29 dec 13 nlm

New Light of Myanmar

THE MOST RELIABLE NEWSPAPER AROUND YOU Volume XXI, Number 257

INSIDE Dhammaçakka Desana recitation contest in Monghsat

12th Waning of Nadaw 1375 ME

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

Myanmar People’s Forum held in Yangon Myanmar People's

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Forum in

Zaygyo and other markets to sell 552 salerooms through competitive bidding

progress at Myan-

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Students grasp opportunity to attend free education course in Bago

mar Con-

INSIDE Cambodian opposition leader appeals for talks with Hun Sen

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Express train fire kills at least 23 in India

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World powers, Iran to resume expert nuclear talks on 30 December

vention Center in Yangon. mna

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Basic first-aid course for youths in Hsipaw

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Silky flowery course conducted

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Yangon, 28 Dec — In order to host ASEAN People’s Forum successfully while Myanmar’s Chair of ASEAN in 2014, Myanmar People Forum Group in cooperation with civil societies in the country organized Myanmar People’s Forum at Myanmar Convention Centre, here, today.

The objectives of the forum with the participation of more than 150 civil societies are to ensure mutual understanding and cooperation among Myanmar civil societies, to share information and experiences, to overcome challenges for the development of the country, to exchange views based on constructive cooperation of local organizations, to raise a

strong voice for all walks of life including the people with disabilities, women, young and adult alike, and to promote participation and decision of the people in social, economic and political development undertakings and poverty reduction scheme.

It was held for the first time in Myanmar with the aim of holding more forums liking to ASEAN People’s Forum, sending representatives of Myanmar civil society selected in the forums, raising the awareness of people related issues at Myanmar People’s Forum and seeking ways and means to implement suggestions and procedures laid down at the last year’s ASEAN People’s Forum.

In his speech, Union Minister for Livestock, Fisheries and Rural Development U Ohn Myint said that in an effort for building up a country through people’s power, it needs to take the strengths of NGOs and civil societies in addition to the government. ASEAN People’s Forum is one of the meetings related to 2014 ASEAN Chair of Myanmar.

Especially, the annual ASEAN People’s Forum is held mainly for promoting the role of civil societies in the establishment of ASEAN Community and for listening to their voices for the emergence of Peoplecentered ASEAN which is the top aim of ASEAN. Myanmar People’s Forum

will help support the successful holding of the ASEAN People’s Forum.

He expressed his belief that the Forum could bring about better ideas for development of the country.

The three-day Myanmar People Forum will be held until 30 December.

Over 150 civil societies will discuss the topics such as equality and human rights, development, peace and democratic reforms etc The resolutions that come out from ASEAN People’s Forum are usually submitted to the ASEAN summits. Myanmar People’s Forum’s results will be discussed at ASEAN People’s Forum.

MNA

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China says satellite network to be big asset, others can use it too

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High rates of high blood pressure persist in US Southeast

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Travel insurance available in Myanmar While the nation is picking up the pace of development in various sectors, private sector has been granted to operate insurance services and more permits will be allowed to private companies in the upcoming year, said an official of the Ministry of Finance.

“Since 2012, private companies have been given permission to run insurance services. More approval will be made for applicants to start their services in the next year”, said Deputy Minister for Finance Dr Maung Maung Thein.

In 2012, 12 insurance

companies were granted permission to operate insurance business and insurance licenses have also been given to 12 more insurance firms this year.

Now, the licensed companies are operating their services.

With a dramatic increase in visitor numbers, it has been planned for foreign visitors to have access to insurance services during their stay in Myanmar.

“The number of applications for travel insurance is still low. But, it is expected to see foreign visitors applying for the insurance later when they

Byline: Wai Yan Oo Photo: Tin Soe knew more about travel insurance,” said a manager of a private insurance firm.

Tourists to Myanmar can buy travel insurance by paying the premium for one unit of cover which is K 500,000 for one-week duration is K 500.

Tourist insurance buyer will be awarded compensation in the events of death or injury caused by accident while travelling with any conveyance based on the extent of units he or she bought.

Myanma Alinn: 27-12-2013 Trs: YM

Myanmar sees more tourist arrivals in recent years.

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Sunday, 29 December, 2013

New Light of Myanmar Local News

National Sports

Victorious athletes of SEA Games receive warm welcome

L abutta , 28 Dec— Town’s elders, district and township level departmental personnel, members of social organizations and local people extended a warm welcome to gold medalists in the Chinlone events of the XXVII SEA

Games at the entrance to Labutta of Ayeyawady Region on 25 December.

At Yway Nadi Hall, the ceremony to honour the victorious athletes took place. Chairman of the Township Sports and Physical Education

Committee Township Administrator U Toe Toe Tun and Hluttaw representative U Hlaing Oo gave speeches.

Gold medalist Chinlone athlete Ma Thuza Aung spoke words of thanks.

MMAL-District IPRD

Fire breaks out in Seikpyu Township S eikpyu , 28 Dec—A fire broke out at a onion warehouse in west ward of Seikpyu in Magway Region at 9.45 am on 26 December.

A total of 30 members of Fire Services Department

and Auxiliary Fire Brigade and 10 policemen together with local people put out the fire with the use of one fire truck.

They could totally put out the fire within 10 minutes.

The fire started from the warehouse where garbage caught fire, and sparks fell on the roof of the warehouse.

In the incident, one warehouse of U Win Myint was destroyed in the fire.

Seikpyu Myoma Police Station opened a file of lawsuit against U Myo Thein (a) Pon Gyi, 43 over negligent fire under the law.

MMALTownship IPRD

Electrification

Power supply through solar panels in villages Pale, 28 Dec— Spending the fund of rural development and poverty alleviation, electrification was performed in five villages namely Sityin, Kyaythahmyar, Chinpyitkyin, Taungywathit and Khawthandi villages in Pale Township of Yinmabin District on 20 December.

Pale Township Electrical Engineer U Myint Thein said, “Sagaing Region Government contributed a half cost for electrification equipment such as solar panels and related items.

The remaining part of the

cost was funded by the local people. The solar equipment were shared 77 items to Sityin Village, 120 to Kyaythahmyar Village, 75 to Chinpyitkyin Village, 42 to Khawthandi Village and 36 to Taungywathit Village, totalling 350.” U Hla Aung of Sityin Village of Pale Township explained, “I am over 50 years old. Our Village is 40 miles away from Pale. We had lagged behind in development. We had been living there with the use of oil lamps and candles. Thanks to the region government, now we can

enjoy lighting through solar panel. So, we all thank the region government for their efforts in electrification to our village.”—MMAL-Min Khant Soe (Zeyar Myay)

Students grasp opportunity to attend free education course in Bago

Bago, 28 Dec—The 70-day free education c o u r s e , organized by Phyo Education Group, was opened at its hall on Shwemawdaw Pagoda Road in Bago of Bago Region on 24 December afternoon.

It was attended by Speaker of Bago Region Hluttaw U Win Tin, Patron of the education group Chief Minister of Bago Region U Nyan Win, Bago Region Minister for Social Affairs Dr Kyaw

Oo, Region Minister for Development Affairs U Ye Myint Tun, Patron of Bago Region Women’s Affairs Organization Daw Tint Maw, students and parents totalling about 200.

Voluntary Activity

Basic first-aid course for youths in Hsipaw H s i p a w , 28 Dec— Organized by Hsipaw Township Red Cross Brigade of Shan State (North), the basic first-aid course No 1/2013 was opened at the hall of No 1 Basic Education PostPrimary School in Hsipaw on 26 December, attended by students, departmental officials and town’s elders.

Chairman of Township Red Cross Supervisory Committee Head of Township Health Department Dr Nyunt Oo Maung made a speech.

Instructor of the

Township Red Cross Brigade U Than Myint explained facts about the red cross brigade and Q/A of the brigade U Thein Soe Naing plan of the training

course and disciplines.

The trainers gave training on first aid courses to 50 trainees during oneweek period.

MMAL-Sai (Hsipaw)

Narcotic drugs seized in Ye Ye, 28 Dec—Acting on a tip-off, Commander of Ye Township Police Force Police Major Kyaw Soe Lwin and party raided the public rest house in Mawkanin Village

of Lamaing in Ye Township on 22 December evening.

They seized 45 stimulant tablets and K 30000 from Min Tun Oo, 17 at the rest house.

Myanmar Maternal and Child Welfare Association on 26 December, with an address by President Dr Daw Mon Mon Aung.

It was also attended by vice-presidents of the association, CEC members, the vice-president of Myanmar Maternal and Child Development Federation and members, the chairperson and secretary of Nay Pyi Taw MCWSC, chairpersons of Township MCWAs and members, and departmental officials.

A total of 50 trainees from ministries and townships are attending the course.

MNA

Silky flowery course conducted Nay Pyi Taw, 28 Dec— With the aim of increasing incomes for the families, silky flowery course was conducted at the hall of

Wellwishers donated cash to the fund of the education group. The Region Chief Minister gave words of encouragement to students.

MMAL-Thant Zin

According to further investigation, the squad searched the house of Daw Win Shwe in Mawkanin Village and seized 265 stimulant tablets and K 1.5 million from her bedroom.

In more investigation, they confessed that the stimulant tablets were entrusted at the restaurant in Mawkanin Village by Tun Win (a) U Paru, 37.

Therefore, the combined team searched the restaurant at 10.10 pm.

Tun Win escaped from the scene. Lamaing SubTownship Police Station filed a lawsuit against drug traffickers and those who are on the run under the law.

MMAL-Nay Myo Htut (Ye)

New Light of Myanmar

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

WORLD

World powers, Iran to resume expert nuclear talks on 30 December Brussels/Ankara, 28 Dec — Experts from Iran and six world powers will resume talks on Monday on how to roll out last month’s landmark nuclear deal in Geneva, hoping to resolve numerous technical issues before the accord can take effect.

A spokeswoman for European Union foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton, who oversees diplomacy with Iran on behalf of the United States, Russia, China, France, Britain and Germany, said talks were scheduled to last one day for now.

Two rounds of negotiations have been held so far since Iran agreed on 24 November to curb its most sensitive nuclear work in

return for relief from some economic sanctions that are damaging its oil-dependent economy.

In comments that highlight the challenges facing negotiators, Iran’s nuclear chief said on Friday Teheran was pressing on with tests of more efficient uranium enrichment technology. His comments appeared aimed at soothing the anger of Iranian hardliners over possible new US sanctions on Iran.

The nuclear experts have to work out when the deal will be implemented, triggering the loosening of economic restrictions by the EU and the United States.

A key sticking point appears to be what information

Western governments will receive in advance to verify that Iran is meeting its end of the deal before they lift some sanctions.

Other outstanding issues address how exactly sanctions will be eased and practical details of Iranian concessions.

Some diplomats from the six nations have said they hoped the deal could be put fully in place by the second half of January.

The talks resume at a sensitive time. Iranian hardliners, irked by the foreign policy shift since moderate President Hasan Rouhani was elected in June, oppose the Geneva deal and call it “a surrender to America’s pressure” by the government.

Express train fire kills at least 23 in India

Iran’s ambassador to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Reza Najafi and Tero Varjoranta, IAEA Deputy Director General and Head of the Department of Safeguards (R), leave a news conference at the headquarters of the IAEA in Vienna on 11 Dec, 2013.—Reuters A group of 100 hardline Iranian lawmakers are seeking to oblige the government to increase uranium enrichment to 60 percent, a level that can produce bomb-grade material if enriched further, if new US sanctions are imposed on Teheran.

It is not clear if the bill

will be debated in Iran’s 290-seat parliament as the country’s most powerful authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has repeatedly backed the Geneva talks. If approved, the bill would have to be ratified by a constitutional watchdog body to become law.—Reuters

Thai anti-government protester shot dead

Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro (2nd L), and the President of the National Assembly, Diosdado Cabello (L), take part in an end of the year event with the National Bolivarian Armed Forces in Tiuna Fort, headquarters of the Defence Ministry, Venezuela, on 27 Dec, 2013.—Xinhua

Cambodian opposition leader appeals for talks with Hun Sen Phnom Penh, 28 Dec — Cambodia opposition leader Sam Rainsy appealed Saturday to Prime Minister Hun Sen, who heads the ruling party, to agree to talks in order to find a way out of the country’s current political crisis.

