Sport Today 21:00 World News Today With Zeinab Badawi 22:30 World Business Report 22:45 Sport Today 23:00 BBC World News America 23:30 Hardtalk

00:05 Cow And Chicken 00:30 Cramp Twins 00:55 George Of The Jungle 01:20 Courage The Cowardly Dog 01:45 Eliot Kid 02:10 Ed, Edd N Eddy 02:35 Ben 10: Alien Force 03:00 The Powerpuff Girls 03:15 Chowder 03:40 The Secret Saturdays 04:05 My Gym Partner’s A Monkey 04:30 Ben 10: Alien Force 04:55 Best Ed 05:20 Skunk Fu! 05:45 Cramp Twins 06:10 Eliot Kid 06:35 The Marvelous Misadventures Of Flapjack 07:00 Codename: Kids Next Door 07:25 Cow And Chicken 07:50 Angelo Rules 08:05 Cartoon Network Dance Club 08:15 Adventure Time 08:40 Ben 10: Ultimate Alien 09:05 The Secret Saturdays 09:30 Batman: The Brave And The Bold 09:55 The Powerpuff Girls

10:20 Robotboy 10:30 Hero 108 10:55 Ben 10 11:20 Chowder 11:45 The Marvelous Misadventures Of Flapjack 12:10 Camp Lazlo 12:35 George Of The Jungle 13:00 Foster’s Home For Imaginary Friends 13:25 Codename: Kids Next Door 13:50 Ben 10 14:15 My Gym Partner’s A Monkey 14:40 Squirrel Boy 15:05 Eliot Kid 15:35 Ed, Edd N Eddy 16:00 Cow And Chicken 16:25 Chop Socky Chooks 16:50 Skunk Fu! 17:15 Chowder 17:40 Best Ed 18:05 Hero 108 18:30 Cartoon Network Dance Club 18:45 The Marvelous Misadventures Of Flapjack 18:55 Batman: The Brave And The Bold 19:20 Ben 10: Alien Force 19:45 The Secret Saturdays 20:10 Bakugan Battle Brawlers 20:35 Fantastic Four: World’s Greatest Heroes 21:00 The Powerpuff Girls 21:25 Ed, Edd N Eddy 21:50 Robotboy 22:00 Adventure Time 22:25 Hero 108 22:50 Ben 10 23:15 Bakugan Battle Brawlers 23:40 Chowder

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

Backstory World Sport World Report World Report World Business Today Piers Morgan Tonight Anderson Cooper 360 World Sport World View World Report Backstory World Report World Report World Sport Inside Africa World Business Today World One World Sport World’s Untold Stories Piers Morgan Tonight News Stream World Business Today International Desk The Brief World Sport Prism International Desk World’s Untold Stories Quest Means Business

00:40 Dirty Jobs 01:35 Gold Rush: Full Disclosure 02:30 Ultimate Survival 03:25 Ultimate Car Build-Off 04:20 Mythbusters 05:15 How It’s Made 05:40 How Machines Work 06:05 Dirty Jobs 07:00 Ultimate Car Build-Off 07:50 American Chopper: Senior vs Junior 08:45 How It’s Made 09:10 Mythbusters 10:05 Cake Boss 10:30 Border Security 10:55 Time Warp 11:25 Gold Rush: Full Disclosure 12:20 Swords: Life On The Line 13:15 Ultimate Survival 14:10 LA Ink 15:05 Dirty Jobs 16:00 Ultimate Car Build-Off 16:55 Mythbusters 17:50 Extreme Fishing 18:45 Cake Boss 19:10 Border Security 19:40 Time Warp

BORDERLAND ON OSN MOVIES ACTION

20:05 How Machines Work 20:35 How It’s Made 21:00 The Next Great Baker 21:55 LA Ink 22:50 Police Women Of Maricopa County 23:45 Extreme Fishing

00:30 The Gadget Show 00:55 Kings Of Construction 01:45 Mighty Ships 02:35 Ultimate Power Builders 03:25 How Stuff’s Made 03:50 Thunder Races 04:45 Science Of The Movies 05:40 One Step Beyond 06:10 Nextworld 07:00 Catch It Keep It 07:55 Head Rush 07:58 Sci-Fi Science 08:25 Weird Connections 08:55 Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman 09:45 The Gadget Show 10:35 The Future Of...

11:25 Green Wheels 11:50 Catch It Keep It 12:40 One Step Beyond 13:05 Mighty Ships 13:55 Bang Goes The Theory 14:45 Kings Of Construction 15:35 The Gadget Show 16:00 Head Rush 16:03 Sci-Fi Science 16:30 Weird Connections 17:00 Brainiac 17:50 Cosmic Collisions 18:40 Inside The Space Shuttle 19:30 Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman 20:20 Sci-Fi Science 20:45 Cool Stuff And How It Works 21:10 The Gadget Show 21:35 The Gadget Show 22:00 Inside The Space Shuttle 22:50 Through The Wormhole With Morgan Freeman 23:40 Building The Future

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

Jungle Junction Special Agent Oso Little Einsteins Higglytown Heroes Jo Jo’s Circus Jungle Junction Special Agent Oso Little Einsteins Higglytown Heroes Jo Jo’s Circus Jungle Junction Special Agent Oso Little Einsteins Higglytown Heroes Jo Jo’s Circus Jungle Junction Special Agent Oso Little Einsteins Higglytown Heroes Special Agent Oso Jungle Junction Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Timmy Time Handy Manny Jake & The Neverland Pirates The Hive Handy Manny Handy Manny Mickey Mouse Clubhouse The Little Mermaid Little Einsteins Jungle Junction Lazytown Imagination Movers Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Jake & The Neverland Pirates Jungle Junction Jungle Junction Timmy Time The Hive Little Einsteins The Little Mermaid Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Handy Manny The Hive Jake & The Neverland Pirates Imagination Movers Lazytown Jungle Junction Special Agent Oso The Hive Little Einsteins Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Jake & The Neverland Pirates The Little Mermaid Handy Manny Timmy Time Mickey Mouse Clubhouse Jake & The Neverland Pirates The Hive Handy Manny The Little Mermaid Little Einsteins Handy Manny The Hive Jungle Junction The Little Mermaid Timmy Time Jo Jo’s Circus Mickey Mouse Clubhouse

06:00 Kid vs Kat 06:20 Kick Buttowski 06:40 Pokemon Dp: Sinnoh League Victors 07:05 Phineas And Ferb 08:05 American Dragon 08:30 Kick Buttowski 08:50 Kid vs Kat 09:00 Zeke And Luther 09:50 I’m In The Band 10:15 The Super Hero Squad Show 10:40 Suite Life On Deck 11:30 Pair Of Kings 11:55 Phineas And Ferb 12:45 Kid vs Kat 13:50 The Suite Life Of Zack And Cody 14:15 The Suite Life Of Zack And Cody 14:40 Zeke And Luther 15:05 Kick Buttowski 15:25 Kid vs Kat 15:35 Pokemon Dp: Sinnoh League Victors 16:00 I’m In The Band 16:25 Suite Life On Deck 16:50 Zeke And Luther 17:40 Phineas And Ferb 18:30 Escape From Scorpion Island 18:55 Kick Buttowski 19:20 American Dragon 19:45 Aaron Stone 20:10 Phineas And Ferb

20:15 20:40 21:05 21:30 21:50 22:00 Cody 22:20 23:00 KSA

Kid vs Kat Phineas And Ferb I’m In The Band Zeke And Luther Phineas And Ferb The Suite Life Of Zack And The Super Hero Squad Show Programmes Start At 6:00am

00:25 Kendra 00:55 The Soup 01:25 Too Young To Kill 03:15 25 Most Stylish 04:10 Sexiest 05:05 Extreme Hollywood 06:00 THS 07:50 Behind The Scenes 08:20 E! News 09:15 Married To Rock 10:15 20 Acts Of Love Gone Wrong 12:05 E! News 13:05 Kimora: Life In The Fab Lane 14:05 Kourtney And Kim Take New York 14:35 50 Most Insane Celebrity Oops 16:25 Behind The Scenes 16:55 Khloe And Lamar 17:55 E! News 18:55 Kourtney And Kim Take New York 19:25 Kourtney And Kim Take New York 19:55 THS 20:55 Chelsea Lately 21:25 Holly’s World 22:25 E! News 23:25 Chelsea Lately 23:55 Keeping Up With The Kardashians

00:15 00:40 01:30 02:20 03:10 04:00 04:50 05:40 06:30 2008 08:00 08:25 09:15 10:05 10:55 11:20 11:45 12:35 13:25 14:15 15:05 15:55 16:45 17:10 18:00 18:50 19:40 20:30 21:20 22:10 23:00 23:50

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

Untracked BMX Megatour World Combat League Untracked Aiya TV Final Fu BMX Megatour World Combat League FIA European Drag Racing Quattro Events 2009 Winter X Games 15 2011 Asian X Games 2009 Cape Epic X-Traordinary X-Traordinary Fantasy Factory Untracked BMX Megatour World Combat League X-Traordinary Fantasy Factory Quattro Events 2009 Winter X Games 15 2011 Asian X Games 2009 Cape Epic BMX Megatour Untracked Final Fu World Combat League Aiya TV Untracked

The Haunted Psychic Witness Nightmare Next Door I Was Murdere Dr G: Medical Examiner Amsterdam Vice The Haunted Mystery Diagnosis Forensic Detectives Murder Shift Mystery Diagnosis Real Emergency Calls Disappeared FBI Files True Crime With Aphrodite Fugitive Strike Force Mystery Diagnosis Real Emergency Calls Disappeared Forensic Detectives Murder Shift FBI Files Mystery Diagnosis Real Emergency Calls True Crime With Aphrodite Fugitive Strike Force Deadly Women The Prosecutors Dr G: Medical Examiner

00:30 The Frankincense Trail 01:30 Departures 02:30 Banged Up Abroad 03:30 The Best Job In The World 04:00 Bondi Rescue 04:30 David Rocco’s Dolce Vita 05:00 Exploring The Vine 05:30 Meet The Natives 06:30 The Frankincense Trail 07:30 Departures 08:30 Banged Up Abroad 09:30 The Best Job In The World 10:00 Bondi Rescue 10:30 David Rocco’s Dolce Vita 11:00 Exploring The Vine 11:30 Long Way Down 12:30 Lonely Planet: Roads Less Travelled 13:30 Don’t Tell My Mother 14:30 Banged Up Abroad 15:30 The Best Job In The World 16:00 Bondi Rescue 16:30 David Rocco’s Dolce Vita 17:00 Exploring The Vine 17:30 Long Way Down 18:30 Lonely Planet: Roads Less Travelled 19:30 Don’t Tell My Mother 20:30 Banged Up Abroad 21:30 The Best Job In The World 22:00 Bondi Rescue 22:30 David Rocco’s Dolce Vita 23:00 Exploring The Vine 23:30 Long Way Down