At a press conference, Sam Rainsy, leader of the Cambodia National Rescue Party, said his party wants to have an “open talk” with the Cambodian People’s Party next week.

He said that, starting from Wednesday, the first day of the New Year, the CNRP requests an open meeting among political parties and major civil organizations with the participation of the public in order for them to listen to the talks.

In an immediate

response to Sam Rainsy’s appeal, Sar Kheng, deputy prime minister and minister of interior, said the CPP’s door is always open for negotiations with the CNRP but he did not give any specific date for such a meeting as Hun Sen just returned home Saturday from a three-day official visit to Vietnam. Also Saturday, Sam Rainsy made a surprise and rare statement by extending his warm wishes to Hun Sen and his family for happiness and success in work for the betterment of Cambodia and people in the New Year.

However, both Sam Rainsy and his deputy Kem Sokha said that opposition protests will go on unless a proper solution to the current political crisis is found.

Kyodo News

Bangkok, 28 Dec — A Thai protester was killed and four wounded, an emergency official said on Saturday, after an unidentified gunman opened fire on demonstrators whose efforts to topple Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra flared into violence over the past two days.

The shooting came 48 hours after clashes between police about 500 protesters, who are determined to disrupt a snap 2 February election called by Yingluck, outside a voting registration centre in which two people were killed and scores wounded.

Petphong Kamjonkitkarn, director of the Erawan Emergency Centre in the Thai capital Bangkok, told Reuters one man in his 30s had been killed and four others suffered gunshot wounds.

The protesters have been rallying for weeks in their attempt to topple Yingluck, who they see as a

puppet of her brother and former premier, billionaire tycoon Thaksin Shinawatra, and have vowed to disrupt the election.

Yingluck, who draws her support from the populous voter base among the rural poor in the north and northeast, is determined to go ahead with the poll.

On Friday, her government asked the military for help to provide security for both candidates and voters.

However, the chief of the heavily politicised military refused to rule out military intervention, responding that “the door was neither open nor closed” when asked if a coup was possible.

Several hundred protesters are camped out in tents around the walls of Government House in Bangkok. Witnesses said they were sleeping when gunfire suddenly rang out at about 3.30 am on

Passengers are seen on a high-speed train from Harbin, capital of northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province, to east China’s Shanghai, on 28 Dec, 2013.

The Harbin-Shanghai high-speed train service was officially opened on Saturday. The new line, running across the country’s frigid regions, cut passengers’ travel time to around 13 hours from the previous 32 hours.—Xinhua

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Saturday (2030 GMT Friday). “I was sleeping and then I heard several gunshots. I was surprised,” said one 18-year-old protester, who would not identify himself other than by his nickname “Boy”.—Reuters

New Delhi, 28 Dec — An express train caught fire in southern India on Saturday, killing at least 23 passengers, TV reports said.

The fire broke out in one of the cars of the train in the predawn hours of Saturday in Andhara Pradesh state, the reports said. More than 70 passengers were in the train car when the fire started.

The train was heading from Bangalore, a major city in southern India, to Naded in the western state of Maharashtra, the reports said.

The cause of the fire was not immediately known.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has instructed the railways department and Andhra Pradesh state government authorities to extend all possible help in rescue and relief operations.—Kyodo News

A Thai security personnel is seen through a shattered windscreen of a destroyed police trucks at the ThaiJapan youth stadium, the site of fierce clashes between anti-government protester and riot police, in central Bangkok on 27 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

Yemeni tribesmen blow up pipeline in south Aden, 28 Dec — Yemeni tribesmen blew up a pipeline in the eastern Hadramout province on Saturday, disrupting oil flow two days after they seized an Oil Ministry building in the province, a local government official said.

The authorities face regular challenges from tribesmen who attack oil pipelines and power lines for reasons including demands for more employment and the release of jailed relatives.

Tribal sources said on Thursday that the Oil Ministry attack was in

response to the killing of a tribal leader this month at an army checkpoint after his bodyguards refused to hand over their weapons to soldiers.

The pipeline attacked transports crude oil from Massila oil field in Hadramout to the port of Mukkala. This was the first time the pipeline has been hit.

Yemen, one of the Arab world’s poorest countries, is struggling to restore state authority after longserving President Ali Abdullah Saleh was forced to step down in 2011.

Reuters

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Sunday, 29 December, 2013

New Light of Myanmar

Sc i e nc e & Te c h no l o gy

China says satellite network to be big asset, others can use it too Beijing, 28 Dec— China’s homegrown satellite navigation system will bring untold economic, social and military benefits and other countries in Asia are welcome to use it, the director of China’s satellite navigation agency said on Friday.

The year-old Beidou satellite navigation system is a rival to the US Global Positioning System (GPS) and Russian GLONASS. Beidou’s 16 satellites serve the Asia-Pacific but the number of satellites is expected to grow to 30 by 2020 as coverage expands

Long March 3C, carrying the 6th Beidou navigational satellite, lifts off from the launch pad at the Xichang Satellite Launch Centre, Sichuan Province, on 1 Nov, 2010.—Reuters

globally.

The system would bring benefits across the board, in both civilian and military applications, said Ran Chengqi, the director of the Satellite Navigation Office.

“The construction of the Beidou network should resolve the country’s security issues, including economic security and the security of society-at-large,” he said. “It’s obviously a combined military and civilian infrastructure.”

“What purpose it will have for national defence or armament, that’s for the armament department or Defence Ministry to consider, but I think that its uses are many,” Ran told a news conference.

The successful deployment of Beidou means the increasingly potent Chinese armed forces will have an

accurate, independent navigation system — vital technology for guiding the missiles, warships and attack aircraft that allow Beijing to claim great power status.

Senior Chinese military officers have said Beidou is more important for the country than manned space flight or the Chinese lunar probes now under way, according to reports in the state-run media.

But the benefits are by no means limited to defence.

The government sees it as a commercial coup for fast-growing market satellite navigation services for cars, mobile phones and other applications.

China is encouraging other countries in Asia to adopt it by offering the service free, as the United States does with the civilian GPS network.—Reuters

Italy delays ‘Google tax’ until July, OKs funds for business, welfare Rome, 28 Dec— Italy delayed the start of its planned Internet tax until July 2014, approved billions of euros in business and welfare measures and extended a ban on media cross-ownership in a final package of year-end legislation approved on Friday.

The launch of an Internet tax, sometimes dubbed the “Google tax”, passed this week by parliament, will be postponed until 1 July, 2014, Prime Minister Enrico Letta’s office said

in a statement. The delay should ensure it can be more closely coordinated with other European countries.

The tax, designed to ensure that companies that advertise and sell online in Italy do so only through companies with a tax presence in the country, has been criticized by the European Commission, which expressed doubts on its legality before it was approved in parliament.

The delay was

A Google logo is seen at the garage where the company was founded on Google’s 15th anniversary in Menlo Park, California on 26 Sept, 2013.—Reuters contained in the so-called “Milleproroghe” (“thousand extensions”), a catchall decree used by Italian governments to pack in

Nasdaq to compensate firms on 31 December for botched Facebook IPO New York, 28 Dec — Nasdaq OMX Group Inc will compensate firms on 31 December for qualifying claims related to Facebook Inc’s botched May 2012 initial public offering, the exchange operator said in a note to traders on Friday.

Nasdaq said previously it would pay up to $41.6 million in claims to market participants that lost money when a glitch in Nasdaq’s system during the IPO prevented timely order confirmations for many traders, leaving them unsure about their exposure for hours and, in some cases, for days afterwards. Nasdaq said a total of $41.6 million in claims

qualified for compensation, even though market makers estimated they lost $500 million collectively.

Firms that qualified for compensation had until 23 December to agree not to sue Nasdaq over the IPO in order to be eligible for a one-time voluntary payout.

While Nasdaq was fined $10 million by the US Securities and Exchange Commission, the largest fine ever for an exchange, the snafu was just one of a raft of high-profile technology glitches that have plagued exchanges in recent years.

Reuters A man walks past a sign welcoming Facebook to the NASDAQ Marketsite in New York on 18 May, 2012.

Reuters

miscellaneous pieces of legislation that must be approved before the start of the new year.

Reuters

Places to Go The following is the reproduction of Myanmar Hotels & Tourism Guide 2013 Visit www.tourismguide.com.mm for further information.—Ed

Chaungtha Beach Beaches Myanmar is graced with some of the world’s most beautiful beaches along its 2,229 kilometre (1,385 mile) coastline from Nat River to Kawthoung.

Ngapali Beach With its long, white-sand beach and crystal clear water, Ngapali Beach has long been a favourite seaside destination for domestic and foreign tourists. There is an impressive range of restaurants that serve freshly caught seafood.Activities include boat tours to Pearl and Kyauk Kalat islands, visits to Thandwe market and Thandwe Pagoda, bicycle and motorbike hire, fishing, snorkeling and diving.

Chaungtha Beach Chaungtha Beach has clear water and soft, clean white sand and is fringed by palm trees. It is about six hours drive from Yangon. There is a fishing community on a nearby island where villagers sun-dry their catch.

Ngwe Saung Beach About one hour by car from Pathein, Ngwe Saung Beach is a nine mile long white sand beach, with villages at each end.

Water Activities and Walks Apart from swimming, sunbathing and snorkelling, visitors can rent bicycles. Speedboats are available to visit offshore islands. Shops in the nearby villages sell souvenirs. Food stalls offer a variety of fresh seafood at reasonable prices, cooked to order.

Technical problem delays space station streaming-video venture Cape Canaveral, 28 Dec — Spacewalking cosmonauts on Friday installed two cameras outside the International Space Station for a Canadian streamingvideo business but then retrieved the gear after electrical connections failed, officials said.

Station commander Oleg Kotov and flight engineer Sergey Ryazanskiy left the station’s Pirs airlock at 8 am EST (1300 GMT) as the complex sailed 260 miles over Australia, mission commentator Rob Navias said during a NASA Television broadcast of the spacewalk.

It was third spacewalk this week by members of

the station’s six-man crew.

NASA astronauts Rich Mastracchio and Mike Hopkins made spacewalks on Saturday and Tuesday to replace a failed cooling pump.

During the first part of Friday’s planned sevenhour outing, the Russian cosmonauts set up a highdefinition video camera on a swiveling platform and a medium-resolution still imager for Vancouver-based UrtheCast Corp.

The Russian space agency, Roscosmos, agreed to host the cameras on the $100 billion station, a project of 15 countries, in exchange for rights to use images and video taken

over Russia. UrtheCast has commercial rights to images and video of the rest of the world, company Chief Executive Scott Larson told Reuters.

UrtheCast plans to sell data to companies and government agencies that buy Earth-observing satellite imagery. It also plans to stream images over the Internet for free to subscribers, with the aim of attracting advertisers and sponsors.

But those plans are on hold after an unknown glitch kept the cameras, located outside the station’s Zvezda command module, from communicating with ground stations.—Reuters

New Light of Myanmar

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

5

B US I NE S S & H E A L TH

High rates of high blood pressure persist in US Southeast New York, 28 Dec— One third of US adults have high blood pressure, but in the southeastern part of the country the rate is well over half, according to a new study that finds too little is being done to reverse the problem. The Southeast has been called the Stroke Belt because of well-known high rates of cardiovascular disease, including high blood pressure. But that knowledge has not led to changes, nor to a full understanding of the reasons for the population’s high risk, the study team reports.

“The rates have not changed,” though the US has had treatment guidelines for high blood pressure since 1977, said one of the authors, Dr Uchechukwu K A Sampson, an assistant professor of medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Centre in Nashville, Tennessee.

“The number of people who do not know that they

have high blood pressure is the same,” he added.

High blood pressure is an established cause of death from cardiovascular disease and accounts for up to 7.5 million deaths worldwide each year, the researchers point out.

To investigate the persistently high rates of high blood pressure in the South, Sampson’s group used a large database with recent information on men and women in southern states covering the years 2002 to 2009.

They focused on 69,000 white and black adults with similarly low income and education levels — to eliminate poverty as a factor — and analyzed what other causes might be contributing to blood pressure problems.

Overall, they found that 57 percent of the study participants had high blood pressure. Blacks were nearly twice as likely as

whites to be suffering from the disease, which has no symptoms of its own, but can lead to stroke or kidney damage if untreated.

But the racial difference was seen mainly among women. Fifty one percent of black and white men had high blood pressure, but the rates were 64 percent among black women and 52 percent among white women.

Obesity seemed to be a main driver of the problem, especially among whites, with the most severely obese having more than four times the risk of high blood pressure compared to normal weight men and woman. Other factors linked to the likelihood of severe high blood pressure included high cholesterol, diabetes, a history of depression and a family history of heart disease.

The numbers Sampson’s group found have not changed from previous

A blood-pressure machine is seen inside a basket with other medical devices at a medical centre of the Greek Delegation of the Doctors of the World in Athens on 31 May, 2012.—Reuters studies and that consistency is alarming, he said.

“Are they still the same factors people have found before?” Sampson said. “If they are, that is bad news, then that means we have not done what we should have done in the past few years.” Of the study participants who knew they had high blood pressure, 94

GM recalls 1.5 million cars in China over fuel pump bracket Shanghai, 28 Dec — General Motors Co’s (GM.N) China joint venture is recalling 1.46 million cars due to a defect with the fuel pump brackets, in one of the largest safety recalls in the world’s biggest auto market.

The cars are made locally by Shanghai General Motors Co Ltd, GM’s venture with SAIC Motor Corp (600104.SS). GM said on Friday the bracket may crack after long-term use and in extreme cases could lead to fuel leaks.

The recall, which was announced on Friday by China’s General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine,

affects two of GM’s most popular models in China, the Buick Excelle compact car and the Chevrolet Sail subcompact.

More than 1.2 million Excelle made between 2006 and 2011 and more than 240,000 Sail subcompacts built between 2009 and 2011 are in the recall.

Separately, Ford Motor Co’s (F.N) joint venture with Chongqing Changan Automobile Co Ltd (000625.SZ) will recall close to 81,000 of its Kuga crossovers over a steering part, China’s quality control agency said. The leading US automaker by sales, GM is facing stiffer competition in China from

New York, 28 Dec— Parents who set limits are less likely to have kids who smoke, regardless of their ethnic and racial backgrounds, according to a new US study.

Researchers surveyed middle schoolers from diverse backgrounds and found those whose parents had an “authoritative” and “structured” parenting style were also more likely to be Cigarette butts fill an ashtray outside a construction site in Central, a business district in Hong Kong, on 18 Oct, 2006.

Reuters

percent were taking at least one blood pressure medication, which is a good thing, Sampson said. But only 30 percent were taking a diuretic medication that promotes water loss from the body. Diuretics should be one of the first-line medication options, the authors write.

Black people were

twice as likely as whites to have high blood pressure without knowing it, Sampson said. That racial difference did not change even when researchers accounted for differences in income and education, the authors write in the journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes.

Reuters

Big year ends with Wall Street hopeful for 2014

Lines of cars are pictured during a rush hour traffic jam in central Shanghai on 11 July, 2013.—Reuters competitors such as Volkswagen AG (VOWG_p.DE).

Yale Zhang, head of Shanghai-based consulting firm Automotive Foresight, said GM was unlikely to sustain a big reputational hit in China because of the recall.

“GM has warned that the affected component might crack after long use and lead to fuel leakage, but

in real life it doesn’t appear to have happened,” Zhang said.

“There are so many recalls these days, and some automakers call back products proactively more as a precaution,” Zhang said. “In this case, the recall shouldn’t affect GM’s reputation in China that much.”

Reuters

discouraged from smoking by their parents and less likely to become smokers.

“Many past studies have examined broad parenting styles, however this study looked at how specific parenting strategies may help protect youth from cigarette smoking initiation,” said Cassandra Stanton, an assistant professor in the oncology department at Georgetown University, who led the study. “We also note that unlike many studies in the

area that are conducted in largely white middle class samples, this study was conducted in an urban multi-ethnic low-income school district,” Stanton told Reuters Health.

It’s important to identify ways of helping parents prevent kids from starting to smoke, Stanton’s team writes in the Journal of Pediatric Psychology, because the majority of lifetime smokers begin before the age of 18.

Reuters

Strict parenting may reduce teen smoking

New York, 28 Dec— As Wall Street’s best year in more than 15 draws to a close, few are expecting a repeat performance in 2014, though traders have plenty of reasons to feel optimistic.

While the market will likely enter January quietly, with many traders still out for the holidays and few major catalysts, the upward trend is seen continuing next week, especially in some of 2013’s high-flying names.

Economic growth is expected to accelerate next year, boosting employment and consumer purchasing power. But with markets repeatedly notching all-time highs, that may not translate to market gains as dramatically as in 2013.

“There’s a pervasive feeling that the economy is getting better, and the Fed is still on the market’s side

after saying it would keep rates low,” said Donald Selkin, chief market strategist at National Securities in New York.

“However, while new money will still be flowing into stocks next year, probably we’ll see less money come in. There’s little chance of another 30 percent gain or so next year.”

The S&P 500 .SPX has risen 29 percent so far in 2013, its best annual performance since 1997.

The Dow Jones industrial average. DJI is up 26 percent while the Nasdaq is up nearly 38 percent.

The gains have been widespread, with all 10 S&P 500 sectors higher on the year. The weakest group, telecoms .SPLRCL, rose 6.5 percent while consumer discretionary .SPLRCD led the year with a gain of 40 percent.

Reuters

A Wall Street sign is pictured outside the New York Stock Exchange in New York, on 28 Oct, 2013.—Reuters

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Sunday, 29 December, 2013

New Light of Myanmar WORLD

Hollande wants bigger UN role in Central African Republic

Paris, 28 Dec — French President Francois Hollande has asked the United Nations to play a bigger role in the Central African Republic, Hollande’s office said in a

statement on Friday.

France deployed a 1,600 strong peacekeeping mission in its former colony this month to stop massacres between militias, but the UN-backed intervention

is struggling to restore security in the country. “(The president) has asked the United Nations to play a more important role during the transition in Central African Republic,” Hollande’s office said of his phone call with UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon.

Under the terms of a UN resolution passed on 5 December, France hopes to hand over responsibility for security to the African Union peacekeeping force MISCA in six months.

The AU operation is due to reach 6,000 troops by late January but analysts say its inefficacy may require a UN peacekeeping mission to deploy. Ban is preparing a proposal for a

Washington, 28 Dec — Israel has informed the United States of plans to release the next group of Palestinian prisoners on 30 December under a USbrokered peace plan, the State Department said on

Friday.

“Although we had expected the release to occur on 29 December, we have been informed that technical issues made it necessary to do the release a day later,” State Department

spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement.

The release of about two dozen prisoners, the third group to be free since the talks resumed in July, are seen by the United States as an important

next-step toward reaching an interim peace agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians by April.

A final agreement will then take about a year to negotiate.

Reuters

Belgrade, 28 Dec — A bomb blast shook the offices of Montenegro’s leading daily Vijesti in the latest attack on a newspaper known for its criticism of the authorities under long-term leader Milo Djukanovic.

No one was hurt in the blast, which appeared to target a room used by editor-in-chief Mihailo Jovovic, shattering windows and damaging the facade of the building in the capital, Podgorica, shortly before midnight.

Jovovic said he was in his office and another 15 people were in the building at the time. “Glass shattered all over the office, one window was blown in and smoke filled the room,” Jovovic told reporters.

Vijesti director Zeljko Ivanovic said the attack was a murder attempt on the newspaper’s editor.

“This was the expected outcome of years of campaigning by the prime minister (Djukanovic), his government, his party and the mafia against independent media and primarily Vijesti,” he said in

a statement.

It was not clear what kind of explosive device was used. Vijesti said security cameras had captured a man in a black jacket planting a package in front of the building and leaving the site about a minute before the blast.

The Interior Ministry said it was looking for a man and a black Opel Corsa car in connection with the incident.

The attack follows a bomb blast in August outside the home of Vijesti

journalist Tufik Softic.

The newspaper’s offices were pelted with stones in October during tensions over Montenegro’s first gay pride march. Cars belonging to the paper were torched in 2011.

Vijesti is a fierce critic of Djukanovic — Montenegro’s dominant figure since the collapse of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s — and the cozy political and business elite in the tiny Adriatic republic of some 660,000 people.

Reuters

New York, 28 Dec — The United Nations General Assembly on Friday approved a $5.53 billion UN budget for 2014-2015, down 1 percent from the total spending during the previous two years.

The new biennial budget includes a 2 percent staffing cut, or some 221 posts, and a one year freeze in staff compensation.

The so-called core UN budget that was adopted does not include peacekeeping, currently running at over $7 billion a year and approved in separate negotiations, or the costs of several major UN agencies funded by voluntary contributions from member states.

As in past years, the biennial budget negotiations were marked by a tussle between poor countries seeking to raise UN development spending and major developed countries, which are the biggest budget contributors, trying to rein in the figures as they struggle to reduce expenditures in their own national budgets.

France’s President Francois Hollande addresses a news conference during a European Union leaders summit in Brussels on 20 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

possible UN mission.

Scores of demonstrators took to the streets of the capital Bangui on Sunday to complain that French forces were disarming only Muslim Seleka fighters, exposing Muslim citizens to revenge attacks by Christian groups. France has formally denied this.

Hollande said he had told Ban the French troops were there to protect the civilian population without discrimination.

Ban said in a statement on Thursday that he was appalled by the continued violence, including the reports of dozens more bodies found on the streets of the capital Bangui.

Reuters

US says Israel plans to release Palestinian prisoners on 30 December

Bomb targets Montenegrin newspaper critical of government

Editor-in-chief of Montenegro’s leading daily Vijesti, Mihailo Jovovic looks through a window damaged in a bomb blast overnight at the newspaper’s offices in Podgorica on 27 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

US welcomes Okinawa governor’s decision on Marine base relocation Washington, 28 Dec — US Defence Secretary Chuck Hagel on Friday welcomed the approval by the governor of Japan’s Okinawa Prefecture of landfill work for the relocation of a US Marine Corps air base within the island prefecture.

“It is the most significant milestone achieved in these realignment efforts so far,” Hagel said in a statement, referring to a plan to move the Futenma Air Station to a facility off the Henoko coastal area of Nago from a densely populated area in Ginowan. “Reaching this milestone is a clear demonstration to the region that the alliance is capable of handling complex, difficult problems in order to deal effectively with 21st century security challenges,” Hagel said.

The Japanese and US governments agreed in April that the land used for the Futenma base can be returned to Japan in the Japanese fiscal year of 2022, which begins in April 2022, or later. But a senior official

of the Defence Department implied the US side could be flexible about the schedule, saying, “If the government of Japan is able to accelerate the construction and move the date up, we’ll be quite happy to move the facility.”

The Japanese and US governments mapped out the original plan for the Futenma relocation in 1996 in a bid to reduce the burden on Okinawa, which hosts the bulk of US military forces in Japan. But they have yet to implement it following revisions, due mainly to opposition in local communities.

“Resolving these yearslong issues will enable us to take our relationship to the next level as we revise the guidelines for US-Japan defence cooperation,” Hagel said, referring to work by both governments to review the guidelines, which detail the roles and cooperation of the Japanese and US forces in a potential contingency, by the end of 2014.

Kyodo News

UN General Assembly approves $5.5 billion budget for 2014/15

A United States Coast Guard boat patrols the waters of New York’s East River in front of the United Nation’s building during the United Nations General Assembly in New York on 24 Sept, 2013.—Reuters Fiji’s UN Ambassador Peter Thomson, speaking on behalf of the Group of 77 developing nations, said the 2014-2015 budget “represents the best that we as member states can muster at this time of continuing austerity in the world economy.”

He said the G77 bloc supported the budget “with deep concern that budgetary austerity may negatively affect the development pillar of the work of the United Nations.”

Critics of the United

Nations, especially in the United States, have long charged that it is a bloated and sometimes corrupt bureaucracy that wastes taxpayers’ money.