00:00 02:00 04:00 06:00 08:15 10:00 PG15

Wild Things-18 Mindhunters-18 Zombieland-18 The Day After Tomorrow-PG Changing Lanes-PG15 Stonehenge Apocalypse-

MEAN GIRLS ON OSN MOVIES HD 12:00 14:00 16:00 18:00 20:00 22:00

Shinjuku Incident-PG15 Changing Lanes-PG15 The Truth About Charlie-PG15 Shinjuku Incident-PG15 Friday The 13th-18 Echelon Conspiracy-PG15

01:00 The Waiting City-PG15 03:00 MacHEADS-PG15 05:00 Stuart Little 2-FAM 07:00 Justice League: Crisis On Two Earths-PG 09:00 The Sorcerer’s ApprenticePG15 11:00 Invictus-PG15 13:15 Astro Boy-FAM 15:00 On Broadway-PG15 17:00 Hurricane Season-PG15 19:00 Cirque Du Freak: The Vampire’s Assistant-PG15 21:00 Pete Smalls Is Dead-PG15 23:00 Precious-18

00:00 It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia 00:30 The Daily Show Global Edition 01:00 The Colbert Report Global Edition 01:30 South Park 02:00 Comedy Central Presents 03:00 Rita Rocks 03:30 Comedy Central Presents 03:30 Tyler Perry’s House Of Payne 04:00 South Park 04:30 The Tonight Show With Jay Leno 05:30 Will And Grace 06:00 According To Jim 06:30 Family Biz 07:00 Late Night With Jimmy Fallon 08:00 Seinfeld 08:30 The New Adventures Of Old Christine 09:00 Rita Rocks 09:30 Will And Grace 10:00 According To Jim 10:30 Seinfeld 11:00 Family Biz 11:30 The Tonight Show With Jay Leno 12:30 The New Adventures Of Old Christine 13:00 Tyler Perry’s House Of Payne 13:30 Will And Grace 14:00 According To Jim 14:30 Sons Of Tucson 15:00 Seinfeld 15:30 The Daily Show Global Edition 16:00 The Colbert Report Global Edition 16:30 Family Biz 17:00 Late Night With Jimmy Fallon 18:00 Rita Rocks 18:30 Tyler Perry’s House Of Payne 19:00 Seinfeld 19:30 Raising Hope 20:00 The Tonight Show With Jay Leno 21:00 The Daily Show With Jon Stewart 21:30 The Colbert Report 22:00 The Cleveland Show 22:30 Weeds 23:00 South Park 23:30 Late Night With Jimmy Fallon

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

The Closer In Treatment In Treatment The Ellen DeGeneres Show Cold Case The View Good Morning America Detroit 1-8-7 Emmerdale Coronation Street The Ellen DeGeneres Show The Martha Stewart Show The View The Closer Cold Case Live Good Morning America Grey’s Anatomy The Ellen DeGeneres Show Emmerdale Coronation Street Hawthorne Body Of Proof House Grey’s Anatomy Detroit 1-8-7

00:00 Criminal Minds 01:00 The Unit 02:00 In Treatment 03:00 The Closer 04:00 Cold Case 05:00 Law And Order: Criminal Intent 06:00 Criminal Minds 07:00 30 Rock 08:00 The Event 09:00 Law And Order: Criminal Intent 10:00 The Closer 11:00 Cold Case 12:00 30 Rock 14:00 The Event 15:00 Criminal Minds 16:00 30 Rock 18:00 The Event 19:00 Hawthorne 20:00 Body Of Proof 21:00 House 22:00 The Unit 23:00 Law And Order: Criminal Intent

01:30 03:30 05:15 07:15 09:15 11:00 13:30 15:15 17:00 PG15 19:00 21:00 23:00

Speed-PG15 Blood And Bone-18 Dead Presidents-18 Timeline-PG15 Bad Girls-PG15 Armageddon-PG15 Heaven’s Fall-PG15 Bad Girls-PG15 G.I. Joe: The Rise Of CobraRansom-PG15 Echelon Conspiracy-PG15 Borderland-18

00:00 Hope Springs-PG15 02:00 Moon Over Parador-PG15 04:00 Return To Me-PG15 06:00 National Security-PG15 08:00 A Low Down Dirty ShamePG15 10:00 Ice Age 3: Dawn Of The Dinosaurs-FAM 12:00 Jack-PG15 14:00 The Invention Of Lying-PG15 16:00 Hope Springs-PG15 18:00 The Hudsucker Proxy-PG15 20:00 The Shape Of Things-PG15 22:00 Black Dynamite-18

01:00 03:00 04:33 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 PG 21:00 23:00

Aspen Extreme-PG15 Gilles’ Wife-PG15 Blues Brothers 2000-PG15 A Far Off Place-PG15 Mama I Want To Sing-PG Coraline-PG Born Free-PG The People Speak-PG15 In The Electric Mist-PG15 The Madness Of King George-

01:00 03:15 05:15 07:00 09:00 11:00 13:00 15:00 17:00 19:00 21:00 23:00

Moulin Rouge!-PG15 Amelia-PG15 Mean Girls-PG15 Four Christmases-PG15 Citizen Jane-PG Last Chance Harvey-PG15 Everybody’s Fine-PG15 Ice Castles-PG15 Citizen Jane-PG The Greatest-PG15 Lower Learning-PG15 The Shape Of Things-PG15

An Education-PG15 I Love Your Work-18

01:30 Christmas In New York-PG 03:45 A Christmas Carol-PG 06:00 Treasure Island-PG 08:00 Dennis The Menace: Cruise Control-FAM 10:00 A Simple Wish-FAM 12:15 Young Fisherman-PG 14:00 A Christmas Carol-PG 16:00 Planet 51-PG 18:00 The Wild Thornberrys MoviePG 20:00 Mr. Magoo-PG 22:00 Young Fisherman-PG 23:45 Planet 51-PG

00:00 Saint John Of Las Vegas-18 02:00 My Bollywood Bride-PG15 04:00 Winning Time-PG15 06:00 Flicka 2-PG15 08:00 Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel-PG15 10:00 Adventures Of A Teenage Dragonslayer-PG 12:00 Celine: Through The Eyes Of The World-PG15 14:00 When In Rome-PG15 16:00 Frequently Asked Questions About Time Travel-PG15 17:45 Valentine’s Day-PG15 20:00 Four Last Songs-PG15 22:00 District 9-PG15

00:00 NRL Premiership 02:00 ATP Tennis 04:00 Super 15 06:00 Weber Cup Bowling 07:00 Super Rugby Highlights 08:00 World Hockey 08:30 NRL Premiership 10:30 AFL Highlights 11:30 FEI Equestrian World 12:00 Super Rugby Highlights 13:00 Masters Football 16:00 ATP Tennis 18:00 Super Rugby Highlights 19:00 Live Rugby Junior World Championship 23:00 Super Rugby Highlights

00:00 European PGA Tour Highlights 01:00 Super Rugby Highlights 02:00 Futbol Mundial 02:30 ICC Cricket World 03:00 Trans World Sport 04:00 Super League 06:00 Trans World Sport 07:00 Super Rugby Highlights 08:00 World Hockey 08:30 NRL Premiership 10:30 AFL Highlights 11:30 FEI Equestrain World 12:00 Super Rugby Highlights 13:00 Masters Football 16:00 ATP Tennis 18:00 Super Rugby Highlights 19:00 Live Rugby Junior World Championship 23:00 Super Rugby Highlights

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

UFC 131 Prelims UFC 131 UFC 131 Countdown UFC Unleashed WWE NXT WWE SmackDown UAE National Race Day Series Full Throttle Aquabike World WWE Bottom Line City Centre Races City Centre Races Le Mans 24 Hour Race UAE National Race Day Series Aquabike World Full Throttle City Centre Races WWE Bottom Line WWE Vintage Collection UFC 131 Prelims UFC 131

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

Ice Road Truckers American Pickers IRT: Deadliest Roads Warriors The Nazi Officer’s Wife Ice Road Truckers American Pickers IRT: Deadliest Roads Warriors The Nazi Officer’s Wife Ice Road Truckers American Pickers IRT: Deadliest Roads Warriors The Nazi Officer’s Wife Ice Road Truckers American Pickers Pawn Stars Nostradamus Effect

Classifieds TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

Personal Trainer Tr rainer r

Types T ypes o off basketball basketball injuries injuries

ACCOMMODATION

Eve Even en a casual asual sual uall game game e of o basketball b baske ketba etb ll puts puts heavy h he ea avy y pressure pressur p sure re on n feet fee fe eet e and a an ankles, ank ankl ankle nkle kle le es, and an nd d careless careles care carreless c eless ess players pl pla la ay yers or those ye th hose with poor poor shoes shoe es are arre often offten ofte en n injured. in inju j red red. ed d

Acute injury

Chronic, or overuse, injury

Develops slowly; damage worsens over months, years

Sudden, accidental blow; difficult to prevent

Typical al causes c

Landing improperly after jump

Inadequate warmup Poor conditioning

Twisting fall Midair collision

Improper, ill-fitting or worn-out shoes High arches, flat feet, bow legs or tight calf muscles

Lunging for rebound Scrambling for loose ball t Ankle sprains t Torn ligament t Muscle pull t Tendon rupture t Broken bone

Sharing accommodation available in Salimya opposite Eddie Store for Indian bachelors.

Contact: 97947562. (C 3437) 13-6-2011

Most common co

t Stress fracture t Plantar fasciitis* t Shin splints t Achilles heel t Tendinitis t Blisters

*Injury on sole of foot

Courtt surface su

Sharing accommodation available for a Keralite bachelor near Downtown Holiday Inn, Sharq.

Contact: 99387111/ 97929183.

Risk of both types highest est on o paved outdoor courts, est on wood indoor courts especially concrete; lowest

How to o respond r

After a bad fall or twist, stop playing at once; apply ice and compression bandage, elevate leg and see physician if necessary

Sharing available (bath attached) for family in a double bedroom + hall flat - Abbasiya, opp. Garden Variety Store near Asianet building.

Contact: 97213877 / 50202206.

(C 3438) 14-6-2011

Reduce activity according to seriousness of injury

One fully furnished room

Grap Paul Trap © 2011 MCT Graphic: Source American Academy Academy of Podiatric Podiatric Spo r ts Medicine ((U.S.) U.S.) Source:: American Sports

No: 15119

with attached bathroom available for decent bachelor or small family. Two bedroom C-A/C flat in Fintas, near London Hospital close to Fahaheel highway.

Contact: 60020168. (C 3433) 11-6-2011 Sharing accommodation available for Indian decent Hindu or Catholic bachelors or small family with Mangalorean family two bedrooms, window A/C, opp. Rashid Hospital, Shara Amman, Salmiya. Contact: 55995437. (C 3431) 9-6-2011 Furnished 1 bed, 1 hall, flat near German Clinic Abbasiya. From end of June, Indian or Sri Lankan family.

Contact: 99430379.

(C 3427)

live -in maid / nanny.

Contact: 99824597.

(C 3436) 13-6-2011 Urgently required an experienced cook for a Kuwaiti family. Attractive salary + food & accommodation will be provided. Candidates with transferable Iqama.

Contact: 94064401.

(C 3434) 11-6-2011

FOR SALE MATRIMONIAL Toyota Corolla 2002, silver color, 100,000km, excellent condition, KD 1500.

Contact: 66729295.

(C 3435) 13-6-2011 SITUATION VACANT Required English speaking

Keralite Christian Anglo Indian boy B.E, 27 yrs, 175cms, working with MNC Bangalore invites suitable proposals (caste no bar).

Contact Email: shinestoncorreya@gmail.com (C 3432) 11-6-2011

DIAL 161 FOR AIRPORT INFORMATION In case you are not travelling, your proper cancellation of bookings will help other passengers to use seats Airlines RJA JZR THY ETH UAE DHX ETD FDB GFA QTR JZR JZR KAC JZR KAC JZR KAC BAW KAC FCX KAC KAC KAC FDB KAC KAC UAE IRA QTR ABY ETD GFA IRA MEA MHK JZR JZR JZR AFR QTR KAC MSR UAL RJA KAC FDB KAC

Depurture Flights on Tuesday 14/6/2011 Flt Route 642 AMMAN 267 BEIRUT 772 ISTANBUL 620 ADDIS ABABA 853 DUBAI 370 BAHRAIN 305 ABU DHABI 67 DUBAI 211 BAHRAIN 138 DOHA 529 ASSIUT 207 DAMASCUS 544 CAIRO 505 LUXOR 302C MUMBAI 555 ALEXANDRIA 412 MANILA / BANGKOK 157 LONDON 416 JAKARTA / KUALA LUMPUR 201 BAHRAIN 206 ISLAMABAD 302 MUMBAI 332 TRIVANDRUM 53 DUBAI 352 COCHIN 284 DHAKA 855 DUBAI 605 ISFAHAN 132 DOHA 125 SHARJAH 301 ABU DHABI 213 BAHRAIN 619 LAR 404 BEIRUT 711 BAGHDAD / NAJAF 165 DUBAI 121 BAHRAIN 201 DAMASCUS 6700 PARIS 6130 DOHA 672 DUBAI 610 CAIRO 982 WASHINGTON DC DULLES 640 AMMAN 512 TEHRAN 57 DUBAI 562 AMMAN

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

SVA KAC JZR QTR KAC ETD UAE GFA SVA JZR JZR ABY JZR RBG ALK JZR KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC KAC SIA JAI VOS FDB OMA MEA KAC MLR MSR DHX KLM UAE JZR GFA QTR UAL AIC JZR JZR MSR DLH AXB JZR PIA

500 746 257 134 546 303 857 215 510 777 239 127 213 3555 227 177 104 166 502 542 618 786 614 674 774 458 572 93 61 647 402 552 1405 618 372 443 859 183 217 136 981 981 135 787 612 636 389 539 205

JEDDAH ABU DHABI / DAMMAM BEIRUT DOHA ALEXANDRIA ABU DHABI DUBAI BAHRAIN RIYADH JEDDAH AMMAN SHARJAH DEIREZZOR ALEXANDRIA COLOMBO / DUBAI DUBAI LONDON PARIS / ROME BEIRUT CAIRO DOHA JEDDAH BAHRAIN DUBAI RIYADH SINGAPORE / ABU DHABI MUMBAI KANDAHAR / DUBAI DUBAI MUSCAT BEIRUT DAMASCUS COLOMBO / DUBAI ALEXANDRIA BAHRAIN AMSTERDAM DUBAI DUBAI BAHRAIN DOHA BAHRAIN CHENNAI / AHMEDABAD BAHRAIN RIYADH CAIRO FRANKFURT KOZHIKODE / MANGALORE CAIRO LAHORE / PESHAWER

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

Departur DLH AIC BBC PIA THY ETH UAE FDB DHX ETD QTR JZR RJA GFA JZR JZR BAW KAC FDB KAC KAC JZR KAC KAC KAC UAE ABY IRA QTR ETD GFA IRA KAC MEA JZR KAC JZR JZR MHK KAC KAC JZR MSR RJA FDB UAL QTR

Depurture Flights on Tuesday 14/6/2011 Flt Route 637 FRANKFURT 576 GOA / CHENNAI 44 DHAKA 240 SIALKOT 773 ISTANBUL 620 BAHRAIN / ADDIS ABABA 854 DUBAI 68 DUBAI 371 BAHRAIN 306 ABU DHABI 139 DOHA 164 DUBAI 643 AMMAN 212 BAHRAIN 200 DAMASCUS 120 BAHRAIN 156 LONDON 545 ALEXANDRIA 54 DUBAI 671 DUBAI 745 DAMMAM / ABU DHABI 256 BEIRUT 511 TEHRAN 561 AMMAN 101 LONDON / NEW YORK 856 DUBAI 126 SHARJAH 604 ISFAHAN 133 DOHA 302 ABU DHABI 214 BAHRAIN 618 LAR 165 ROME / PARIS 405 BEIRUT 776 JEDDAH 541 CAIRO 212 DEIREZZOR 238 AMMAN 712 NAJAF / BAGHDAD 501 BEIRUT 785 JEDDAH 176 DUBAI 611 CAIRO 641 AMMAN 58 DUBAI 982 BAHRAIN 6131 DOHA

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

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

AFR KAC KAC KAC SVA KAC QTR KAC JZR VOS JZR ETD UAE GFA ABY JZR RBG SVA JZR JZR ALK KAC KAC JAI FDB JZR KAC KAC OMA MEA SIA MLR MSR DHX KLM JZR UAE GFA KAC FCX QTR KAC KAC JZR JZR KAC UAL MSR

6700 551 673 617 501 773 135 613 538 82 182 304 858 216 128 266 3556 511 786 134 228 283 361 571 62 528 343 351 648 403 457 1405 619 373 443 206 860 218 381 102 137 301 205 502 554 411 981 613

DUBAI / HONG KONG DAMASCUS DUBAI DOHA JEDDAH RIYADH DOHA BAHRAIN CAIRO BAGHDAD DUBAI ABU DHABI DUBAI BAHRAIN SHARJAH BEIRUT ALEXANDRIA RIYADH RIYADH BAHRAIN DUBAI / COLOMBO DHAKA COLOMBO MUMBAI DUBAI ASSIUT CHENNAI COCHIN MUSCAT BEIRUT ABU DHABI / SINGAPORE COLOMBO ALEXANDRIA BAHRAIN BAHRAIN / AMSTERDAM DAMASCUS DUBAI BAHRAIN DELHI BAHRAIN DOHA MUMBAI ISLAMABAD LUXOR ALEXANDRIA BANGKOK / MANILA WASHINGTON DC DULLES CAIRO

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

34

TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

s ta rs CALVIN

CROSSWORD 341

STAR TRACK Aries (March 21-April 19) You may be designing or creating all sorts of ideas to use in teaching, guiding or helping others to quickly learn some new technique this Monday. Much thought will go into some teaching process. You enjoy mental discipline and may work long and hard at whatever you put your mind to do at this time. You could present or teach anything where substance and content are at issue.

Perhaps there are lectures lined up for today—at least some issues you have given much research and thought—will be of interest to others. Some may find you especially witty and eccentric just now. You may be able to relay your insights with positive results. You can enjoy and value your own life situation now. There is an opportunity to heal a disappointment.

Taurus (April 20-May 20)

POOCH CAFE ACROSS 1. A former agency (from 1946 to 1974) that was responsible for research into atomic energy and its peacetime uses in the United States.

4. Valuable fiber plant of East Indies now widespread in cultivation.

9. A United Nations agency created by a multinational treaty to promote trade by the reduction of tariffs and import quotas.

13. A doctor's degree in preventive medicine.

14. Small shrubby African tree having compound leaves and racemes of small fragrant green flowers.

15. The chief solid component of mammalian urine.

16. According to the Old Testament he was a pagan king of Israel and husband of Jezebel (9th century BC).

18. Large sweet juicy hybrid between tangerine and grapefruit having a thick wrinkled skin.

19. Acquire or gain knowledge or skills.

20. An independent agency of the United States government responsible for aviation and spaceflight.

21. A state in New England.

22. A cylindrical drawstring bag used by sailors to hold their clothing and other gear.

24. Having the leading position or higher score in a contest.

26. Open-heart surgery in which the rib cage is opened and a section of a blood vessel is grafted from the aorta to the coronary artery to bypass the blocked section of the coronary artery and improve the blood supply to the heart.

27. Resinlike substance secreted by certain lac insects.

29. 16 ounces.

33. A flat wing-shaped process or winglike part of an organism.

36. Having undesirable or negative qualities.

38. No longer having or seeming to have or expecting to have life.

43. English theoretical physicist who applied relativity theory to quantum mechanics and predicted the existence of antimatter and the positron (1902-1984).

45. An island in the Persian Gulf.

46. The capital and largest city of Bangladesh.

48. The branch of computer science that deal with writing computer programs that can solve problems creatively.

49. Full of submerged reefs or sandbanks or shoals.

56. An associate degree in applied science.

57. (Judaism) A Jewish festival (traditionally 8 days) celebrating the exodus of the Israelites from Egypt.

60. A plant hormone promoting elongation of stems and roots.

61. Hormone released by the hypothalamus that controls the release of thyroid-stimulating hormone from the anterior pituitary.