US Deputy Ambassador Joe Torsella, who focuses on UN management and reform at the US mission, said the 2014-2015 budget marked a “new commitment to real fiscal discipline at the United Nations at a tough time for hardworking families around the world.”

Reuters

New Light of Myanmar

Car bomb kills three in southern Russia Moscow, 28 Dec — A car bomb killed three people in the southern Russian city of Pyatigorsk on Friday, officials said, in a worrying development for the Kremlin as Russia prepares to host the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi in six weeks’ time. Pyatigorsk lies 270 km (170 miles) east of Sochi, where the Games, a major prestige project for President Vladimir Putin, will open on 7 February.

The blast blew out the windows of buildings in an industrial neighbourhood of the spa resort town, officials said. Thee people were killed, Pyatigorsk mayor Lev Travnev said on staterun Rossiya-24 television.

The explosion badly damaged a traffic police

building, Interfax news agency reported, but staterun Itar-Tass cited police as saying all three people killed were bystanders, not police.

Pyatigorsk is just north of a strip of mostly Muslim provinces plagued by near-daily violence in a long-running Islamist insurgency. Its leader, Chechen warlord Doku Umarov, urged militants in a video posted online in July to use “maximum force” to prevent Putin staging the Olympics.

Militants say they want to carve out a Muslim state in the North Caucasus.

Their insurgency is rooted in two post-Soviet separatist wars in Chechnya, one of the region’s provinces.

Reuters

WO R L D

Battered Erdogan seen weathering storm as scandal deepens

Istanbul, 28 Dec — Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan still enjoys the fierce loyalty of pious voters and wealthy elites, which should be enough to keep him in power in the face of a corruption scandal that has rocked his government and reached his family. But the suggestion by members of his AK party that a general election could be brought forward to next year shows that he is more worried than ever about his grip on a country he has transformed during a decade in office.

A less feisty leader might already have been sunk by the corruption scandal involving accusations of wrongdoing at a state-run bank.

Attack on reporter restores passion to Ukraine demonstrations

A protester holds pictures of journalist Tetyana Chornovil, who was beaten and left in a ditch just hours after publishing an article on the assets of top government officials, during a protest rally in front of the Ukrainian Ministry of Internal Affairs in Kiev on 26 Dec, 2013.—Reuters Kiev, 28 Dec — Pro- 34-year-old restored pastesters demanded Ukraine’s sion to protests that have interior minister resign on been losing steam more Thursday after an opposi- than a month after the govtion journalist known for ernment spurned a pact on documenting the extrava- closer ties with the Eurogance of the country’s po- pean Union, turning instead litical elite was chased to former Soviet master down in her car and sav- Moscow. agely beaten in a midnight Pro-EU demonstrators attack. Clutching pictures have been occupying cenof Tetyana Chornovil’s tral Kiev, but their numbers badly bruised face, hun- have been falling since Rusdreds marched on the Inte- sia offered Ukraine a $15 rior Ministry in the capital, billion bailout this month.

Kiev.

The United States said The attack on the the journalist’s beating was Media workers broadcast the meeting of the sixth session of the 12th NPC Standing Committee live in Beijing, capital of China, on 27 Dec, 2013.

Lawmakers and officials deliberated a report of the State Council on China’s rural poverty alleviation work at the meeting on Friday.

Xinhua

Sunday, 29 December, 2013 7

“particularly disturbing” and that Washington was concerned and watching the situation.

“The United States expresses its grave concern over an emerging pattern of targeted violence and intimidation towards activists and journalists” who participated in or reported on the protests, said a statement issued by State Department spokeswoman, Jen Psaki on Thursday evening.

Psaki called on Ukraine’s government to ensure respect for human rights and to send an “unequivocal message” that violence against government critics “will not be tolerated.”

“The United States, in concert with our European partners, will continue to closely watch the disposition of this and other cases,” she said in the statement.

Ukraine’s interior minister, Vitaly Zakharchenko, had already become a target of opposition anger following a violent crackdown on protesters by police late last month that helped swell the demonstrations.—Reuters

Two members of the cabinet have resigned after their sons were arrested.

Another minister who quit said the prime minister knew what was going on and should resign as well.

The affair turned more personal this week when Turkish media published what appeared to be a preliminary summons for Bilal Erdogan, one of the premier’s two sons, to testify.

The authenticity of the document could not be verified.

Investors are nervous and the lira currency has swooned.

But the scandal has only brought out the fight in Erdogan, who has consistently said that the entire affair is a foreign-backed plot against him. He has sacked

Turkey’s Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan greets his supporters as he leaves a mosque after Friday prayers in Ankara on 27 Dec, 2013. — Reuters police officers including example of the conspiracy, the Istanbul police chief, he said: “If they try to hit exchanged diatribes with a Tayyip Erdogan through powerful cleric and stead- this, they will go away Because fastly insisted he has done empty-handed. nothing wrong. they know this, they’re atThe document nam- tacking the people around ing his son was just another me.” —Reuters

New York City on track for record-low crime rates New York, 28 Dec — With only four days to go in the year, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said on Friday that the big city is on track to set a new record low in homicide and shooting rates in 2013.

There have been 332 homicides so far this year, down 20 percent from last year’s record low, and down nearly 50 percent from 2001, the mayor said.

This year is set to be the lowest since the city started keeping track in 1963.

Meanwhile, the number of shootings has fallen by 20 percent from last year’s record low — with 1,093 shootings reported through Thursday — down 32 percent from 2001, he

said. Overall crime is now down 32 percent from 2001 in a city of 8.4 million people, he said, noting that the decline has not been achieved by putting more people in prison.

Rather, it’s been achieved while putting far fewer people in prison as incarceration rates in New York City have decreased by 36 percent from 2001, he said.

The innovative programmes the city is undertaking are helping to keep people out of jail, and to prevent them from returning to jail, as it believes discharge planning and pre-release preparation are critical to reducing recidivism for both pretrial and

sentenced inmates, he added.

The mayor attributed the historic crime lows in the city to strict gun laws that are strictly enforced and also aggressively defended the New York Police Department’s use of the controversial stop-andfrisk tactic as a key to the big drop in violent crime.

The most murders New York City recorded in a single year was 2, 245 murders in 1990, an average of six murders a day.

New York City is now averaging less than one murder a day, even though its population has grown by about 300,000 people since 2001.

Xinhua

Four US military personnel released in Libya Washington, 28 Dec — Four members of the US military detained in Libya were released after being taken into custody by the government, US officials said on Friday.

“All four (have been) released,” a US defence official said.

Earlier, the US State Department confirmed that the four were being held and US authorities were in touch with the Libyan government over the issue.

Circumstances under which the four were detained remained unclear.

But more than two years after the collapse of Muammar Gaddafi’s government, the country remains in turmoil with widespread insecurity.

The New York Times reported that the service members were taken into custody near Roman ruins at Sabratha, a tourist area about an hour’s drive from the capital, Tripoli.

The incident takes on greater significance because of the militant attack in Benghazi on 11 September, 2012, in which US Ambassador Chris Stevens

and three other Americans were killed.

The attacks touched off a political storm in Washington, with Republicans accusing President Barack Obama’s administration of telling shifting stories about who was behind the attacks.

In October, US forces seized Nazih al-Ragye, better known by the cover name Abu Anas al-Liby, in Tripoli in connection with the bombings of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998.

Reuters

8

New Light of Myanmar

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

local News

December mass walk continues for fourth week Sunday, 29 December, 2013

Build a world free of landmines As a defensive measure, both sides with different ideologies use landmines during the conflicts and wars globally. But, neither side takes care of the lethal devices to dig up during or in the aftermath of the conflict. No matter what the reason they have held, it is undeniable fact that most of the landmine casualties are innocent civilians only. It is high time those parties involved put an end to the new mine use and took responsibility for demining according to both humanitarianism and religion in a civilized world.

According to Landmine Monitor 2013 country report, Myanmar has seen a drop in the number of mine causalities with the low level of incidences of new mine use and armed conflict when compared to previous years. But, Myanmar has still ranked third in the top five with the highest number of mine victims. Since the assumption of office, the government steered the country into the sweeping reforms and invited all non-state armed groups to sit on the negotiating table. Much as the process is progressing moving towards a peace pact, mine clearance appears a follow-up stage. Due to the slow progress in demining, mine risk concerns still spike among internally-displaced persons for their return homes and local people in the mine-riddled areas for their peaceful livelihoods.

Some said the decontamination of landmines is impossible until peace process is irreversible and durable. But, we do believe a real push is desperately needed for mine removal as much as peace process. It is because mine clearance needs to take many years. Moreover, it is not sensible to realize the mine action plan without accurately knowing where the mine deployment is.

In order to rid the world of the scourge of landmine, now it is the time for all conflict parties to reach a lasting peace for the sake of people living on the landmine-contaminated soil and the rehabilitation of mine survivors. So long as the wars and conflicts drag on, no one is safe from the risk of stepping on the devastating devices. Let’s give our commitments to build a world free of landmines.

Nay Pyi Taw, 28 Dec—The fourth week of December mass walk activity started in front of Myoma Market this morning.

Deputy Ministers for Sports U Thaung Htike and U Zaw Win, officials from the President’s Office, Union Government Office, Pyithu Hluttaw, Amyotha Hluttaw and ministries, departmental staff, members of NGOs and people joined the mass walk activity.

Over 6500 participants joyfully took part in the mass walk. They walked along Taungnyo-Pyinmana Road and finished designated place in front of Gems Museum and took physical exercises.

The officials and well-

Photo shows participants taking part in December mass walk activity in Nay Pyi Taw. mna

Buddhist cultural teachership course opened in Myawady Myawady, 28 Dec— Opening ceremony of Buddhist cultural teachership course took place at Bayintnaung Hall of Basic Education High School No. 1 in Myawady Township on 25 December.

At the ceremony, Dep-

Wellwisher Daw Nan Thi Thi Oo donates stationery through a trainee.—Tun Tun Oo (Myawady) Pyinmana, 28 Dec— Hailing the 66th Anniversary Independence Day, Yan Aung (2) Ward administrator’s cup football tournament is organized under the leadership of Yan Aung (2) Ward Administrator U Kyi Khaing Min. The tourney includes four groups which consist of footballers under 20 years old in the ward.

You will be able to enjoy the Academy Award Presentation We don’t know who will Ceremony not only through get the award but we your presence but also heard a lot of ploys of the through the live sponsors for the ceremony! coverage Costume and stage decoration

wishers served the participants with snacks and soft drink.

MNA

Assortment of make-up ads

Cartoon-Thabyay

uty Township Education Officer U Saw Min Khin explained the purposes of the course and Course Instructor Daw Nu Nu Khin of Yangon Dhamma Byuha Sasana Marmaka Association explained the subjects.

Wellwisher Daw Nan Thi Thi Oo and family donated exercise books, ballpens and Dhamma text books to the trainees and Retired Headmaster U Tun Tin spoke words of thanks.

Tun Tun Oo (Myawady)

Yan Aung (2) Ward administrator’s cup football tournament kicks off A total of 14 clubs took part in the event that will be held till 4 January at Tabaung football grounds in the ward. Each team comprises five players including goalkeeper and three substitutes totaling eight players. The final match will be held on 4 January (Independence Day). K 100,000 is set for first prize, K 75,000 second prize and K 50,000 third prize.

Ko Myo-Shwe Paukkan A correspondent from the New Light of Myanmar Daily interviewing with Mohnyin Township Pyithu Hluttaw Representative U Kyaw Soe Lay, the Deputy Commissioner, the Medical Superintendent, the Township Administrator and the Township Engineer on work progress of regional development task at Hluttaw representative’s office on 26 December.—NLM 001

Players vying for the ball during a soccer match of Yan Aung (2) Ward administrator’s cup football tournament in Pyinmana.

Photo: Ko Myo (Shwe Paukkan)

New Light of Myanmar

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

LOCAL NEWS

66 Anniversary Independence Day 2014 th

9

Four objectives of 66th Anniversary Independence Day

- All the national people to live together in the Union forever in weal or woe; - All the national people to strive together for non-disintegration of the Union, non-disintegration of national solidarity and perpetuation of sovereignty; - All the national people to participate in efforts for ceasing armed conflicts and gaining genuine peace;

ASEAN Summits and related meetings will be held at Myanmar International Convention Centre (1), Nay Pyi Taw

Photo: Kyaw Swe Moe (IPRD)

Dhammaçakka Desana recitation contest in Monghsat Students of basic education schools recite Dhammaçakka Desana in the contest in Monghsat.