62. A kind of heavy jacket (`windcheater' is a British term).

63. A mature blood cell that contains hemoglobin to carry oxygen to the bodily tissues.

64. A federal agency established to coordinate programs aimed at reducing pollution and protecting the environment.

65. West Indian tree having racemes of fragrant white flowers and yielding a durable timber and resinous juice.

66. East Indian tree bearing a profusion of intense vermilion velvet-textured blooms and yielding a yellow dye.

DOWN 1. A city in southern Turkey on the Seyhan River.

2. An ancient Hebrew unit of dry measure equal to about a bushel.

3. The act of pursuing.

4. A metric unit of length equal to 1000 meters (or 0.621371 miles).

5. An ancient Assyrian city on the River Tigris and traditional capital of Assyria.

6. Medium-sized tree having glossy lanceolate leaves.

7. The sign language used in the United States.

8. King of Saudi Arabia from 1964 to 1975 (1906-1975).

9. A Russian prison camp for political prisoners.

10. An Arabic speaking person who lives in Arabia or North Africa.

11. A three-tone Chadic language.

12. The taste experience when a savoury condiment is taken into the mouth.

17. Any of numerous local fertility and nature deities worshipped by ancient Semitic peoples.

23. A gradual decline (in size or strength or power or number).

25. A light touch or stroke.

28. A compartment in front of a motor vehicle where driver sits.

30. A sodium salt of carbonic acid.

31. Being three more than fifty.

32. The act of scanning.

34. Flower arrangement consisting of a circular band of foliage or flowers for ornamental purposes.

35. A river in north central Switzerland that runs northeast into the Rhine.

37. A city in north central Nigeria.

39. An informal term for a father.

40. A loose sleeveless outer garment made from aba cloth.

41. An intensely radioactive metallic element that occurs in minute amounts in uranium ores.

42. A inexpensive showy collectibles.

43. A Russian prison camp for political prisoners.

44. A high-crowned black cap (usually made of felt or sheepskin) worn by men in Turkey and Iran and the Caucasus.

45. A port in southern Lebanon on the Mediterranean Sea. 47. Doglike nocturnal mammal of Africa and southern Asia that feeds chiefly on carrion.

48. Of or relating to the stomach and intestines.

50. A chordophone that has a triangular frame consisting of a sounding board and a pillar and a curved neck.

51. A law passed by US Congress to prevent employees from being injured or contracting diseases in the course of their employment.

52. Someone who works (or provides workers) during a strike.

53. Warm-blooded egg-laying vertebrates characterized by feathers and forelimbs modified as wings.

54. A small cake leavened with yeast.

55. Noisy talk.

58. A colloid that has a continuous liquid phase in which a solid is suspended in a liquid.

59. A constellation in the southern hemisphere near Telescopium and Norma.

60. A silvery ductile metallic element found primarily in bauxite.

Yesterday’s Solution

Today is not the best time for financial decisions. It is a good time, however, to increase your skills so that you can increase your finances. You can do anything you want to do in this life, if you can manage to get moving in one direction. Self-discipline and a sense of self-worth become important issues now. A fear of asserting yourself can hold you back—as can coming on too strong. The trick is in knowing how to make the most of your personal abilities, working within your limitations instead of feeling hemmed in by them. Round-table conversations bring out your own particular ideas. You are very gifted, having great magnetism and warmth and also a keen and powerful mind. A sense of support makes this a happy time.

Gemini (May 21-June 20) There is an emphasis on communication, expression of ideas and the connections between people. What goes on in your mind is the all-important motivation in your life. Not always hot on the follow-up, you may tend to get the ball rolling and then move on to other things. It might be a good idea to work with a team that can follow up what you begin. You can find strength in your ability to gather support and delegate responsibility. Your adaptability prevents you from being the object of some misconceived criticism. It may be hard to keep up with you today. Tonight you may decide to socialize a little, perhaps through dancing, or some other types of entertainment. In the next few days, you will attract many people to you.

Cancer (June 21-July 22)

NON SEQUITUR

Someone in authority may oppose your ideas. His or her agenda just may be a bit behind your thinking. Patience on your part and a typed report on how your changes might be helpful will show you to be the wise one. You may be unable to appreciate his or her attitude or understand his or her problems. It is not that you do not care—mostly, you are progressive and may feel slowed if you have to back up and straighten out a problem he or she should be able to handle. You have a definite sense of mission today. You enjoy putting into practice that which is good for all and you may find yourself working with different cultures.

This is where you enjoy working or helping the most. You may want to travel, inform and teach.

Leo (July 23-August 22)

ZITS

You could be at the attention of your superiors, elders or in relation to your work. You may find that you enjoy your responsibilities more than usual today. You are at home in the world of concepts and ideas and are able to grasp the gist or whole picture when given just a few facts. If you are not working in a place of business today you could find yourself taking on a new technique or studying new ideas to use in your projects. Perhaps you are attending a lecture. Your innate sensitivity to others molds you for any of the service occupations where you can diagnose or interpret what others are unable to express. You have a fine mind and may suffer from over-sensitivity—patience can be a great aid to progress at this time.

Virgo (August 23-September 22) This is a great time to be with others and to work together.

Everything points to your taking the initiative. You could feel great support from those around you. Reflective and tactful, you are able to please others.

Above all, you are forever charming and gracious, fascinating and mysterious. You could be in charge of coordinating groups or representing groups. You have a knack for putting the feelings of a group into words and may serve as a teacher or spokesperson. Communication is one area where you can find support and backing from friends and co-workers. Subjects about the past may interest you. Social events would be better another time unless they have already been in the plans for today.

Watch your finances this week—there is a leak.

Libra (September 23-October 22)

MOTHER GOOSE AND GRIMM

This is an excellent day to be with others and to work together. You may be sought after as just the person for a particular job. You exhibit your patient attitude just now and are able to respond and to build upon what is already happening. Change, however, may be in the air. Your own partiality for routine and the traditional may result in your feeling challenged by anything new or different. You could find yourself struggling against change and progress, clinging on to the status quo. Although a conformist, you may surround yourself with partners and friends who are themselves unconventional and offbeat. You are willing to listen to others, take cues and then reflect and build upon that information. You will enjoy the company of friends this afternoon.

Scorpio (October 23-November 21) Your conservative values clash with whatever is unconventional and different today. You do not value novelty and do your best to ignore changes at this time. You appreciate tradition and regularity and your value system is dead set against anything new or out of the ordinary. This may be temporary for now. Your path or career may be in a change that involves some outside company—never fear, at the most you could experience a shift in physical placement.

Some negotiations may be in order. This can be a good time to take stock of where you want to go professionally. A good conversation with those you love is possible this evening. A loved one may have some good ideas for you at this time—listen carefully.

Sagittarius (November 22-December 21) You may be required to put in some overtime work today or you may find that some personal business needs tending to now.

Whatever the case, this is a time during which circumstances bend to your will and things have a way of working out smoothly. Here are real opportunities to complete and work out difficulties and projects that require both long-term effort and a high degree of discipline. Continued success on the career level may point to changing your ideas about how you want to earn your living. A little shopping may be in order this afternoon. This could just be for checking out prices. Spend some time out of doors by running, cycling or just being with friends—perhaps some yard work. This will help to balance your energies.

Capricorn (December 22-January 19) Good news may be pouring in all at once today. Life’s problems seem to have easy solutions. You also may benefit from an older person or one in authority. Life just seems to assume a dreamlike stance. People from your own environment—friends and surroundings—give you lots of encouragement for whatever you need to accomplish. You appreciate and discover the beauty in your own life and in those around you. Be careful that you do not overspend or indulge too much just now—enjoy. This is a time of good fortune when things open up in a very natural way for you. Situations seem to create the path for you to take.

Opportunities prevail and you may find yourself wanting and able to do almost everything.

Yesterday’s Solution Aquarius (January 20- February 18) Most likely, your life is fairly full—there is not usually much time for viewing the sunset. However, today time seems to have caught up with you—you seem to be in the mood for dreaming and viewing the sunset.

Writing poetry now may be a rewarding experience. Others may pull you out of your reverie soon so enjoy your dreaming and then get back to current business. Friends and responsibilities may not appreciate or agree with your dreamy side just now.

There is a yearning to broaden your horizons—perhaps plans for travel. You will find the evening a great time to reflect and understand your own situation, just how you feel about yourself and how your goals are developing. Good things come to you all day long.

Pisces (February 19-March 20)

Word Sleuth Solution

Expressing yourself with your relations and with others may not be always smooth; patience, you will be happier with the eventual outcome. You could be preoccupied so much with your professional life you forget to say no to some of the overtime requests. You will want to share some fun time with those family members among whom you enjoy sharing an income. Your friends, partners and relationships mean a lot to you. They are a primary source of strength and you always look to them for support and encouragement. You will be making plans to become more involved with neighbors or family members. You have read an amusing story recently and may find yourself relating it to others this evening.

Laughter is contagious and good for all.

A

y

e niv rsar n

TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

Years

i n f o r m at i o n FIRE BRIGADE STATE ST TAT TE OF KUW K KUWAIT WA AIT

112

Tel.: T e el.: 161

DIRECTORA DIRECTORATE AT TE GEN GENERAL NERAL OF CIVIL A AVIATION V VIA AT TION METEOROLOGICAL L DEP DEPARTMENT PA ARTMENT DA AY: Y Monday DAY:

WWW .MET.GOV V..KW W WWW.MET.GOV.KW

13/06/2011 13/06/201 1

Ministry of Interior

Ext.: 26 2627 627 - 2630

Fax: 24348714

19:00

Time Issue Time

Expected Weather Weeather for the Next 24 2 Hours

website: www.moi.gov.kw For labor-related inquiries and complaints: Call MSAL hotline 128

BY Y NIGHT NIGHT::

Relatively Relat tively hot with light to mode moderate erate north westerly wind, wi with ith speed of 12 - 35 km/h

BY Y DA AY: DAY:

Hot with w light to moderate freshe freshening ening gradually north wester westerly rly wind, with speed of 15 - 40 4 km/h causing raisin i ing sand d raising

WARNING W A ARNING

No Current W Warnings aarnin ngs

STATION ST TAT TION

Al-Madena

22418714

Al-Shohada’a

22545171

Al-Shuwaikh

24810598

Al-Nuzha

22545171

Sabhan

24742838

Al-Helaly

22434853

Al-Fayhaa

22545051

Al-Farwaniya

24711433

Al-Sulaibikhat

24316983

Al-Fahaheel

23927002

Jleeb Al-Shuyoukh

24316983

Ahmadi

23980088

MAX. REC.

MIN MIN. N. EXP EXP. P.

Al-Mangaf

23711183

KUWAIT KUW WA AIT CITY

42 °C

3 °C 30

Al-Shuaiba

23262845

24812000

KUWAIT KUW WA AIT AIRPORT AIRPOR RT

41 °C

3 °C 30

Al-Jahra

25610011

Amiri Hospital

22450005

NUWAISEEB NUW WAISEEB A

37 °C

3 °C 30

Al-Salmiya

25616368

Maternity Hospital

24843100

W A AFRA WAFRA

42 °C

2 °C 29

Mubarak Al-Kabir Hospital

25312700

SALMI

40 °C

2 °C 26

Chest Hospital

24849400

ABDALY ABDAL LY

42 °C

2 °C 26

Farwaniya Hospital

24892010

Adan Hospital

23940620

JAL ALIYAH ALIY YAH A

41 °C

2 °C 25

Ibn Sina Hospital

24840300

F A AILAKA FAILAKA

41 °C

2 °C 29

Al-Razi Hospital

24846000

PORT AHMADI POR RT

37 °C

3 °C 30

Physiotherapy Hospital

24874330/9

UMM AL-MARADEM AL-MARAD DEM

35 °C

3 °C 30

W A ARBA A - BUBYAN BUBY YAN A WARBA

41 °C

27 2 °C

Hospitals Sabah Hospital

Clinics Rabiya

4732263

Roudha

22517733

Adhaliya

22517144

Khaldiya

24848075

Keifan

24849807

Shamiya

24848913

Shuwaikh

24814507

Abdullah Salim

22549134

SFC. CHAR CHART RT

13/06/201 13/06/2011 1 120 1200 00 UTC

POLICE STATION

4 DA DAYS AY YS FORECAST Temperatures Temperatures DAY DA AY

DATE DA AT TE

WEA WEATHER AT THER R

Tuesday Tuesday

14/06

W eednesday Wednesday

15/06

Thursday Friday

Wind Wind Speed

Wind Wind Direction Direction

MAX.

MIN.

hot + raising sand s

43 °C

30 °C

NW

15 - 40 km/h

dusty

41 °C

30 °C

NW

25 - 50 km/h

16/06

dusty

42 °C

32 °C

NW

25 - 50 km/h

17/06

dusty

43 °C

33 °C

NW

25 - 50 km/h

PRAYER P PRA AY YER TIMES

RECORDED RECORDE ED YESTERDAY YESTERDA AY AT AT KUW KUWAIT WA AIT AIRPORT AIRPOR RT

Fajr

03:13

MAX. Temp.

M Temp.

45 °C

Sunrise

04:48

Temp.

MIN. T M emp.

27 °C

Zuhr

1 1:48 11:48

MAX. RH M

19 %

Al-Nuzha

22526804

Industrial Shuwaikh

24814764

Al-Khadissiya

22515088

Asr

15:22

MIN. RH

04 %

Dasmah

22532265

Sunset

18:48

Wind MAX. W M ind

N 53 km/h

Bneid Al-Ghar

22531908

Isha

20:20

TOTAL RAINFALL T OT TA AL L RA AINF FA ALL L IN 24 HR.

Al-Shaab

22518752

Al-Kibla

22459381

Ayoun Al-Kibla

22451082

Al-Mirqab

22456536

Sharq

22465401

Salmiya

25746401

Jabriya

25316254

Maidan Hawally

25623444

Bayan

25388462

Mishref

25381200

W.Hawally

22630786

Sabah

24810221

Jahra

24770319

New Jahra

24575755

West Jahra

24772608

South Jahra

24775066

North Jahra

24775992

North Jleeb

24311795

Al-Ardhiya

24884079

Firdous

24892674

Al-Omariya

24719048

N.Kheitan

24710044

Fintas

3900322

All times are local time unless otherwise stated.

Al-Madena Police Station Al-Murqab Police Station Al-Daiya Police Station Al-Fayha’a Police Station Al-Qadissiya Police Station Al-Nugra Police Station Al-Salmiya Police Station Al-Dasma Police Station

22434064 22435865 22544200 22547133 22515277 22616662 25714406 22530801

THE PUBLIC AUTHORITY FOR CIVIL INFORMATION Automated enquiry about the Civil ID card is 1889988

00 mm

13/06/11 15:01 UTC 13/06/11

V1.00

T1.06

PHARMACIES

AIRLINES

ON 24 HRS DUTY GOVERNORATE

PHARMACY

ADDRESS

PHONE

Ahmadi

Sama Safwan Abu Halaifa Danat Al-Sultan

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

23915883 23715414 23726558

Jahra

Modern Jahra Madina Munawara

Jahra-Block 3 Lot 1 Jahra-Block 92

24575518 24566622

Capital

Ahlam Khaldiya Coop

Fahad Al-Salem St Khaldiya Coop

22436184 24833967

Farwaniya

New Shifa Ferdous Coop Modern Safwan

Farwaniya Block 40 Ferdous Coop Old Kheitan Block 11

24734000 24881201 24726638

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

Kuwait Airways Jazeera Airways Jet Airways FlyDubai Qatar Airways KLM Air Slovakia Olympic Airways Royal Jordanian Reservation British Airways Air France Emirates Air India Sri Lanka Airlines Egypt Air Swiss Air Saudia Middle East Airlines Lufthansa PIA Alitalia Balkan Airlines Bangladesh Airlines Czech Airlines Indian Airlines Oman Air Turkish Airlines Aeroflot

22433377 177 22924455 22414400 22423888 22425747 22434940 22420002/9 22418064/5/6 22433388 22425635 22430224 22425566 22438184 22424444 22421578 22421516 22426306 22423073 22422493 22421044 22414427 22416474 22452977/8 22417901/ 2433141 22456700 22958787 22453820/1 22404838/9

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Years

TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

li fe s t y le G o s s i p

Russell Brand is completely ‘eccentric’

T

he British comedian is known for his wacky ways but ‘Get Him To The Greek’ co-star Rose Byrne says his strangeness would not stop her from working with him again. Australian actress Rose told Live magazine: “I become hysterical with laughter on set - particularly when I’m tired. Working with Russell Brand was a challenge - obviously his reputation precedes him. You never know how he’s going to be, and you’re working with someone who’s

Australia. She said: “I think there’s a cultural affinity between the British and Australian people because of our history. Maybe that’s why James McAvoy and I had a good laugh on the set of ‘X-Men’.”

had many interesting ‘incidents’. “Thankfully he’s got an off switch, so when we were working there was some laughter, especially during the improvisation, but he was pretty focused. Yes, he’s eccentric, but I would work with him again in a heartbeat. He has lovely people around him too, a great team, which I think says a lot about a person.” Rose also hit it off with her ‘X-Men: First Class’ co-star James McAvoy because of the “cultural affinity” between Britain and

Middleton

Hamm thinks ‘Mad Men’ should end

splits from boyfriend

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on Hamm thinks ‘Mad Men’ should end after its seventh season. The popular advertising TV drama, which is centered on a 1960s agency and also stars January Jones and Christina Hendricks, has recently been renewed for three more seasons bringing it up to a total of seven and Jon thinks the show will have run its course by then. He said: “I think it should end [after the seventh season]. Everything should end. I was a big fan of ‘The Office’ over here because it ended.” However, Jon - who is currently starring in the movie ‘Bridesmaids’ - admits he is extremely grateful for the success the show has brought him. He told radio news segment BBC

Newsbeat: “I’m 40, which is ridiculously old in Hollywood.

I mean, come on, I’m not in ‘Twilight’. I could play their grandfather or something. It’s crazy that this has happened. I’m a very, very lucky human being.” Jon will start shooting season five of ‘Mad Men’ in “late July or August” but he has no idea what to expect for his character Don Draper. He explained: “I don’t think [the scripts] exist. The way Matthew [Weiner] writes the show is very organically. He starts when he starts and eventually there are scripts but I certainly haven’t seen them.”

P

ippa Middleton has reportedly split from her boyfriend. The brunette beauty - who wowed the world with her stunning figure when she was the maid of honor at her sister Catherine’s wedding to Prince William in April - is said to have called time on her six-month relationship with Alex Loudon after they struggled to cope with her new-found fame. A source told The Sun newspaper: “Pippa has become very high-profile and it’s put a strain on things. They’re moving in different circles.” Another insider told the Sunday Times newspaper: “It is common knowledge in their close circle of friends that Pippa and Alex have recently split up.”

Pippa and former England cricketer Alex have not been seen together since the marriage of the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge at London’s Westminster Abbey on April 29. In recent weeks, Pippa, 27, has been spotted out with her ex-boyfriend George Percy, who she dated while they were at Edinburgh University together. The couple - who have known each other for almost 10 years - enjoyed a short break in Madrid, Spain, attended the Queen’s Club tennis tournament together in London and had a three-hour meal together at London restaurant Le Cercle. A spokesperson for the Middleton family declined to comment.

T

he Darkness singer Justin Hawkins knew he had to quit drink and drugs when he wet himself on a plane. The ‘I Believe in a Thing Called Love’ rocker admits his substance abuse made him paranoid and irresponsible, and he knew his lifestyle had gotten out of control when he woke up in mid-air dressed as a microphone and soaked in his own urine.