Monghsat, 28 Dec—Under the aegis of Presiding Nayaka of Thabyinnyu Monastery Sayadaw Bhaddanta Indaka of Kyade Village in Monghsat Township in Shan State (East), the third Dhammaçakka Desana recitation contest took place

at the Dhammayon of the monastery in Monghsat on 26 December.

Chairman of Township Management Committee Township Administrator U Aye Naing and Chairman of Township Development Supportive Committee U Sai Chit Thaung formally opened

the contest.

The religious associations from Basic Education Post-Primary School (Myothit), BEPPS (Kyade) and Dhamma School, BEHS senior and junior religious associations participated in the contest.

Kyemon-Than ZawOo (IPRD)

Zaygyo and other markets to sell 552 salerooms through competitive bidding Mandalay, 28 Dec— Markets and Slaughters Department of Mandalay City Development Committee will sell 552 sale rooms of Zaygyo and other markets through competitive bidding.

The list of sale rooms include that of Mingala Market, Mann Thiri Market, Mann Yadana Market, Myohaung Market, Seinpan Market, Thiri Mandalar Market, Htitaing Markets and Thiri Marlar car parts

shopping mall.

Most of the buyers purchase the shops on the ground floor. The shops from first to above floors are rare to be bought. Therefore, the shops on these floors are to be used as the warehouses, said a owner of the cosmetics shops from Rose Complex of the Zaygyo Market. The MCDC has installed the second and third floors of the Zaygyo Market with lifts escalators.

KyemonMaung Pyi Thu (Mandalay)

- All the national people to work hard in building a developed and discipline-flourishing democratic nation

Illegal timber seized Patheingyi, 28 Dec— Acting on a tip-off, a police squad led by IP Than Zaw Oo and Senior Forester U Kyaw Min Lwin of Township Forest Department inspected the stationery vehicle with the load of illegal timber near Hmway Pyant Tea Shop in Ohnchaw Village in Patheingyi Township, Shan State (North) on 25 December.

They seized pieces of tamalin illegal timber on board together with Kyaw Kyaw Lin, 21, son of U Tha Htwar of Kangyi Village of Nawngkhio Topwnship and Arkar Moe, 19, son of U Maung Oo and Zaw Win, 22, son of U Win Naing of the same village.

Forest Department opened files of lawsuit against the illegal timber traffickers under the law.

Kyemon-Thiha Ko Ko (Mandalay)

HRD

Toungoo Education Network donates school desks

Toungoo, 28 Dec—The 10th coordination of Toungoo Education Network was held at its office on Pagoda Road in Toungoo on 25 December.

Patrons Sayagyi U San Tin (retired region education officer) and Daw Chit Chit made speeches.

General Secretary Dr Ba Swe and Secretary U Nanda explained the minutes of the previous meeting and

future tasks.

The meeting decided to donate 35 school desks and three tables to eight Basic Education Primary Schools and Monastic Education Schools.

They provided 120 school desks and three tables worth K 3.2 million to the schools for the first time in the township.

Kyemon-U Kyaw Hla (Toungoo)

Talks on fire preventive measures, traffic congestion reduction given Pakokku, 28 Dec—A team comprising Pakokku District Head of Fire Services Department U Khin Maung Than and Commander of Township Police Force Police Major Than Soe

gave talks on fire preventive measures, reduction of traffic congestion, crime reduction and prevention of abuse against children at the hall of Ward 9 administrator in Pakokku on 26 December

evening.

It was attended by about 70 local people.

The Head of District FSD explained the points of preventing the outbreak of fire and putting out of fire, the township police force commander reduction of traffic accidents, crime reduction and prevention aganist rape case.

The officials then held discussions with the participation of the local people.—Kyemon-Aung (Mann Tekkatho)

Official give educative talks to local people in Pakokku.

10

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

India seeks possible US tax violations as stand hardens in row New Delhi, 28 Dec— India has sought details about staff in American schools in the country for possible tax violations and revoked ID cards of US consular officials and their families, retaliatory steps for the arrest of an Indian diplomat in New York.

The measures suggest that the two countries are no closer to a resolution of a diplomatic dispute over the treatment of Deputy Consul General Devyani Khobragade this month on charges of visa fraud and underpayment of her housekeeper.

Khobragade, who

New Light of Myanmar Wo r l d

US judge says NSA phone surveillance is lawful New York, 28 Dec— A federal judge ruled that a National Security Agency programme that collects records of millions of Americans’ phone calls is lawful, calling it a “counter-punch” to terrorism that does not violate Americans’ privacy rights.

Friday’s decision by US District Judge William Pauley in Manhattan diverged from a ruling by another judge this month

that questioned the programme’s constitutionality, raising the prospect that the Supreme Court will need to resolve the issue.

In a 54-page decision, Pauley dismissed an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit contending that the NSA collection of “bulk telephony metadata” violated the bar against warrantless searches under the Fourth Amendment of the US Constitution.

A Washington Metro bus is seen with an Edward Snowden sign on its side panel on 20 Dec, 2013.

Reuters

The judge also referred often to the 11 September, 2001 attacks, in which nearly 3,000 people died, and said broad counter-terrorism programmes such as the NSA’s could help avoid a “horrific” repeat of those events.

“This blunt tool only works because it collects everything,” Pauley wrote.

“Technology allowed alQaeda to operate decentralized and plot international terrorist attacks remotely.

The bulk telephony metadata collection programme represents the government’s counter-punch.”

The programme’s existence was first disclosed by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, who is now in Russia under temporary asylum. His leaks have sparked a debate over how much leeway to give the government in protecting Americans from terrorism.

Reuters

Foreign convoy attacked in Afghan capital, three dead

has denied the charges, was handcuffed and stripsearched while in custody, sparking outrage in India.

An Indian government official said on Friday that New Delhi had asked the US Embassy to provide details about people working in American schools and other US government facilities to determine if they had permission to do so and if they were paying taxes that are mandatory under Indian law.

Reuters

Kabul, 28 Dec — A suspected suicide bomber attacked a military convoy on the eastern outskirts of Kabul on Friday, killing at least three foreign soldiers, police and the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said.

The Taleban claimed responsibility for the attack which comes as President Hamid Karzai deliberates over an agreement allowing US forces to stay in the country beyond 2014.

ISAF put the death toll at three service members.

The Slovak foreign ministry said two of the dead were Slovak servicemen and one was a US soldier.

A Taleban spokesman claimed responsibility in a message on his Twitter account.

“A number of foreign forces were killed and wounded and many

Beirut, 28 Dec — Syria’s army ambushed Islamist fighters in the Qalamoun mountains north of the capital Damascus on Friday, leaving as many as 60 people dead, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.

The attack happened between the Christian town of Maaloula and the town

of Yabroud, where government forces and rebels are fighting, said the Observatory, a British-based, pro-opposition monitoring group with sources across Syria.

Syria’s civil war between forces loyal to President Bashar al-Assad and mostly Sunni Muslim rebels fighting to topple him has

Devyani Khobragade, India’s deputy consul general, attends the India Studies Stony Brook University fundraiser event in Long Island, New York, on 8 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

vehicles were also destroyed,” the militant spokesman said.

Many Afghans, including a gathering of 3,000 tribal leaders and other prominent people, have urged Karzai to sign the US pact quickly because they worry about security after

2014 when most foreign forces are leaving.

Karzai says he does not want to sign until after a presidential election scheduled for April next year and unless the United States fulfils a number of his demands.

Reuters

US trucks lift up an armoured vehicle hit by a bomb attack in Kabul on 27 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

Several Egyptians help an injured man out of the site of a clash between security forces and supporters of ousted Islamist president Mohamed Morsi at Alf-Maskan Square in Cairo’s Heliopolis District, Egypt, on 27 Dec, 2013.

Xinhua

Four killed, scores wounded in clashes across Egypt Cairo, 28 Dec — Muslim Brotherhood supporters and police clashed across Egypt on Friday, leaving at least four dead in protests after the army-backed government declared the group a terrorist organization.

The violence broke out after Friday prayers and the health ministry said 87 people were wounded in the clashes, which flared in Cairo and at least four other cities.

An 18-year-old Brotherhood supporter was shot dead in the Nile Delta city of Damietta. A second man was killed in Minya, a bastion of Islamist support south of Cairo, and a third person was killed in the capital, the interior ministry said, without providing further details.

A young man was killed late on Friday, the state news agency reported, after clashes broke out in the southern city of Aswan between security forces firing tear gas and Brotherhood supporters who burned two police cars.

Security forces detained at least 265 Brotherhood supporters nationwide, including at least 28 women,

the ministry also said.

The widening crackdown has increased tensions in a country suffering the worst internal strife of its modern history since the army deposed Islamist President Mohamed Mursi in July.

Security forces have killed hundreds of his supporters and lethal attacks on soldiers and police have become commonplace.

The Brotherhood was declared a terrorist organization after 16 people were killed in a suicide attack on a police station on Tuesday, although the group condemned the attack and it was claimed by a radical faction based in the Sinai Peninsula.

The Muslim Brotherhood and its Islamist allies had called for protests in response to the government decision. Police fired birdshot and tear gas at student protesters at Al-Azhar university’s Cairo campus.

Gunfire was heard in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia, where demonstrators threw fireworks and rocks at police who used teargas, a Reuters witness said.

Reuters

Scores of rebels killed in Syrian government ambush killed more than 100,000 people since March 2011.

Syrian state television showed footage of dozens of bodies lying in a mountainous area, with machine guns and rocket-propelled grenades next to them.

“There were about 400 of us including Saudis, Chechens and other nationalities,” a badly wounded

fighter who was lying on the ground told a state television reporter who was asking him about numbers and nationalities.

The fighter said he belonged to Liwa al-Islam, a Salafist jihadi group that is one of the biggest and best organized rebel units fighting to topple Assad.

Reuters

Forces loyal to Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad are seen in the Qalamoun mountains north of Damascus, in this handout photograph distributed by Syria’s national news agency SANA on 27 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

New Light of Myanmar

Sunday, 29 December, 2013 11

R e gi o na l

Flu season begins, peak expected in late January in Japan Tokyo, 28 Dec—The influenza season has set in nationwide in Japan with the average number of patients per clinic topping the lead-off threshold of one in the latest weekly report and the peak anticipated in late January and early February, a national institute said on Friday.

The season started at the usual time of the year, the institute said. Around 5,000 designated clinics

nationwide reported an average of 1.39 patients in the week through Sunday, it said. The type A Hong Kong strain was the most reported virus variety so far with flu activity particularly strong in western Japan. By prefecture, Yamaguchi had 5.12 patients per clinic, followed by Kagashima with 4.67, Kochi with 3.92, Oita with 3.52 and Saga with 3.21.

The Health, Labour

and Welfare Ministry has called on the public to wash hands after going outside and to wear a mask if infected so as not to spread the virus. Vaccines usually take about two weeks to be effective.

Influenza season usually lasts between December and March in Japan. Typical symptoms include a fever exceeding 38 C, headache, joint pain, and muscle pain.—Kyodo News

Nepal to have first hospital for wild animals Kathmandu, 28 Dec — The Denver Zoo in the United States is helping Nepal build its first hospital for wild animals at Sauraha in Chitwan, south-central part of the country.

The hospital will be built at the Chitwan National Park, a World Heritage reserve that protects over 932 square km of forests, marshland and rippling grassland and wildlife, said officials of the National Trust for Nature

Conservation (NTNC). The Denver Zoo has verbally assured financial assistance of 10. 5 million rupees (150,000 US dollars) to build the hospital that will be of great help in treating injured and endangered wild animals at the national park, added the officials.

“The initial deal for the hospital has already been made,” said Govinda Gajurel, general secretary of the NTNC. “A written deal about the sort of help that

we will get from Denver will be made soon. A team headed by Denver Zoo Vice President for Animal Care Brian Aucone has already met with Nepali officials in this regard.”

The NTNC had been in talks with former US Ambassador to Nepal Michael E Malinowski, president of the US Humane Society and other US government officials on the construction of the hospital for a long time.—Xinhua

China’s railways mileage tops 100,000 km

Beijing, 28 Dec — China’s railways network topped 100,000 km in total mileage on Saturday, as several new high-speed rail links started operations ahead of one of the busiest travel seasons next month.

The newly opened links include the XiamenShenzhen railway, Xi’anBaoji railway, ChongqingLichuan railway, and others in southwest China’s Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region and have a combined mileage of 2,000 km.

Of the 100,000 km of track, more than 10,000 km are highspeed, said Hu Yadong, vice general manager of the China Railway Corporation.

The expanded railways network increases passenger capacity during the 40-day spring travel peak, which starts on 16 January, by 7.9 percent, said Yang Chuantang, minister of transport.

Yang forecast that 257 million trips will be made on the railways during the period, as people go home

A train moves on Xiashen Railway, or Xiamen-Shenzhen Railway, south China’s Guangdong Province, on 11 Aug, 2013. The 502-kilometre-long railway, which links Xiamen City in southeast China’s Fujian Province and Shenzhen City in south China’s Guangdong Province, was finished on 10 Aug, 2013.—Xinhua to their families for Spring Festival on 31 January.

A total of 2,667 pairs of trains will be operating before the Spring Festival, an increase of 157 from last year.

Total trips during the period will break a new record by reaching 3.62 billion, including waterways, roads, railways, and air routes. China’s first railway was built in 1876 in Shanghai and first

PH gov’t launches massive rehabilitation programme for Haiyan-devastated areas

Photo taken on 24 Feb, 2012 shows US tourists visiting the new house of villager Ji Jinmei (1st R) at Jili Village of Huzhou City, east China’s Zhejiang Province. The per capita net income of farmers in Zhejiang reached 16,122 yuan (2,657 US dollars) in the first nine months in 2013, which is expected to be the highest per capita income of the country’s rural residents.—Xinhua

Laos pledges to encourage production initiatives, check infrastructure spending Vientiane, 28 Dec — The Lao government has pledged to invest more heavily in commercial production initiatives while rein in infrastructure spending, state-run daily Vientiane Times reported on Friday.

Prime Minister Thongsing Thammavong made the commitment during the ongoing ordinary session of the National Assembly that concluded here on Friday.

The decision to readjust government investment priorities came after

parliamentary suggestions that benefits from government infrastructure spending in recent years were taking too long to materialize. The National Assembly made the suggestions amidst current budgetary strain in the country.

The Lao government already has suspended a number of projects in order to ease budgetary concerns including infrastructure development schemes deemed “not critically important.”

Xinhua

Manila, 28 Dec — In the upcoming year of 2014, the top priority of the administration of Philippine President Benigno Aquino III is to rehabilitate vast areas in the Central Philippines devastated last November by super-typhoon Haiyan ( locally named Yolanda), the strongest typhoon to hit land in recent history.

Early this month, Aquino announced that the government will earmark a total of 40.9 billion pesos (950 million US dollars) for housing, infrastructure, livelihood and employment opportunities, local facilities and social services in Tacloban City, the worsthit city, and other coastal communities in the island

Provinces of Leyte and Eastern Samar. The entire 40.9 billion pesos could be fully funded in the budget for 2014. Earlier, the Philippine Congress passed a supplemental budget of 14.5 billion pesos (330 million US dollars) for the immediate rehabilitation and rescue efforts in the typhoon-hit areas.

Aquino has also appointed former Senator Panfilo Lacson as his rehabilitation czar. Lacson, also a former chief of the Philippine National Police (PNP), will oversee the reconstruction of the entire region ravaged by the super typhoon.

Government funds aside, the United Nations (UN) and several foreign countries have pledged to

continue extending financial support for the rehabilitation of the typhoon-hit areas in the Philippines.

Earlier this month, the UN launched a global 791-million-dollar call for aid to take care of the needs of the survivors in the Philippines over the next 12 months.

In a visit to Tacloban City last week, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon reiterated UN’s full support for the rehabilitation of the city and other areas.Ban urged typhoon survivors to “never despair” as he pledged to rally global backing to help them recover from one of their country’s deadliest disasters during his visit on 21 December.—Xinhua Rescuers work at the accident site after a fire triggered by a natural gas explosion broke out in a shopping mall in Luzhou City, southwest China’s Sichuan Province, on27 Dec, 2013. Four people have been confirmed dead and 35 others injured in the accident.

Xinhua

independent railway was constructed in 1881 in Tangshan in north China’s Hebei Province. When new China was founded in 1949, there were less than 22,000 km of lines and but only half of that was serviceable. According to the national railway network plan, highspeed rails will reach 19,000 km by 2015.

By 2020, the total railway mileage will top 120,000 km.—Xinhua

Bangladesh tense ahead of opposition march Dhaka, 28 Dec — As the main opposition alliance in Bangladesh gears up for a “long march” to Dhaka seeking cancellation of the parliament polls slated for 5 January, many fear the situation in the country could become much more volatile.

Former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia on Tuesday night through a Press conference urged people from all walks of life to join march toward capital Dhaka on 29 December to put pressure on Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s government to scrap the parliamentary elections.

Khaleda Zia made the plea at the end of the fifth spell of countrywide blockade enforced by her 18-party alliance.

Hasina’s ruling Bangladesh Awami League (AL) party has vowed to resist the programme and asked its leaders and activists to remain alert to prevent any attempt to create anarchy in the name of the programme.

Xinhua

12

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

New Light of Myanmar

a d v e r tis e m e nt & Ge NERAL THE REPUBLIC OF THE UNION OF MYANMAR Claims Day Notice MINISTRY OF ENERGY MV panja bhum voy No (003)

Consignees of cargo carried on MV panja bhum VOY NO (003) are hereby notified that the vessel will be arriving on 29.12.2013 and cargo will be discharged into the premises of a.w.p.t where it will lie at the consignee’s risk and expenses and subject to the byelaws and conditions of the Port of Yangon.

Damaged cargo will be surveyed daily from 8 am to 11:20 am and 12 noon to 4 pm to Claims Day now declared as the third day after final discharge of cargo from the Vessel.

No claims against this vessel will be admitted after the Claims Day. Shipping Agency Department Myanma Port Authority Agent for: M/s wan hai lines pte ltd Phone No: 256908/378316/376797

Russia to ban 11 Estonian dairy, fish exporters Tallinn, 28 Dec—Russia has announced a ban on 11 Estonian dairy and fish exporters, which will take effect from 9 January, 2014, the Estonian Public Broadcasting (ERR) reported on Friday.

The move was part of Russia’s attempt to force the rules of its customs union with Belarus and Kazakhstan onto the European Union, of which Estonia is a member, the ERR quoted Marko Mihkelson, head of Estonian Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee, as saying.

Russia recently also banned food products from the Netherlands and Lithuania as these companies failed an inspection by Russia in October, the report said.

Ago Partel, head of the Estonian Veterinary and Food Board, said the ban follows a previous pattern whereby Russia bans products, then negotiations are opened and the bans are alleviated or dropped.

Partel predicted that the process would take at least a few months.

The overall effect of the ban on the Estonian dairy and fish industries is not yet known.

A number of the companies in question has told Estonian media that they export between 30 and 80 percent of their products to Russia, Belarus or Kazakhstan.

Russia had already imposed sanctions on two fisheries in early November for using raw materials from companies not recognized

by Russia.

Reuters

A local resident picks up an item from a heap of illegally dumped waste left from the construction of facilities for the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, a Black Sea resort city in Russia, on 6 Nov, 2013.

Kyodo News

MYANMA OIL AND GAS ENTERPRISE (INVITATION FOR OPEN TENDER) (17/2013) Open tenders are invited for supply of the following respective items in United States Dollars and Myanmar Kyats.

Sr.No Tender No Description Qty Remark (1) IF'B-147(2013-2014) Down Hole Mud Motor Ex Horizontal (1) Set US$

Directional Drilling Rig (2) IFB-148(2013-2014) Caterpillar C-9 Truck Engine for (1) No US$

30 Ton Mark Oil Field Truck (3) IFB-149(2013-2014) CNG Compressor Driven Electric (1) Lot US$

Motor With Complete Package (4) IFB-150(2013-2014) Spares for IMW (Mother) Dispenser (7) Items US$ (5) IFB-151(2013-2014) Arc Transformer Welding Machine (8) Nos US$

with Complete Accessories

AC, 400 AMP, Dry Type (6) IFB-152(2013-2014) Mobile Welding Machine with (10) Nos US$

Complete Accessories 600 AMP,

Diesel Engine Driven (7) IFB-153(2013-2014) Spares for GM 6V 53 Engine (15) Items US$ (8) IFB-154(2013-2014) Spares for GM 6V 71 Engine (17) Items US$ (9) IFB-155(2013-2014) Spares for CAT D-3408PC Rig Engine (26) Items US$ (10) DMP/L-047(2013-2014) Multi Grade Diesel Engine Oil (700) Drums Ks

SAE 15 W 40 (API- CF 4) - Tender Closing Date & Time - 22-1-2014,16:30 Hrs Tender Document shall be available during office hours commencing from 26'h Decem­ber, 2013 at the Finance Department, Myanma Oil and Gas Enterprise, No(44) Complex, Nay Pyi Taw, Myanmar.

Myamna Oil and Gas Enterprise

Ph . +95 67 - 411097 / 411206

Latvia ready to join euro zone Riga, 28 Dec— Latvia is ready to become the 18th member of the euro zone on 1 January, 2014.

Posters on Latvia’s entry to the currency bloc are hung along main streets of Riga, capital of Latvia, to mark the event.

Since July 2013, the Latvian authorities have carried out a large-scale publicity campaign to inform people of the advantages of its entry to the euro zone to ease people’s concerns over possible rises in commodity prices and unemployment rate after joining the bloc.

According to government regulations, shops in Latvia are now showing product prices in two currencies: lat and euro.

The euro will officially be brought into Latvia’s formal circulation in 2014,

but some private shops are already accepting euro payments now.

Latvians are now busy converting lat into the euro.

Riga’s shopping centres have also witnessed an increasing number of customers who want to spend their lats in hands before the New Year.

Latvia’s central bank said there is no need to be panic, as people can still convert their lats into the euro at the central bank without paying any fees after the official circulation of the euro.

Latvian Finance Minister Andris Vilks said during a recent TV interview that the transition to the euro would not cause any serious problems, as the experience of its neighbouring country Estonia has shown.

Andris Ruselis, deputy governor of the Bank of Latvia, said on Friday that euro cash has already arrived in Latvia and the central bank has rich reserves of euro notes with various value. Euro coins have already been delivered to Latvia during Christmas time.

As the New Year fast approaches, the number of people who support Latvia’s entry to the euro zone keeps growing. In May 2012, opinion polls showed that only 27 percent of Latvians supported the country’s eurozone entry, and the number even fell to 13 percent in September in the same year.

However, the latest “DnB Latvia barometer” survey showed a majority support for Latvia’s eurozone membership.

Xinhua

Tunisian police seize $2.3 million of gold at roadblock Tunis, 28 Dec — Tunisian police found 60kg of gold, worth around $2.3 million, as they checked vehicles for arms and militants on one of the main road links with the remote south of the country on Friday, state media reported.

Authorities have set up roadblocks on major routes, fearing Islamists may be planning attacks during New Year celebrations.

The North African country is still in flux after the revolt that toppled President Zine el Abidine Ben Ali in early 2011 and inspired revolts across the Arab world.

Moderate Islamists oppressed by Ben Ali rose to power. But ultra-conservative Salafists — keen to impose an Islamic State — returned too, from exile or prison.

Police said it was too early to say where the gold had come from or where it was going.

“We cannot link every operation to the terrorism.

An investigation is underway,” an interior ministry spokesman told Reuters.