In an interview with The Sun newspaper, he said: “I woke up in first class on a plane wearing a microphone fancy dress costume and realized to my shame that I had publicly wet myself. It was not my finest hour. “It was during a ridiculous phase of not trusting airline food. I began to think they were putting chemicals in it to make you constipated. So I decided I wouldn’t eat anything and just drank until I passed out.” Justin, 36, has compared his behavior to that of

an animal, claiming he had essentially become a chimpanzee. He added: “I was smashed up all the time. It was getting to the stage where I was literally behaving like a chimpanzee. I might as well have been clambering up on stage eating it.” Justin quit The Darkness in 2006 and entered rehab where he quit drink, drugs and smoking, and he now prefers to channel his energies into adding to his extensive collection of tattoos. He said: “I think most of my obsessiveness has transferred to ink. I’ve lost count of how many tattoos I’ve got, but I’m covered in them - mostly musical instruments I admire.” The Darkness played their first large scale comeback show on Friday at the Download Festival at Donington Park in the UK. `

Agron dating Gossip girl star D

Hawkins had plane epiphany to quit drugs

ianna Agron is reportedly dating Sebastian Stan. The ‘Glee’ actress and the ‘Gossip Girl’ actor - who was in a relationship with Leighton Meester for two years - are said to be smitten with each other and he has already won the approval of her TV co-stars. A source told Life and Style magazine: “He came to Dianna’s 3pm ‘Glee’ performance at the Staples Center in Los Angeles on May 28. He waited for her backstage. Once the cast finished the show, Dianna ran backstage to Sebastian, and they were all over each other! Dianna and Sebastian love hanging out together. He can definitely hang with the ‘Glee’ cast.” In April, Dianna was linked to Sebastian’s ‘Captain America: The First Avenger’ co-star Chris Evans after meeting him at a pre-Oscars in February. An insider said at the time: “Chris’ brother Scott is a huge fan of her show, and he particularly loves Dianna. He and his friends like to joke that as long as she stays on the show, the family will welcome her with open arms!” Dianna split from her ‘I Am Number Four’ co-star Alex Pettyfer at the beginning of February after dating for less than a year, even though the 25-year-old beauty had recently spoken about their exciting relationship. She explained: “Alex might see himself as a bad boy, but he’s actually very sweet in real life. “I think it’s important to have your differences in any relationship. I wouldn’t want to be dating a carbon copy of myself. That would just be boring.”

L

ily Allen will celebrate her honeymoon in a teepee at the Glastonbury Festival. The pop star wed Sam Cooper on Saturday and the newlyweds will celebrate their union at the music event - which is the place where they first met in 2009 - later this month in Pilton, Somerset, South West England. Festival organizer Michael Eavis, a close friend of Lily’s, will be personally making sure the happy couple - who are expecting a baby together are well looked after. He told The Sun newspaper: “I’ll set her up a special tent she’ll have the best treatment.” Another source added: “They’ll have easy access to all mod-cons. They can feel like they’re camping, but there will be no roughing it.” The festival starts on Wednesday June 22 and will be headlined

by U2, Coldplay and Beyonce Knowles. Lily - who runs vintage clothes store Lucy In Disguise with her half-sister Sarah Owen - married building firm boss Sam in a church ceremony in Cranham, near Stroud, Gloucestershire, on Saturday. Less than 100 guests attended the wedding, including comedian Harry Enfield - who previously dated Lily’s mother, film producer Alison Owen - TV star Angus Deayton, the singer’s actor brother Alfie and her half-sister Sarah Owen. Amy Winehouse celebrated her honeymoon after she wed Blake Fielder-Civil by hiring a £3,000 teepee at Glastonbury in 2008, shortly after they married in Miami.

J

ennifer Lopez will “probably” watch the US version of ‘The X Factor’. The 41-yearold singer - who is a judge on rival pop star search show ‘American Idol’ - loves watching talent programs and thinks she will tune in when the series airs in September. Speaking at the 95-106 Capital FM Summertime Ball at London’s Wembley Stadium last night she told BANG Showbiz: “You know what, I watch all those shows. I’m a big fan of those type of shows so I’ll probably be watching.” The ‘On The Floor’ hitmaker had kind words for Nicole Scherzinger - who will be a judge on ‘The X Factor’ alongside Simon Cowell, LA Reid and Paula Abdul wishing her “the best” of luck for her new

venture. She said: “I just saw Nicole backstage. I gave her all my love and wished her the best, she says she’s already started. She was supposed to be the host and now she’s a judge and she’s very excited about that.”

Jennifer raises three-year-old twins Max and Emme with her husband Marc Anthony, and when she can she likes to have them with her when she is working on her various projects. She said: “The secret to working with kids? I just try and keep them close all the time. They’re here tonight. I travel with them when I can. I want to let them know how loved they are. Another child?

Maybe, maybe.” —Bang Showbiz

TUESDAY, JUNE 14, 2011

lifestyle Music & Movies

Comedians looking for laughs in Muslim comedy tour

S

o a Jew, a Christian and a Muslim walk into a bar. The bartender turns around and says, “What is this ... a joke?” Yes, it is a joke but some people would wonder what a Muslim is doing in a bar and how he could possibly be involved in a joke. Because as far as many Americans are concerned, the words “Muslim” and “humor” don’t belong in the same sentence. Which is where Ahmed Ahmed’s “Just Like Us,” which opened Friday in limited release, comes in.

Ahmed is a stand-up comic in the US and, yes, he is an Egyptianborn Muslim. On a recent swing through the Middle East with a clutch of fellow comics, some of

whom are also Arabs, he took along a camera crew to document to fact that Muslims can tell damn good jokes about themselves and that other Muslims will laugh uproariously.

The movie is fast, funny and light on its feet, dipping less into politics or religion than into cultural quirks and characteristics.

For instance: An Arab invented the original mechanical clock, which is odd since Arabs are never on time. Bu-dah-bum. You get the idea. One might complain that Ahmed and his Comedy Arabic Tour hit the most liberal ports-of-call in the Middle EastDubai, that international center of business and trade in the United

Arabs Emirates; Beirut, Lebanon, the “Paris of the East”; and Egypt, the “Hollywood of the Arab world.”

Ah, but the comics also gave an underground concert in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, where no public entertainment is allowed, religious police are everywhere and they can’t even enter the country as entertainers but as “consultants.” How in the world did they get away with it? That may have been another documentary in itself!

Ahmed, one of the stars of Vince Vaughn’s Wild West Comedy Show and The Axis of Evil Comedy Tour, isn’t interested in the larger picture. He settles for

brief forays into each city and a hit-and-run encounter with his relatives in Egypt. Expect no broader context but simply an assertion that once you get everyone laughing, an Arab is “just like us.” As an examination of complex cultural ties and conflicts, that’s pretty glib but in this instance glib is also funny.

Ahmed takes along a group of comedians that include Omid Dajalili (star of The Infidel), “In Living Color” alum Tommy Davidson, “The Wedding Ref” host Tom Papa and Ahmed’s Wild West Comedy Show co-star Sebastian Maniscalco. And while he did direct, Ahmed is generous in showing his fellow comics during

their times on stage.

Some of the laughs here come in watching-and hearing- the North American comics test jokes on an entirely different audience without being fully aware of the censorship laws. Ahmed admits he was banned for a year in Dubai for saying something that rubbed the authorities the wrong way. A woman comic uses the word “balls,” then abruptly wonders if now she’ll be banned. The audience seemed to laugh at this but that may be how Ahmed edited the film. Who knows what they’re laughing at?

For that matter, editing is so fast and the pace of the tour so swift that you wonder what did

get left out. How did that underground concert in Riyadh happen? Why is there a brief altercation backstage at one event? How did authorities react to the gags?

And doesn’t the fact that most of the routines are in English exclude most of the Arab populations in these countries?

Mostly, Ahmed wants to show men, women and children of the Middle East smiling and cracking up in laughter to counter the image of the serious, sullen or even furious Arab who inhabits the American consciousness. He and his comics tell jokes well enough that he gets ample opportunities for this. —Reuters

S Korea’s Pororo penguin takes flight worldwide

S

Italian tenor Andrea Bocelli (center, in sun glasses) stand for a group photo with the ‘Magnificat choir’ in the Church of St. Saviour in the old city of Jerusalem yesterday.—AFP

Amos Lee takes diverse sound to 2 Bonnaroo stages

T

ucson isn’t the first place you think of when the topic of musical journeys comes up. The Arizona town felt just right for a little self-exploration to Amos Lee, though. The Philadelphia singer was on a quest of sorts when he started recording his fourth album, “Mission Bell,” and he found just what he was looking for in the desert home of producer Joey Burns and his band Calexico. “I’ve listened to a lot of Calexico’s records, and I love how Joey and John (Convertino) and everybody else in the band just work with — I don’t really like using this terminology but it’s the best I can come up with — the sonic landscape that they create. It’s rich and it’s deep, but it’s also subtle and simple at the same time. I’ve always really appreciated the way they make sound move.”

And the way they helped Lee with the multiple flavors and colors of “Mission Bell” has kicked the former second-grade teacher’s career into a higher orbit. His first three albums were well-received, and he was already a popular collaborative partner.

But he’s in even higher demand, opening for Adele, working with artists as diverse as Zac Brown Band and James Gadson, and holding down two slots at this year’s Bonnaroo — Saturday’s acoustic performance and a fullband set Sunday. “It is definitely the busiest I’ve been with all the stuff I’ve done, just with the press, the TV, the trips back and forth to Europe,” Lee said while standing

in the meager shade of a tent backstage at Bonnaroo. “I’ve had stretches where I’ve probably done more shows, but I’ve never been busier and I’ve never had a more intense experience that I’ve had this time.”

Part of that success is due to the inventiveness of “Mission Bell,” an album that marks a blossoming for the 33-year-old singer.

Burns and his Calexico mates helped Lee break out of a neosoul niche that had begun to chafe. Lee was looking for a way to reacquaint himself with the things that had made music so exciting back when he was playing open mic nights in neighborhood bars. “You get stagnant, and I felt like some ways as a performer I was not feeling the same way about performing as I did before,” Lee said. “So I had to find and am still looking for new ways to open myself up even more to the experience of playing for people and to open that energy up more that comes between the audience and the performer.”

Burns, Convertino and Calexico have a reputation for taking collaborators places they’ve never been before.

They’ve worked previously with Iron & Wine, Neko Case, Nancy Sinatra and My Morning Jacket’s Jim James on a powerful version of “Going to Acapulco” for Todd Haynes’ Bob Dylan film “I’m Not There,” among many others.

They’re known for a Southwestern-flavored blend of Americana that’s lush, vibrant and haunting. After meeting

Tim Noyes of Aunt Martha performs during the Bonnaroo Music and Arts Festival in Manchester, Sunday.—AP

briefly in Europe while on tour, Lee and Burns were reintroduced

by Willie Nelson’s harmonica player, Mickey Raphael, while Lee was looking for a producer and quickly decided to work together.

Burns was intrigued by the “transitioning” Lee was undertaking and thought he might be able to help. “I think he’s been pursuing that for a while, trying to figure out what he does and what he does well,” Burns said in a phone interview from Tucson. “He can do so many different things so well, I think he’s really now applying the ability to distill everything together into his sound and his identity in his songs and his music. So I think it is an exciting time as a fan of Amos and his music.” Lee scheduled a trip to Tucson last year to see if things would work out, and after recording a few songs, he came away convinced. Lee immediately felt like a kid let loose in the toy store at Wavelab studios,

Springsteen saxophonist suffers stroke

S

tar saxophonist Clarence Clemons, a member of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band, suffered a stroke at home in Florida, Rolling Stone Magazine reported yesterday. The 69-year old musician has had various health crises in recent years, including surgery on his knees as well as for a back ailment. There was no immediate word on his current condition.

His last appearance with Springsteen’s legendary group was in December. Clemons also made a cameo performance on Lady Gaga’s recently released “Born This Way” album.—AFP

Clarence Clemons

where everything he could imagine, from unique guitars and amps to glockenspiels and vibraphones, were laid out in a big room. “It really does give you a chance to delve a little deeper into what you want to do, I guess, sonically,” Lee said.

“As an acoustic guitar player I really haven’t spent a lot of time doing it and I really loved it. The atmosphere is just wide open.”

Lee says “Mission Bell,” which features appearances by Willie Nelson, Lucinda Williams and Sam Beam, has a live feel that comes from everyone gathering in a big room and throwing out ideas. The group would set aside one song to work on another that felt more urgent, sometimes nailing a track in a take or two.

Along the way they layered on little details and highlights that pushed the sound into three dimensions. The Spanish-flavored horns on “El Camino,” for instance, sit in the distance and create a

different mood than you might find in a soul song. A haunting pedal steel guitar line by Greg Leisz helps push “Windows Are Rolled Down” along like a sunny Sunday drive. And then there’s the final moments of “Violin,” a one-take wonder that breaks down into a fuzzy guitar feedback coda as Lee quietly sings, “Oh, God. Oh, God.” All this adds up to something more than soul, folk, jazz and all those other tags that have overburdened Lee. “There’s been comparisons to Bill Withers, which is great, I love that,” Burns said. “But it’s more than that, too. He’s got other influences. He really kind of confuses definitions, which is really interesting to me because I’m a fan of that kind of music where it’s just not blatantly one thing, but it expands into other areas and other things.”—AP

outh Korean animator Choi Jong-Il knew he had a hit on his hands when Pororo the penguin hopped onto TV screens back in 2003. Choi’s previous creations had failed to grab the undivided attention of his six-yearold son and his son’s friends. That all changed when the mischievous but affectionate blue and white penguin, sporting aviator glasses and a flying helmet, made his debut. “The kids’ eyes were glued to the TV...they never touched other toys as long as Pororo was on,” Choi told AFP in an interview.

Pororo, whose dream is to fly, has taken off big-time since then. In South Korea he has been dubbed the “children’s president” and his image appears on everything from cellphones to chopsticks. Iconix, which Choi started in 2001 with six employees, has grown into one of the nation’s biggest animation studios with two subsidiaries and 160 workers.Pororo has been sold to 110 countries and helped Iconix garner 27 billion won ($25 million) in sales last year. Sales will grow to 38 billion won by the end of this year thanks to rising popularity overseas, particularly in China and Southeast Asia, Choi said. Korean animators have talent and experience. In South Korea, they helped bring the Simpsons to life along with SpongeBob and other characters.

And a studio in hardline communist North Korea, working as a subcontractor, helped flesh out Pororo.” They did a pretty good job... North Korea actually does a lot of animation subcontracting jobs, especially European countries like Italy,” Choi said. But the collaboration fizzled out due to difficulties in phone calls and other communications across the divided peninsula. In South Korea, a lack of investment has made it harder for animators to progress beyond being subcontractors, said Stella Suh, director of the animation industry team at the state-run Korea Creative Content Agency.

“South Korea has top-class world capability in animation production, but creating independent animation films is all about funding,” she said. “The government has offered some financial aid but it’s hardly enough. Many (animators) still find it so difficult to find any major source of funding to kickstart a new project.” Thanks to Pororo, Iconix is the exception.”Going global is inevitable given the small size of the domestic market... I think our overseas sales will outpace our domestic sales by 2020,” Choi said.

His creed was to create a cartoon that offers nothing but fun.”Most cartoons for pre-school children aim to educate them through different forms of lectures, typically delivered through adult characters squeezed in a story,” said the 45-year-old former advertising manager. Pororo does not preach-he just goes out and has fun in his Arctic setting with friends including Petty the female penguin, Poby the Polar bear, Crong the green dinosaur and Eddy the fox. There are no adults. Internet chatrooms soon started to buzz with parents expressing gratitude that Pororo gave them a break from restless children.

The character was chosen as a goodwill ambassador for Visit Korea Year. More than three million limited-edition stamp sets of Pororo were sold out in 10 days in March.

The characters appear on more than 1,500 merchandise items from clothes and cellphones to chopsticks and bankbooks, helping Iconix earn more than 90 percent of its revenue from royalty fees.“Merchandise tie-in is where the money mostly comes from. But kids won’t beg parents to buy the products unless they loved the original animation film and its characters,” Choi said. Choi, citing government data, estimated the country’s overall merchandise character market at about six trillion won, far bigger than the underlying cartoon animation film market worth 700 billion won.

The state-run Seoul Business Agency estimates Pororo’s brand value at 389.3 billion won, based on its forecast economic impact over the next 30 years. Choi refuses tie-ins with items such as toy guns or junk food franchises. He also resisted pressure from thousands of Internet users to feature Pororo eating a traditional Korean meal. “Featuring our own traditional traits may alienate child viewers in other cultures...I want my characters to be accepted universally, with no attachment to a certain cultural background,” he said. Choi’s dream is an entertainment empire for all generations, like Disney. “Now my son is 14... he still loves Pororo, but I want to keep making new animations for him to enjoy as he and other Pororo fans grow older.”—AFP

Jolie-Pitt Foundation donates $500,000 to Joplin

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rad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are donating $500,000 from their foundation to help Joplin rebuild from the deadly tornado that struck the southwest Missouri town last month. The Community Foundation of the Ozarks says the gift from the Jolie-Pitt Foundation will go to mid- and long-term needs in the tornado-ravaged city.

The Community Foundation announced the gift Friday in a news release. Pitt grew up in southwest Missouri and says in the release that he spent much of his childhood in the area and knows the people to be “especially resilient.” The May 22 tornado destroyed more than 8,000 homes and 400 businesses. The death toll was 151 as of Friday, including several victims who died as a result of injuries suffered in the storm.—AP

South Korean animator Choi Jong-Il poses with a doll of cartoon character Pororo the little Penguin at his office in Seoul on June 2, 2011.—AFP

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Years

lifestyle Awards

I

Nikki M James accepts the Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical for “The Book of Mormon”.

Mark Rylance accepts the Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play for “Jerusalem”.

rreverent musical “ The Book of Mormon,” an affectionate spoof about Mormons from the creators of the TV show, “South Park,” scooped the major honors at the Tony Awards held on Sunday, winning nine awards. The hit show about two young present-day Mormon missionaries sent to Uganda won some of the night’s top awards including best musical, original score, best book, best direction and best actress in a featured role in a musical at the awards for Broadway’s best musicals and plays.

“We did this because we all secretly wanted to have a big, happy Mormon family and now we do,” said co-creator Trey Parker on stage, before jokingly thanking their “co-writer,” the late Joseph Smith Jr, who founded the Latter Day Saint movement, saying, “You did it Joseph, you got the Tony!” The British import to Broadway, “War Horse,” adapted by Nick Stafford from the 1982 novel of the same name, which uses puppets to tell the story of World War I and a soldier’s quest to find his horse and bring him home, won a total of five awards, including best play.

Actress Frances McDormand won best actress in a leading role in a play for her turn as a tough single mother in the play, “Good People,” and in accepting her first Tony predicted her current role would become “an American classic,” before adding emphatically, “I love my job.” Mark Rylance beat out Al Pacino to win the top acting award in a play for his turn in “Jerusalem,” and rather than giving a traditional speech, recited an excerpt from an obscure Midwestern poet-as he did when he won a Tony in 2008.

The awards were handed out at New York’s Beacon Theatre in a live televised event hosted by actor Neil Patrick Harris.

Other major winners included best play revival winner, “The Normal Heart,” a semiautobiographical play that focuses on the AIDS crisis, which premiered in 1985. It won

three awards, including for actors Ellen Barkin and John Benjamin Hickey.

In accepting her Tony, Barkin, 57, said, “it’s the proudest moment in my career. It has transformed me, not just as an actor but as a human being,” while Hickey backstage called the revival “extraordinary” that “so many young, gay people and so many young, straight people are coming to see this play.” Its playwright Larry Kramer said on stage, “I could not have written it had not so many of us so needlessly died.”

A revival of the musical, “Anything Goes,” won three awards, led by best actress in a musical winner Sutton Foster, while John Larroquette won best featured role in a musical for “How to Success in Business Without Really Trying.”

(From Left) Andrew Rannells and the cast of ‘The Book of Mormon’ perform during the 65th annual Tony Awards on Sunday. — AP photos

In this theater publicity image released by Boneau/Bryan-Brown, Andrew Rannells, center, performs with an ensemble cast in “The Book of Mormon” at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre in New York.

Trey Parker and Casey Nicholaw accept the Best Direction of a Musical (From left) Trey Parker, Matt Stone and Robert Lopez accept the award Tony Award for “The Book of Mormon”. for Best Book of a Musical for “The Book of Mormon”.

Frances McDormand accepts the award for Best Performance by an Sutton Foster accepts the award for Best Performance by an Actress in Actress in a Leading Role in a Play for her role in “Good People”. a Leading Role in a Musical for her role in “Anything Goes”.

(From Left) Larry Kramer is hugged by Daryl Roth after they won the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play for “The Normal Heart”.

Norbert Leo Butz with his Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical for “Catch Me If You Can”.

John Benjamin Hickey accepts his Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play for “The Normal Heart”.

(From Left) Norbert Leo Butz, Sutton Foster and Mark Rylance appear backstage with their awards.

Ellen Barkin accepts the award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Play for her role in “The Normal Heart”.

John Larroquette accepts the Tony Award for the Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Musical for “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying”.

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lifestyle Awards

Best Play: “War Horse.”

Best Musical: “The Book of Mormon.”

Best Book of a Musical: Trey Parker, Robert Lopez, Matt Stone, “The Book of Mormon.”

Best Original Score (Music and/or Lyrics) Written for the Theatre: Trey Parker, Robert Lopez, Matt Stone, “The Book of Mormon.”