The gold was found near the town of Al-Miknassi, close to Sidi Bouzid, where Tunisia’s uprising started.—Reuters

New Light of Myanmar

Sunday, 29 December, 2013 13

E NTE R TA INM E NT

Miley Cyrus says after Disney, it was time to be herself Los Angeles, 28 Dec — It is sex, drugs and pop music — and Miley Cyrus is fine with it that way now that the provocative singer has shed her innocent Disney star image along with most of her clothes. Cyrus, 21, who has grabbed headlines in the past year for her admitted drug use, sexually suggestive dancing and wearing as little as boots in a music video, said she was surprised by the scrutiny her new persona has attracted.

“I went from people just thinking I was, like, a baby to people thinking I’m this, like, sex freak that really just

pops molly and does lines all day,” Cyrus told the New York Times in an interview to be published on Sunday and made available early online, referring to the drugs MDMA and cocaine, respectively.

“It’s like, ‘Has anyone ever heard of rock ‘n’ roll?’” the “Wrecking Ball” singer countered. “There’s a sex scene in pretty much every single movie, and they go, ‘Well, that’s a character.’

Well, that’s a character. I don’t really dress as a teddy bear and, like, twerk on Robin Thicke, you know?”

Cyrus, who rose to

Singer Miley Cyrus performs during the 2013 Z100 Jingle Ball in New York on 13 Dec, 2013.

Reuters

prominence as a teen star of the Disney musical TV series “Hannah Mon-

tana,” has become a bad girl of pop music since her performance at the MTV Video Music Awards in September when she

“twerked” (a sexually suggestive dance) during a performance of Thicke’s hit “Blurred Lines.” “I don’t have a bunch of celeb friends, because I feel like some of them are a little scared of the association,” Cyrus said of her new persona. “This is terrible. I was backstage with (the rising pop star) Ariana Grande. I’m like, ‘Walk out with me right now and get this picture, and this will be the best thing that happens to you, because just you associating with me makes you a little less sweet.’”Cyrus, whose newest music video “Adore You” shows her writhing between bed sheets in her underwear, sucking her thumb and rubbing her body, said she feels more free to

be herself now that she is no longer under a Disney contract. “When I was no longer employed by anyone, that’s when I was like, ‘O.K., I’m going to do my own thing.’

But I waited until I felt like I had respectfully finished out what I was supposed to do, you know?” she said. Cyrus signed with label RCA this year after releasing her first three albums on Disney’s Hollywood Records. Cyrus, the daughter of country music singer Billy Ray Cyrus, also fired back at pop star Joe Jonas, formerly of the Jonas Brothers, who said Cyrus and pop singer Demi Lovato introduced him to marijuana Reuters

Chris Brown’s new song is all about girls and weed

Pussy Riot members Nadezhda Tolokonnikova and Maria Alyokhina (L) talk to the media at Vnukovo Airport in Moscow, on 27 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

Los Angeles, 28 Dec —Rapper Chris Brown’s new song Wildcat, which has landed online, is about girls and weed.

The 24-year-old singer released two versions of his new single Loyal last week.

Lil Wayne and Too Short are featured in the first version while Wayne and

French Montana appear in the other one.

It’s still not confirmed whether or not Wildcat will be featured in his long-delayed album, X. Originally planned to be released earlier this year, the follow-up to 2012’s Fortune has been pushed back to next year.

PTI

Chris Brown

Russian punk band says freed to improve Daniel Radcliffe’s The Woman in Black Russia’s image before Olympics to have multiple sequels

Moscow, 28 Dec — One of two freed members of punk protest band Pussy Riot, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, said on Friday their release was aimed solely at improving Russia’s image before it hosts the Winter Olympic Games and was not a humanitarian gesture.

Tolokonnikova, 24, and Maria Alyokhina, 25, walked free under a Kremlin amnesty on Monday after serving more than 21 months of a two-year prison term for performing a profanity-laced “punk prayer” protest against President Vladimir Putin in Moscow’s main Russian

Orthodox cathedral.

Tolokonnikova said the Winter Olympics, due to be held in February in Russia’s Black Sea resort of Sochi, were Putin’s pet project and that anybody attending them would be supporting him.

“With the Olympics approaching, Vladimir Vladimirovich (Putin) does not want his favourite project ruined,” Tolokonnikova said. Last week, Putin also pardoned former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, viewed by Kremlin foes as a political prisoner, after he spent more than 10 years in jail. “The thaw has This picture was posted on Twitter by Selena Gomez

nothing to do with humanism. The authorities only did this under pressure from both Russian and Western society,” Tolokonnikova told a news conference with Alyokhina at her side, adding she feared “there could be more repression after the Olympics”.

“Whether one likes it or not, going to the Olympics in Russia is an acceptance of the internal political situation in Russia, an acceptance of the course taken by a person who is interested in the Olympics above all else — Vladimir Putin,” Tolokonnikova said.

Reuters

Los Angeles, 28 Dec— Actor Daniel Radcliffe’s scary movie The Woman

in Black may spawn into multiple sequels.

Producer Simon Oakes

A still from the movie, The Woman in Black.

Selena Gomez cooks Christmas dinner with baby sister Los Angeles, 28 Dec — Pop star Selena Gomez and her six-month-old sister spent some time in the kitchen to prepare a delectable meal for Christmas.

The 21-year old took to

photo-sharing website Instagram to post a photograph which shows her cooking with her baby sibling.

“Gracie helping me cook Christmas dinner.”

Read the caption of the pho-

tograph. In the photograph, Selena Gomez is seen wearing a long-sleeved white shirt with her hair loose, while her six-month-old sister Gracie dons a green ruffled outfit.—PTI

says he is ‘definitely planning three and four’, when it comes to his plan for the adaptation of Susan Hill’s novel.

“If your second’s successful, then your third, then you’ve got a franchise. I just don’t believe in the notion that you can press a button and create a franchise, but, I mean, I’m definitely planning 3 and 4,” Oakes said.

The second film The Woman in Black: Angels of Death is slated for UK release on 13 February, 2015.

Jeremy Irvine is tapped to play the new male lead, with Phoebe Fox and Helen McCrory in supporting roles.

The horror movie is adapted from Susan Hill’s novel of the same title. Tom Harper serves as a director, replacing James Watkins who helmed the first film. Jon Croker writes the screenplay, with Susan Hill helping with the story.

PTI

14

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

New Light of Myanmar S PO R TS

Federer adds “childhood hero” Edberg to coaching team Melbourne, 28 Dec— Former world number one Roger Federer has made his “childhood hero” Stefan Edberg part of his coaching team and will use him on an occasional basis next year, the Swiss said on Friday.

“I am happy to announce that beginning in Melbourne, Stefan Edberg will join Severin Luethi on my coaching team,” Federer, a 17 times grand slam champion, announced on his Facebook page referring

to next month’s Australian Open.

Swede Edberg, also a former world number one, won six grand slams, including two Australian Open titles, in the mid1980s.

“Severin, who has been part of my team for the last seven years, will do most of the weeks and Stefan has agreed to work with us for at least 10 weeks starting at the Australian Open in Melbourne,” the 32-year-

Roger Federer of Switzerland serves to Rafael Nadal of Spain during their men’s singles semi-final tennis match at the ATP World Tour Finals at the O2 Arena in London on 10 Nov, 2013.—Reuters

old Federer added.

“Stefan was my childhood hero, and I am really looking forward to spending time (with) and learning from him.”

Federer is the third leading player to hire a former tennis great to help on the coaching side after Andy Murray’s link up with Ivan Lendl and world number two Novak Djokovic’s decision to recruit Boris Becker to his team.

“I’m really excited to be part of Roger’s team and I hope together we can bring out his best tennis,” Edberg was quoted as saying on the ATP website (www.atpworldtour.com).

The Australian Open, the first of the season’s four grand slam tournaments, begins on 13 January with Federer looking for his fifth title there and first since 2010.

The world number six opens his season next week at the Brisbane International, where Briton Murray has been champion for the last two seasons.—Reuters

Nadal says fitness more important than titles in 2014

Madrid, 28 Dec — Staying fit is more important to Rafael Nadal in 2014 than adding to his 13 grand slam titles, the world number one was quoted as saying on Friday.

Spaniard Nadal had one of the best season’s of his career in 2013 following his return in February after seven months out with a knee injury, winning 10 tournaments including a record eighth French Open crown and a second US Open title.

As he gears up for the start of the 2014 tour, the 27-year-old Mallorcan told Spain’s As newspaper remaining healthy and being able to challenge at the top level were his priorities.

“What I want is to be able to start the year well and in shape to compete in the big tournaments,” Nadal said.

“In that sense, and thinking about 2014, I am not going to talk at the moment about winning the ninth Roland Garros or winning Wimbledon again,

Stoke manager Hughes charged with improper conduct

London, 28 Dec —Stoke City manager Mark Hughes has been charged with improper conduct for his coat-throwing touchline tantrum during the 5-1 Premier League defeat at Newcastle United on Thursday, the FA said.

In a statement on their website (www.thefa.com) on Friday, the FA said: “It is alleged that his behaviour in or around the 40th minute of the fixture amounted to improper conduct”.

In an ill-tempered contest, Stoke had two players, Glenn Whelan and Marc Wilson, sent off.

Hughes reacted histrionically to the dismissal of Irish international midfielder Whelan in the first half and threw his coat behind him into the air when he was sent to the stands by referee Martin Atkinson.—Reuters

Stoke City manager Mark Hughes

Mourinho hoping for ‘little Suarez injury’ London, 28 Dec — Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho enjoyed a typical moment of mischief on Friday when he suggested a “little injury” might deprive Liverpool of in-form striker Luis Suarez for Sunday’s Premier League clash at Stamford Bridge. Speaking to Chelsea TV, the Portuguese coach avoided any mention of Suarez’s controversial behaviour in the clubs’ last meeting, at Anfield in April, when he bit the arm of defender Branislav Ivanovic.

Instead, Mourinho said he hoped the free-scoring Uruguay striker — who was suspended for 10 matches for his dental attack — would not be available to play in the clash of the third and fourthplaced clubs.

“Maybe Suarez has got a little injury,” he said following Liverpool’s 2-1

defeat at Manchester City on Thursday. “I’m not asking for a big injury... Just a little injury to stop him playing for four days.”

Knowing that Suarez has scored 19 goals in 13 league games this season, Mourinho — who has bemoaned his own strikers’

profligacy this term—unsurprisingly avoided making comparisons. His three main strikers — Fernando Torres, Samuel Eto’o and Demba Ba —have scored only five times between them.

“Every game is hard,” he said. “The difference is some teams are bigger

Liverpool’s Luis Suarez (C) is challenged by Manchester City’s Joleon Lescott during their English Premier League soccer match at the Etihad stadium in Manchester, northern England on 26 Dec, 2013.

Reuters

—bigger name, bigger impact... Man City-Liverpool, Chelsea-Liverpool, ChelseaArsenal... “But every game is difficult. The last two matches we played (at home), Swansea and Crystal Palace: 1-0, 2-1. You have to give everything to win matches.”

The Portuguese praised Eto’o, despite the Cameroon international having missed two clear chances to net his third league goal of the season. “He did well,” Mourinho said. “I want that feeling that my strikers are working to have chances. I want them to shoot, I want the goalkeeper to save, the ball to hit the post.” Mourinho also said he hoped to see Chelsea awarded more penalties for fouls on their tricky Belgium winger Eden Hazard, who scored in a 1-0 win over Swansea City on Thursday.

Reuters

which would be the third time.

“No, look: what is important to me is to maintain my fitness in a way that will allow me to play the whole year, and competing at a good level.

“You see it’s not easy: I couldn’t do that, for the whole season, in 2012, 2013.”

Nadal’s 10 titles last season came close to matching the best year of his career, when he won 11 in 2005, including his first Roland Garros crown.

He said his enforced rest in the second half of 2012 had meant he was fresh and hungry on his return and that was possibly why he had been so successful.

“In terms of results, I don’t know if 2013 was the best year of my career,” Nadal told As. “What made it special was the feeling of being able to compete again at the level I managed.

“But certainly 2013 was the most emotional of

Spanish tennis player Rafael Nadal my career. If you ask me about the key elements of what happened I think I started playing when I was fresher than ever after a seven-month rest. That may have been the key to the successes.”