Best Revival of a Play: “The Normal Heart.”

Best Revival of a Musical: “Anything Goes.”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Play: Mark Rylance, “Jerusalem.”

Best Performance by an Actress in Leading Role in a Play: Frances McDormand, “Good People.”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical: Norbert Leo Butz “Catch Me If You Can.” Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Musical: Sutton Foster, “Anything Goes.”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Play: John Benjamin Hickey, “The Normal Heart.”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Play: Ellen Barkin, “The Normal Heart.”

Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Musical: John Larroquette, “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.”

Best Performance by an Actress in a Featured Role in a Musical: Nikki M James, “The Book of Mormon.”

Best Direction of a Play: Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris, “War Horse.”

Best Direction of a Musical: Casey Nicholaw and Trey Parker, “The Book of Mormon.”

Best Choreography: Kathleen Marshall, “Anything Goes.”

Best Orchestrations: Larry Hochman and Stephen Oremus, “The Book of Mormon.”

Best Scenic Design of a Play: Rae Smith, “War Horse.”

Best Scenic Design of a Musical: Scott Pask, “The Book of Mormon” Best Costume Design of a Play: Desmond Heeley, “The Importance of Being Earnest.”

Best Costume Design of a Musical: Tim Chappel and Lizzy Gardiner, “Priscilla Queen of the Desert.”

Best Lighting Design of a Play: Paule Constable, “War Horse.”

Best Lighting Design of a Musical: Brian MacDevitt, “The Book of Mormon.”

Best Sound Design of a Play: Christopher Shutt, “War Horse.”

Best Sound Design of a Musical: Brian Ronan, “The Book of Mormon.”

Special Tony Award for Lifetime Achievement in the Theatre: Athol Fugard, Philip J Smith.

Regional Theatre Tony Award: Lookingglass Theatre Company (Chicago) Isabelle Stevenson Award: Eve Ensler.

Special Tony Award: Handspring Puppet Company.

Tony Honors for Excellence in the Theatre: William Berloni, The Drama Book Shop, Sharon Jensen and Alliance for Inclusion in the Arts.—AP

Sutton Foster, center, leads the cast of “Anything Goes” in a performance.

Mormon domination But it was “The Book of Mormon” that dominated the night, winning nine of 14 nominations but falling short of beating the record of the Mel Brooks musical comedy, “The Producers,” which won 12 Tony Awards after it opened in 2001. “The Book of Mormon” also won for best lighting, scenery and sound design and orchestrations. Nikki M. James, who won a Tony for her role as a member of an African village, said backstage, “I knew when I read the script this was going to get a lot of attention.”

The four Tony Awards won by Parker for “The Book of Mormon,” which he co-created with Matt Stone from “South Park” and composer Robert Lopez-tied the record for the most Tony awards in one night set by Joshua Logan for the original 1949 production of “South Pacific.” “I want to thank the ‘South Park’ fans. If it weren’t for you guys, we wouldn’t be here,” Parker said on stage in sharing the award for best direction with Casey Nicholaw.

But the show’s two lead actors lost the best performance by an actor in a leading role in a musical to Norbert Leo Butz, who called his FBI agent role modeled on his own father in “Catch Me If You Can” his greatest role but “not easy.” The short-lived musical “The Scottsboro Boys” was shut out of the awards after receiving 12 nominations, as was “The Merchant of Venice” which starred Pacino.

The show featured sprinklings of jokes about the current beleaguered and injuryprone $65 million musical “Spider-Man: Turn off the Dark,” which was panned by critics in previews before being revamped with its official opening this week. It missed the deadline for this year’s awards. Rock star Bono, who wrote the show’s music along with his bandmate, The Edge, joked on stage: “WE used to be famous for being in U2.”—Reuters

Neil Patrick Harris performs with the cast of “Company”.

Todd Haimes and his fellow producers accept the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Musical.

(From left) Marianne Elliott and Tom Morris accept the Best Direction of a Play Tony Award for “War Horse”.

The cast of “Memphis” performs.

Catherine Zeta-Jones presents the Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role in a Musical.

Daniel Radcliffe presents the Tony Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role in a Play.

Robin Williams presents the award for Book of a Musical.

Bono and The Edge of the band U2 on stage.

Chris Rock presents the award for Best Musical.

Samuel L. Jackson presents the award for Best Play.

The cast of “Sister Act The Musical” performs.

Whoopi Goldberg introduces the cast of Brooke Shields presents the Tony Award for “Sister Act The Musical”. the Best Performance by an Actor in a Featured Role in a Musical.

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File photo shows houses on Golden Lane, an ancient street lined by historic houses forming part of the Prague Castle complex.—AFP photos

Ghosts of Prague’s historic Golden Lane K

veta Zrustova, 91, can clearly recall the spring day in 1938 when she entered a tiny house in Prague’s famed Golden Lane to ask advice from the fortune teller Madame de Thebes.”I was scared stiff. She was sitting in the corner with a cat on her shoulder,” said Zrustova who was 18 and wanted to know how her school exams would go.

Madame de Thebes, who later died during interrogation by the Nazis after predicting the fall of Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich, was just one of the colorful reallife residents of the historic street.

Closed since early 2010, the revamped lane at Prague Castle, which is one of the city’s top tourist draws, reopened at the start of the month and aims to give visitors a glimpse into the lives of the people who once made it their home. Most of the 20 tiny houses lining the street have been transformed into small museums, detailing the lives of their former residents. “The goal is to show visitors the dwellings of ordinary people who lived and worked here, as if they had just left their homes,” said historian Pavel Jiras, the man behind the transformation.

The houses were built under the arches of the castle fortifications on the basis of a decree issued

by German Emperor and Czech King Rudolph II (1552-1612).”A seamstress, a herbal doctor, a gold-

smith.... Each house has its own history,” said Jiras.” There’s also a great beauty in the humble lives of those people... a mysterious magic which is in stark contrast to our aggressive and cruel era,” he added. Contrary to popular legend, tirelessly relayed by tourist guides, the alley never served as an address for alchemists employed by Rudolph II to try to transform lead into gold.

Famous inhabitants of the Golden Lane have included Franz Kafka (1883-1924), the Prague-born Jewish author writing in German, who sought inspiration here from 1916 to 1917.”In the house at number 22, Kafka wrote the narrative that appears in the short story “A Country Doctor”,” says Gabriela Cinkova, manager of a bookshop now located there.”What many people don’t know is the fact that Kafka was also an illustrator,” she added, pointing at a small book with drawings by the writer, lying next to his famous novels “Amerika: The Missing Person,” “The Trial” and “The Castle.”

Number 12 was home to historian Josef Kazda, who saved thousands of Czech films from destruction by the Nazis. Number 15 has been revamped as a goldsmith’s house in memory of the scores of goldsmiths who lived in the street which over the centuries was also called the Goldsmiths’ Lane. “You can see a real goldsmith’s workshop there with all

the necessary tools,” said Frantisek Kadlec, head of the tourism department at Prague Castle.

The tools are a gift from a Czech family who heard a radio report on the revamp and decided to donate the instruments they inherited from a family member who died in 2009, he added. The house at number 26, formerly the home and workshop of a seamstress, also displays a photo of her lover in an Austrian army uniform, taken before he was killed in World War I. The last residents had to leave the Golden Lane shortly after the communists took power in former Czechoslovakia in 1948.

The totalitarian regime was toppled in 1989, and four years later the country split peacefully into the Czech Republic and Slovakia. With the advent of capitalism, critics charged the lane had become an overly commercialized tourist trap. Ivo Velisek, head of the administration office at Prague Castle, insists the Golden Lane is now better than ever after its most extensive revamp in memory. “For a long time, we had two permanent residents here: a couple of tawny owls. They left five years ago, maybe they felt something wasn’t working here,” said Velisek.”But they came back in the spring as if to tell us: the Golden Lane has been reborn,” he added with a smile.—AFP

Emma

A shows actress Emma Watson on the July 2011 issue of “Vogue magazine.”—AP

File photo shows the renovated pub in the Golden Lane.

Pippa

Middleton’s love life takes center stage

Watson looks to P grow past Harry Potter E mma Watson is preparing for the next chapter of her life The ‘Harry Potter’ actress admits that she needs to find her way out of the bubble, which she describes in part as the safe world of life on the set of the successful film franchise. Watson says in the July issue of Vogue magazine that she wants to explore more of her creative side, and cites Patti Smith as a role model.

“I want to live like Patti,” she said of the singer-songwriter, visual artist and poet. The 21-year old remains close with costars Daniel Radcliffe and Rupert Grint, and recently flew to New York to see Radcliffe perform on Broadway in “How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.” Watson plays Hermione Granger for last time when the franchise’s last film, “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2” is released in July.—AP

File photo shows the renovated pub in the Golden Lane.

ippa Middleton’s social schedule yesterday generated intense speculation about who — if anyone — she’s dating.

The young woman who wowed the world with her sensational turn as sister Kate Middleton’s maid of honor at the royal wedding has sparked speculation about whether she’s still romantically linked with cricket-starturned-banker Alex Loudon. Middleton has not been seen publicly with Loudon, 30, for several weeks.

Instead, she’s been seen around town — and in Spain — with former flame George Percy, son of the Duke of Northumberland, one of Britain’s richest men. As the duke’s eldest son, Percy stands to inherit a considerable fortune. “The Duke of Northumberland’s son would be a considerable catch,” said Charles Kidd, editor of the blue blood bible Debrett’s Peerage. “He’s the heir to his father and his father’s title. The duke is the highest rank of the peerage — they do rank just after the royal family.” Kidd said Percy, 27, has served as a “page of honor” to Queen Elizabeth II, a position that allows him to accompany the queen at some major state events.

Loudon also has “distinguished ancestry,” Kidd said, with close ties to the 1st Earl Jellicoe, who served as admiral of the naval fleet. Pippa Middleton’s visits with Percy — at

a tennis tournament and a posh London restaurant — have prompted Britain’s newspapers to report that she and Loudon have separated. Pippa Middleton, dubbed “her royal hotness” by the tabloids, has been in the news almost continuously since capturing attention at her sister’s wedding to Prince William. “I do think she’s got the potential to be a huge star for years to come if she’s very selective,” said Max Clifford, Britain’s most prominent publicist. “But I don’t know who she’s dating.”—AP

File: Pippa Middleton, the sister of Kate Middleton, sits in the pews of Westminster Abbey in London during the wedding ceremony of Prince William and Kate Middleton.—AP