Nadal will get his next crack at a grand slam when the Australian Open starts in Melbourne in mid January. He is playing compatriot and world number three David Ferrer at an invitational event in Abu Dhabi later on Friday.—Reuters

Poyet and Sunderland aim to rub salt in Cardiff’s wounds

London, 28 Dec — Sunderland boss Gus Poyet will seek to rub salt into Cardiff City’s wounds when his improving team visit the newly-managerless Welsh club on Saturday.

Poyet believes his team can maintain their own momentum and, with other results going their way, may be able to climb off the bottom of the Premier League.

Just 24 hours after Cardiff sacked their widelyrespected manager Malky Mackay, Poyet hopes to take advantage by heaping more pressure on them.

“People keep forgetting we are unbeaten in four games — we’re playing well,” Poyet told the Sunderland website (www. safc.com) on Friday.

“It’s up to us to keep that belief going.”

Sunderland have won twice and drawn twice in four outings in all competitions since they suffered consecutive home defeats

by Chelsea and Tottenham earlier this month.

On Thursday, they maintained their more disciplined defensive approach with a 1-0 win at Everton, recording their third clean sheet in four games during which they have con-

ceded only one goal. “The whole squad has to pull together — two games in three days is tough,” added Poyet, following their win at Goodison Park, courtesy of a first-half penalty by Ki Sung-Yueng.

“We have quality players to call upon like Jozy Altidore and Adam Johnson who were on the bench, but we face a difficult match.

“They are fighting for their lives, but we need to make sure we’re ready and perform to the best of our ability. We need to make it difficult for them on Saturday.”

Cardiff lost 3-0 at home to Southampton on Thursday and are only four points ahead of Sunderland in 16th place in the Premier League.—Reuters

Sunderland’s manager Gus Poyet

New Light of Myanmar

Sunday, 29 December, 2013 15

GE NE R A L Chinese man saved after getting lost in southwestern Norway

People move aboard a small boat in a flooded street, in Vila Velha, state of Epirito Santo, Brazil, on 26 Dec, 2013. At least 44 people have died and more than 60,000 have been left homeless following torrential rain in southeast Brazil over the past few weeks, officials said on Thursday.—Xinhua

Private vehicles becoming Nepalis’ necessity Kathmandu, 28 Dec — Personal vehicles including car, jeep and motorbike, which are once considered to be luxury, have now been a matter of compulsion and necessity.

The rising individuals’ income, growing number of youths conscious to raise their living standards and mismanaged public transport services in Nepal has prompted large number of consumers to own personal vehicles for them.

According to government data, Nepalis purchased 35 four wheelers (cars and jeeps) and 512 two wheelers (motorbikes/ scooters) a day on average in the first four months

(from mid-July to mid-November) of the current fiscal year.

Suppose a four wheeler costs 2.5 million Nepali rupee (26,315 US dollars) and a two wheeler is priced at 150,000 Nepali rupee ( 1,578 US dollars), the Nepalese collectively purchased automobile worth 160 million Nepali rupee (1.68 million US dollars) a day.

According to the fresh data released by Department of Transport Management (DoTM) this week, a total of 71,954 personal vehicles were registered across the country during the first four months of current fiscal year, around 5 percent more than what had

been registered during the same period of last fiscal year.

Of the total number of registered vehicles, 61,492 (85 percent) were twowheelers, a clear manifestation of Nepalis’ preference for small and light vehicles.

The DoTM officials attributed the elevated life style and growing income of common Nepalis to the growth in purchase and registration of personal vehicles.

“The rise in the registration of personal vehicles is because they have been an integral part of Nepalis’ life,” DoTM spokesperson Mukti KC told Xinhua.

Xinhua

Oslo, 28 Dec — A young Chinese man, who got lost in the mountains on the way up to Peikestolen in southwest Norway earlier on Friday, has been found and saved in a prompt search operation.

A search team heard cries at 21:30 local time (2030 GMT) and located the 21-year-old man 20 minutes later, said the Norwegian-language newspaper Aftenposten in a dispatch on its website.

The man, whose condition was described as “safe and sound”, was expected to be taken first to Preikestolhytta, and from there to Stavanger later.

A search operation was quickly launched after police were notified of the incident at 20:00 (1900 GMT).

The man, whose identity was not immediately known, called his friends at about 15:00 local time

(1400 GMT), saying that he was lost on his way up to the famous tourist spot Preikestolen.

The man was last seen 2.5 km away from the parking place on the way up the Preikestolen.

He was with his two friends, who decided to return to Stavanger due to the bad weather, while he chose to continue the planned trip.

A storm was raging in the area and the bad weather condition was hindering the searchers, including several volunteers.

The man “is fairly scantily dressed and he has no food and drink with him,” said Anatoly Bjoernsen, a police officer from the Norwegian county of Rogaland.

One of his friends, who declined to be named, told Xinhua through telephone that the man had been taken to a local hospital for medical checkup.—Xinhua

Aden, (Yemen), 28 Dec—Artillery shells fired by the Yemeni armed forces struck a secessionist camp in the southern province of al-Dhalea on Friday, killing 12 people and injuring many others, local residents told Xinhua.

One of the local residents told Xinhua anonymously that several artillery

shells landed at a secessionist camp in al-Dhalea Province, leaving at least 12 people killed and many others injured. A local chief of emergency confirmed to Xinhua on a telephone conversation that 12 civilians were killed and about 30 others were seriously injured during the military artillery attack.—Xinhua

Artillery shelling kills 12 in Yemen’s secessionist camp

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Keeper Hart is ‘best in England’ says Pellegrini London, 28 Dec — Two months after dropping him following a string of mistakes, Manchester City manager Manuel Pellegrini on Friday hailed goalkeeper Joe Hart as “the best in England”.

England first choice Hart, 26, played his first Premier League game in nearly two months in the 4-2 win at Fulham on 21 December and produced several outstanding saves on Thursday when City beat Liverpool 2-1 at the Etihad Stadium.

“He has worked very hard in the last month and a half,” Pellegrini told the City website (mcfc.co.uk).

“He is the best goalkeeper in England.”

Hart was replaced by

Romanian Costel Pantilimon early in November, one week after an error that allowed Fernando Torres to score Chelsea’s winner in a 2-1 Premier League triumph at Stamford Bridge.

At that time, he appeared to be suffering a loss of confidence although Pellegrini did still pick him for Champions League and League Cup matches.

His reflex saves to deny Philippe Coutinho and Jordan Henderson in Thursday’s thriller suggested any such crisis is now behind him.

City’s win enabled them to leap-frog Liverpool into second place in the Premier League behind Arsenal.

Pellegrini added: “I am very pleased with Joe... Not

only (for) now, but I think in all the games he played in the last month. He did very well.

“I thought it was good for Joe to have a rest. He was not in his best moment.”

Hart’s restoration helped City recover from a one-goal deficit against Liverpool.

“It was a very important win because Liverpool was the best team in the Premier League and they were at the top of the table before the match.

“It’s important that we showed the personality to come from behind to win the game.”

Pellegrini also warned: “We play against Crystal Palace in less than 48 hours (after playing Liverpool)

and we have to be ready for that.”City captain Vincent Kompany echoed those thoughts. “These fixtures bring different challenges and there is a lot to take account of - as much as we would like to call ourselves favourites, there will be fatigue and, being the festive period, the games come thick and fast,” said the Belgian defender.

“There have already been one or two surprise results and my experience is that Tony Pulis’ teams are really organised and difficult to beat.”

Palace climbed out of the bottom three with a 1-0 win at Aston Villa on Thursday, extending their improved run to include four wins in seven games.

Reuters

R/489 Printed and published by the New Light of Myanmar press in Nay Pyi Taw, the News and Periodicals Enterprise, Ministry of Information.

Manchester City goalkeeper Joe Hart throws the ball during their English Premier League soccer match against Fulham at Craven Cottage in London, on 21 Dec, 2013.—Reuters

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New Light of Myanmar

Union H&T Minister visits Myanmar traditional food and souvenir festival

Photo shows site chosen for construction of Hoang Anh Gia Lai Myanmar Center Hotel and Business Building Project of Vietnam on Kaba Aye Pagoda Road.—mna

First International Camp for Myanmar Girl Guides opens Yangon, 28 Dec—A ceremony to open First International Camp for Myanmar Girl Guides and Osaka Girl Scouts took place at No.1 Basic Education High School in Lanmadaw Township here.

Firstly, Yangon Region Electric and Industry Minister veteran scout U Nyan Tun delivered an opening address.

Later, Chairperson of Girl Scouts of Osaka of Japan Ms Yoko Shinke and acting chief of Myanmar Girl Scouts (temporary) Daw Tin Hla Kyi extended greetings.

Afterwards, Girl Scouts of Osaka donated make-

shift tent t to Myanmar Girl Scouts and Myanmar wellwishers, K 6.2 million.

“This is much more different one than normal gathering of scouts as it will include exchanges of culture, language and traditional food, said Dr Myint Myint San who has arranged the course. Myanmar youths can share knowledge with their counterparts from Japan, she added. A total of 36 girl scouts and eight teachers who have completed the Asia Pacific Course from Myanmar and nine girl scouts and four teachers from Japan will take part in the three-day camp.—MNA

Sunday, 29 December, 2013

Yangon, 28 Dec— Union Minister for Hotels and Tourism U Htay Aung inspected work progress of Hoang Anh Gia Lai Myanmar Center Hotel and Business Building Project of Vietnam on Kaba Aye Pagoda Road here yesterday morning.

The Union minister then met Country Director Ms. Stephanic Harl and Editorial Manager Mr. Michael Nesbitt from Oxford Business Group which is compiling data for publishing The Report Myanmar 2014 at Inya Lake Hotel.

They discussed matters on launching the book in February 2014.

Afterwards, he viewed round Myanmar traditional food and souvenir festival in honour of the tourists who arrived in Yangon

by M.V Azamara Journey Cruise Liner from United

States with the arrangement of Myanmar Voyages International Tourism Co Ltd at People’s Park.

M.V Azamara Journey Cruise Liner carrying 665 tourists from US, Australia and Europe and 420 crews arrived at Myanmar International Terminal Thilawa (MITT) yesterday.

The tourists visit downtown Yangon, Thanlyin and Bago and will proceed to Phuket of Thailand tomorrow.

Similarly, M.V Voyager Cruise Liner carrying 365 tourists from Britain and Europe and 224 crews arrived at Bo Aung Kyaw Port on 27 December. The tourists on board visit downtown Yangon, Thanlyan, Bago and Bagan Region and will leave the port for Phuket of Thailand tomorrow.

MNA

Opening of First International Camp for Myanmar Girl Guides and Osaka Girl Scouts in progress at No.1 Basic Education High School in Lanmadaw Township. mna

One killed as Islamist students clash with police in Cairo

A supporter of the army and police throws back a Molotov cocktail at students of Al-Azhar University who are supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and ousted Egyptian President Mohamed Mursi, during clashes outside the Al-Azhar University campus in Cairo’s Nasr City District 27 December, 2013.—Reuters

Cairo, 28 Dec— One student was killed on Saturday when supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood fought with Egyptia police at the Cairo campus of AlAzhar University, state media reported.

Shaimaa Mounir, a student activist, told Reuters that the dead student was Khaled El-Haddad, a supporter of the Brotherhood that was designated this week as a terrorist organization by the state.

The violence followed clashes across the country on Friday in which at least five people died.

State-run newspaper Al-Ahram said that se-

curity forces on Saturday fired teargas to disperse pro-Brotherhood students who were preventing their classmates from entering university buildings to take exams.

Protesters threw rocks at police and set tyres on fire to counter the teargas.

Al-Ahram quoted a health ministry official as saying that one student had been killed and four injured.

Two college buildings caught fire in the violence.

State TV broadcast footage of black smoke billowing from the faculty of commerce building and said “terrorist students” had set the agriculture faculty

building on fire as well.

Police arrested 60 students for possession of makeshift weapons including petrol bombs, according to an emailed statement from the interior ministry. Calm had been restored, and scheduled exams had begun after the morning clashes.

Al-Azhar, a respected center of Sunni Islamic learning, has for months been the scene of protests against what the Brotherhood calls a “military coup” that deposed Islamist Mohamed Mursi as president after a year in office.

Reuters